OOTD: an Arty Blouse for an Arty Afternoon

First of all, I'm extending the deadline to enter the Jcrew canvas tote giveaway until Sunday Feb 28th at midnight. If you haven't entered the giveaway yet and you would like to, please leave a comment in my post here (and not in this post).

Second, I apologize for not posting since Tuesday. I'm trying to have a post a day (as the only negative thing that many of you had to say about the blog is that I don't post often enough, which I find truly amazing), but sometimes there isn't enough time in my day.

I wore this outfit on Wednesday and it feels like ages ago as we are under the snow since yesterday. One of my best friends invited me to a member's preview of the Whitney Museum Art Biennal on Wednesday afternoon. It wasn't something that we had planned, I called her around lunch time to see if she wanted to do something in the afternoon and she told me that she had an invitation and that if I wanted we could go together. I should add that this friend of mine has a toddler too (actually he's my daughter's "boyfriend") so the idea was to go with them and see what happened.
In deciding what to wear I had a precise goal in mind: I wanted to look like someone interested in art who happens to be a mother and not a mommy who happens to be in a museum. You get the difference. In fact, I WAS a person interested in the art world a not-so-long time ago. Then, for some strange law of motherhood, you become less and less interested in things like the latest tendencies in art and architecture and more and more interested in things like your daughter's poop.
Anyway, I always liked to dress up a little bit to go to a museum. We could say that people interested in art aren't interested in clothes, but that's the artists. The museum-goers are a totally different crowd, especially in NY. I could have gone all intellectual-black but then I thought that my friend would be a little bit surprised to see me wearing black in the afternoon and we were with toddlers anyway, so I decided to grab my favorite artsy blouse instead.
It happens to be an old H&M blouse, so it makes for an "all H&M blog week" (I will be back to Jcrew right after this post!) and it's one of those rare cases when something that is meant to be disposable makes its way into one's closet's "permanent collection". I always reach for this blouse when I feel "artistic" because the pattern reminds me of a painter's palette (the cardigan is the Zara cashmere cardi that I had bought to wear with the Jcrew beaded ribbon top from the fall):




OK, so maybe I still looked like a mommy with toddler in toe who was at the Biennal preview by mistake but at least I felt like I made an effort.
My daughter stole the scene because she was rocking a skinny-jeans-with-long-sweater look that got many compliments (and I, as the mommy, got the compliments). Unfortunately I didn't have my camera with me but she was wearing the Stella McCartney leopard minidress that I got for a real steal during the crazy sales at the Gap:



It's fascinating to go to a museum with a toddler because they go to the basics of painting, like colors and shapes. The highlight for my daughter was a big painting with a little Santa upside down. That one got many giggles. The exhibition is spreaded through four floors and by the time we got to the 4th floor my daughter and my friend's son were running around and trying to climb up many of the pieces (is not their fault if many of the "sculptures" looked like toys for toddlers) so we had to cut it short. Personally I didn't like much of what I saw but I was a little bit distracted and I can't say that I really took the time to enjoy any of the video installations. I guess that I should go alone if I really wanted to understand what I saw.

Next up, a few Jcrew new arrivals. And I know, I still owe you the Tory Burch shoes review (it's coming, it's coming).