Wedding in Seattle: Outfits

The wedding in Seattle that I have blogged about a while ago is coming up this weekend and I will fly out to Seattle on Friday. I have worked on my outfits in the meanwhile and want to share with you what I have decided to bring.

I have listened to your comments and looked for a cardigan to wear with the watercolor dress (in any case even in NYC it would have been too cold to wear it alone). I don't have a black cashmere crewneck (a no-brainer) and the only option currently available is the featherweight cashmere cardigan that is still full price. After trying different alternatives (including the Jackie in pink frost that is a perfect color match for the dress), I have settled for the Celosia cardigan in black, which goes very well with the style of the dress and also has the advantage of being very thick so that it should keep me warm. I am going to wear this to church, probably:





I think that the black Celosia is a nice option for those of you looking for an evening or dressy cardigan: the ruffles are elegant but not overwhelming. Before buying this one, I sold my other Celosia in cinnamon spice on the JCA Weekly Exchange because I didn't want to have many cardigans in the same style, especially ruffled. I think that I am going to wear the black much more often than the cinnamon spice.

For the evening reception, I have two options and I think that I am going to bring both and decide at the last minute.
The first option is to wear my BR cocktail dress with my BR velvet blazer from last winter and a BR necklace. I hadn't thought about it when I was putting it together, but it's a 100% Banana outfit, which, for me, is kind of unusual as I don't own a lot of Banana:





In pictures the dress is a little bit loose on the top but that's because for the life of me I couldn't zip it up and I didn't want to force and break the zipper just to take pictures of myself (that would have been silly, right?) The necklace is very sparkly IRL and I bought it along with the dress on supersale for something like $18, after seeing it on the adorable Slastena who highly recommended it.

The second option is more elegant in a classic way. It features an old dress by Caterine Malandrino that I had bought years ago at a sample sale and I was simply afraid to try on because I was sure that it wouldn't fit any longer. Well, it looks like I did loose all that baby fat after all, as it fits me again like a glove!
It's made in a double layer of silk chiffon and has a beautiful draping:




I think that it is maybe a little too serious for a friends' wedding but the advantage over the first outfit is that I am very comfortable in this dress and I can dance the night away without worrying about my ladies coming out (which is always a problem with a strapless). What do you think?
The only outfit that I haven't figured out yet is the one for the rehearsal dinner. The invitation says "Dressy Casual" and I interpret it as evening casual without jeans. So I was thinking of a pair of pants or a mini and a nice top, like the ribbon beaded one. Any advice?

If you have something to say speak now or keep silent forever ;-).

Follow-up on the "What to Wear with Sweet Guava" Post

Ladies, as I said before I value your opinion very much and you gave me some great feedback on my quest to find a good match for my sweet guava blouse (see post here). Many comments suggested that I should look into something in a brown shade like cocoa or caramel, and honestly I would have never thought of that by my own.

The problem is I have nothing in those shades (only turtlenecks) and Jcrew hasn't offered anything this year besides the Cashmere V-neck long cardigan in heather caramel (by the way, where are the beiges at Jcrew?), which is still FP. What's a girl to do (besides kicking herself for not getting a Michelle in glazed pecan last year in super-final sale)?
At least you inspired me to try my toothpick cords in soft ochre and they look GREAT with the blouse (not only the color but also the skinny style, that allows the blouse to fall nicely):



Someone also suggested cinnamon spice, so I tried my Celosia cardigan on this:



but I have to say that it looks nicer in the pic than IRL (the cinnamon spice and soft ochre look quite the same in the pic but they fight a little bit IRL in my opinion).

The other color that was very popular in your comments was yellow, in a mustardy shade. Here I was luckier because Jcrew has a lot of mustardy cardigans (so much so that I think they are out of names). Now, it would have bothered me to buy a new cardigan only for the sake of wearing it with this blouse (and that's why I couldn't go with a pale pink or even a sweet guava, because I know that I wouldn't wear them enough), but mustard yellow looks good on me and it fits well in my closet so it's something that I can wear again and again.
So during the 20% off sale promo last week I ordered a cashmere crewneck in warm maize (after looking for it in store, where it was cheaper and not finding it) and I got it in the mail two days ago (by the way, I hadn't ordered anything since before Thanksgiving, so I was pretty excited to receive a Jcrew box). Of course I HAD to order some ride-along for the free shipping, but more on that in another post.

I have to say, I LOVE this color (OK, warm maize is not exactly the same as mustard but we all know that Jcrew can have three different shades that look almost the same if it weren't for the color code on the tag) and I like that it looks almost golden under a certain light. Also it was my first crewneck cashmere cardigan, and I'm pleased with the fit (but luckily before ordering I had tried another color in store in XS, otherwise I would have bought a S, my size in the Jackie).
Here it is with the blouse (taken with the natural light coming from two different sources. As you can see the color of the cardigan seems to change, it' not the camera, even if the color in the second pic is more true):




Even if I hadn't bought it for the sweet guava blouse, I would keep it, I know I'm repeating myself but this is a great color. Re. the quality of the cashmere, I didn't have high expectations and as far as I didn't pay FP it's fine if it's a little bit lightweight.

So I can file away this sweet guava dilemma. Now thanks to you I have at least two cardigan options (besides the navy and black ones) to wear with my blouse and spring is going be here sooner than we think.
But I have another fashion dilemma ready for you, stay tuned!

In the meanwhile keep warm and have a nice weekend all!

Cinnamon and Cords (Weekend Outfits)

Is there an expiration date for OOTD posts? I'm sorry to bother you with my LAST weekend outfits when the NEXT weekend is just around the corner (when I used to work the joke was that the weekend officially started on Wednesday after-noon, when the first half of the week was officially behind us), but because I spent the day of Monday almost in bed with flu-like symptoms (I had the two flu vaccines, I can't possibly have a flu!) and yesterday I still wasn't feeling well (but had to deal with it because my daughter had a busy schedule), today is the first day where I can stomach to look at the computer screen for more than two consecutive minutes. And I really liked these outfits, so I'm going to share anyway.

Before posting the outfits, I wanted to update you on my last week purchases. I was saving what was left on my gift card for something "cinnamon spice" on sale. I LOVE this color, it is one of the prettiest Jcrew "fall-winter" colors ever in my opinion. I wasn't hoping to find the cashmere boatneck popover any longer (I had tried in October but apparently it sold out quickly) but when I saw that it was down to $69.99 on the website last week I had to at least try a few stores in the city. Well, not only I found one in my size but I also found a Celosia cardigan in the same color for $39.99 (probably a return).

While I was in the store I noticed that another item on my wishlist since they came out in the summer, the toothpick cords, finally came down to $29.99, so I decided that it was the right moment to buy a couple of colors while my size was still easily available. I bought the soft ochre first and then the navy and deep aubergine. I am still regretting not buying more of last year's matchsticks, and I'm not sure that they are going to redo the toothpick style next year, so I thought that I'd better get them while I could ((no need to say that I don't have anything left on the gift card). I have to say that after these last purchases I felt like a lot of stress went off my shoulders and I haven't even checked the website or the JCA blog in the last three days because I bought everything that I wanted to buy and I could even envision not buying anything else until the spring. OK, maybe it's because of the flu, but still.

And now the outfits. Saturday was very cold and I wore my new soft ochre toothpick cords with the warmest sweater that I own. It's a very thick cashmere turtleneck by the French brand "Zadig and Voltaire" (which has now a store in the Meatpacking district) and it is all what a cashmere turtleneck should be: incredibly soft, warm and luxurious (I have to say, I remember spending a small Euro-fortune on this but it was just before moving to NY - I moved around Thanksgiving - and I was afraid that the winters in NY would be too cold for my wardrobe. And in fact they were exceptionally cold the first two years that I was here):





You can see that I'm holding something in the first pic. Let me introduce you to a girl's best friend:



Cashmere (even the best) piles but we are lucky to live in a world where someone (a genius) has created the Magik Fuzz Buster and our sweaters can look like new in less than 5 minutes. I have a Jcrew red cashmere sweater that I had bought when I was almost five months pregnant and after a few wears over my pregnant belly (and also a passage in the regular cycle of the washing machine by my husband who used to do the laundry) looked like an old sock and it is almost in like-new conditions after an intensive Fuzz Buster session. If you don't have one of these I urge you to run to the closer Walmart and buy one (it costed me $5 a couple of years ago). I'm one of the laziest person on the planet when it comes to housekeeping duties but you can really do this while watching TV. Plus, don't underestimate the pleasure of seeing a beloved cashmere (but it works on any blend) sweater that you had given for dead coming back to life before your eyes. It is Magik, I tell you.

On Saturday night we were invited at friend's for dinner. I wore my black matchstick cords from last year, my black Gap "layering" turtleneck with the snow-gem tee over it (both tucked in the cords) and a red lipstick very similar to the lipstick that the model is wearing in the latest catalog (mine is by Giorgio Armani). It was VERY pretty and festive. Unfortunately I couldn't take pics because it was already dark and the day after I didn't have the time to wear the whole thing again just to show you. But in case you have something similar in your closet, I would give it a try.

On Sunday we went all the way downtown (Tribeca) for a Xmas brunch with friends that we hadn't seen in a while (it was kind of a reunion). The restaurant with its big windows and wood panels was the perfect spot. I wanted to wear something festive but casual, so I broke out my new Celosia with the check shirt (that I surprisingly liked together). In the pic I'm wearing the toothpick cords in navy but I had to switch them for jeans at the last minute because it was starting to rain and cords don't love rain as you probably know (I apologize for my daughter's stuff in the background):



Fun fact about the Celosia cardigan: there was another baby at our table (younger than my daughter, barely a year old) and she was mesmerized by the cardigan's ruffles. When she was about to cry, all I had to do was come closer and show her the intricate design of the ruffles and she would just look at them and giggle. Who knew that a cardigan could babysit? I was surprised that the mother didn't ask where she could buy one!

Have a nice week!