Thrift Style Thursday - Denim Rebel

I'm pretty excited about this week's Thrift Style Thursday - who doesn't love denim?  What I'm more excited about though is the actual denim I'm wearing.  I did a very basic, simple DIY!  I had been resisting shorts for years, I got to a point where for some reason I no longer liked my legs.  Then two summers ago it was crazy hot, we went to St. Louis where it was into the 100s for highs and I decided I needed shorts again so I started easing them back into my wardrobe - but surprisingly not a single pair was denim.  Then last summer when I was pregnant I had two pairs of denim maternity shorts that were the best thing ever.  Flash forward to this summer and I found one pair of denim shorts before the shopping ban - and lately have been feeling like that isn't enough.  What is a girl on a shopping ban going to do?  Make her own!!  I took a pair of jeans that were sitting in my "get rid of" pile and turned them into cutoffs!

Now I'm sure you're all going - any idiot can take jeans and make them into cutoffs.  And you'd be right - but I'm one of those idiots who is all thumbs with even the easiest DIY projects.  I actually watched several YouTube videos before taking my scissors to these jeans.  I'm pretty proud of them, not only do I like the rough distressed edge I got on them, I also added some distressing to the legs with some rips and holes that I also learned how to do through some online videos and the overall result is pretty fun!  They are a little shorter than I was intending, but in the end I'm kind of glad - and my mom said it best "you're young and have nice legs, might as well show them off while you still can!"  She's right, I do kind of like my legs again - must be all that cardio and lifting from taking care of a 20 pound plus child!

 Shirt - thrifted, Shorts - DIY cutoffs from thrifted Gap jeans

Bag - Fossil (flea market), Sandals - Target

Sunglasses - Target

These were super comfy for my shopping trip to the Just Between Friends sale last Friday and for just kicking around the house with Oliver!  I'm anxious now to try some other DIY projects - over the weekend I successfully made two turban style headbands from t-shirts and my next project is taking a denim jacket and turning it into a vest.  I have already done the "turn into a vest" part, but now I want to bleach it so it's lighter colored.  Apparently my jumping into DIY projects is kind of like opening a can of Pringles, once you pop the fun don't stop!  Or something like that!  If you have any super simple DIY projects to share, send them my way!

Check out the other denim rebels at their blogs below!

Spoolish//Sandpaper Kisses//Sincerely Miss J//Confessions of a Refashonista//

Alligator Toe//Buttons&Birdcages//Snippets With Alex//
Eclecticity//Being Zhenya//Erika's Style Diary//Sistas from Cali//

The Two Cent Chick//Lipstick And Yarn//Nuttier Than Nutella//
That Cheap Bitch//Slight Impression

Inspiration Monday - Build an ark

Hey guys.  We had quite the storm over the weekend.  It was intense.  I'll share more about that in a moment, but first things first, it's Inspiration Monday with two birds (congrats again to Miss Megan on her wedding this past weekend!) and they chose this awesome casual look from Alessandra Ambrosio.

This was easy.  Comfy shorts, my current favorite peach top, sandals and a necklace.  Boom.  Simple and chic.  Mr. Monkey was kind enough to take my pictures yesterday.  Yesterday ended up being a rather nice day.  The rest of the weekend?  Totally different story.

Shirt - Mudd, Kohls

Shorts - Duo Maternity, consigment

Necklace and Earrings - S&D

Bracelet - Bead for Life

Sandals - Italian Shoe Company from cousin 

It all started Friday night.  We were over at our music director's house having a Friday night rehearsal.  Suddenly we all started getting government issued text messages that there was a Flash Flood warning in our area.  I looked outside and it was getting dark, but not raining.  I checked my Weather Center app and saw that there were severe storms approaching, but didn't think too much of it.  We get storms, it's not a big deal.  Well pretty soon the sky just opened up, I have never seen rain come sideways quite like it did.  You could see it was windy.  The lights started flickering and then the power went out.  So, rehearsal was pretty much called off at that point.  The Pants Monkey and I decided to head home when there was a brief lull.  We only live a few blocks away, so at least it wasn't far to go.  It was quite a drive though - lots of limbs and standing water in the road.

We got home and thankfully we had power.  Everything seemed more or less ok, but I was nervous because we have had water come in the basement before in these kinds of storms, sometimes it just takes awhile.  And sure enough, Saturday morning my fears were confirmed when I found water in the laundry room and a little bit on our main room carpet.  We need to grate the lawn away from our house in the backyard is what it boils down to.  At any rate, we spent the rest of the weekend dealing with that.  It's slowly getting better, but I think we're getting a new de-humidifier to speed up the process, the one we have seems to have failed!

Despite all of that, we salvaged a decent day yesterday.  The Pants Monkey brewed beer and we had dinner out on a patio.  I tell you though, I feel like I need a weekend from my weekend!

For more Inspiration Monday outfits head on over to two birds over here.

Basket Case

No, the title of this post is not referencing my state of mind, but is instead in reference to the Green Day song, specifically the opening lyric "do you have the time, to listen to me whine, about nothing and everything all at once." Because I'm a little whiny today, I'm not going to lie.  Yesterday was a DAY my friends.  You know those kind of days that every time you turn around you want to scream?  Yeah.  Most of it centered around getting a new PC at work.  This was supposed to be a very good and exciting thing since my old one was really getting slow, going through cycles where it wouldn't load anything, etc.  But, nothing ever goes smoothly with these kinds of things!

The problem is, I run a program on my computer that allows me to print the employee security name badges.  And this program is not super cut and dry.  Oh no.  So, my IT guy spent all afternoon trying to get it to work and then we called the outside vendor that supports the program, who wasn't available until the last half hour of my day.  We got it all solved just under the wire.  But while this was going on it was next to impossible to do my job, which ok, wouldn't normally be so bad, but my boss is on vacation right now so things are a little busier than usual, so it was mildly frustrating.

I got home and was all thumbs with stuff there it seemed, I needed to boil potatoes so we could make pierogis last night (I married a good Polish boy after all) and I kept dropping them everywhere, but fortunately they seemed no worse for the wear.  Then we made the pierogis which led to a delicious dinner, but we made a double batch, so it took a couple of hours.  My back was killing me by the time we were done. (Side note - if you're on Vine, I made a video of what all goes into them)  So we crashed on the couch for a bit and then more or less went to bed.  So I felt like I didn't get much downtime after my crazy day.

Sweater - LOFT, thrifted

Plaid button shirt - Vintage Lee, Hill Valley Vintage

Shorts - Old Navy 

Tights and boots -Target

Bag - Vintage Coach, Rewind NE

Necklace - S&D

Today I hope is better, but I'm not going to lie, I'm not feeling great in the lady department and I am missing out on a super cool event at the Minnesota Institute of Arts tonight that is all about fashion - specifically vintage - so I'm sad panda about that, but I had other plans I couldn't miss unfortunately.  So I wore a cute outfit that includes some vintage in the spirit of the event and I'll live vicariously through my other blogger friends that I know will be attending (looking at you Miss Cambria - I expect a full report!)

So there you have it.  Told you I was whiny today!  It's all so trivial, first world problem stuff, but I gotta say, I feel better getting that off my chest!  Here's to a better day today!

One headlight

It's been ages since I've pulled out these shorts, so I decided to do so today.  They're wool based, so they are pretty much for winter wear.  I did pull them out once this summer though and wore them with a semi-dressy t-shirt one day and kind of liked the look.  I'm excited to finally be wearing this statement piece I got at the last Stella and Dot party I went to.  It was way clearanced that day and I've been wanting something like this for awhile.  I've had it for the last month but I hadn't found the right thing to wear it with until today.

 Sweater, t-shirt and shorts - Old Navy

Tights - Target

Shoes - DSW

Necklace and earrings - Stella and Dot

Moving on, we now have storytime.  The Pants Monkey and I are kind of lazy sometimes about things.  I can admit it.  And sometimes when something needs to be fixed or replaced on say one of our cars, we kind of limp along for a bit before taking care of it.  About two weeks ago, we were driving my car home from picking up some dinner.  It was dark out and I'm not a fan of driving in the dark, so Mr. Monkey was driving.  He was really close behind a car in front of us while we were at a stoplight and I'm like "what are you doing?  Be careful!" He says, "I think you have a burned out headlight, I'm trying to see in the reflection of the car in front of us."  When we got home we checked and sure enough, the passenger side light is out.  For the most part, I drive during the day, so we figured he could replace it for me a little later.

Welcome to later.  Today was kind of dark and cloudy as I was driving into work.  Now, it has been a little dark when I've been driving home at night too, but I haven't had anyone flashing lights at me or anything so I hadn't been too worried about it.  This morning however, after I parked and started towards my building, I hear an angry lady behind me yell "You have a burned out headlight on your car!"  I was running late, but I turned around and politely said "Thank you!" and kept going.  She then screamed "Well you might want to fix it!"  Yes lady, I do want to fix it.  I don't intend on endangering others forever.  I texted the Pants Monkey and he said he'd take care of it this weekend.  It's a good thing too, because I'm really tired of having the song "One Headlight" by the Wallflowers stuck in my head!

Double the fun

I have two outfits to share today, because I wasn't sure if today's This or That counted for skirts or not.  It is Colored Bottoms or Printed Bottoms for today.  So I have an outfit from the weekend and my outfit for today and hope I somehow covered this challenge well. 

So this first outfit was from Saturday.  It was mega hot outside, so shorts were a must.  I love, love, LOVE these plaid shorts.  They are comfy, they go with everything and I remember that even though I bought them in an actual department store (Herbergers) I got them for an amazing deal, they were five dollars.  I don't know why I remember that, but I guess I could say I never forget a deal!  Anyway, these are my "printed bottom" look.

These next pictures are today's outfit and they posed a challenge of course because it was cloudy and threatening rain this morning so I had to go inside.  I think the pantry is no longer my favorite indoor picture spot.

I chose a colored skirt to be a "colored bottom" because I don't have any colored pants/capris for summer.  So, you get a purple skirt!  And the platform sandals I've been talking about all week!  Finally!  The Pants Monkey commented as I was leaving this morning "New shoes?"  I said no, I'd worn them once before and he said "well I didn't see them, they are cute!"  I love that he thinks my shoes are cute!  I also had a male co-worker comment on them too, that he thought they were cute.  I do find it funny when I get compliments from men!

The only problem I have with these sandals is getting the laced part to stay up.  Anyone else have shoes like these?  Any tips or suggestions?  This next picture turned out much better, even if you can't see the shoes as well.

I feel kind of like a ballerina today in a way, flowy skirt and laced sandals?  Total ballerina.  I want to twirl around the office.  I might get some odd looks though!

Outfit one:

Shorts - Herbergers (old)

Tank top - Old Navy

Headscarf - Target

Outfit two:

T-shirt - Old Navy

Skirt - Ragstock 

Sandals - Old Navy