The Duck Stops Here

  You know I've owned this cardigan for months and only realized there was a duck on it this week? Alternate titles for this blog post include Duck & Cover, What the Actual Duck, and Augh This Ducking Cardigan.

  I just thought it was a cool asymmetrical pattern! I was not incorrect, but my pattern recognition skills clearly need work.

Migrating Mallard cardigan: Rosie Neira (thrifted)

Belt: eBay (available here)

Jeans: ZARA basic (thrifted)

Sleigh Boots: Report (thrifted)

Excellent Photoshopping over ugly flowerpot: ME

  Gets better: I grew up on a lake. I've been feeding mallards like this my whole life.

  While the Internet has been going on about pumpkin spice boots cooler weather fall blah blah, I have been enjoying San Francisco summer, and desperately gripping the warm, sunny weather with my little blacksmith hands. All the talk got me thinking, though: I have been doing this "outfits" thing for less than a year, now. I have no idea what is going to be Aya style (stAyale?) for fall. What do I even own?

  So I tried this outfit, which I think was kind of based on this idea from Once Upon a Zipper, a website for a consignment store in Nashville, Tennessee. I like the looks the employees put together!

...Then I overheated after an hour and changed. :D This cardigan is warm!

  This cardigan is also the closest to "animal print" I've got. If animal prints are your thing, you should check out How I Wear My: Animal Print at Everything Just So and The Rich Life (on a budget) tomorrow.

  's right, not a zebra, giraffe, or orangutan in my closet, just the occasional dragon and this duck. I have a bustier with what might be blue leopard. Maybe. Evidently I do not do animal prints. Or neon. Or patterns. Or pumps. Or flats. Or capris. Or bright colors. Or open-toed boots. Or wedges with that weird straw/dock rope material looped around the sides. Or anything yellow. I am, however, trying out cardigans and sweaters after a mere 27-year hiatus. I'm sure my adventurous personal style is an inspiration to all.

  How long does a shirt have to be before it's considered a 'tunic'? Thought this one might, but now I think it stops too short and just points directly at my crotch. Too much skinny-jean-squeezed-thigh showing. Clearly this will take some work. But in the meantime, I'm going to be in sundresses and my one pair of embarrassingly holey denim shorts for as long as I can.

  What do you not do in your own wardrobe? Anything you've tried after a long time that you never thought you would?

Get Thee to a Haberdashery

  I have a new hat. It has a bow. :D

  The thing about being a student is you don't have money, but you *do* have the occasional Thursday morning free to tootle downtown for the quarterly Goorin Bros. sample sale. All hats were $20 or less.
  This was one of the few fancier lady hats at the sale. I politely sidled at a dead sprint up to the table, plonked it on my head, and nearly forgot to remove it when I went to take a shower.

  Seemed like a good match for my Diesel coat, now with 100% more airship captain medal! Man I have got to get those sleeves altered.

Hat: Goorin Bros. (sample sale, available in plum)

Western-style coat: Diesel (thrifted)

Cara 'Royal Highness' Military Pin: Nordstrom (here)

Dress: OzzOn Japan (Japan)

Corduroys: WOW jeans (thrifted)

Boots: Two Lips (thrifted)

  The sample sale was excellent timing for the upcoming Hat Attack, thrown at the beginning of each month by the vivacious Judith of Style Crone.

  I am also celebrating finally hemming these corduroys. They're made in Japan! I thrifted them when I lost all that weight stressing out this summer, and as I'm gaining it back they're slowly becoming more and more bootylicious but somehow staying just as comfortable 

  I love the pockets with the brass buttons! Given the trends lately, I think the world could use a whole lot less buttock rather than more, so I styled them under this OzzOn dress:

  The coat and hat do not go at all with the dress, but I fell in love with the lines of these items together.

  Today was a fine day. :D And yes, this hat sample sale thing is quarterly (this was my first, so I just found out about them.) The vast majority are bucket hats, Gatsby/flat caps, and baseball style caps, but if you're dying to get a Goorin Bros. hat on the cheap, ping me and I can poke around for you at the Christmastime one. :D

Lab Fashion

  I think I've figured out a lab-appropriate outfit with some personality!

  The shoes don't match, but I don't have many shoes I can walk in for 13 hours.

  Around mid-July in the SF Bay Area, weather turns humid, grey, and windy and stays that way until September/October. Adding insult to injury they ventilate the lab something fierce, and I'm numb and shivery after 4 hours in there.

  I need something layered and warm, something I can walk miles in, and fabric that won't dissolve/burst into flames if when I sweat (the school is a mile uphill from the train station.)

  I love this cropped cardigan by BIZZ. It's got a flattering crop cut for the long of waist, slightly princess sleeves for the broad of shoulder, and a warm stretchy collar that turns up against the wind.

  And check it out, the embroidery goes all the way around! I love it when that happens.

  I didn't realize the back seams of the two garments would line up like that, but I like it.

  I am also wearing a stretchy bamboo fabric dress. It's big and made of that useless super stretchy style cloth that's too thin to wear on its own, so it's always an underlayer. I'll admit it does make a great underlayer. I'm almost certain you can't see my midriff through it, but in case you spot it, please let me know and I'll make sure it gets packed safely away.

  Whatever happened to the bamboo fabric trend? I have a few pieces, and some sets of sheets that are bamboo, and I really liked it. Then it all went away.

  The bottom button was missing, but I kind of like the twin points it makes at the bottom. And I can always move the top button down, since I've never buttoned it up to my nose before.

  Random question: do you find yourself noticing how you resemble family members as years go by? I look at a lot of photos of myself for this blog, and I feel like I'm seeing it more and more.

Cropped cardigan: BIZZ (thrifted)

Dress underlayer: Natural Life (shop at The CAMP)

Skinny jeans: ZARA Basic

Shoes: Hush Puppies Hatha (old)

Rainy Day Blues

  I'm back to my old palette. :D While trying out new colors I've never worn before has been a lot of fun, going back to my familiar colors feels confident and happy. PLUS I got to try this denim on top and bottom I've heard of on other style blogs. It's a win-win-win situation! I love style blogging. :D

  It's raining today in SF. I busted out my newly-hemmed ZARA basic dept skinny jeans. It might show in the photos that I screwed up when hemming these. I cut one leg on the new hem line, not the 2nd line I'd conveniently drawn below it for guidance. ): I have hemmed dozens of my trousers and it's the first time I've done that, haha. Oh well, they're dark and will usually be in boots.

  The dress is strapless, which doesn't suit rain so well, so I tied off the alternative apparel overshirt last seen here with a silver leaf ring. The dress has cool zipper halves sewn in a spiraling pattern down the front, and fortunately for any jackets and chairs involved, not the back. It also has built-in padding in the front! I was instantly won over.

  Leggings and skinny jeans under short garments was a revelation for me. I tried to go for a look that is form-fitting and sexy but not overstuffed sausage.

The story of every pair of pants in my life

  Summer school starts for me Monday, so I don't know how much style blogging I'll be able to do, as class is from 9:30am until 10:00pm four days a week. If you look on Twitter and my last post is "AAAAAUUUGGH" then you will know Chemistry has eaten me alive. I would like my epitaph to read 'She tried to get into grad school. [swear] this economy.'

Dress: Do & Be (thrifted) dark grey version size S on eBay

Skinny jeans: ZARA basic (thrifted)

Overshirt: alternative apparel VintageSoft (thrifted)

Boots: Naya Lark (eBay) some on eBay

Ring: Silver of the Valley (etsy, shop defunct)

Necklace: Metropolitan Museum of Art store (gift)