Bows on my Toes

Hey Readers,

Today, I have bows on my toes. I love that that rhymes and that today is Friday! There's nothing like bows on your toes to carry you into the weekend, eh? Here is my outfit:

What do you think?

My Memories Giveaway

Happy Tuesday Readers!


I am so excited to host a very special giveaway from my friends at My Memories Suite. What is My Memories Suite, you ask? And what am I giving away? Here are the details. . . 


My Memories Suite is a digital scrapbooking software with background papers, photo template layouts, fonts, word art, embellishments, shapes, and even offers the capability of adding video, music, and even narration to your scrapbooking creative endeavors. In addition to being able to print your creations, this software also gives you the opportunity to share your decorated memories online, as a movie or interactive album. Pretty cool, eh?


In high school and during part of college, I tried my hand at scrapbooking, but eventually lost interest because it took so much time. Printing pictures, buying paper and various embellishments, carefully writing out words (and starting over and over again until they were just right), and trying to crop and place each photo just so. Not only was it time consuming, it was stressful.


My experience with My Memories Suite has been entirely different. Yes, creating a scrapbook page requires time- but not as much time as traditional scrapbooking. Fixing a misspelled word or changing fonts takes seconds instead of minutes and I don't have to deal with glues, staples, or scissors. Thank goodness!


Here are two pages I created from a college trip to Ireland:

So. . . I've told you a little bit about what My Memories Suite is- but what am I giving away? Good question!


I am giving away one copy of the My Memories Suite Scrapbook software to a very lucky winner. I also have a coupon code, for everyone, that will give you a 10 dollar discount off the price of the software. Here it is: Q9Z4J-Q7AAD-K1P


How do you win? Over the next week, please follow/become a subscriber of my blog and leave a comment on this page with the following information:


1) Your favorite fall memory
2) A product from the website that catches your eye
3) Your email address (so I can reach you if you win!)


Good luck Readers!  If you would like to learn more about My Memories Suite, I would encourage you to check our their blog, Facebook, and Twitter pages: 
   Blog- http://blog.mymemories.com/
   Facebook- http://www.facebook.com/pages/MyMemories/140359372717593 
   Twitter- http://twitter.com/#!/mymemoriessuite

Keep Your Eyes Peeled. . . Giveaway Ahead!

Hello Readers!

I have very exciting news! Later today I will begin to host a giveaway from the lovely people at My Memories Suite.

Check back later for more details. . .

What did I wear?. . .

Hello Readers,

I bet you're wondering what I chose to wear to my friend's wedding. . . It was a tough choice, but a few suggestions via facebook comments and my mom's expert advice I made my decision. . . 

With Jake and Kerry on their wedding day!

For my friends wedding I wore. . . (drumroll please)

The Orange Whirligig Dress!

I paired it with:

These vintage clip ons

This matching necklace

And these Tan Calvin Klein Snakeskin Pumps

What to Wear?: Help me Choose!

Hello Readers! Happy First Day of Fall!

I need your help! Tomorrow, I am attending the wedding of my dear friend (and former roommate and track teammate), Kerry. During recent moves over the past two months I've realized that I have WAY too many dresses, and decided not to buy a new dress for this occasion.

So. . . my dilemma is more of a surplus of options rather than a shortage. Will you help me pick a dress? The wedding begins at 2:00, so it's a late afternoon into evening affair. I want to be dressy but not too dressy. Do you know what I mean?

Here are the contenders, let me know what you think!:

The Mompos Dress- a bit summery. . . but such a blast to wear!

I love wearing this dress, but I fear that it is too casual and summery. But, maybe I could dress it up with tights, heels, and a different belt?

The Whirligig Dress in Dark Pink/Fuschia

The Whirligig Dress in Dark Orange

Oh the Whirligig Dress. . . this dress is so versatile and oh-so-comfortable! I think of it more as a teaching dress, but I think I could add some pizazz with the right accessories. But which color? The pink is so easy to wear with my coloring, but the orange looks so rich! Oh decisions!

My dark green silk straplesss dress from Banana Republic

I've had this dress in my wardrobe for quite some time (since 2008, I believe), but I can count the times I've worn this dress on one hand with digits to spare. This may sound silly, but I feel like Heidi Klum every time I wear this dress. Is this dress in or out?

Leave me a comment here or on facebook and let me know what to choose! Also, I will gladly welcome any styling suggestions!

Orange YOU Stylish: Oxidation

Hello Readers!

I hope this post finds you in good spirits! Today, I wanted to share a recent outfit I wore to work featuring the color orange. As you know, the color orange strikes my heart with fear and hesitation each time I consider wearing it.

Look at all of that orange! Quinn Fabray is much braver than I !

There is a skirt in my wardrobe, the Wallflower Skirt by the ever-brilliant Tracy Reese, that just happens to be orange. This skirt trumped my fear of orange, and in purchasing and wearing it I am becoming more bold in my wardrobe choices. So bold, in fact, that I wore the skirt to work! Here it is:

Who can resist this skirt?

In an earlier post, I mentioned that most of the color matching I wear is inspired by colors found together in nature. Oxidation, a naturally occurring chemical reaction, turns copper from an orange-y hue to various shades of bluish greens and aquas.

Example? The statue of liberty. Once it was a coppery hue, now it is a lovely mint shade.

This image, found on google, shows an approximate simulation of how Lady Liberty looked initially, before oxidation set in. 

My outfit, as you may have already gathered, is inspired by this very process. I wore cream, off-white, and grey as neutrals to balance my combination of orange and aqua (if neutrals were on a periodic table of colors, I think I would classify them as noble gases). What a smart combo!

The entire day I wore this outfit I received compliments from strangers, students, and even a colleague or two! What a way to feel great wearing orange!

Orange YOU glad you read my blog? 

Thanks for reading!

PS- next week I am running a giveaway- stay tuned!!!

Orange YOU Stylish: Spring Preview

Hello Readers,

I hope you all are having a wonderful week! I know that I did! The college I work for didn't have classes on Wednesday, which meant that I was able to take a little vacation, which meant spending time with family and celebrating the life of our late family mascot, Meeka, who passed away at the end of August.

On a lighter note. . . I was looking for orange clothing to add to my pinterest board "Orange You Stylish: Wearing Orange" and I noticed that orange clothing is hard to find! I did a bit of research on style.com, and I noticed that many 2012 Spring/Resort designer collections featured this elusive but bold color.

Would you like to see? Here is a handful of delightful examples:

This collection from DSquared2. . .

. . . Marc by Marc Jacobs. . .

. . . Rebecca Minkoff. . .

. . . Badgley Mischka. . . 

. .  Rachel Zoe:

And Donna Karan:

Orange YOU Stylish: Orange in Nature

Hello again Readers!

When it comes to mixing colors, I often look to nature for inspiration. Not always, but most of the time, what "goes" together in the natural world also "goes" together in fashion in decor. Let's think about that for a moment. . .

Delicate peachy oranges, sunset pinks, and dark greens

When we go to the ocean (my favorite place of inspiration) we find a variety of colors that combine and create portraits of that particular place. Normally, the portrait of an ocean is painted with shades of blue, green, grey, and tan. It isn't a surprise, then, that these colors coordinate easily with the clothing and artifacts we choose to wear in an outfit or the furniture and paints we choose to place in a room.

The color orange is a bit more difficult for me to place or understand because it isn't a color I see, or pay attention to at least, on a regular basis. Well. . . until I embarked on this project. Here are some examples:

An O'ahu sunset of orange, grey, violet-grey, and dark blue

Various shades of orange and brown in an array of fall leaves

A monarch butterfly- white, black, dark orange, light orange, and white.

The outcome of the oxidization process- orange, brown, mint green, aqua, turquoise, and green. For more details, see www.whydoes.org/why-does-copper-oxidize, where I found this photo

Later this week we will look at examples such as these to understand what to wear when sporting the color orange. Stay tuned!

*PS- for those of you on twitter, if you see something orange, or something that would look great with orange, please tweet about it! To share it with me, and to look at what others have found, include the hashtag #OrangeYOUStylish.

Orange YOU glad you read my blog?

Orange YOU Stylish!: I Wish I Knew. . .

Hello Readers,

Recently, I've been trying to be a bit more adventurous with my wardrobe. Nothing crazy, just a bit more color. In the past, more color has meant more purple, green, or blue. Lovely colors, but nothing out of the ordinary for me.

Woah!

In my quest for adventure, I purchased one dress in two colors with the intention of choosing one and returning the other. (I wrote a post about this, enlisting help in this decision). Of the two colors, despite my readers' recommendations, I chose pink (well, more of a fuschia) over orange. Although bright pink/fuschia  is a brave addition to my wardrobe, I admit that orange would have been the braver choice.

The primary reason I did not choose orange was because I wasn't sure how to style this color. In a reply to my post regarding this decision, my friend Mary asked for recommendations on this matter. I don't have an answer, yet, but I hope to find and make recommendations over the next few days.

What do YOU wear with orange?

Join me in this adventure! If YOU have any suggestions, please feel free to leave a comment on this or future posts. (I love comments!)

Never Fear!

Hello Readers,

Never Fear! Eclectic Elegance is here!

It's been a while since my last blog post. Some of you may have forgotten about me, others may have feared the status of this blog and/or my life. Everything is OK- but life has been too busy lately for blogging. The past three weeks have been a whirlwind of emotions, loss, gain, and change. Taking care of these things has taken presidence over this blog, but I hope to be back at full speed this weekend.

Until then. . . here are a few fun photos to enjoy!

A galloping zebra at the Peoria Zoo

Vanilla-Honey Cupcakes with Raspberry Buttercream Icing

Summer Daisies

Marigolds

A Fading End-of-Summer Rose