October 27th, 28th, 20th, 30th, and 31st! - The end

We are at the end of the ODP! For some of my friends, they will be relieved that they get to see me in something other then this black dress. This little black dress has served me well over the last 31 days, but I am looking forward to a different look starting November 1st. The black dress is pretty worn out. I ripped a hole in the bottom and actually tore another two large holes along the seam on the bottom ruffle just this weekend. It is looking pretty see-through as well, so I am looking forward to wearing something else on Tuesday!

Here are the last couple of days of the ODP.

October 27th-
Black Dress
Red Cardigan
Yellow T-shirt Bracelets
Green Argyle Shoes

October 28th-
Black Dress
Cream/Gold Cardigan
Pink Silk Scarf
Strappy Sandals

October 29th-
Black Dress
Black Cardigan
Pink Ugandan Bead Necklace
2 Jones Design Company Flowers
Black Flats

October 30th-
Black Dress
Brown/Tan Shirt (From my honeymoon)
Cream Snake Skin Belt
Pearl Necklace
Brown Peep Toe Heels

October 31st-
Black Dress
Black Cardigan
Magenta Tights
Heather Grey Hand Knit Scarf

Thoughts on ODP

This year, I am taking away my love of accessories. The scarfs, hats, necklaces and shoes made each day completely different from the other. It reminds me to invest in classic, well built pieces as the foundation of my wardrobe and then add trendy accessories as my budget allows. This will allow me to have versatility without a stuffed wardrobe. Simplicity is the best way to maximize your wallet and creativity. I realized I do not have a lot of variety in shoes, necklaces or earrings and plan on expanding that part of my closet. 

I've also discovered something about my style: I really like dresses! I loved putting on a dress every day this month. The feeling of being feminine was a great addition to each day. I carry myself differently when wearing a dress and I feel more confident as a result. That confidence translates into beauty to my husband and I received many welcome compliments from Craig all month. When I am confident about what I am wearing and how I look, I am more attractive to my husband. Confidence = beauty (at least in the Barber household!)

My love of dresses has reminded me of my love of vintage. The 1940-1950's is my style era for a dressier look. For my casual look, I love the 1970's. Not having access to my modern wardrobe made me think more about how I wanted to look each day. As I was searching for ways to change the look of my black dress, I stumbled upon several vintage blogs and felt inspired. I should dress in a way that makes me feel beautiful. It shouldn't matter what the latest trends are, if some skirt toots my horn, I should wear it, because confidence = beauty. Time to start scouting out vintage finds!

This year I learned a lot from watching the other women who participated. I enjoyed seeing what everyone wore and how they made their outfits unique or just sported the same dress every day with little adaptation. Every women did it for a different reason, but there has been a sense of togetherness that I didn't feel last year. This project isn't for everyone, but I am grateful to the other women who did the project alongside me. 

The biggest thing I took away from the ODP was a weight loss! Looking at myself every day, trying on different combinations of clothing and accessories made me take a good, hard look at the frame that all of these things were hanging on. I wasn't thrilled with what I saw, and decided that I couldn't complain anymore unless I actually did something about what I saw. It motivated me to cut back on my portion sizes and stop late night snacking and make running and exercise a bigger priority. Because of this mirror staring, I lost 7 pounds this month and I couldn't be more excited! Now only 5 more to go to get to my pre-kids weight!

Good-bye, October Dress Project until next year! 

(Yep. I'll do it again next year!)

October 24th, 25th, 26th- Almost there!

Only a couple more days and I am glad, because my dress is stretching out! The front has to be covered all the time with a shirt, scarf or sweater because of the sag. This cheap Ross purchase has not held up well, but I am glad that you can't see any stains that might be on it because it is black.

The last couple of days, I have been tweeting about my new obsession: vintage clothing. I have always been a vintage girl, but now I want to take it into my clothing. Since I am limited to my existent wardrobe and am not going to go out and buy anything clothing wise until next month, I decided to start fixing my hair in the 1930's, 40's and 50's style. And then today I got lazy. But I hope to keep it up to match my switch to an older era.

October 24th-
Black Dress
Lilac Top
Brown/Black/Tan Scarf
Cream Woven Belt
Brown Peep Toe Heels

October 25th-
Black Dress
White Ribbon
Red Polka Dot Scarf
Locket
Brown Ankle Boots

My sexy husband. He bought new clothes for the school year, and I just thought he looked pretty awesome and that I should share a picture of his hotness on the blog. He thought it was weird that I was taking a picture of him, but he is such a great husband that he indulged me!

October 26th-
Black Dress
Blue Pheasant Blouse
Premiere Brown Layered Necklace (Gift from Dawn Durrell)
White Silk Jones Design Company Flower
Brown Belt
Pearl Studs
Tan/Blue Boat Shoes

Necklace is a gift from my good friend Dawn. She stays with us a couple nights a week and came home with it as a gift. Love it!

Family Night Ideas

Every couple of weeks we have a family night/outing. Sometimes we go somewhere exotic, but most nights we go for a picnic in the backyard or have a Family Movie Night. It is pretty simple: blankets on the floor, everyone in pj's, homemade popcorn in cool containers, and a Veggie Tales film. Bingo! Family Movie Night! As the kids get older, we will do more, but for now, we enjoy the simplicity of their excitement in doing something out of the ordinary as a family.

Here is a list of other ideas we are planning on doing and I hope they will inspire you to have your own Family Night this week. And please share your ideas in the comment section of the blog post. I'd love to hear how your family spends time together!

Ideas for Family Night

-International Night- Choose a country for that night. Make passports during the day so everyone can "travel" there that evening. Cook a dinner that features a side dish or an entire meal from that country's cuisine. Play music from the country while the night is happening. Find a traditional game, book or film from the country and do together after dinner. This can be done every couple of months with different countries.

-Camp In- Put sleeping bags on the living room floor and collect as many pillows and blankets as you can. Turn out all the lights and give everyone a flashlight. Make campfire banana splits and  sing campfire songs. Make a glow-in-the-dark comet and play catch as everyone tells about their day.

-Unbirthday Party- Throw a birthday party for nobody, just for fun. Bake a cake, put up streamers and pin the tail on the donkey. Everyone gets to blow the candles out as you sing, "Happy unbirthday to nobody!" Wrap gifts you bought at after Christmas sales or on discount through out the year for a local homeless shelter or children's home. Consider donating old birthday decorations as well.

-Dance Party- Step aside, Richard Simmons! It is time to get our family groove on! Have everyone dress up in workout clothes or funny costumes, crank up the music and shake your groove thing. Not only will this be a lot of fun, it is a built in workout for the grown-ups! Use the kids as weights and lift and lunge to your favorite tunes.

Here are pictures from our first family movie night a month ago, just for fun.

{WARNING: This last part talks about TV not being beneficial to your child. If you are easily offended and use the TV on a regular basis, please skip this section.}

We don't watch a lot of television in my house for a family with preschoolers and I would encourage more parents to do this as well. The cost is high, but the payoff is even higher. We try to entertain each other in more creative ways then TV. My kids probably watch about 30 minutes to one hour once a week while I sort the organic produce that comes every Thursday. I don't see a lot of value in plopping them down in front of the TV daily for the purpose of getting things done (even though I have a great excuse to do so, because I am a business owner). Because my children are only 17 months apart, they actually get along very well and entertain one another for several hours at a time. My kids love books, structures made out of cardboard, buckets, and acorns. These things are their television. They don't know any different and they don't know what they are "missing out on" by not watching Sesame Street or Dora the Explorer or Wonder Pets. They have learned the old-fashion way of using their imagination to occupy themselves and they are better for it. My kids aren't unique in this ability and with a little encouragement, any kid can develop a deeper appreciation for their own imaginative world.

And that trickles over into our family time. Our kids never see us vegging in front of afternoon/evening TV. Before we got married we decided to not own a television for the first year of marriage. We wanted to spend that first year getting to know one another. It is has been seven years and we still don't own a television. Now, we will watch things on Netflix or Hulu once or twice a week after the kids are asleep, but it isn't a daily thing. Craig and I read books, magazines or newspapers while the kids quietly play during our after dinner time, knowing that we can't become too enthralled in our reading material because the kids often need our intervention in sibling affairs. I knit and Craig will play guitar while we have family jam sessions once a week as well. And we read a LOT together as a family. Reading out loud teaches many, many things to children and since Craig and I love books to begin with, it is a natural part of our family life. We are making wonderful memories on a daily basis that we will treasure for years to come all because we decided to minimize the amount of media that our family was exposed to. We know our children really well because we spend much of the day in face-to-face interaction and I am thankful for that relationship.

If any of you moms out their who are reading this do let their preschoolers watch TV every day, I would encourage you to change the norm in your household. Instead of turning on their favorite show, pull out play dough, or make paper dolls, or color some pages you printed off the internet, or have them build a town with wooden blocks. The world is there oyster! All you have to do is make the opportunity for them to experience it. It is harder to come up with activities to replace the stimulation of the television, but the rewards are worth it. A great blog I found to help this goal is "I Can Teach My Child!" Check it out and have fun with those kids!  

(And if you want to know how I make it work by keeping TV out, just ask. I would be happy to share what our day is like and give you more ideas!)

October 21st, 22nd, 23rd- Weekend Fashion

Now that the ODP is coming to a close, I am really focusing more on maximizing all of my wardrobe and accessories for these last couple of days. Inspired by this post, I am going to be pursuing my love of all things vintage in my wardrobe after this project is finished. My house reflects my love of old, re-purposed items, but it is time for my clothing to find inspiration from that as well.

On Friday, I tied a silk scarf around my head, clipped a flower around it and it reminded me of the 1960's. Why not start adding the vintage inspiration now with what I have?

October 21st-
Black Dress
Turquoise Sweater
Brown Silk Scarf
Jones Design Company Wool Flower
Brown/Gold Snake Skin Kitten Heels

Scarf from my mother-in-law, Connie.

Postcard necklace from my sister-in-law. Love it!

I also wore the outfit this way for the first part of the day, because my grandmother-in-law gave me this handmade scarf. Isn't it beautiful? The colors matched too perfectly not to wear it.

On Saturday, I woke up and the weather was chilly. Hooray! I was able to wear my favorite vintage winter coat! I picked up this beauty at a thrift store in Germany and I L.O.V.E it! I still need to get new buttons for it, because some of them are broken, but I wear it with pride anyway. And the scarf is a pashmina from India. My parents bought it for me as a Christmas present several years ago and the proceeds of the scarf went to help free girls trapped in the sex trade industry. It is one of my favorite articles of clothing for that very reason.

October 22nd-
Black Dress
Purple Cardigan
Purple/Orange Pashmina
White Tights
Black Flats

And today for church, I wore a scarf that a friend, Kim from MOPS bought me as a thank you gift for being the table leader that year. Love it! I really do love that a lot of accessories are gifts from friends and family. Sometimes I think that other people know my style better then I do!

October 23rd-
Black Dress
White T-shirt
Blue Floral Scarf
Tan Boots
Red/Brown Earings

Thoughts on the dress-

Only 8 more days in this dress and I had the wildest idea as I woke up this morning: What if I wore a dress or skirt every day for 365 days? Not the same one every day, but made the commitment to not wear pants for an entire year? I am not going to do it, but it got me thinking about how I really have enjoyed the feminine charm of wearing a dress every day. I think I carry myself differently when I am not wearing pants and I like that. It will be my aim to incorporate more dresses and skirts on a regular basis in the days to come. And in Florida, we can get away with it year round!

All Things Pumpkin

A story told with pictures of the journey of the pumpkin in the life of the Barber family.