The Office

I work in an environment that is what most people would consider "business casual." But what does that mean? Looking around my building, I've spotted women in everything from a formal suit complete with a stylish heel to a broom skirt, hiking sandals and a camisole.

For women, why is business casual painted with such a broad brush? Ask three women in your office what business casual means to them, and I guarantee that you will receive three different answers. At my job and while I'm out with friends and colleagues, I hear many different excuses as to why it's ok to dress in a less than professional manner (khaki, wrinkled clam diggers instead of trousers, printed tshirts instead of blouses, "Crocks"-inspired footwear instead of heels, wet unstyled or unwashed hair shoveled back into a an unprofessional bun or ponytail instead of a well-styled cut).

I would like to think that most of us are not as obtuse to not know what qualifies for acceptable work wear. Truth be told, I think it all boils down to being lazy - in some form or another. Let's face it, we've all had days where we press snooze on the alarm leading us to rush during our morning process or last-minute items like leaving a little bit early to get gas because you were unable to the night before. But when you peel back another layer, most times we find out that those are the excuses not the real reason for our lax style.

Study after study shows that those who look put together get ahead faster than those who don't put the same effort into their appearance. And I would even dare to venture that those who look pulled together and give off a successful image don't even need to be as smart or qualified many of times.

So why do we still let so many easily fixed hurdles get in our way? I really believe that it's sometimes easier to know there's something to change than change it. Changing your appearance like losing weight takes time and discipline and will not happen over night.

But, once we complete the transformation, it's all worth it. Don't let the excuses of "I want to lose more weight before I buy new clothes," "I can't afford the clothes I want," and/or similar variations of stop you from your journey.

Your exercise for today is to get started in small bites. Open up your closet and see what you have. Chances are you have a closet brimming full of clothes yet you "have nothing to wear." Pull out your favorite items: the gorgeous color shirt that makes your hair and eyes pop, the pants that fit perfect all the time, the dress that hugs your curves just right.

Place your top three or five favorite items on one side of your closet. Now, go through and look for the items that are your least favorites: the dated blazer with a button missing, the pilled cardigan, the trendy fluorescent shirt that you bought from the junior's department and never wore. These items should be taken out of your closet IMMEDIATELY! They are not items that will help you discover what looks good on you.

Don't mourn the fact that you spent "good money" on these items. Rather, donate them to a charity or give them to a friend who might enjoy.

If you are not ready to do your whole closet at once, do it in bite size bits, repeating this process until there's only items you love. You'll then be ready for step 2.

Spring Cleaning

About a week ago, I decided to clean out my closet. Brimming with clothes, not a empty hanger in site, and I had  nothing to wear!

The pieces that didn't make the cut all had something in common: they were my style, per se, but something about them didn't "wow" me. The sweater, for instance, that was tossed aside was a gorgeous mint color with clear mint colored buttons. I love bling and mint, but the problem for this piece was that the sleeves were long - I don't like long-sleeve sweaters since I get warm easy. 

Like the sweater above, most of these clothes only were worn a handful of times, but I kept overlooking them in my closet when I would go to get dressed because the fit was off or it was something that I liked three years ago, but just wasn't striking a chord with me anymore. And, I felt guilt about getting rid of them because I might wear them someday.

So, the time came and I took no mercy. I got rid of about 25 articles of clothing, and when I shoved them in a bag headed for the Goodwill, I didn't feel bad!

As luck would have it, my friend Court  (my twinnie), who people confuse me for all the time because we are the same height etc., came over for St. Patty's day and I gave her the bag of clothes. She got some great scores!

It's nice now to not have to see all those things that I wasn't going to wear ever or wear and not feel at my best. Now, I have a closet with less clutter but more options. 

I also notice that now when I go out, I won't just run into a store and buy five or more articles of clothing because there's a sale. Most times, I only really love one or two items, but feel compelled to buy the other items because there is a sale (many of the items I cleaned of the closet fit into this category).

My black cardi and cream blouse are two of my go-to staples. In this pic I've paired the two with a
yellow and black pencil skirt and a cheery lemon colored necklace - perfect for spring and the office!

It also occurred to me that I have way more options if I wash my clothes more often. I work for a water district, and using water efficiently is very important to me, so I was only doing laundry once every two to three weeks; however, it seriously limited my options of what I could wear because a lot of my mix and match staples, like my black cardi and cream blouse (above) were always in the laundry.

Washing laundry about every week will still give me a pretty full load and provide me with more clothing options without having to buy more clothes.

Owning and buying less and washing more: the key to my spring cleaning success!

What is your brand?

Coke, Nike, Gucci - all products that have a very distinct brand. When you mention or see one of them, what do you think of? A true brand is more than just a logo or tagline, it is a promise that distinctly identifies your product is different than another product.

Going along with that means that your product(s) must fall in line with your brand and live up to that promise.

What is your brand? What does it say about you? I get a lot of emails from all kinds of places and one that I got a while ago (forgive me that I can't remember who it is from!) asked the question "What is your brand?".

Being from a communications background, it doesn't seem the least bit odd to remember that image is everything, and, no, I am not just referring to looks. It's part of the whole package. What you look like, how you dress, how you speak and more.

As the companies mentioned above know, a successful brand is one that is not all over the map. Rather, you always know what you are getting with a product from said brand. Often and unfortunately, our own personal brand is all over the place.

Take for instance your Linkedin profile. Linkedin is a professional networking site where you would want to put your best foot forward in hopes of maintaining your credibility as well as developing relationships with other folks - one of whom may be your next boss (no joke, I really got my last job in part through Linkedin) or another customer.

Using my field of communications as an example, I cannot explain why many accomplished communications folks have the most questionable profiles and profile photos. Do they not realize the brand that they are projecting?

For instance, I've seen a lot of communications individuals that maintain photos that are undeniably 15 years old or even have no photo at all. When I think of a professional communications person, an up-to-date photo comes to mind.

There has been numerous scientific studies done that prove that people, rightly or not, judge you in less than 5 seconds. With such a small amount of time to make a first impression, wouldn't you want to put your best foot forward?

Along the same line, if you have a super-professional Linkedin page, but have an accessible Facebook page featuring photos of you drunk and on the floor what does that say about your judgement to others and the strength of your brand?

I've never really run the gamut of brands, but in the last year or so, I've really tried to consistently portray my brand day in and out.

There are many ways that you can refresh your brand, but let's just look at one way: Your physical appearance. Does your style match up to the image you want to project? Mine was matching up, but lacking.

In my ideal professional brand, I would have a conservative, professional look that displayed my funkiness in an appropriate way. My real brand was conservative and professional, but BORING! Lots of trouser pants, suit jackets and cardigans, which is fine, but I always felt so boring just being appropriate.

Once I decided that my brand would be to dress in a more feminine, professional fashion utilizing shift dresses and pencil skirts and minimizing my use of jackets, I really felt like there was success with my brand.

One thing that I am always aware of with my brand is that it should be carried through daily. Yes, there are always going to be days when you are not looking your best, whether you have a cold or a bad hair day. But I never have an excuse to abandon my brand.

No matter where you work, you can almost always count on someone that comes in with wet hair, rumpled clothes and no makeup. Many of times those folks have an excuse that they didn't have enough time. To me, their brand says sloppy and a that they are a person that I can't even count on to come in looking professional, so what will their performance be like at work? Sloppy with errors throughout? Fair or not, that's the way my mind (an other minds) work.

Take for instance this photo below. We had work headshots done a couple of weeks ago, we use these photos for when professional organizations and others need a pic. I didn't have any control over the background, which is pretty standard. But, I did have control over what I was wearing in the pic.

To project a more mature appearance, I decided to go with a pinstriped jacked, but mix things up with a  shiny taupe top and my favorite Stella & Dot necklace. I almost hate to say it, but I like bling, and big chunky bling is part of my brand. But, I was able to rock the bling in a professional way without looking unprofessional.

I am still working on refining my brand, but the more I go with what I like rather than what I think I should like, the more authentic and happy I feel. And, I think, it shines from within.

Sure, I work in a more conservative environment, but I still try to show my authentic style through accessories.

Making do...

It's one of those months where our paychecks conveniently fall just a few days out of sync with our mortgage and other automatic payments, meaning we are down to nada. Of course, we have money in our long-term savings, retirement and other accounts but, in my opinion, those are always OFF LIMITS, so we made do when it came to tonight's meal.

Morgan smartly suggested that we make tots and drench them in the leftover cheese dip that we usually use for tortilla chips (excellent side!). Then, we used our last three pieces of bread, including the end, to make bacon, turkey and swiss sandwiches. Heaven on a plate! Add in some Moscato Port that tastes oh-so-divine and that was dinner.

I write this post not to feel bad about the fact that I don't have any spending money for the next few days, but rather to reflect on the fact that making do is sometimes the best thing to do. Of course, I could've put some dinner on my credit card or taken money out of savings, but this meal was perfect. And, we were challenged to think outside our normal meals to come up with something fabulous.

And, that's what happens in life. We often get so stuck in buying more and more instead of using our creativeness to come up with something fantastic using items we already own. This principle can be applied to food, home design, clothing and basically anything else.

I will use our little meal tonight to reflect upon how much I already have and be thankful for all that I have been given.

The Ever Changing Bucket List

When I think of bucket lists, it heralds in thoughts of old people in their 70s diagnosed with a terminal disease, knowing that they have limited time to do ALL the things that they never did before. We all have our reasons for not doing those things we want to do: we are too busy, we'll do it later, we can't afford it, etc.

But surprise! We all have limited time here. And, that's why it's important to narrow down your list of would've, could've, should'ves before it's too late.

When I was in my late 20s, my husband and I brainstormed our first bucket list, which included items as small as try out a new restaurant to owning a BMW (me). The list is pinned prominently on our fridge, so we never forget what's on the list. That first bucket list is about five years old, but I am happy to say that roughly 85 percent of those items were accomplished.

The rest didn't happen mostly because we decided they weren't things we necessarily found important after the list. Now, it's about five years later, and we are several lists removed from the first. Why are lists so important you ask? They keep you motivated and accountable.

I don't move through life trying to accomplish one thing after another like I am tearing through the jungle wielding a machete, but I do get satisfaction from what I've accomplished. One of the ways I am going to continue my journey into self-discovery is reviving my blog, which I started nearly three years ago!

I don't have any lofty hopes of millions of folks reading. If you stumble across my blog and get something out of it, I am happy, though! One of my goals for this blog is to feature a potpourri of things that make me smile and live a good life. That could be a beautiful picture, an inspirational thought, kitties, clothes or anything else that inspires me.

With that said, I liked my work outfit today. If I had to name it, I would name it mint topped with polka dots. I got the skirt at The Limited last year, and it came with a nifty short sleeved jacket (where I work, we wear lots of jackets),  but when I put the outfit on and wore it to a PR conference last year, it was more golden girl than 30-something PR chic. Therefore, I never wore the skirt again. I had toyed with getting rid of it since that time, but I adored the color too much to do so.

So...I decided to deconstruct the Betty White-inspired suit and mix the skirt with a cute polka dot cardi that I found online at The Loft (it was recently 60 percent off!). I then added a belt to accentuate my waist and added some cute flats (I can't wear heels, ever. But, I'll go into that another day).

Mint is one of my absolute favorite colors, and I was so proud of my outfit, in fact, that I took a pic after I put on makeup this morning. My goal was to actually take a pic (that was not in the loo) so you could see my face and showcase my bag and shoes as well, but I opted for my pjs!