strawberries!

Fresh produce season (also known as summer and fall) in New England is the best time of year. My family picks and freezes strawberries, raspberries, and blueberries so we can eat them through the cold, dreary winter. It's a basic 4-season survival tactic. 

I went strawberry pick twice in the same weekend this year, to make sure I got enough. 

YUM!

Hope everyone is enjoying the holiday weekend. Mine has been full of all appropriate activities: fireworks & friends with most of worcester, veggie burgers, berries & whipped cream, watermelon mojitos, friends and new apartment cat-adoption adventures (more on that later), ocean beach fun, and more fireworks & friends tomorrow. It's been great, needless to say. 

fringe benefits

First of all, I wonder how many bloggers have used "fringe benefits" for a post about bangs before, probably a ton...but I like it.

I got my hair trimmed, and I let the stylist (who I totally trust) give me an asymmetrical bang. At first I was kind of wary, thought I looked a little Vulcan-like (hi, I like Star Trek.), but everyone else (mom, dad, boyf, people in salon) seemed to react positively.

After 24 hours with my new look I realized, I totally have the Emily Fitch bangs I always wanted! At least I will when they grow out a little.

summer day: cotton dress, straw hat, sandals

This straw fedora is easily one of my favorite summer items. It goes with everything and almost every situation and it makes everything outfit that much more summer fun. 

This dress is from Target last summer, but they're selling it again this summer in so many pretty colors! Purple and turquoise, anyone? Quite possibly coming soon to this blog. 

And this is what my bag looks like on a busy, but organized morning:
keys, camera case (the flowered thing), sunglasses, iced coffee and smoothie - homemade breakfast to go, and of course my wallet, checkbook, and sparkly daily toiletries/make-up pouch

(and if you can't tell, it's a pretty big bag to carry all of that)

Today was kind of stressful at work (website technical issues and grant writer's block) but then I ended the day with a compliment on a different work thing, got a few little things fixed on my bike for less than  $10 and took a bike ride in the lovely lovely summer weather, and even had yummy leftovers so I had a great dinner with no cooking. It make tackling the website and grant tomorrow seem so totally doable. 

I'm lazy

I think an over arching trend in my portion of this blog is my laziness, whether it be in my wardrobe choices or my picture-taking (or lack thereof). So this is just another example of that. Thursday after work I was so tired and ready to start my weekend (4-day 40 hour work week, I love and hate you) that I just took some quick mirror phone pics.

This is one of my favorite work outfits recently. I like that I can wear this denim dress if I dress it up with a blazer, sparkly-toes shoes, and pearl earrings. It transitioned perfectly into a post-work summery date outfit! Too bad the movie times were changed we didn't get to see Tree of Life after all.

summer requirements

It's here. The thing we(Floridians)'ve all been dreading. Summer. You guys, it's terrible. It's super hot and humid and rains almost every day, but the rain doesn't make it any cooler or less humid! So there are a few summer essentials that make going outside almost bearable, which every Florida girl should know, as seen in the following pictures.

1) Summer dress. Light fabric, preferably floral or striped in my case. Above the knee a must, to maximize breeziness.

2) A good pair of sandals, appropriate for most occasions. A pair of really casual flip flops (like those great 2 for $5 pairs at Old Navy) and a nicer pair of sandals also works, but I like to kill two shoe birds with one shoe stone...so to speak.

3) Hair ties and bobby pins! To get my long hair off my neck and my bangs off my forehead.

4) Finally, you need a good attitude! The summer will be over soon, right?

I'm still working on that last one...

Oh, and don't forget lots of sunscreen! That's the real way to survive in the sun. Especially if you are a porcelain princess like me.

mom, daughter, skirt

Remember the pile of beautiful fabric I brought back from Ghana?  My mom and I made a bubble skirt:

and I already owned the perfect matching cardigan

So fun & colorful to wear!

It's the weekend! And it's already raining on my plans. I am going strawberry picking this weekend and biking or walking to the farmer's market tomorrow. 

Speaking of fun weekend things, if you're in the Worcester area, check out next weekend's best event (hosted by my organization): African American & Juneteenth Festival. Good music, yummy soul food, and vendors!

sunny days & short hair

I cut my hair! and it turned into summer! 

Well, not exactly like that. It was actually already a beautiful summer day when I cut my hair and for about a week (or two?) after. Since then it's been mostly rainy. Hey, Mother Nature? My straw fedora looks a little silly in the rain. 

Anyway, these were sunny day outfits!

This dress? The more than your money's worth, once Mom's, always receive compliments dress. It's by go to for a hot, summer day - I'm a big fan of guaranteed comfort & guaranteed compliments, you know? 

In other exciting summer news, 3 of my 4 herbs have sprouted and my tomato plants look great (though little yet)! And the farmer's market starts this weekend:-)

Final thoughts for the evening, if you haven't read Keiko and Gala's posts about body image and blogging, you should check them out:
Keiko: On Body Image
Gala: Blogger Beautiful?...
Gala: Body Pressure...

my turn

Ok, time to play catch up. Here are some more outfits from my mini hiatus.

First up is another version of my Free People shirt, remember the one with the birdies? When I saw this one (also on sale, thank you Macy's!) I kind of knew I had to get it.

I've pretty much been rocking this hairstyle every day that I don't wash my hair, which I probably embarrassingly more often than it should be. I always wanted to be one of those cool girls who wore a bun on top of her head, and my hair is finally long enough to be one! Goal accomplished. One step closer to self actualization.

(sorry about my messiness of my room! I can't get it together and be clean...not that close to self-actualization after all...)

Next is an outfit made possibly by the wonderfulness of H&M. Maxi skirt + scarf = easy summer weekend outfit! I've been wearing this skirt a lot. I can get away with it at work and it's so easy on the weekend, I can't help myself!

I hope everyone who might be reading this is having a great summer so far, involving lots of lovely summer clothes and enjoying of sunshine. I certainly am enjoying the easy-going nature of summer clothes, and finally getting used to the fact that I just can't wear layers in Florida heat. I'm also enjoying silly summer TV shows, So You Think You Can Dance, anyone??

kind of a long time ago

Good things

-women's leadership conference with my mom

-walk to celebrate world refugee day this morning

No so good thing
-it rained on my strawberry picking plans! didn't the weather know that today was a particularly bad day to rain?

No story for this outfit, just something I wore sometime in the last couple of months when I wasn't blogging much. 

fancy pantsy

Hi blog! Miss me? I missed you. I did some stuff while I was neglecting you though, and that was fun. I went to a wedding and I got to dress up. Wanna see? Ok!