Tag: forever21

October 4, 2018 – Oldie Goldies (OOTD #387)

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Here’s an outfit made of clothing I’ve owned for four years or more.

And no, it wasn’t on purpose — this wasn’t some kind of self-imposed challenge to make an outfit out of older clothing. In fact, I didn’t notice that this outfit was made of exclusively older clothing until I started writing this blog.

Let’s see, I think pretty much all of these pieces — with the exception of the leggings — were purchased sometime in my freshman or sophomore year of high school. The leggings might actually be older: perhaps from eighth grade. One of the few perks of having not grown an inch since middle school — I never throw away clothes because I outgrew them.

The downside of not growing since middle school is, of course, I still look sort of like a middle schooler.

It’s interesting though, because I’m pretty sure I wouldn’t have put these pieces together in this way back in middle school/early high school when I first got them. For one, leggings were against dress code at my middle school, so that never would have happened unless I wanted to get yelled at by my 8th grade history teacher.

But more importantly, four-five years ago, my style was just different. I wore a lot of skater skirts, infinity scarves, and utility jackets. That’s not to say I don’t still wear those things, but not really together any more. Together, they make me look like I stepped right out of 2014 — this outfit is a pretty good example of that. I think I even recognized in the blog I wrote that I looked like a (short) Hot Topic model from 2014.

I’ve never really had this problem before, but I’m finding I have to be more and more careful that my outfits don’t look like something from 2014. The differences between 2014 and 2018 fashion are subtle — and many 2014 pieces can still be worn in 2018 — but I have be cognizant of what looks contemporary, and what looks ever-so-slightly dated.

Honestly, I think being slightly dated is even worse than being completely out of style. When you’re out of style, you’ve at least committed to a look. When you’re dated, you’re clearly trying to be contemporary, but you’ve missed the mark.

I’m excited for when 2014 fashion is old enough to look vintage. The day my child goes to decade day at school wearing an infinity scarf, leggings, and riding boots, I’ll know I’ve made it.

That’s about it for today. Thanks for reading, and I’ll see you in the next one with more updates on my life at home at Notre Dame. Don’t forget to check me out on Pinterest, Instagram, Facebook, Bloglovin, Twitter, and Tumblr! For business inquiries, shoot me an email at lensembledujour@gmail.com!

Jacket: Banana Republic

Turtleneck: Forever21

Leggings: The LOFT

October 3, 2018 – We All Fall Down (OOTD #386)

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It doesn’t get much more fall than this.

Fall in the Midwest is actually quite lovely — it’s everything I always wanted fall to be when I lived in the South, when all we got were a few cool days usually followed by an intense heat wave that would turn all the leaves brown instead of orange. Meanwhile, winter in the South (or at least, the part of the South I’m from) is preferable to the winters we get here South Bend, but thankfully, I have winter break to go home and keep away from the perpetual snowstorm that is December-January in Northern Indiana.

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just some dead stuff on the ground

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Fall in South Bend usually means taking as many pictures with trees as possible. It’s not like there’re necessarily that many other interesting things to use as backgrounds — and we all know (or at least, I know) I use certain locations a little more than I probably should.

I live in a boring place, what can I say? I love my school, but it feels small at times — which is a pretty far cry from when I began here, and it felt massive. I suppose I’ve just gotten taller, or something.

Speaking of looking taller, I wrote a blog the other day about my preferred pose to make my legs look longer. There are some prime examples of that pose here in this post, especially the very first one at the top. I don’t pretend to be anything that my five foot tall-self (except for when I’m pretending to be a five foot one), but I do like to play with the perspective of different shots in order to find the most flattering angle. I may look like a 12 year-old boy in person, but I don’t need to in my pictures.

Just kidding. 12 year-old boys are probably taller than me.

That’s about it for today. Thanks for reading, and I’ll see you in the next one with more updates on my life at home at Notre Dame. Don’t forget to check me out on Pinterest, Instagram, Facebook, Bloglovin, Twitter, and Tumblr! For business inquiries, shoot me an email at lensembledujour@gmail.com!

Checkered top: J. Crew

Sweater: Forever21

Shorts: Forever21

Glasses: Discountglasses.com

October 1, 2018 – Recipe for Style (OOTD #385)

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Shhh…I know it’s a corny title. Just hear me out.

I’ve mentioned before that I have a formula for fashion on days when I don’t want to be creative with my outfits. The days where I roll out of bed 10 minutes before class starts, the days where I feel sick, or the days I’m just too lazy to come up with anything better — I come back to this outfit formula.

Here’s what it is: pair one (1) pair of fitted pants or leggings with one (1) loose-fitting top, such as a sweater. Top with one (1) jacket and two (2) simple black booties.

The silhouette is flattering, I don’t have to worry about shaving my legs, and I always know I’ll look fashionable — even if not innovative. It’s basic, but classic, and it works.

With this particular outfit, I even added a belt. That’s the thing with the formula — it also lends itself well to accessorizing. Jewelry, scarves, belts all look good because the silhouette of the outfit itself is so simple.

I’d recommend come up with their own outfit formula for days when they don’t feel like getting dressed up. It doesn’t have to be my formula, but it’s got to be something you’re comfortable with throwing together on those days when you can’t be bothered to stand in front of your closet contemplating what to wear. The worst is when you’re on a time crunch, and none of the pieces you’re combing seem to look good together. That’s where a formula comes in.

When back when I was a middle schooler, I had a formula. Back then, it was a floral skirt, a lacy camisole, and a cardigan, preferably from Hollister or Abercrombie. Sometimes I’d also wear Uggs and put my hair in a Snooki bump. It was a look.

The point? Being formulaic isn’t always bad, as long as you do it in moderation.

That’s about it for today. Thanks for reading, and I’ll see you in the next one with more updates on my life at home at Notre Dame. Don’t forget to check me out on Pinterest, Instagram, Facebook, Bloglovin, Twitter, and Tumblr! For business inquiries, shoot me an email at lensembledujour@gmail.com!

Jacket: Thrifted

Top: Forever21

Pants: Banana Republic

September 28, 2018 – Overdress (in a T-Shirt) [OOTD #383]

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I love this shirt.

It says “Overdress” in huge bold letters, but get this — it’s a t-shirt. T-shirts aren’t dressy. You can’t be overdressed in a t-shirt. In fact, you’re more likely to be underdressed.

But it’s the silly irony of a shirt that proclaims the importance of overdressing while simultaneously being an inherently casual piece that I so love. I don’t know if anyone else loves it. I don’t know if people who see me wearing it think that it’s funny that a t-shirt would say “Overdress” or if they just think it’s stupid. I like it though.

You know what else I like? (This transition, which I seem to use a lot on this blog?)

Fridays. Interestingly, this outfit from September 28 was also a Friday, the same day as the one that I’m publishing it on a month later on November 2. I don’t know if I like Fridays enough to screen print it it on a t-shirt (or write an 2011 annoying song about it), but maybe enough to name a restaurant after it with really good chicken wings.

IMG_6728

On Fridays, I only have one class, which is only 50 minutes long and which meets late enough in the morning, allowing me to sleep in. Today, I had an exam, which was a little unfortunate, but after that, the rest of the day is free for relaxing and being a boring potato of a human being. Maybe I’ll do some work. No Friday night is complete without it.

That’s about it for today. Thanks for reading, and I’ll see you in the next one with more updates on my life at home at Notre Dame. Don’t forget to check me out on Pinterest, Instagram, Facebook, Bloglovin, Twitter, and Tumblr! For business inquiries, shoot me an email at lensembledujour@gmail.com!

Jacket: Lilly Pulitzer (thrifted)

Top: Forever21

Pants: 

September 20, 2018 – Stairway to Heaven (OOTD #380)

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The Main Building at Notre Dame = Heaven, right? So naturally, this is the Stairway to Heaven.

Actually, fun fact — popular lore at Notre Dame dictates that if you walk up the front steps of Notre Dame’s Main Building (the one with the golden dome)  as an undergraduate, you won’t graduate in four years. However, these aren’t the front steps — they’re part of a smaller side staircase. My degree is safe, at least for now.

The other bit of popular superstition is that you can’t walk on the grass of God Quad, or else you’ll fail your freshman Theology class — joke’s on them though, because I definitely stepped on the grass of God Quad many times, and I still got an A in that class. I am in a second Theo course now, though, so I’m definitely not going to continue to test my luck. Joke’s on me now.

The days are getting shorter, and I’m finding it more and more beneficial to try to get my photos in in the afternoon rather than the evening. The afternoon sun can be a bit harsh, as you can see here, but the evening sun is dying earlier and earlier. On nights where I can’t get anyone to do pictures for me until 7:00pm at night, that proves to be quite the problem.

I’ve said this before, I’ll say it again — I look forward to the day when I can live with a friend whom I can rely on to do pictures for me. My roommates are awesome this year, don’t get me wrong, but asking someone to go out of their way to take pictures of me just seems wrong.

I usually catch people by asking them to get a meal with me first. Then, when they can’t run, I ask them to do pictures for me really quick. Works every time.

That’s about it for today. Thanks for reading, and I’ll see you in the next one with more updates on my life at home at Notre Dame. Don’t forget to check me out on Pinterest, Instagram, Facebook, Bloglovin, Twitter, and Tumblr! For business inquiries, shoot me an email at lensembledujour@gmail.com!

Top: Forever21

Skirt: Forever21

September 18, 2018 – Hawaiian Vacation Witch (OOTD #378)

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Get ready, because this is my spookiest Halloween costume!

What? You’re telling me this isn’t in any way spooky or costume-like?

Yeah, I guess you’re probably right. This is just me in a Hawaiian shirt and a black sunhat. Not spooky. But maybe 21st century witches just aren’t spooky like we think of them. That’s probably how they disguise themselves.

You know what is spooky, though?

Asking people to take pictures for my blog. In fact, it’s so spooky, I didn’t even ask anyone to do them for me for this outfit, I just did them myself.

I didn’t buy my Apple Watch so that I could take pictures — in fact, I didn’t even know that it could do that until spring of this year– but I am so glad that it does. Seriously, the remote feature on my watch that connects to my phone has been one of the single most useful features.

Maybe that’s the kind of witchcraft I do — I can take pictures on my phone without actually touching my phone. Break out the pitchforks and the Puritan Bibles and put me on trial already.

That’s about it for today. Thanks for reading, and I’ll see you in the next one with more updates on my life at home at Notre Dame. Don’t forget to check me out on Pinterest, Instagram, Facebook, Bloglovin, Twitter, and Tumblr! For business inquiries, shoot me an email at lensembledujour@gmail.com!

Top: thrifted

Skirt: Zara

Hat: Forever21

September 13, 2018 – The Secret Garden (OOTD #374)

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It still counts as secret if most people knew it existed, but I didn’t know about it for a whole year, right?

This little spot (which I’ve actually included in a blog before!) is the courtyard garden in the Hayes-Healey building. It’s really cute — and it’s only accessible from within the building, which adds to the mysterious quality. Seriously, like I said, I didn’t even know it existed for 99% of my freshman year. I’d heard whispers of a garden in the mathematics building, but since I had no math classes (shout-out to my AP Calculus teachers in high school, who allowed me to get a 5 and not take any math in college), I never had a reason to go and look.

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the ivy leagues are overrated

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Finally, at the end of my freshman year, some friends and I were trying to get some cute group pictures before summer break, and someone suggested the Hayes-Healey garden. It was actually all locked up when we tried to go, but we ended up getting some pictures with the giant globe in the building — another feature I never knew Notre Dame had.

I like how Notre Dame — a school that is notably not a part of the Ivy Leagues — has a hidden ivy garden. As the guy from the Incredibles would say, “Coincidence? I think not!”

It’s actually probably a total coincidence. The Ivy Leagues are overrated anyway — it’s not like Columbia was my dream or anything…

I’m at a total loss for how to end this blog today, so I Googled a joke for you — “How many Harvard students does it take to change a lightbulb?”

“One. He holds the lightbulb still, and the whole world revolves around him.”

That’s about it for today. Thanks for reading, and I’ll see you in the next one with more updates on my life at home at Notre Dame. Don’t forget to check me out on Pinterest, Instagram, Facebook, Bloglovin, Twitter, and Tumblr! For business inquiries, shoot me an email at lensembledujour@gmail.com!

Top: Free People

Jacket: Forever21

Skirt: J. Crew (thrifted)

September 10, 2018 – In Retrospect (OOTD #371)

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My apologies, it seems like it’s been nine days since my last blog post.

I’m not sure what the longest I’ve gone without writing a blog here is, but nine days probably ranks in the top ten. Whoops.

It’s been absolutely insane in my life since October 3, when I last posted — hence the nine day break from writing. While I generally try to get in a blog post regardless of how busy I am, as I find it adds a nice bit of consistency (as well as allows me to do a bit of reflection), I just could not find the time to do any writing these last several days.

What have I been up to? Midterms season, for one. And unfortunately, they’re not entirely done — I’ve got several exams following fall break, which means they’re going to haunt me this whole week while I’m trying to relax. To be honest, I’d rather a ghost haunt me, in true Halloween fashion, than exams. I feel like an undead soul would be much less scary.

On a more optimistic (kinda?) note, I’ve also been keeping super busy with study abroad applications. I’m submitting applications for Paris, France; Geneva, Switzerland; and Kigali, Rwanda. I have absolutely no clue as of yet which of these programs will accept me, and which one I would most like to do. I don’t even know which semester I’ll go abroad, or if I’ll try to do both.

Heck, I don’t even know what I’m doing tomorrow, my first day of fall break. Hopefully sleeping in a little?

I regret a little falling so behind on these blogs, because now the content I’m writing about here (my life as of October 12), is completely different from what went was going on in my life on September 10. I don’t even know what was really going on for me on September 10. Did I have exams? Was busy with activities? I really don’t know; I’ve already forgotten. I guess it wasn’t a very important day.

At any rate, the fact is, it’s fall break now, and I should hopefully be able to keep up my blogging schedule a little better. Fingers crossed that you see me here writing again tomorrow.

That’s about it for today. Thanks for reading, and I’ll see you in the next one with more updates on my life at home at Notre Dame. Don’t forget to check me out on Pinterest, Instagram, Facebook, Bloglovin, Twitter, and Tumblr! For business inquiries, shoot me an email at lensembledujour@gmail.com!

September 9, 2018 – Travel Travesty (OOTD #370)

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For part one of my September Chicago adventures, click here.

Previously, on L’ensemble du jour: Amanda and I went into Chicago to see a Fall Out Boy concert, and it was a pretty good day. We didn’t get lost, didn’t encounter any horrific traffic, and we got to see all tourist-y spots we wanted to. As travels go, it was about as struggle-free as an adventure could be.

So the next day, we woke up at our AirBnB and prepared to depart. We were on a slight time crunch, as I had a mandatory attendance class (plant class, actually, which I discuss here) that met at 1:00PM, and I needed to be back for it. So by 9:30AM, we were all set to go. We left the keys on the coffee table, and walked out to the car.

This, of course, is where everything fell apart.

First, the car door wouldn’t open. Upon examining the key fob, we came to the conclusion that it must be out of battery, and thus, it wouldn’t open the electronic lock. Okay, whatever, we’d just take out the physical key and start the car that way, right? Engineers plan for these sorts of emergencies; there’s no way a dead car key battery should stop a person from starting a car.

Well, apparently, the engineers of the Toyota Prius did not plan for this sort of emergency. The physical key let us open the door and get inside, but it would not allow us to start the car. After frantically consulting Google, the manual, and Amanda’s parents (multiple times), we realized that the only solution would be to get a new battery for the key.

Fine. So we walk down to the nearest convenience store, buy the battery and some screwdrivers, and scuttle back to the Prius. By now, we’ve wasted over an hour, and I’m wondering whether I could actually make my plant class. But optimistically, I figured the new car key battery would work, and that we’d be fine. It’d be a little tight, and we wouldn’t be able to get breakfast on our way home like we’d hoped, but at least I’d make it back on time.

Except, of course, the new battery did not solve our problems. The only new development after we replaced the battery was that now, instead of dead silence when we tried to start the car, the dreaded “check engine” light dinged on.

With few options left, Amanda decided to try calling a mechanic to jump the car. We had to wait an hour for him to come (during which time I took these photos in the neighborhood), but finally, like the Messiah, he came to deliver us from our suffering. For whatever reason, jumping the car worked, and while neither Amanda nor I could think of a reason why the car battery had died, or what that had to do with the dead key fob, neither of us really cared. Crossing our fingers that the car wouldn’t decide to die again while we were on the highway, we sped off back to Notre Dame.

By the time I got back to campus, I had never before been so glad to see the stupid Golden Dome and the Jesus statue on God Quad. I missed my botany class, but after frantically emailing my professor, she agreed to let me make up the class. In celebration, I took these photos on God Quad, just to prove that I made it back.

In conclusion, if you have uncharacteristically good luck for part of your travels, don’t expect to have the same good luck for the rest of it. In fact, expect to have bad luck — life likes to balance itself out that way. Like the time I got first class on my flight to London and then got trapped in Atlanta for two days on my flight home, no adventure is complete without a mild disaster. That’s what makes it an adventure.

That’s about it for today. Thanks for reading, and I’ll see you in the next one with more updates on my life at home at Notre Dame. Don’t forget to check me out on Pinterest, Instagram, Facebook, Bloglovin, Twitter, and Tumblr! For business inquiries, shoot me an email at lensembledujour@gmail.com!

Jacket: thrifted

Sweater: Forever21

Skirt: Forever21

September 7, 2018 – Plant Aunt (OOTD #368)

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Dang, I can’t believe that, with all of my plant-themed blogs, I haven’t used that title before.

I’ve mentioned my interests in plants many, many times before on this blog, but until this year, it hasn’t been much more than just that — a personal interest. This semester, though, I got into a one-credit course called Local Flora, which is about local plant life in Northern Indiana. It’s honestly been one of my favorite classes I’ve taken here at Notre Dame so far, and it has nothing at all to do with my actual academic concentration.

With this class, I get to go out and learn to identify plants. I’m admittedly not that great at it, but I’m learning. Because it has nothing to do with my major, I admittedly don’t devote as much time to doing the readings and homework as I should, or as I would like to.

In some alternate universe, maybe I became a botanist. Realistically though, my interest in plants will likely never amount to anything more than a garden and a collection of indoor potted plants.

I believe that there have to be a lot of alternate universe versions of me that went off and decided to pursue interests other than law and international relations. I hope that one of my alternate selves is an artist, and maybe another took Adv. Human Anatomy earlier than senior year and decided to become a doctor. Maybe one actually decided to pursue a career in the military, like she’d always sort-of considered.

At any rate, I’m here now — and maybe this version of me will end up becoming a famous blogger. I’ve still got my fingers crossed. The YouTube career I’d always wanted as a middle schooler is probably never going to happen, but I’ve still got this. Granted, I’ll never become famous if I continue to put off writing blogs until 9PM at night but…shhhh.

That’s about it for today. Thanks for reading, and I’ll see you in the next one with more updates on my life at home at Notre Dame. Don’t forget to check me out on Pinterest, Instagram, Facebook, Bloglovin, Twitter, and Tumblr! For business inquiries, shoot me an email at lensembledujour@gmail.com!

White Top: Altar’d State

Pink Top: Forever21

Jeans: American Eagle