Tag: H&M

January 23, 2018 – Boyfriend Jeans Instead Of A Boyfriend (OOTD #208)

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If you had asked me this time last year if there’s anyway I could’ve seen myself with short brown hair, wearing a motorcycle jacket and boyfriend jeans, I’m not sure I would have believed you.

I guess a large part of my disbelief would have come from the hair – I think the Meilin of January 2017 would have liked to believe she could be long-haired and blonde forever.  It was such a major part of how I defined myself that I even wrote one of my college application essays on it.

I’m not actually blonde though – I’m a brunette – and eventually, the bleach got to be too much for my poor hair follicles. We’ll see how long until I start assaulting my scalp with chemicals again, but for now, the plan is to let my hair rest and grow out for a while.

Just as surprising to my 2017 self would have been the outfit though. Boyfriend jeans and  a motorcycle jacket? Not that I would have had anything against something edgier like that – my little high school emo self was definitely into anything that made me look like a scary teenager – but it was always still within a very feminine vein.

This outfit is much more tomboyish than I ever would have seen myself in before – and I think that’s actually a pretty great thing! I guess this is still more an observation than a passage of judgment, but regardless, I think trying out new styles and expanding on one’s fashion repertoire is always a healthy thing to do.

It’s definitely been for me getting to explore and investigate into this new boyish kind of style that I hadn’t really considered myself open to before. More options the better, right?

Thanks for reading, and I’ll see you in the next one! Don’t forget to check me out on Pinterest, Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and Tumblr! For business inquiries, shoot me an email at lensembledujour@gmail.com!

Jacket: Hollister

Top: H&M

Jeans: American Eagle

January 10, 2018 – Shorts In The Winter (OOTD #198)

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Well, I was praying for warmer days, and we sure got them.

Kentucky is the strangest state I’ve ever seen in terms of winter weather – you can have one day that’s 15 degrees and freezing, and the following day will be sunny with a high of 75. It’s not so much the 15 degree cold or 75 degree heat that bothers me – it’s that they follow one after the other. It just doesn’t feel natural, you know?

If you’d told me in mid-December when I was still at Notre Dame with its sub-zero temperatures and two feet of snow that I was going to be standing in front of my garage door in on January 10th in denim shorts, there’s no way I would have believed you.

Here I am though – shorts in January. The ice caps are melting and the polar bears are dying, but at least I got a little more sun than usual in a winter month.

I’m probably going to need to look back on these photos in a few weeks when I’m back in the frozen, sunless cornfields of Northern Indiana to motivate myself to make it through to the spring. Even my darkness-loving, cold-weather butt can get tired of the Midwest winter. For as weird as they are, the rare warm winter day we get in Kentucky can actually be a welcome reprieve from the cold.

Thanks for reading, and I’ll see you in the next one! Don’t forget to check me out on Pinterest, Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and Tumblr! For business inquiries, shoot me an email at lensembledujour@gmail.com!

Sweater: H&M

Shorts: American Eagle

December 15, 2017 – A Long Day (OOTD #183)

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Christmas Outfits Challenge 2017: Day 13

Fun fact: by the time these photos were taken at about 4 in the afternoon on December 15, I had been up for over 24 hours.

Well, nearly. See, it all started at 6 AM, December 14. Why was I up that early, you ask? I had my final final, that morning at 8 AM, and I wanted to get up early enough so that I could relax (sort of), have some coffee, and get ready before I made the ten minute walk to the building where my exam was held.

This was the final I was most worried about too – Theology. I had an A in the class, but I needed an 87 on the final to keep that grade, so I needed to make sure I actually did well. Thankfully, the exam went well (well enough… I forgot to memorize the quotes I was supposed to by Nestorius and Cyril, but…y’know – you can’t win them all), and by 10 AM, I was finished with my first semester of college.

Then, I managed to sneak in an hour-long nap in my room before my roommates came in and we had to clean up our dorm before we left.

After that…well, I didn’t do much. I really had no reason to be awake – I had a bit of remaining work to do, I guess, and some blogging to work on, but I probably should’ve napped so I could be up in time for my 4 AM bus to Midway Airport.

Should’ve. Instead, I stayed up all night with some of my friends were also waiting to catch buses to catch plains that Saturday after classes ended. It was kind-of a weird night…

Anyway, I wound up on that 4AM bus with only one hour of sleep under my belt. I managed to get another hour of sleep whilst on that 4AM bus, and by 6AM-ish, I was sitting at my gate at Midway Airport. My plane, though, didn’t leave until 9AM, so I just kind-of sat there bleary-eyed for three hours watching the people go by and thinking about how I wanted to nap but I didn’t really want to in the middle of an airport.

Time-skip ahead a few hours, and I was standing in front of my grandmother’s house in Louisville at 4PM taking my photos with only three hours of sleep over the course of 34 hours – one hour after my Theo final, one hour on the 4AM bus to Midway, and one hour on the plane from Chicago to Louisville.

It’s great being home though, and it’s great being done with my first semester of school. It was worth a very long day of being awake.

Thanks for reading, and I’ll see you in the next one with more updates on my life as an idiot college student. Don’t forget to check me out on Pinterest, Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and Tumblr! For business inquiries, shoot me an email at lensembledujour@gmail.com!

Jacket: H&M

Shirt: Forever21

Turtleneck: The LOFT

Pants: American Eagle

Boots: LL Bean

December 8, 2017 – December Splendor (OOTD #178)

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Christmas Outfits Challenge 2017: Day 7

Pardon the lack of a blog yesterday – finals and all, you know?

Actually, in truth, finals have not been the most pressing thing on my mind recently – I mean, sure, they’re a big deal and such and maybe I’m blowing them off more than I should, but I’ve been pretty distracted by this recent snowfall we’ve gotten.

It’s so weird – weather never distracts me like this. I guess I’ve also never had so much pretty snow in the weeks leading up to Christmas; it’s always too hot still in Kentucky in early December. This whole “white Christmas” thing is a foreign concept to me, but one that I’m happily adapting to.

Maybe part of it is just how pretty my school is. Like, with the exception of a couple of ugly buildings on North Quad that look like an 80’s attempt to be modern, Notre Dame’s just a really architecturally interesting school, and the snow just accentuates that, falling on the curves and angles of the buildings in such a way that it looks like a purposeful accent – a highlight, if you will. There’s a reason that like, half the photos of this blog are just me standing in random doorways.

Another part of it (me being distracted, that is) is that I’m just looking for ways to keep myself from studying for my finals because I don’t want to accept that to the possibility that they could actually cause my grades to fall at this point in the year…but I’m pretty sure that’s not a thing. Consequences? What consequences?

Thankfully, all I’ve got left though is Theology tomorrow morning, and then it’s all over. Then there’s packing, and returning my textbooks, and doing laundry, and cleaning the rooms, and going to bed at a decent-enough time so that I can wake up in time for a 4am bus to Midway – okay, so maybe it’s not over. Is it ever?

Anyway, wish me luck on my Theology exam tomorrow, or, if you’re feeling extra religious, pray for me. Maybe if I go to the basilica tonight I’ll earn some extra brownie points with God that he can then transfer to my exam.

Because if Theology has taught me anything, that’s exactly how God and Christianity operate!

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

Sweater: H&M

Skirt: River Island

November 30, 2017 – On the First Day of Christmas (OOTD #172)

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The Christmas season is finally here!

Well, according to me, anyway. I suppose the Catholic church may have a different definition of the advent season, and the big box stores seem to think Christmas begins as early as mid-October (seriously, I swear, while I was looking for Halloween decorations this year at Target, I was already coming across Christmas lights), but for me, Christmas begins on the last day of November.

I’m not really sure how I came up with the last day of November as the first day I start dressing for Christmas – it’d make more sense that it be the first day of December, right?  It also doesn’t make sense because I’ve designated the day after Thanksgiving as when I first begin to listen to Christmas music, so the last of November isn’t even necessarily the day I first fully begin celebrating Christmas…

I wish I had some kooky story to tell you about some imaginary fantasy I had as a kid about why I had to wait until November 30 to break out my Christmas sweaters and the red and green color combinations, but I have nothing. This arbitrary, self-imposed rule has been like this for years now, though – on November 30, I start dressing for Christmas.

And it’s my goal, from now until December 25, to continue dressing in Christmas outfits. Call it an outfit challenge. How many ways can I wear the red and green pieces in my closet? How many hours can I go in my wool Abercrombie Christmas sweater before I’m trying to itch off my pores? Looks like now’s the time to find out.

If you’re still looking for a kooky Christmas story though, I do have one about how, in first grade, I went on a loud tirade in the middle of our Christmas party about how Santa wasn’t real, and that my classmates were stupid to believe in him. I was obnoxious enough that my teacher had to pull me aside to tell me to shut up. Interestingly, though the Santa illusion didn’t last long for me, the concept of flying reindeer was significantly less unbelievable to my childhood self. I’m pretty sure wasn’t until years after my Santa realization that I  realized that flying reindeer were fake too.

To be fair, I’ve never seen a reindeer before in my life. How can I be sure they don’t really fly?

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

Jacket: Forever21

Sweater: H&M

Pants: Banana Republic

November 16, 2017 – No Clever Title Today, Please Try Again Tomorrow (OOTD #161)

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Today’s blog is coming to you from the back of my friend’s car as I head into Chicago to catch a flight from Midway back to Lexington for Thanksgiving.

It’s been a long two days of class. Monday, I had to get up early to register myself for classes for next semester, and Tuesday, I had a huge term paper due in my history class. Admittedly, that’s less than I usually have to do, but for some reason, it just felt like a lot.

It’s all good though, because like I said, I’m heading home tonight. And this time, I’ve got a regular ticket, so there should be no chances of me getting caught in the Atlanta airport for two days because I flew standby.

I do rather like to fly, though. I hate how expensive everything is in airports, but otherwise, they’re really nice places as long as you’re not rushing about. I think 75% of my airport experiences have been highly positive – the only two distinctive times I can remember not enjoying myself in an airport were the ATL fiasco I just mentioned and once, when my family and I were flying through Orlando and we had like 10 minutes to sprint across the airport to catch a flight.

Hopefully though, everything goes smoothly with this one. I figure if I’ve managed to take the Greyhound by myself, flying through Midway should be a breeze.

Who knows, maybe I’ll even get lucky and get bumped to first class like what happened on my outgoing flight to London from Detroit this summer. Probably not since it’s Thanksgiving weekend and the airport is bound to be somewhat busy, even though it’s late, but I can dream.

Anyway, please enjoy this super glamorous shot of the wind catching my hair in an odd way as I try to push up my sunglasses. I’m a beauty.

Skirt: The LOFT

Sweater: H&M

November 7, 2017 – RIP My Theology Grade (#153)

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Alright, so context: at Notre Dame, there’s this superstition that if you walk on the grass of God Quad, you’ll fail your freshman theology class.

What’s God Quad? It’s this area of grass in the middle of campus, right in front of the Golden Dome and the Basilica. It’s a bit sketchy about what the exact boundaries are, some people (but not all) posit that the rule doesn’t apply on game Saturdays, and no one really knows if the rule still applies to theology grades beyond your freshman year. Still, though the rules regarding the rule are kind of hazy, the fact still stands that there is a rule that no one – not students, not professors, not even visitors – step on the God Quad grass.

So naturally, I just had to go romping all around God Quad for this set of photos.

In my defense, I never really intended to step on the grass;  my photographer actually did it first. I felt sort of badly about what happened – so I was standing there on the sidewalk, posing stupidly as I do, and, in order to get a better shot, she stepped back onto the forbidden God Quad grass.

I believe I actually shouted a bit in shock when her foot landed upon the ground, I was that shaken that she was willing to break social convention for me. And so, I figured that if she was going to break the God Quad rule, I ought to do it with her – a sort of solidarity in rebellion, you know?

Ah yes, the rebellion of being a college kid at a prestigious Catholic university walking on the grass…put me up there with Che Guevara and George Washington. I’m headed for the history books, guys. Remember my name.

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

Sweater: H&M

Scarf: Coach

Pants: The LOFT

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October 24, 2017 – On Trend (OOTD #143)

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Look and me – grey hair cut into a lob, oversized cardigan, crop top, boyfriend jeans…just make me Instagram famous already; my ability to follow trends deserves it.

If that painfully millennial statement didn’t make you run away cringing, then congrats! Here’s your medal.

(In all actuality, I don’t consider myself a millennial – I believe I fall more under the definition of Generation Z, as I have been using the Internet since a young age, and it has almost always been a large component of my life. That’s the key component that distinguishes millennials from Generation Z, and it kind of peeves me to be lumped in with millennials…but that’s a rant for another blog).

Anyway, I am, admittedly, quite a fan of the Fall 2017 trends. It was no secret that Summer 2017 didn’t particularly impress me – firstly, because summer fashion never impresses me because it tends to rely upon pieces that are worn alone, rather than intelligent layering that winter and fall fashion revolves around, and secondly, because I felt like it had nothing new to offer. Off-the-shoulder tops and high-waisted denim shorts have been in style since Summer 2016; Summer 2017 just seemed like a re-hash of old trends we had seen before (and seen very recently).

But oversized sweaters combined with oversized pants – now that’s something that’s a little more unique. And also, way more comfortable than tight skinny jeans! It’s all very 90s, which is a decade that’s been trending for like, four years, making me think it’s possibly on its way out, but in the meantime, I’m enjoying it. I feel like skinny jeans have consistently been in-style since I was about 11 (I don’t believe I owned any other fit of jeans from 6th grade to senior year), so it’s refreshing to see something new.

I was just recently in a Forever21, which, to me, is the epitome of trendy fashion, and for the first time in a while, I actually liked a good deal of the things I saw. Forever21 clothes are all pretty cheap, meaning they’re really good at churning out pieces as soon as the Instagram influencers and fashion magazines declare something to be in style. They also tend to lean trashy and juvenile, but I saw less of that there than usual.

I’m optimistic for this winter’s fashion scene. I like the 60s and 90s influence we’re currently seeing, as I’m always here for vintage fashion, and I think it’s quite possible I could go a few months without complaining about the state of the fashion industry. Because you know, I, a teenager with no connections to the fashion industry and no educational background in fashion, am the de facto authority on what should and shouldn’t be trendy.

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

Sweater: Forever21

Top: H&M (thrifted)

Jeans: American Eagle

October 13, 2017 – Friday the 13th (OOTD #135)

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**spOoKy vibes**

It’s not even a spooky outfit here – I left my glittery spider tights and my ghost socks at home – but it was a spooky day.

What made it spooky, you ask? I took a Greyhound from South Bend to Dayton, Ohio, and that was quite creepy. Not necessarily the worst experience of my life, but um…far from great.

I’m no stranger to public transport, but I’m no connoisseur either – I am, you’ll remember, from Kentucky, and we don’t exactly have any subways or trains here. Plenty of horses, but sadly, you can’t just hop onto one of those and ride off to the mall.

Thus, pretty much all of the transport you do in KY is by car, which, for me, a car-less individual who is a pretty lousy driver at any rate, is far from ideal. I do believe Lexington has a public bus system, but I’ve yet to meet anyone who’s actually used it.

The entirety of my experience riding public buses comes from the school bus, which I suffered on regularly from age 11 to age 17, a bus or two from North Jersey into NYC, and a tour bus in Beijing. A Greyhound was an entirely new experience for me – all I’d heard about them came from Billy Joel’s lyric “taking a Greyhound / on the Hudson River Line” in “New York State of Mind,” and the La La Land lyric “I left him at a Greyhound station / west of Santa Fe” from “Another Day of Sun.”

And how was the experience? Ehhhh…it might have been better if the driver weren’t the rudest person I’d met in my life (though I can’t blame him, a job as a Greyhound driver must suck), and if I’d not sat next to an extremely obese woman for the first leg of the journey (though I can’t blame her either, it’s not her fault I chose to sit next her), but all in all – it was alright. I napped. I watched Treehouse of Horror episodes. I looked at memes on Twitter. It was pretty dull and the only sketchy thing that happened was that one time that the bus driver threatened to kick this one guy off the bus for…reasons? I don’t really know actually; I was pretty engrossed in Treehouse of Horror VI.

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

Jacket sweater shrug thing: Forever21

Top: H&M

Bralette: Aerie

Jeans; Abercrombie

September 13, 2017 – My Pants Story (OOTD #111)

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Pardon the tragically late post today – I just woke up from a three-hour nap.

I knew I needed one, but I definitely didn’t intend for it to go on so long. I had pulled a late night the night before, so I had every intent of taking an hour-long snooze after classes let up. Then one hour rolled into two…and two into three…you get the picture.

I guess I should’ve set an alarm, but it’s okay – for once in my time here in college, I’m not super bogged down with homework. I mean,  I am, but less so than I have been for weeks. I fee like this is probably some kind of “calm before the storm” experience…but I don’t know what kind of storm to expect or when to expect it.

Good thing I have this totally not flimsy scarf to protect me!

Wednesday’s outfit was one of those ones that I did not plan out the night before, and outfits like that tend to be hit-or-miss. This one, I feel, is a hit. It might be a little top-heavy with all the red, but I don’t think it’s too bad. There’s also the fact that I’m wearing my most flattering pair of jeans – I think these high-waisted dark-wash skinnies have the ability to make anything I wear instantly more chic, whether it actually is or not.

There in high school, I was more of leggings kind of a person, but now in college, I think I may just transition back into a jeans person for the first time in years. Perhaps the first time ever, actually – I hated to wear jeans as a kid, growing up. I thought they were stiff and never breathed well, so I had a phase from about 1st grade to 3rd grade where I refused to wear jeans. In fact, I basically refused to wear anything that wasn’t a skort from the Children’s Place.

Then, in middle school, the leggings-as-pants trend kicked in, but it was against my school’s dress code – you weren’t even allowed to wear yoga pants, not even the bootcut ones. At that point, I started wearing skinny jeans from Hollister and Abercrombie, and while they sort-of fell out of use in high school when I realized the joys of leggings, I mostly haven’t looked back.

And, I think I may have arrived at the inception of a new era of Meilin’s pants-wearing history – the revival of the jean. The fact is, jeans always look classier than leggings, and they’ve gotten to the point now with all the spandex in them that they’re almost as comfortable as leggings. Basically, jeggings have taken over the market – though I doubt anyone would call them that. Whenever I think of “jeggings” I usually have war flashbacks to a pair of Justice “jeggings” I had in fifth grade that didn’t even have real pockets, just printed-on ones. I do believe that’s what they call a crime aganist fashion.

Anyway,  I should never be allowed to take three-hour naps in the middle of the afternoon. I just used “inception of a new era of Meilin’s pants-wearing history” in a sentence. Something tells me none of my professors would be impressed.

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

Scarf: Stolen from my mother’s closet (Mom, if you’re reading this, I demand $1,000 paid in cash or you’re never seeing it again)

Jacket: Forever21

Shirt: H&M

Jeans: Hollister