A quickie before Mass. Being Team Basic in my Maggie dress today, with my new red Xero Cassie shoes:
Whew, the office mirror. Not one I ever get to to clean. Maybe I'll do that as a Father's Day gesture.
Anyway, away we go. A joyful feast and a happy Father's Day to all the dads!
LATER:
The dad in this house and I celebrated him by going out to lunch by ourselves, since nobody else got up to go to Mass with us (good thing the parish up the road has a hangove --- I mean, a LifeTeen Mass, on Sunday evenings). Then we came home, and I worked all afternoon on Sun poetry essays. The kids had presents for him at dinner, which was fun, and then I took Dora out for another walk to close the day.
On arriving home, I changed out of my Maggie dress into one of my bamboo swing dresses --- a long-sleeved one, actually.
Surprisingly, I was quite comfortable, even outside in the heat of the afternoon. I changed largely because I want to take care of my new dress, so that she stays nicer longer --- a thought brought to me by the condition of my Camellia, which has just sprung another little hole, just above one of the pockets. I intend to mend it, but I am noticing the overall wear and tear that dress has sustained, largely as a function of having been worn for a hundred days straight last year, then a lot ever since.
The color has faded a good bit, too, so much so that I'm considering a dye job. I'd like to turn her a slightly brighter dark indigo blue. Not . . . that I don't have a lot of clothes in this color family already . . . but I was thinking maybe a little brighter, tilting cobalt. I could either dye thread to match for mending, or have better success matching thread to the color for mending. I just think the dress would feel better with a refresh like that, and that a darker, more saturated color would wear better year-round. I'm thinking along the lines of this dress of Bronwen's, this kind of dark/bright indigo, a little brighter than the marine blue of the Maggie dress I wore this morning. I think this is the same dress --- I could do this look with Camellia in this color. Kind of makes me want to reclaim the big duster cardigan from the outbox, although I think it would still look like a bathrobe. Also, I do have blue bamboo swing dresses with which to achieve a similar effect. Anyway, more to come on the clothing-refurbishment front.
Meanwhile, I find I feel a little more careful than I used to when it comes to these dresses. Not Sierra: she seems to be indestructible. I really think if I buy any more wool dresses, they will be Sierra in other colors, because I just wear the heck out of that dress, yet she never looks worn. I do love my Maggie dress a lot. I love the silky feel, the scoop neck, the swing. I think she's going to be massively versatile over the long haul --- and really, I'd love her in more colors, too, because she's such a wearable dress. BUT I want to keep her looking fresh and nice as long as I can, because I do need a dress that looks nice enough for things other than schlumping around the house with the dog.
So I'm glad I have these bamboo dresses. I keep saying it, but I'm happy with how they perform. They're not as well made, but given how hard I wear them, in all kinds of situations, they have held up really wonderfully. They're light, airy, flowy, breathable, and comfortable. Again, I'm especially happy that I could wear long sleeves today --- I got kind of a lot of sun at the beach --- and not be sweltering. This bodes well for summer hikes when I don't want to get burned up. I would love to lay my hands on some slightly longer versions, once I'm buying again: the dress I'm wearing at this moment is a small, and my burgundy one is a medium, but I'm wondering if I could wear a large just as well, and get a little more length. That'll be something to think about when the "buy" window opens again. Until then, I want to bend my energies to mending and refreshing and getting good wear out of what I already have --- and now that I'm home again, wearing my way through my closet a little more. I'm struggling to stay on top of my daily record, but it doesn't take an accountant to see what clothing capital I am still not spending here.
FINAL THOUGHT: I mean, basically all I want out of life is 52 dresses in shades of blue.