Baby, it's cold outside. Sunny but cold. Cold for us, that is: 28F at the moment, with a high of 53 --- not really cold-cold, but not that warm.
The town Christmas parade happens this afternoon, culminating in the lighting of the Christmas tree on the courthouse square lawn. When we come back from taking the children to the airport, the town will look like fairyland, as it always does in the weeks before Christmas. Of course, it goes dark the day after New Year's, and that's a little depressing when you're trying to slog through to Epiphany, but that's the way the culture crumbles. Not that it was ever otherwise in these parts. Anyway, it's pretty, and I look forward to the lights every year.
Lights are up on houses around the neighborhood, too. Once Thanksgiving is over, even the more reticent among us begin to decorate in earnest. One nice thing about having Dora, as I remarked to my husband last night, is that she prompts us to take these late-night walks, which I at least would almost certainly not do if I didn't have a dog. As autumn gives way to winter, the sky becomes its own feature, brilliant with moon and stars which the empty trees don't obscure. And in the weeks running up to Christmas, the houses are lit --- tastefully with candles in all the windows, or exuberantly with strings of colored light everywhere and Santa and his reindeer inflated on the lawn. There's a house around the corner for us which has just swapped out two big inflatable turkeys (dressed as Pilgrims, in black buckled hats) for Santa in an inflatable helicopter whose rotors go around and around.
My plan is to do Advent in my usual more sober fashion, bringing out the decorations little by little. I broke down and bought some large-ish votive candle holders, three purple and one pink, because I'm sick of trying to figure out my candle situation every year. These I can just plunk tea lights into. But then I found some tall taper Advent candles, that I think somebody must have given me for Christmas last year, and I still have a lot of tall glass votives in purple and pink, bought from the dollar store also last year, so I guess I can fill up the whole house with Advent candles. I might put some in a front window and try to remember to light them after dark. I have also told my husband that if he sees a cheap artificial tree with lights, he is to buy it so that I can put it on the front porch. I'll keep it out there till Epiphany, if not till Candlemas, so help me. Somebody ought to do it. I can barely make it to Epiphany with the indoor tree, but a little lit-up outdoor tree --- why not?
Our houseguests will be here for the first Sunday in Advent, though they'll be out that evening with other friends. Still, they want to come to Mass with us, which is nice, and having them come means that I will do some more seriously preparatory housecleaning than I might have done otherwise. The only real things I have on for the week are one Sun essay and a speed-read of my MFA student's novel, which I've got to turn around to her pretty quickly, and want to get off my plate in any case, so as to focus on holiday preparations. I'm giving fervent thanks that I don't have to travel to pick up the college kids this year --- they haven't decided yet whether they're driving home, or flying, or just how they intend to get places, but that is their beer, not mine.
At the moment, I'm the only one up, having risen early to wash my hair and give it time to dry. I'm sitting in the kitchen, cozy in my green Sierra (which I slept in) and my Aran cardigan, drinking my coffee. Later I'll get dressed for Mass, but not yet.
I'm looking forward to my latest little spate of Poshmark purchases, since the holiday weekend delayed all shipping. The Japanese linen jumper/pinafore I ordered should arrive Tuesday, and I'm praying it fits. I did ask measurements, and I did measure myself, but I'm always anxious. I've struck out a couple of times with skirts that just wound up being too straight, despite the size listing, to fit my hips well. I'd really like for this dress to work, because it would be such a nice layer over literally all my wool dresses. It's a soft beige which would work with everything (again, I plan to dye this white skirt when it comes, because I think a soft beige/ecru would be incredibly versatile). In the summer I could see it layered with the two wool and wool-silk-cashmere tanks I bought last winter and haven't worn enough --- one of them I'd actually put back up on Poshmark, but I took it down this morning because I thought a) I'm going to want some warm base layers again, which is why I bought it in the first place, and b) I will have more things to wear it with this year than I did last year.
Now the husband is up, and it's almost 9, so I think I'll go dress myself and dry my hair a little.
Wearing:
I was actually going to wear my green pullover with this outfit, but then I put the Aran cardigan back on, and you know, it's what I'm wearing. So:
*Beetroot Brooklyn dress
*Snag merino tights in Crocodile (a dark enough green that it really reads as a neutral here)
*Thrifted Birkenstock Melrose boots
*Thrifted Aran cardigan in charcoal gray
*Very old teal silk velour scarf
*Base layer: thrifted teal merino-silk-cashmere tank (the very one I retrieved out of my Poshmark basket this morning --- it's thin enough that it works well under this dress, and since I'm wearing it, I might not need a coat)
Cardigan is maybe a little bulky, but I think it works all right. The fit is close enough that it doesn't totally obscure the shape of my body. As the day warms up I can unzip it, but for now I think I like the coverage.
Wonky half-dry hair.
I always love the luxe-ness of this scarf. I really like it against the nubby rugged cardigan. Temps are already above freezing, so I should be plenty warm.
In underwear news --- a phrase sure to thrill the heart on a Sunday morning --- one of my Boody bamboo bras has completely sprung its whatsy. That is, the elastic is flaking out of the band, so that it no longer . . . holds things up, shall we say. When I wore it yesterday, I experienced a distinct . . . landslide, shall we say . . . from under the band. So much for that. I did wear it hard and constantly for --- two? --- years? I think? Not sure I'll replace it with another of the same, but will be on the lookout for something. This might be the time I try one of those Branwyn bras. Maybe. I do have a number of bras, of varying degrees of holdage, shape-age, etc. I should probably just wear more of what I have. Right now I'm wearing a synthetic bra, one of two I bought back in the summer, which I have to say I like for the way it makes me look. I refuse to wear traditional underwire bras, but this one has a kind of crossover situation that you hook in front, and the effect is satisfactory. I'd absolutely need to wash these when I take them off, and alternate between them that way, and I don't love the feel on my skin, but on the other hand, I really didn't love the feeling my natural-fiber bra was giving me yesterday, so all in all, things aren't worse.
I still have another of those Boody bras, but I will wear it with caution henceforth. They were about the cheapest bras that company makes, but I liked them a lot, and I'm kind of sad that even with a lot of hand-washing they haven't held up (so to speak) longer than they have done.
Anyway, I'm dressed and warm and ready to rumble. Time to let the dog out, finish drying my hair, and get on with it all.
Prayer intentions (which I forgot to add earlier):
*for A, possibly miscarrying her baby
*for S, whose tongue cancer has returned
* for other cancer patients: C, S, R, K
*for the repose of the souls of L and M
*for another A, facing difficult trials
I realize how random all this sounds. Bras . . . prayers for people in crisis . . . Christmas trees . . . velour scarves . . . whatever. It is of these things that the created order is composed, and Christ holds it all together in himself.
LATER:
OK, back to trivial stuff. Here's a little glimpse of my base-layer tank, in what I hope is a relatively modest shot:
This outfit worked well for church. I kept my cardigan zipped and had my scarf draped down my front, so managed to avoid flashing any monks during Mass: always a win. This dress also feels like a win, in a color so different from anything else I wear, yet so easy to coordinate with everything else I own (more or less). It's going to be a happy color to wear in the dark of the winter --- I'm already planning for it as my Gaudete Sunday dress, because I'm like that. But it might also wind up being my Christmas Eve dress . . . we'll just see. Pacific Brooklyn is also a contender, and perhaps a more obvious one, but some fun red-and-green (slanted versions of red and green, that is) could happen with this dress.
I was also warm enough, even without a coat. The day has turned gray, after a sunny start, so it feels chilly, even if it's not actually that cold. Dora and I are cocooned in our chair, doing nothing remotely like work. And I'm still comfortable in my dress, base tank, cardigan, wool tights, and boots. I put on my thick wool Norwegian socks before heading out the door, too, because my boots are ever so slightly too big, and I worry about wear on my tights if I don't put socks on, too. Fortunately that's warm and cushiony to do, and my feet are perfectly happy. I could have worn a 39 in these boots, but the 40s I have are good for accommodating extra socks and warmth in the cold.
So now we're lying around, and the kids are packing and doing last-minute laundry. Later on we'll all go to dinner in the direction of the airport. Last Saturday night, it was just my husband and me at the Primal Brewery, but tonight, for a last hurrah, it'll be the four of us.
And then a work week, and preparation for next weekend's guests. The time will fly --- Advent will be upon us, then Christmas with all its beauty and mayhem. I'm sad the kids are leaving, but the sooner they go, the sooner they'll come back (and go again, because that is the way of it, but eventually they will come back).
LATER STILL:
Still mulling some kind of plan for 2024. Tis the season, I guess. And . . . not that I don't have plans. I have two books launching in 2024. I have writing, editing, and thesis-reading jobs. I HOPE I'm going to do some more actual writing, like maybe make progress on another novel. I guess the question is, what do I wear for all that?
And the answer? Have you looked in your closet lately? That is, sometimes it's good to answer a question with a question. And in this case, yes, largely, the answer lies in my closet.
But I don't want to declare a no-buy year. Remember how the last one went? Or the "purchasing pause" I instigated in the summer, apparently to jump-start my fall shopping? The takeaway, at least as I'm choosing to read the tea leaves, is that telling myself no really doesn't work. At least, for me it does not work.
But what if . . . mulling some stuff I said yesterday . . . what if there were a moratorium, or at least a limit, on anything new? I bought a lot of new dresses this year --- a lot for me, anyway. And I'm wearing them, which indicates to me that I didn't buy too many, especially as a couple of my older ones are stepping back from the daily rounds. It seems to me that as much as I might continually want new styles that Wool& produces, there might be other sustainable ways to scratch the "something new" itch --- and to add some subtle variety to my wardrobe, without pushing my rota of dresses out of the spotlight.
I'm cool with not being a minimalist. I don't want to have clothes I don't wear, but I enjoy having a variety of clothes that I do wear. I also enjoy, periodically, something new. (Let's be real. I enjoy bursts of new things, then I'm good for a while until I want another burst of new things). But I don't know that I need to continue, at least in the next year, the cycle of doing a challenge and getting another new dress. While I will probably want some more summer dresses, for example, I don't need, necessarily, to buy Wool& dresses. Maybe I'm getting to a point where I have enough for now: enough in good shape, to serve me through the next year.
Meanwhile, yeah, in case you hadn't gotten the message, I'm kind of on a linen roll. (Yes, this is a weird time of year to want linen) I love the linen items I own, and I do wear them year-round. In fact, I have a couple of things I need to make sure I'm wearing (that linen lab coat, for example, which I think could work for me even in the winter --- almost the last time I wore it was Houston, where it was distinctly hot as a layer), or else resell. But I love my linen big shirt, my linen skirts . . . and I love them specifically as ways to vary my dresses. I don't love linen as a fabric for travel, because wrinkles, but 95% of the time I'm not traveling.
Linen is also easy to find secondhand, at decent prices. Not Not Perfect Linen, usually, but you know . . . decently made secondhand linen pieces. And I have seen NPL pieces that are more expensive than I'm prepared to pay right now, but if I keep watching, the time will come when I might say, "You know, $70 is a great price." I might especially say that if I haven't spent $500 on wool dresses in the same calendar year. Right now $20 is pretty much my limit.
So anyway. Not making resolutions. But having thoughts. If nothing else, it's good to have a template.