Refreshing Your Winter Wardrobe

Happy Monday lovelies! I spent the weekend cleaning and organizing my apartment to get ready for the holidays. It was also rather chilly out so for the first time since I moved to Dallas, I got to wear long sleeves! On Sunday, I decided it was time to switch out my summer clothes for my fall and winter clothes, which inspired me to write this post! Refreshing your winter wardrobe doesn’t necessarily mean going to Macy’s and buying all-new everything though. For me, it means trying things on and figuring out if I still like it and if it still fits well. Here are a few tips to get your wardrobe ready for the chilly months!

Decide What to Toss

As I was dragging storage bags out from under my bed, I immediately noticed several articles of clothing that I knew I wouldn’t wear no matter how much I tried to convince myself. However, nothing in the world can convince me that I don’t need all of my quilted vests and fluffy scarves. My favorite monogrammed vest is from Marley Lilly (link here). Getting rid of the things you really don’t have room for in your closet helps save you room and allows you to better judge what you need for the coming winter!

Organize Accessories

I have so many belts, hats, scarves, and purses that they often get lost in my closet behind a big coat or something. Of course, they never end up getting worn even if they’re really cute. Find a simple way to organize them that allows quick access. For example, I hang all of my necklaces on a circular, spinning tie rack that hangs on one of the racks in my closet. It works so well and keeps them from getting tangled. Plus, it looks prettier and more put together!

Take Photos of New Outfits

Whenever I’m going through my clothing at the beginning of a new season, I always try to come up with a few new outfits out of the existing clothes I have. Sometimes I don’t even realize how much I have until I look at it from a fresh perspective. Take photos of the new outfits you create so you can remember to wear them!

Pack Up Your Summer Clothing

My last tip is to take all of your summer clothes out of your closet for a clearer, more open space. I used to keep all of my clothes in my closet year round. Instead of focusing on the great winter clothes I had, I was distracted by the summer clothes that I couldn’t wear. Clear all of that out and pack it in boxes or space bags. Hint: roll your clothes to conserve space!

Staying Organized with More than an iPhone

Here’s a random fact about me that I bet you didn’t know: I’m one of those annoying people that has to write everything down, keep an agenda, and hates it when people say “let’s just wing it”. Seriously, it’s my biggest pet peeve and the cause of a lot of my stress. As you can imagine, I try to stay very organized so that I can have peace of mine. Throughout college (and now as a graduate), I regarded organization as my biggest asset. It truly is my life line and I’m going to share with you a few things I use to turn chaos into harmony using things that aren’t created by Apple!

The first thing I use for organization is a filing folder, or several of them if needed. I love them for many reasons but mainly because they look neat and tidy sitting on my desk in a little stack. I put receipts, records, official government documents (think anything from the IRS), and other important paper items in them. Pro tip: If you hate it when things fall out of the sides, use paper clips to hold the sides closed.

As a mature, responsible adult (just kidding), I like to keep track of what I spend and where in a little book so that I can refer back to it if I forgot what I bought. It’s also interesting to see your spending habits and what you spend money on. Most of my money I spend on cute clothes. I need to stop doing that.

Finally, I keep an agenda. I update it daily with things that come up that need my attention. Quite often there’s something I’ll forget about that will be written in my agenda and I’m always glad that I wrote it down. I’ve definitely almost missed quite a few dentist and doctor appointments! I really like the Lilly Pulitzer agendas but I’ve heard the Kate Spade ones are great too. Even my mom has a Lilly though!

If anyone has used a Kate Spade planner, let me know! I’d love to hear your thoughts. Happy Thursday!

Working Girl Inspiration

Good morning lovelies! Here’s a little Thursday inspiration to get you through the day! I woke up and was looking at my Pinterest and pinned a few things that inspired me. You can find more on my board “The Working Girl’s Life” if you like what you see. I love my life as a professional woman and am so empowered by it! However, I don’t think being a professional should mean I can’t live with a little color in my life. No matter what position I’ll hold in my lifetime, you’ll still find me rocking pink and sparkles!

Enjoy your day! It’s almost Friday! Keep working hard being all that you were designed to be. The best is yet to come in our beautiful lives. We are tres magnifique!

At Home Coffee Station

This post is for my fellow coffee lovers out there. I’m a coffee addict. I have one cup in the morning and two in the late afternoon. Its my ritual and I love it. Additionally, I collect coffee mugs. They just make me happy. I also take my coffee with seasonal creamer… lots of creamer. Right now I’m on a pumpkin spice kick. That will end probably mid November when the radio stations start to play Christmas music and I get a hankering for peppermint mocha everything.

In my future home, I hope to be able to have enough counter space for this wonderful little thing called a coffee station. After seeing an awesome one online (seriously, check out that link), I was inspired and created a little list of things you might want in your at-home-station.

1. A collection of fabulous mugs like the C. Wonder mug I featured.

2. An espresso machine or just regular old coffee maker (duh).

3. Starbucks’ professional-in-store syrup pumps for that shot of vanilla you have to have.

4. Biscotti for the slower days when you can actually enjoy your coffee.

5. Stir sticks so you don’t dirty a million spoons.

6. Multiple kinds of bean roasts so you have options (remember, this is for coffee addicts).

7. Sugar stored in a mason jar so everyone knows your awesome at Pinterest.

8. Whipped cream for the illusion of your coffee being made by a barista, oh wait, it was, wasn’t it? Winky face.

9. Spice shakers filled with cinnamon and other heavenly spices to top off that latte.

I can think of a few other things I might have on hand as well such as agave nectar for the friend that comes over and cringes at the chemicals you put in your drink. Possibly a few Starbucks recipes so you can make professional grade lattes. Whatever you fancy!

I got tired of spending $4 on a latte at ‘Bucks and decided to start drinking more of my own creations at home. It saves a fortune. I’m such a typical American girl when it comes to my coffee. It has to be flavored and named something complicated in order for me to drink it. What’s your typical Starbucks order look like? Share with me below!

App for Your Event Planning Needs

It’s hump day and I for one am quite glad. I’m tired, sore from the gym, tired of homework, and just ready for the weekend again. Many of us already have weekend plans and are looking forward to them. I’m hoping to hang out with my gal pal Lindsey or my like-a-sister, McKenna. Weekend plans have a way of becoming really complicated when there’s a million people to text and details to hammer out. Facebook events suck and are more annoying than anything and chain texts are just obnoxious. If any of you “suffer” with these current technologies, then allow me to introduce you to a handy little app called Flashplan.

FlashPlan is brand new and if I’m not mistaken, still in beta testing. I got to talk to the app’s creator, Shravan Rao, a University of Connecticut graduate, about what the app does and here’s what he said:

“We focused on a few issues that we found with the current process of making plans:

> There isn’t a great mobile solution, which doesn’t make sense, because everyone is always mobile.

> Current tools use social accounts, so you can’t invite people that don’t have the app or don’t have facebook, twitter etc.

> Current tools are inefficient (no one checks facebook events, etc.)

We’ve solved these problems by:

> Making Flashplan truly mobile.  You use a phone number to log in and send invites to people in your contact list, which is your truest social network.

> Flashplan currently only uses phone number to log in, and we’ll eventually maybe add facebook log-in to make the process easier, but that would be only to pull name and other info from facebook.  No events or anything would ever go on facebook and you would never invite through facebook.

> There aren’t any additional ads, no random notifications, etc.

Flashplan is all about helping users spend less time making plans and more time making memories.”

Shravan’s idea is brilliant. I get so many Facebook invites to Tupperware parties, online trunk shows, and Mary Kay sales that I completely ignore invites now. Apps like these get my attention because their only purpose is to make planning an event easier. His idea was sparked by his own experience trying to plan an event.

“In November 2013, I was trying to organize a birthday dinner for a good friend, but it was super inefficient; facebook events, for example- no one sees the invites because they’re getting a ton of other notifications and there are ads everywhere, messages, comments, picture tags, etc.  Flashplan is meant for the person that’s social and on the go and is a mobile solution to the problem of quickly and privately getting a few friends together face to face, instead of interacting behind a screen.”

As a society, I think we have lost quite a bit to social media. It certainly is convenient and even fun to use. However, being together in real time is much better than over the internet. Flashplan is designed to simply plan an event and then execute it. 

My own experience using the app was pretty grand. A few things I really liked were that when you begin to plan an event the app syncs with the contacts in your phone and you can simply invite them by selecting their number regardless of if they have the app or not. Another thing is that if you have multiple events in the works, they are organized into each of their own tabs so you can keep details straight and not get anything confused. It has all of the standard planning necessities such as date, time, location (including a map), and notes.

This app is really impressive and I don’t see anything else on the market like it. Here’s the link to the app on iTunes!