Disclosure Statement

    I love blogging.  I really do.  I get to share my thoughts with you and get some great responses in return.  The thing is, blogging doesn't pay, normally.  Sure I could accept payments to review products, but that's not my style.  I prefer to give you my independent opinion, good, bad or in between, and not feel beholden to anyone in the process.  I have, in the past reviewed products that have been sent to me as gifts and given you my opinions on those.  In fact, I've reviewed things I've bought myself just to share my experiences with you.  And at the bottom of every such post I make sure to let you all know exactly what's going on.  This post is doing the same thing.
     I've decided to try to make a little bit of money off my blog.  In the next few days, for example, you'll see that I'll have a blog sponsor for the next 6 months.  In addition, I've created affiliate links with a few companies.  When I give you "The Details" in my outfit posts, I'll also be linking to similar or the same items that you can click through to and purchase.  If you chose to do so, I will get a small commission on these sales in return.  Linked items labeled as “similar” are as close as possible to what I’m actually wearing. If whatever I have on is still available for sale, I will always link directly to it, even if I can’t create an affiliate link that will earn me income.  I also have ads in the column to the right that will earn money for the blog with each impression or click through. 
     I hope that you know that I'm not selling out or trying to push purchases on you.  I'll still be the same chick figuring out how to get from law school to be a lawyer and sharing my journey with you.  If you have any questions, please feel free to ask by email or in the comments.  It is my goal to always be open with you.
<3, A-C 

My New Theme Song

Miss Piggy does empowerment

My Closet

    "A place for everything and everything in its place"

      One of the best parts of our move in August is the master bedroom closet.  It is HUGE!  The Fiance and I divided it up more or less up the middle and we each have more space than we did in the old house combined.  For this I am *very* grateful.  Unfortunately, its allowed me to keep a lot of stuff that I need to go through and get rid of.  But that's not what this post is about.  This is about how I organize my closet.  I saw this post on Kendi Everyday and figured I would show you my closet too. 

     This past weekend The Fiance suggested we organize the closet better.  For the most part it was fine, but he wanted to put some towels in the closet.  So we switched around his shoes and I put my belts on hooks behind the door.  This freed up space on the built in shelves in the closet.  I took advantage of the extra freed up space to fold some bulky sweaters that work best folded than hung up.  One of the shelves is mine to put my bras and other under things on.  I've found that bras last longer if I have a shelf to lay them on.  In this picture you'll also notice that I have a step ladder in my closet.  Its not because we couldn't figure out another place to store it.  Rather its because I'm short.  I can reach almost everything in the closet EXCEPT for the very top shelf where I've been storing my scarves.  Smart, right?  I'm looking for somewhere else or another way to store them, any ideas? 

     The other thing that I have plenty of is shoes.  I am lucky enough to have a shoe rack where all of my heels fit.  Believe it or not they're also organized in a specific way.  The top row is work heels, ie the ones I wear most often.  The second row is heels that I wear every once in a while and the bottom row is special occasion heels along with those that are currently not in season like my gold thong sandal heels.  Sadly, not all of my shoes fit in it.  I have a few pairs of boots that don't fit.  They're found laying on the floor under my pants, long skirts and suits.

    This last picture shows  another aspect of using all the available wall space to my advantage.  Like hanging my belts in the picture above, I've been hanging my pins and brooches.  I have been using the little doll face my aunt made and sent me for this use.  Its always fun to look in my closet and see that happy little face smiling back at me.  If you're interested in having a smiley face brooch holder of your very own, I'll be posting them and several other crafties on Etsy this weekend.  This wall is also where I've placed my laundry hamper.  In our old house there wasn't enough room in the closet to put both my and The Fiance's closet and stand in it at the same time, so I really appreciate being able to put EVERYTHING I need and want in our closet and still have room left over to actually get dressed in there.  
     Despite having all this room, there is a whole bunch of other clothes that I store in a chest of drawers in the bedroom.  Luckily for me my chest of drawers doubles as the stereo stand and The Fiance's chest of drawers doubles as the TV stand, so its not like they're in the way.  The clothes that gets stored in there is stuff like socks, undies, PJs and T-shirts.  Now that I've shown you how I organize my clothes and shoes, its your turn.  How do you organize your clothes?  How often do you revamp your organizational methods?  Found something that you just can't live without and are dying to share?

And by the way, see the little button to the right of this post?  I would *really* appreciate it if you nominated me for the About.com Reader's Choice Awards in the category of Favorite Fashion Blog 2010.

Comfy Jewels

      I was looking through my Picasa album to figure out what pictures I hadn't posted yet and found these from November.  I have no idea why I didn't post them at the time.  Maybe because I took them in the kitchen instead of on the porch?  I don't know.
     This is one of my favorite big comfy sweaters.  It is exactly as it seems, warm, big and comfy.  The perfect attributes to a sweater, as far as I'm concerned.  Little did I know when I purchased this sweater, that it is also the perfect color for me.  According to this article from Shine on Yahoo, its the perfect color for me.  I've read several articles all over the place that claim to tell me what colors are best for me.  None of them have ever made sense to me.  This one, because of its simplicity, does.  After reading through the article, I determined that I'm a Sunrise and as such jewel tone colors are supposed to look best on me.

Sunrise: “In the morning, the sunrise palette colors are clear, clean and crisp,” says Eiseman. “Primarily blue undertones evolve into jewel tones.”
Coloring : Fair-skinned, dark-haired brunettes; fair-skinned silver-haired women; fair-skinned cool blondes; dark, blue-black skin tones with dark hair; and olive skin with dark hair.
Palette : Shimmering jewel-tones like emerald, sapphire, aquamarine and amethyst.

Messy kitchen over my right shoulder!

 I guess it makes sense.  I mean the sweater does look good, right?  And I am most definitely a fair-skinned dark-haired brunette that can occasionally be an olive skin chick with dark hair.  I'm not 100% convinced that these are the *only* colors that look good on me, but they are some of my favorite to wear.  So I guess this color scheme is a good place to start.  Its not, however, a reason to throw out all my pink, black, white or red tops though.  Just a starting point.

    If you've been looking for a color scheme to help you figure out your best colors, because of its simplicity, I definitely recommend the article as a starting point.  If, however, you know what you look good in, then it probably really won't rock your world any, but it might be a good read anyway.  Are you a sunrise, sunset or sunlight?  

The Details:

Sweater: Target

Tee: NY&Co

Pants: Gap

Heels: Aldo

Necklace: Banana Republic Outlet

"new" to me

     This outfit makes me really happy, and there are a couple of reasons for it.  First, its makes me happy because 2 of the items, the sweater and jacket, are "new-ish" to me, but not new.  You see, my little sister spent her Christmas break at my parent's house in Puerto Rico.  While there, she rummaged through my closet as well as my mom's and brought me back some of her plunder.  This jacket, for example, has been hanging in my closet at home for years.  I bought it on a whim because it was on sale and never wore it.  Seriously, when I got it from my sister the tags were still on it.  This time around, though, I knew exactly how I wanted to style it, which by the way, was my problem when I got it.  I just didn't know how to wear it, nor did it really fit into my life at the time as an Undergrad.  

     In fact, this is the second reason why I love this outfit.  I've seen plenty of women rock jackets as part of their outfits and not just as outerwear.  I have tried to recreate the look, but I just didn't have the right jacket in my arsenal, until now.  This jacket does exactly what I want it to.  It fits really well and goes from outside to inside without a problem.  And it fits my life now.  I'm in a position where wearing a jacket and a sweater looks put together AND appropriate.  It totally dresses up the jeans and boots combo.  Did I mention that it made me feel pretty?  What sorts of clothes and outfits make you feel pretty and put together?

Bella posing while I take pics.

The Details:
Jacket: Wilson Leather
Sweater: NY&Co.
Jeans: Old Navy
Boots: Candie's 

EDIT: My mom called me to tell me I look great in these pictures!  She even said I look skinny! :D 

Year in Review

      2010 was a big year for me, I graduated from law school, took the bar, failed it, started my first legal job, moved and turned 26.   Here's a look at my favorite outfits of 2010.

January

 

February

 

March

April

May

June

August

September

October

November

December

Air Force A-C

     I put this outfit together and immediately felt like a female Air Force officer out of the 1940s.  I didn't mean it that way, but so much khaki and that collar just sort of made it that way.  I got the dress months ago and just couldn't figure out how to wear it.  I got it at a consignment store over the summer and at that time it was too warm for think 3/4 sleeves.  Then it was fall and I thought there was just too much khaki and I needed to break it up.  Being that fall here is pretty mild, layering a cardigan would have been too much.  Then finally it was winter and cold enough to wear it, but. . .
    The skirt is just too long.  It's been tough to put together an outfit.  I kept wanting to wear it with heels but my legs would be cut off.  Even this iteration of the dress isn't great as my legs look stumpy.  Nonetheless, I prefer the boots look over the heels look.  I think its because while wearing boots + tights, its ok not to see someone's knees.  Anyway, I'm going to see about hemming this dress.  I think it will just be more flattering if it hits me just under the knee rather than mid-upper-calf.  I also think that I would like to add a tulle skirt ala Audi's outfit under this dress to add some floof and interest to the dress.  It would probably fit with the vintage vibe that I get from the dress too.
    If you've been following me on Twitter (@lawfashionista) then you'll know that I've already begun studying for the bar exam again.  As a way to better concentrate on studying, I've stopped working and will only be studying for the next 7 weeks.  This means that I won't be getting dressed to go to work.  I'm not sure what that will mean for the blog.  I have plenty of backdated outfits to put up and I'm sure when I go on errands I'll change out of my sweats, but don't be surprised if I end up writing posts about how awesome sweats and PJ pants are to study in.   As I figure out a good workable schedule while I'm studying I may not be on a predictable posting schedule.  For the meantime, the bar is my #1, 2 and 3 priority, so that comes first.  The advantage of my being home, of course, is that I have more time to work out, so maybe I'll end up posting about how awesome that is.  We'll see.  Just wanted to give you all a head's up.  Any tips or suggestions on how not to get stressed when studying a humongous test?

The Details:
Dress: Consignment
Cardigan: Target
Boots: Target
Tank: Old Navy