Lotsa Lace

 

 

It's that time of year when I'm getting really, really bored with my transitional wardrobe. My list of never-worn clothing (which I keep to inspire me to create new outfits with it) has dwindled to just 7 items (astonishingly low for me), 6 of which are shoes. Building an outfit around your shoes is possible, but all my efforts were getting nowhere with the only ones interesting enough to anchor an outfit. Further limiting me, even my (purely mental) list of clothes that are old but haven't been worn yet this season, is also down to just a dress or two and a handful of tops. One of the handful was this mesh greyish sweater, which was one of my favorites when it was new last winter.

I wore it several times last year, but the only time I shared it was in my beige & sage outfit from January. I knew I could repeat that outfit if worse came to worst, but I'd much prefer to wear it with something new and exciting. The newest and most exciting things I have in my wardrobe are actually two pairs of over-the-knee socks—which weren't on my list of never-worn clothing, but I guess they should have been. I don't usually consider socks anything to get excited about, but when they are thigh-high, they can easily become the focal point of an entire ensemble. One pair was burgundy, the other was green. There was already a hint of green in the sweater, so I had high hopes that they would go together well!

Putting an olive-green tank top under the sweater was just the ticket to make the slightly conspicuous overknees (I saw someone else use this word recently, and I think it's a wonderfully concise way to refer to over-the-knee socks) fit in with the more subdued colors of the rest of the outfit. It's at times like this that having green hair is also a real boon.

Except for when wearing this sweater with jeans, I seem to always pair it with my lace khaki skirt, because it helps make the pure white lace border of the sweater blend in with other garments. And of course the socks had a white lace top as well, so this was shaping up to be quite a lacy outfit! I decided the only sensible choice of shoe (aside from another shade of olive green, which I didn't have) would be more off-white lace! I rejected my lace pumps (too prissy!) in favor of my lace monstrosities. (I do so love to wear those shoes in combination with an overload of lace!)

Because there were now two patches of stark white standing out a bit too much for my taste (sock tops and shirt bottom), I decided to wear white earrings as well to help balance them out. The white beads are even encased in a silver filigree setting which might be described as "lacy!" Sort of.