#48 - Tulle

I finally got around to takng photos of all my shoes, and I hope that this will make it a bit easier to work out which ones I've worn as part of the shoe challenge, and which ones I have yet to wear.
I may not have mentioned it before, but I LOVE tulle skirts. I have rather a lot of them, and although it can be difficult to make them work as part of dressy or casual outfits, I do try! Luckily, this one is quite long, and being black, I think it's suitable to wear to work.

This is also a new top, and I've taken a photo of the back because it's cute (although it's difficult to see as it blends in with my skin colour. There's a little bow at the top, anyway)!I've had these shoes for years, and they're probably some of my oldest heels. I never used to think of them as being low heels, but I just realised when wearing them recently that they're much lower than I usually wear now. I think at some point I may also have walked through a dusty field while wearing them, so they're not in the best condition. Maybe it was a beach wedding, actually. Anyway, they've seen a lot of wear!

The shoe challenge is starting to make me realise that I need more of certain types of shoes (black and navy shoes, and probably red and pink shoes too, as I've worn almost all of mine already), and fewer of other types (flats, and I've hardly worn any of my green shoes, but that may just mean I need more green clothes!). So it has been useful already!

Some photos from my weekend

Here's something different for a change. I love nature and hiking and animals, which I think would surprise a lot of people who know me! We went to a rainforest/national park over the Easter break, and here are some photos I took. I just have to say that this kangaroo in the first picture was the awesomest kangaroo I have ever seen. He was standing by the side of the road, and when we drove past, he continued to stand there munching his grass. He wasn't worried at all. Awesome :)

Wow, blogger really has a way of ruining all my photos! Anyway, a quick story about the parrots. I love birds, and it is my dream to own a parrot someday! When we went to feed these wild birds, this red & green parrot (King Parrot) was the only one of his type that we saw. For some reason, he really liked me, even though there were a lot of people there with food for the birds. A foreign tourist came over to me after a while and said "Can I have that?" and pointed to the parrot. I thought it was a bit rude (I wasn't monopolising the parrot or anything - it wasn't my fault that he liked me!), but I encouraged the parrot to go to this guy. Anyway, a couple of minutes later he flew back to me again. Heh.

#47 - Happy Easter!

I wanted to wear something nice for Easter, even though I'm not doing anything much. I went to some markets this morning, as we somehow forgot that the shops were going to be closed for the next 2 days, and we hardly had any food in the house! This is one of two River Island dresses I've bought recently. (I've discovered that UK size 6 dresses are SMALL! I probably could've done with the next size up, especially in the other dress I bought - if I wanted to breathe while wearing it, anyway. This one is fine, but a little tight across the chest, which is not a problem I usually have!) Well, I still have plenty of shoes to wear as part of the Shoe Challenge, but some days I just can't find any to match my outfit (that I haven't already worn), like today.


Don't mind the cat in the picture. This is something that tends to happen a lot - I just have to crop him out a lot of the time! Did you know that cats can apparently make 100 different sounds? He was making a lot of those while I was taking this next photo (most of them rather grumpy-sounding!).

These shoes are from Topshop, and they're cute, although not as comfortable as I'd like a pair of flat shoes to be.

More importantly today, here is the super cute Easter egg my sister gave me:
And here is my cat licking it (I was surprised, as I didn't think cats liked sugar!):


Here it is all smashed up and ready to eat :)
Happy Easter!

#46 - Blue

After what has felt like the longest and most boring week ever, I am finally on holidays! It's only a few days, but we seem to have several public holidays over the next couple of weeks, so I think there are only 3 more work days until May 3 (which happens to be my birthday, and not a holiday, unfortunately). I'm going away until the weekend, and I'm just hoping it won't rain, as the weather hasn't been too good lately.
I wore another new dress today, which I love! I wish I could say the same about my shoes! I do think they're cute, which is why I've kept them for several years, however I don't think they were actually made to fit human feet. They are impossible to walk in. Slingbacks are never the most practical or comfortable shoes, but with these particular ones, the straps do not stay on the back of my feet at all. You can probably see in the above photo that they've fallen down. It's rather annoying, but as I have so few pairs of blue shoes, I'll probably keep these until I can find another pair to replace them with.

I hope you all have a nice Easter break, and I'll be back posting again in a few days :)

#45 - Jacquard

I am not sure how I feel about jacquard dresses. I like them, but out of the 3 I own, I've only worn this one. That will change this year, though! I'm determined to get more wear out of everything I own. Anyway, I guess I tend to associate jacquard with elegant old ladies, but hopefully it can be worn by elegant young ladies as well!
I loved this dress so much when I first saw it at Alannah Hill. They didn't have my size, so I tried it on in a larger size and it was too big. I didn't buy it (although I did end up buying a dress in similar colours from another store, but it just wasn't the same), but I couldn't stop thinking about it. I eventually ended up buying it from Alannah's online store in a size too big, but I got my mother to alter it. (Incidentally, I think it's lilac, my mother thinks it's beige, and the store called it pink!).
My shoes are by Circa Joan & David, and they are actually one of the few pairs of platform shoes I own. (It's very slight and you can't even see the platform in these photos). I know a lot of shoe-lovers are going to disagree with me on this, but I don't particularly like platforms. I think the main reason is that I don't want to be any taller than I already am! I am not particularly tall, but I am happy with my height. My assistant thinks it's funny to tell everyone we work with that I always wear heels because I'm short - it's not true!

#44 - Rainy Day

I've noticed the weather getting cooler over the past few weeks, and today was the first day this year that I had to wear tights. (It would have been alright if it had just been either cold or rainy, but as it was both cold AND rainy, the tights had to come out). I was very disappointed about this. I love dressing for Summer, and I am not particurly good at the whole layering thing, or at matching tights/other Winter accessories with my outfits (because we don't get much of an opportunity to do it here). I hope to change that this year, and I think I need to buy about 10 more pairs of tights (once my shopping ban is over) and hopefully I'll manage. I am trying to put off wearing boots for as long as I can, as I only have 3 pairs and that is not going to help me in the shoe challenge. My plan for Winter is to continue wearing my Summer dresses, but with cardigans etc. I really should make an effort to take photos in the mornings, because in the evenings it's dark and I have to use the flash, which looks terrible, and I also look like I've been standing in the rain & have dark circles under my eyes. Not a good look.

These Kate Spade shoes are my most recent shoe purchase (and they'll be my last for a while, considering my current shopping ban). Although I don't often buy black shoes, I saw these ones in David Jones, and I really liked the mesh with polka dots, so I ended up ordering them online (which was much cheaper).

#43 - Shopaholic

I was determined not to buy any clothes last week. I told myself that I wouldn't buy anything until I got paid next week. It was going okay, until somehow I ended up going to my favourite store on Friday and spending $600. I was so annoyed with myself, and I realised that when it comes to shopping, I have no self control. I am a shopaholic. So I've put away my credit cards, and I am going to stop shopping until June. I've done a 'no shopping month' before, but this is more like a no shopping month and a half, which seems like a very long time! It's not going to be easy, but I still have so many clothes I haven't even worn yet.Anyway, my outfit today seemed very matchy, which I was quite pleased about! I also wanted to mention (again) that Hollister and Abercrombie have some great cardigans, surprisingly enough. I bought this skirt recently from Alannah Hill, and I love how sparkly it is. Here are some close-up photos of the details:

I love Pucci. That probably doesn't surprise anyone, as I am a fan of all things bright and colourful. They have the most amazing prints, and these particular shoes have sparkly bows on the front which make them extra cute!