welcome to purple week!

Welcome to Purple Week here at kelinda.KELINDA! I'll be wearing something featuring my favorite grapey hue every day of the week, and I'll also be featuring all of the lovely purple-y outfits you all have sent in to me. After all, the more purple love during Purple Week, the merrier!

To kick things off this afternoon until I update again this evening with my own purple OOTD, here's Boyfriend, rocking a manly purple shirt from this past weekend:


And just so you guys don't miss me too much from now until 7 p.m., here I am giving you all The Crazy Face to tide you over:


Now, here are your Purple Week ensembles!

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If you've ever read Tara K's Mix and Match Fashion (which you should!), you'd find out pretty quick that this stylish lady knows a thing or two about awesome color and pattern pairings. Here, she's sporting a perfect summer outfit, and in one of my favorite color combos, too -- purple + yellow!

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This outfit from Lisa of respect the shoes showcases the reasons why I love her style: the unexpectedness of the orange, gray, yellow, burgundy, green, and purple colorblocking, the sassiness of the outfit, and the incredible way she always pulls it off with such aplomb. Teach me!

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You better believe that I'm going to take a page from AppGal's (Musings on the Mountain) outfit here and do my own "stripes + purple" pairing this week! This look is so fun and flirty, and the swishy skirt just makes me smile.

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Dea here of the Dea Diaries is always cute as a button. I mean, look at the fun ruffles, and the romantic yellow-tipped skirt! I want it all... and throw in that gorgeous bag while you're at it, too, please.

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This is why I love reader submissions -- I just discovered a new blogger to follow! Aili from Jane Squared sent this in and I just love how lady-like this is. The soft purple and green is such a wonderful pairing, and something I never thought of doing before. Ah, you gotta love inspiration...

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Go show ADC some love over at A Daily Checklist -- she has such a feminine eye to outfits that I just adore. I mean, look at that yellow pencil skirt. Just look at it. Is it not the perfect thing to wear with the almost-lavender cardigan? I want it. It needs to be in my closet.

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I don't know what I like more about this picture -- the big, rolling clouds in the blue sky, or that festive purple-printed skirt on gorgeous Julie (Julie of All Trades)! I know I always appreciate a fun print when I see one, and also, I am digging the crossbody bag. Heck yes.

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Want to send me your own (or another) purple outfit for Purple Week? Email it to me at amy.kelinda@gmail.com

apologies! and a very, very late holiday dress update

READERS! It has been too long since I've posted, and too long since I've kept up with all the lovely blogs I follow! I'm terribly sorry for unexpectedly going MIA. With Christmas coming up (eeeek!) I've been rushing around after work taking care of shopping and other Christmas-related chaos. I'm sure most of you have been doing the same, too!

Here's the way overdue look at my original holiday party dress, the Crinkle Cascade dress from J.Crew (now on sale for $99!):

worn with:
bordeaux tights, Hue
Polly heels, Tahari
glass gem necklace, J.Crew Outlet
gold bangle, F21
cluster ring, J.Crew

I got this dress in a size 4 and it fit like a dream. It's completely true to size. For a shortie like me, the length was still modest, but I'd imagine that on taller gals, this frock may be a little too mini.

I ended up changing dresses at the last minute to the Garnet Satin Sheath Dress from White House Black Market because my company's party venue changed at the last minute to an unheated location. Layering a cardigan over the J.Crew dress proved fashionably ridiculous, so I ended up sporting the red dress to the party instead. The red dress was super fun, so I wasn't too torn up about the last-minute change in attire:

worn with:
xhilaration gray tights, Target
stripe lace tights, Urban Outfitters
Polly heels, Tahari
glass gem necklace, J.Crew Outlet
gold bangle, F21
cluster ring, J.Crew

I wore a black cardigan over the dress for most of the night, which is obviously not pictured here. And see the BF's outfit? I picked out everything except for the shoes. He had to look "dress up" appropriate, but the BF is a t-shirt and jeans kind of guy, so I opted to dress him up as casually as possible. He's wearing a dress-down-able (yes, that's a word now) gingham shirt, a charcoal v-neck sweater, a knit tie, and heathered brown slacks. He ended up loving the entire look, noting that it's "surprisingly comfortable." See? That wasn't so hard, was it? Might I dare say that he's kind of excited about after-Christmas shopping with me for new additions to his currently 6-item wardrobe?

crinkle cascade, you are divine

Your order from J.Crew has shipped.

YIPPEE!!! Holiday party season is right around the corner, and you know what pretty little frock I have headed my way? This beauty:

Crinkle cascade dress, J.Crew [x]

I tried it on in the store last weekend, and the BF gave it a big ol' thumbs up. I was worried it would look too twee and cupcake-y, but the tie sash does a surprisingly effective job at reigning those tiers in. It fits TTS, as I took my usual size 4 in it. I'm a short gal, so the dress hit slightly below the knee rather than right above the knee as seen on the model here. My store didn't carry it in the black plum color (pictured), so I ordered it through the red phone. I can't wait for it to arrive! SQUEEEE!!! Gimme gimme nowwwww!

I'm going to hit up Anthropologie this weekend to scope out some other potential holiday party dresses. Thank goodness for J.Crew's 90-day return window. I'm also charged with the duty of picking something stellar for my lives-in-a-t-shirt-and-jeans date. I don't know whether I'm more excited to pick out my dress or his outfit. Finally, my subscriptions to Esquire and GQ may come in handy!

I hope you're all super excited for Thanksgiving tomorrow! I better get turkey. Or else I'll be miffed.

UPDATE: One of my wonderful commenters, sweetsy, brought it to my attention that the Cascade Crinkle Dress is now $178, down from the $250 it was just yesterday! Weirdly, it's not marked as being on sale. It appears that the price just dropped for no reason at all. What's with that, J.Crew? Not cool at all! My suspicion is that J.Crew realized it was too pricey and decided to reduce the price, but didn't mark it as a sale item because of the "extra 20% off sale items" promotion going on right now. Hiiiiiiighly suspect! Needless to say, I called customer service right away and got a nice price adjustment. Thanks, sweetsy! This blogging community is the best, and I'm so happy to be part of it and have such wonderful readers!