Day 15 When you’re on Day 3 of monsoon weather, the cabin fever makes your mind starts to wander. In my case, I start to think about wardrobe questions and other familiar themes. So somehow I landed on the story of Noah. I am sure it was super smelly and gross on that ark with all those animals … and damp. Space was probably super limited for personal items. In that day and age, I would think unless you were super wealthy you only had one set of day clothes and maybe one set of night clothes. People were not so concerned personal hygiene, let alone clothing. With the industrial revolution and the ability to make clothes in mass quantities came the ideas of options in clothing.
I sat down in front of the fire today to write because it felt so cold. I am thankful for an abundance of comforts and choices; not only could I be super comfy and dry in my home, but I could have a fire at the flick of a switch. And I could choose if I was going to wear my blue cardigan or my green cardigan; was it going to be my third day of white sneakers or was I going to have wet and cold toes with my Birkenstocks (I guess I could wear socks) (insert emoji with squinty eyes and tongue sticking out). I have a choice to enjoy my kids and work from home. I love choices, but I also don’t mind having some limits on my choices. Life with less choices seems a bit simpler, and that part of the static wardrobe has worked well. But fundamentally, I still want the option to choose.
Today I had the option of green sweater or blue sweater. I wanted to choose the blue sweater since I have been wearing my green sweater for many days in a row. It was not with my other static wardrobe items. How could I misplace this since I had such a small number of items to keep track of? Strange, and kind of unlikely. I looked through my closet, thinking I did not remember placing it in a different spot, and then frantically checked every room of the house. My last room to check was the laundry room. I knew I would not put that in the laundry because 1) it was not dirty and 2) who actually puts something in the laundry but me? Sure enough I found it in the laundry, wrinkled and damp … sigh, there goes my option for wardrobe happiness to break up this cold rainy day. I was not going to dwell on this since I had a lot to accomplish, so on went the green sweater and back to all my other tasks of kids, house, husband, blog, my Skincare business, my Peach business … and now I was adding in an Etsy store for my fashion sketches.
There is not a better task to occupy a house-bound rainy day than opening an online store. Since I am not particularly computer savvy, all of these online businesses and tasks I have been embarking on take extra time, extra effort and sprinkle in a little frustration because of the learning curve. First I had to stock my store, and then came buying supplies from another online store to ship my fashion illustrations to my clients. As I was working on this my brain started to spin about the different custom fashion illustrations I could offer; I bet a teen girl would love a fashion illustration in her prom dress, Quinceañera dress or Bat Mitzvah dress so I added that custom option in there as well.
One of the reasons I decided to try out this static wardrobe idea was that I do have so many things that I am working on (I put a good chunk of time into my thriving Skincare business), so I needed to add minutes to my day in order to fit a few more things in. I hate wasting time; for instance, running around looking for a sweater drives me insane. This is all a part having my day run like a well-oiled machine: excessive laundry or mess, shopping without a purpose (shopping just to shop) – all these seem like a waste of precious time to me. That is why I love online shopping, and the headlines about malls disappearing say most of the world feels the same way. This is also one of the reasons I can make money with my businesses at home. Most people are streamlining and not wanting to waste time. Shopping online is changing everything.
Tip of the Day: When you are shopping online it is important to order two if not three different sizes and send back the ones that don’t fit. Especially if you don’t know the brand. For me, I know what size I wear in Anthropologie and JCrew so it is easy for me to shop those brands online and be guaranteed a good fit. It is also important to think about the silhouette. If it looks like a shape you have not worn before, then better be safe than sorry: order two sizes and return the one that does not fit! Shoes are harder – I am not an online shoe shopper at all, that is something I have not wrapped my head around just yet. I also think online shopping saves money: not only can you wait for the coupons to come to your inbox, but even more so since I am not in the store being tempted by things I don’t need, I only buy the necessities. Now we are saving time money and brain space with the static wardrobe.
Check out my Etsy store with my fashion illustrations and … PS – Day 16, now past the halfway point.