I celebrated Easter with my family on Saturday, because of my work schedule. After some consideration, I decided to also wear lolita to work on Easter Sunday. There would be less people in the office (in fact, I only saw two other people), no chance of clients dropping by unannounced, and little work to be done. I was correct in my assessment–it really was a good day to wear lolita fashion to work! However, I still opted for something casual, instead of formal, on the chance that someone did drop by. As much as I adore being a lolita, I’d prefer to be recognized for my work rather than for my clothing habits.

I wore a beautiful BABY, the Stars Shine Bright skirt that was a gift from my little sister, but I paired it with a shirt and cardigan that I usually wear with my jeans. I usually don’t consider frilly knee-socks to be casual, because they attract a lot of attention. After considering tights I decided against them because I wanted to keep more pink in the outfit–also, I own a pair of pink socks with white roses in the pattern, and they seemed like a good choice to pair with the skirt.

This picture was taken outside in the rain. The day started off beautifully. My husband surprised me at my office and took me out on a date! ♥ We were able to go to a restaurant we’d been considering but avoiding due to long waits. Well, on Easter Sunday that wasn’t a problem at all. However, when we were finished eating it started to rain! My husband evidently thought that this meant no pictures, but I am determined. He obligingly took a few when we got home before shooing me inside.

I hope everyone else enjoyed Easter, if you celebrated it! ♥ Next year I want to attend an Easter egg hunt~ Maybe I’ll try to take the Sunday off.

I’ve been procrastinating too much! I finally stopped caving into excuses and wore my finery this weekend. Besides lolita fashion, my closet is boooooooring. I absolutely-positively-definitely-completely-utterly hate clothes shopping. When I’ve been ignoring my frilly clothing for a while, I start to get into a mindset where I think that I don’t have time or energy for the effort of wearing lolita…even though it isn’t true! It doesn’t take me very long at all, and the resulting good mood is worth it ten times over~ ♥

After going through my camera when I got home on Saturday, I realized I hadn’t even posted my pictures from St. Patrick’s Day in mid-March. (Whoops!) It’s not too much of a loss–they’re not very good pictures. I went to see the St. Patrick’s Day parade on the Saturday before the actual holiday. My little sister met me, and we coordinated in almost-identical green plaid. I wore my green plaid hairbow and jumperskirt from BABY, the Stars Shine Bright, and she wore a suit-jacket and skirt set from BtSSB. We thought the plaid was identical, but upon further inspection it’s juuuuuust slightly different. (Still a little bit disappointing.)

I kept hearing rumors about awesome weather on Friday, and luckily they turned out to be true! I took it as an opportunity to wear my Twinkle Tartan skirt. I absolutely adore tartan, but pink is always sold out by the time I am ready to buy. I was lucky to purchase this skirt off a girl I know–and it’s such a lovely pink that I couldn’t be more satisfied!

The clip-on pochette is the best part, in my opinion. I have dismal luck with purses. Unless it’s attached to me, I’m probably going to leave it behind. This is one of the reasons that, when wearing my “normal” clothing, I wear a jacket even in ridiculously warm weather–without coat pockets, I don’t know where to put my stuff. The case that clips onto this skirt is the perfect size to hold all of my necessities. Since it’s attached to me, I can’t easily leave it behind, either! Win-win situation~

I tried a new style with my hair. I’ve been seeing twin buns more frequently, although usually of the teased and Mickey-Mouse-ear-esque variety, so I thought I’d give it a shot. I discovered that I have so much hair that I have to carefully form cinnamon-bun-like structures, pinning as I go, or the weight pulls it right out! x_x I kept trying to just wrap them like a “normal” bun, only to watch everything unloop and droop down as soon as the second elastic was secure.

This was also an excuse to wear my new glittery pink sneakers! My mother spotted these when we were at Old Navy. (Unfortunately, they don’t have these listed on the website, only the graphic sneakers! Such a shame!) The store we were at didn’t have my size, but another one we passed later that day did. I hadn’t worn them yet, since I don’t own a lot of things that go with sneakers. Originally I planned to wear my white tea party shoes, but my husband suggested the sneakers–a very good suggestion! They’re the same colour as the glitter stripe in Twinkle Tartan! ♥ So cool!!

To accommodate my work schedule, my family celebrated Easter on Saturday. I wanted to dress up, but didn’t want something over the top. (Okay, that’s not true. I wanted something over the top–I was thinking pink Easter bunny–but wanted to respect the fact that not everyone else shares my enthusiasm for such silly things.)

Several months ago my little sister gave me an Innocent World jumperskirt in a dusty pink hue. It matches hers, which is black. I hadn’t worn it yet, because it’s a shade of pink that doesn’t exist elsewhere in my closet. When browsing through my closet–I had thought to wear a non-lolita sundress–it caught my attention. The lilac-tinted pink reminds me of flowers and Easter eggs. Coincidentally it was the same shade as the hopping bunny wind-up toy in my Easter basket~ ♥

The off-white cardigan was also from my little sister…so her kind generosity provided my Easter outfit. n_~ I think I should find an extra-special birthday present for her this year–I’d hate to have her think she’s under-appreciated. If only I could actually buy her a chicken…

I was only able to dress up one day of my weekend~ Friday involved work in our apartment that kept the door open and absolutely froze everything inside. Thankfully everything went well, so Saturday was all mine for the enjoying–and with actual working heat, no less! I had another lolita over, although she didn’t wear lolita fashion when she came over, but since I met her at a lolita meetup I think it’s a fair enough title. Lolita fashion wasn’t at all the focus of our day together–I was excited that she brought some of her dolls! ♥

I was also excited to wear a dress that I’d been wanting to wear! My little sister and I worked out a not-quite-a-sale-but-not-quite-a-swap transaction amidst the wardrobe collective, and I was thrilled to find that one of the pieces under discussion was a dress I’d been hoping for~ Despite my typical indifference to prints, I think BABY makes some lovely older prints. This dress has a gorgeous design of flowers and cherries that remind me of a painting~ Paired with the bell sleeves, rarely seen in the newer collections for the lolita fashion brands, it stole my heart. ♥

It’s a lovely dress, made of a textured, soft fabric that is extremely comfortable. I know it’s trying to wedge its way into my list of favourites–I can already tell. I coordinated it with plain white lace-topped socks (well, there is a design up the back, but it’s invisible here). I wanted to wear a more detailed pair, since I own two pairs of pink socks that have rose motifs, but I couldn’t decide if they looked alright. The ribbons in my hair were given to me by a friend–they’re from another BABY item, and they matched those on the one-piece perfectly! ♥

I hope I can keep up this trend! I’m already having so much fun; it’s nice to know everything is being put to use~

I really intend to post these outfit snaps earlier than I do, ideally on the day I take the pictures, but I tend to get rather side-tracked. This past weekend (my weekend is Friday & Saturday, because I work on Sunday) I decided to wear lolita fashion both days. I feel pretty good about keeping up with actually wearing my clothing more frequently in 2010~ I really adore lolita, but it seems that the less frequently I wear it, the more likely it is that negative feelings will start to creep up on me. Getting dressed up dispels all that in an instant!

On Friday I opted for something more casual. For me, a casual outfit is one in which I don’t wear my lolita coat over it when I go out. If I wear it with my normal coat, it’s casual. I feel that a skirt and cardigan is pretty casual, unless you take the time to accentuate the rest of the coordinate. It would have been a bit less casual if I had worn a proper blouse, with the blouse’s collar laid over the cardigan’s collar, but even then my cardigan doesn’t have a very formally lolita look to it.

I actually wore this to clean my house! I got into a cleaning kick that day and scrubbed the place from top to bottom–including the baseboards in the bathroom, which were really icky! x_x So much hair, and almost all of it mine! I hadn’t noticed due to the dark floor…

On Saturday, I dressed up more formally, even though I didn’t attend the local meetup. (I really should have gone–everyone told me it was a lot of fun! I didn’t even have a good excuse; just decided to stay home. My husband’s ankle still isn’t 100% better, and I didn’t want to ditch him at home while I had fun. But he certainly wouldn’t have objected to my going, and it would have been more affordable for just me.)

Although I adore Angelic Pretty, my heart doesn’t belong to extravagant prints and bright pop colours. I love their garments with exquisite trim and interesting design elements. I like pintucks, ruffles, scalloped edges, bows, laces, and ribbons~ ♥ I also adore soothing pastels and solid-colour dresses~ My second outfit that weekend was chosen in homage to these elements of sweet lolita that I love.

I wore a long-sleeved blouse from BABY, the Stars Shine Bright under an Angelic Pretty one-piece. I really enjoy coordinating blouses with one-pieces–as long as the one-piece has a square or sweetheart neckline, the peeking collar of a Peter Pan blouse really changes the appearance! I also love gathered sleeves, with the bands of elastic that “poof” the sleeve at different points down the arm. It really reminds me of the outfits more common in older issues of the Gothic & Lolita Bible.

I accessorized my hair, extra-wavy and poofy from the braids I had worn the previous day, with a large bow. I wish I owned a pink headdress–if I had, I would have worn that! I really love headdresses, even though they are so unpopular nowadays~ ♥ A headdress would have increased the “old-school” elements of this outfit. So would extremely-decorated pink platform shoes, or rocking-horse ballerinas~! (Unfortunately, I own neither AND wore my snowboots that day.)

And, I carried Mallow. I didn’t take pictures with him on his strap, as a proper pochette, but just some silly ones. I really enjoyed taking them! The final image is my favourite–I wish it had turned out clearer so I could make an icon or something~ ♥ Even if I am ever lucky enough to acquire an usakumya, I will still adore my pochette. He’s so sweet and tiny~ I’d love to have a pochette-picnic with my friends, since several of them own the same bunny! Maybe someday…