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Spin the Pin - March 2016

Jo from iCurvy revealed the March Spin the Pin late February (pictured above and here) and I knew straight away what top I wanted to wear for it. 

I usually know straight away whether I'll struggle to be inspired or not. I did not struggle at all this month; next month could be a challenge for me though!

Outfit Details:

• Black top with white stripes || By I-N-C International Concepts || Opshopped within a $10 bag of clothing

• Denim jeans cutoff to make shorts || Autograph || Opshopped as jeans for $5

• Wedges || I Love Billy || Opshopped for $4

• Sunnies || El Cheapos from Thailand || Gifted

Check out the other entries at the Link Party 

NZ Style Curvettes - Green

I'm totally loving khaki green atm!

One piece especially that I can't wait to get more wear out of is this Kenneth Cole top I recently thrifted.

The pleather sleeves are a bit tighter than I'd like, meaning I can't bunch them up, they have to stay covering my forearms. This basically means it is not a summer piece of clothing. So when the cooler weather comes... eventually expect to see a lot more of this top.

I love the style of this top. It actually reminds me a lot of my Harlow Invincible winner top (below) that I wore nearly everyday last winter! 

This Chrissy Swan skirt that a friend gave me goes perfectly with the green top. The trim of pleather on the skirt matches with the trims of pleather and sleeves on the top, and you should all know by now how much I love being matchy matchy!!

Outfit details:

• Green top with pleather sleeves || Kenneth Cole || $3 (half price) at an opshop

• Black skirt with pleather trim || Chrissy Swan for Avella, Big W || Given to me by a friend

• Black leaf necklace || $1 at a garage sale

• Black sandals || Target || $15 (at a half price sale)

My Birthday Op Shopping Adventure

My 31st Birthday. Getting older but getting wiser and by wiser I mean knowing that I can get some awesome clothes for just a fraction of the retail cost at Op Shops!

My birthday this year fell on a Saturday and this particular Saturday my Mum had a business meeting in Ballarat. Knowing me Sooo Well she suggested that my Sister and I go with her and make a day of it, op shopping! Best.Idea.Ever.

Saturday morning and we hit the road coffee in hand fairly early. I drove cause if I didn't we all knew I would fall asleep! Lol

When we got to Ballarat we dropped Mum at her Business meeting and arranged to meet her in town later on.

My Sister knows my passion and was well prepared for my mission. We started at the Red Cross Op Shop on Sturt St. We were more trying to plan ahead fitting in op shops as most seemed to close are 1pm so I didn't search every rack like I usually would. However shoes were half price and I found a practically new pair of black City Kitty heels for $4 instead of $8! Bargain number 1 for the day!

We then decided to head to the Mall area cause there was around 4 or 5 oppies clustered together.

First we went to Wozzles Warehouse, an op shop for C.A.F.S (Child and Family Services) and I was pleasantly surprised! When I saw thier sign iutside thier store saying items had been washed and laundered I thought it would be super expensive but it wasn't! It was easily cheaper than the previous Red Cross Op Shop.

So here I bought a cool $3 necklace, a pair of $3 reading glasses (both in my selfie below) and a silver wideneck top by BelleCurve (Target) for $6. I think that is pretty impressive.

I even come across this (photo below), which I assume is a rare one. Considering Harvest Powell is the name of the amazing babe behind Hope and Harvest which has been around for years! I imagine it as something she might've made in her early designer years which went from woman to woman and has eventually ended up right in front of me in a Ballarat Op Shop.

Next we popped into the Vinnies in the Mall and I found an As New Ts14+ black skirt for $8 and some really comfy jeggings (photo below) by Crossroads for $5.

Not far down the Mall was The Salvos, so naturally that was our next stop. I was starting to get pretty hungry and couldn't focus but I stumbled upon an Eve Hunter jumpsuit in the wrong section and decided to get it simply because it was a jumpsuit and size 20. I didn't have the energy to try it on, but I really wanted a jumpsuit and was hoping it would fit. The tag said $10.25. At the counter I find out its a purple tag which was half price and it even fit perfectly when I eventually got home and tried it on!!! Score!!! I put it down to birthday luck.

When my attention wavered, when I started loosing focus and my op shopping was affected I knew it was time for lunch.

We had lunch at The Unicorn which was an enlightening experience, like a trip back in time. Old record tunes, the atmosphere had a real retro/vintage/hipster vibe even down to the waitresses. One had a shoelace as her belt! I was captivated by the view I had of the old historic buildings, I could definately picture Sturt St. during the 1920's nightclub scene with flappers and men in pinstripe pants with braces.... Oh and lunch was awesome too! My cajun chicken, apple and walnut salad was very hot but I managed to eat the majority and loved every hot, delicious mouthful I could eat!

After Lunch we went back to let me finish checking out the Salvos Op Shop in the Mall properly. I knew Mum and Sis were pretty over it and tired, I had spent my budget (roughly) and I figured that the majority of other op shops would be closed by now so we decided to go out to Wendouree Shopping centre on the way home for a drink. 

I had very chocolatey iced chocolate and huge piece of lemon slice. I was soo full. Satisfied but oh so full. 

My Sister drove home whilst I attempted to answer phone, Instagram and Facebook birthday messages but in true Narcoleptic form and like a baby with a full tummy, I fell asleep!

 

It was such a great day! Spending time with the people I love, doing what I love. Who could ask for a better birthday!!! Thanks my Beautifuls! 

Spin the Pin - February 2016

I feel like I've been MIA from Instagram lately. I hate that.

I try to partake in a weekly fashion challenge of some sort but I've just had a really bad run with unfortunate things happening one after the other lately. Dental problems, breaking my curtains, getting over stressed to point of a mental break down, my only bra breaking, having a bad cold/cough/ear infection > meaning I haven't been able to see much of my new born nephew and having to decline my first ever offer to model for a well known plus size brand for a fashion parade (and get paid for it) because of my stupid dental problems!!! .... I feel like I could go on forever. I know they are shitty little things but it all gets me down...

Sooo I'm getting out of my rut and doing a challenge. And if there's any other challenges you think I should have done or should be doing then let me know and feel free to hold me to it! I know I've missed a couple of weeks of #NZStyleCurvettes challenges and I hate it! It's annoying me like OCD so I think I will have to go back and play catch up!

To the point... My Spin the Pin challenge for this month!

If you don't know what the Spin the Pin challenge is yet then learn about it here.

For this months Spin, I have taken full inspiration from the green fringed skirt in the Pin (above). The khaki green coloured skirt with thick fringing reminded me alot of a vest my sister and I bought not too long ago. 

I've always tried to get my younger sister (by 7 years) into opshopping. It's only just now, after years of trying, that I seem to  be getting some success with her. Recently we went op shopping together and found this sheer khaki green coloured vest with fringing, and we all know how "in" fringing is atm. We both liked it so much we decided we could share it.

So for my spin I wore our vest with jeans and these awesome wedged boots I got (for $2) from that same op shop trip. In hindsight I should not have worn jeans because it was soooo hot!

The vest is a bit frustrating the way it sits. I don't think we will keep it. The bottom of the sheer material, where the fringing is sewn on, has been gathered and makes the vest sit really weird, even so on my sis who is quite a lot smaller than me.

I feel like I should give this vest another chance before I send it off to an opshop again since I've only really worn it this once. What would you wear it with?

Outfit Details:

• Khaki green fringe vest || Nuqust || Opshopped for $1

• Jeans || City Chic || $50

• Tan tee || S2S || Opshopped for $2

• Long gold vintage necklace ||Opshopped 

• Beige wedged booties || Kö Fashion || Opshopped for $2

Check out the other babes that have linked up to do this months Spin the Pin too here.

NZ Style Curvettes - Maxi

Be it a maxi dress or a maxi skirt, they always tend to be too long for me... But I have found ways around it. 

I won this cool maxi dress by Embody Denim just last December on Instagram (Read more about that here) but it was too long... easily fixed.

If your maxi is too long you can knot it like I have with this maxi below. You can knot it to the side, at the front, up high, or down low.

If it's a maxi skirt you can pull it up higher so it's not dragging on the ground and no one will know because you will have a top over it! Pull it right up to your boobs, or even over your boobs and no one will know!

Another way I like to style my maxi dresses, or just any dress really is to use it as a skirt, and even sometimes as a top, depending on the dress. For example: the double take photo below shows the same dress being used as a skirt and a top, and it can also be worn as a straight dress. See my Double Take post here.

Since I have pics of me wearing my Embody Denim maxi dress straight at Christmas time last year (the very first pic in this post) I decided to be a bit different this time and wear it as a skirt!

I even used the maxi dress' belt tie as a headscarf to tie the two separate parts of the outfit together!

Outfit Details:

• Maxi dress || Embody Denim || Retails at $249 but I won it!! 

• Headscarf/Headwrap || Belttie from Embody Denim Maxi dress || Free

• Black peplum || Lily n Lou || $12 from Best'N'Less.

• Black sandals || Target || $15

• Bohemien Bardot ring || Samantha Wills || Bought off eBay for $35

• Black bag || Spencer and Rutherford || Opshopped for just $20

• Reversible black & silver necklace || Taking Shape 14+ || I paid $13.30 on sale but it retails at $34.95

• Denim jacket || Autograph || Opshopped for $4.10

Do you have any nifty hacks you use when wearing your maxi?

Spin the Pin - December '15/January '16

Spin the Pin is an Instagram Fashion challenge where the host, iCurvy chooses a 'PIN' of an outfit from Pinterest to which we put our own 'SPIN' on; our own take on the outfit; being inspired by any of its features, colours, traits etc etc.

The Outfit for this month (and for the previous month of December) is this cute blush and gold number worn by Nadia Abhoulhosn. See Nadia's post about this outfit here.

And my SPIN.

Initially I really struggled with how to spin the original outfit my own way. I usually make a bit of a list of what I see and I couldn't see past the pastel, blush coloured coat and the gold.

After quite some time thinking it just sort of clicked that gold was metallic, and the original outfit was all fairly similar colours, almost monochrome... So I went with that; Metallic and Monchrome (or at least similar colours).

Metallic is easy for me because I only have one item of metallic clothing and that is this cute shiny skirt by Huudaverti (read my review of this skirt) that has an amazingly soft, not to mention red inner lining! 

Having the skirt sorted, in turn sorted the colour I was to use. Process of Elimination.

So from that I pulled together this outfit. 

And I quite like it!

Outfit Details:

• Brown waterfall cardigan || No label || Opshopped for $4.50

• Beige singlet || Virtu || Opshopped

• Bronze skirt || Huudaverti || $40 on sale with Free shipping || See my review of this skirt.

• Natural coloured wedge boots || Autograph || on sale at the end of season for $40

• Bronze Clutch || Corelli || OpShopped for $3

• Earrings || can't remember!! Alzheimers 

• Bohemian bardot ring || Samantha Wills || $35 with free p+h from eBay

• Gold bracelet || Opshopped

Check out the other babes who have done this Spin the Pin challenge at the Link Party Here!

NZ Style Curvettes - White

I always struggle with white.

I don't own many white items of clothing and I haven't been married so I can't even post a pic of me in my wedding dress! 

I was initially going to wear this white cowl neck top/dress by Hope And Harvest but I wore it for another challenge in December so I thought I should try something else.

Whilst I was umming and arring over what to wear, I hadn't realised how time had flied until my bf knocked at the door to get me for the movie we were going to see... And I hate making people wait so I just chucked on this white top.

I haven't worn it much since I bought it because I thought it might've been a bit frilly and girly for me. Turns out it's not that bad! 

Outfit Details:

• White singlet || Autograph || Opshopped for $6

• Button Fly Flares || Pho Sizzle || $120 || See Flares here || See my Review of Flares here || $120

• Heels || Rivers || On sale for $8

• Headscarf || Opshopped for $2

• Silver Earrings || DesignStudio || Opshopped for $5 (they were brand new with the $19.95 tag still on them!)