Hand-me-Downs.

every woman has a hand-me-down.

mine happens to be a 70 year old Gucci skirt.

NowNow

I am a realist not a label whore, my budget does NOT incorporate a Gucci lifestyle.

but- i live comfortably. - so I take my hand-me-down seriiiously : ) lol.

whenever you come across a treasure like this sitting in your Mothers attic, given to her from her grandmother, you can't pass that up!

regardless of how in fashion the skirt is, it will be worn, but worn properly. A seamstress or tailor is like a bestfriend in fashion. When clothes actually fit -- the body and the clothing are a match made in heaven.

So, when a hand-me-down comes your way, see the future potential, don't just take it for what it is.

Hand-me-downs even some clothes at good well -- can be special pieces.

These pieces are certainly budget conscience.

hidden treasures!

Although shopping relieves stress your funds may not relate to your desires.

But there is always a creative way to use what you already have in your closet.

those hidden treasures -- can be magical.

dress: forever 21 24.99, shoes Bakers 44.00

I did not like how this dress looked one bit, but I was able to find two belts, one dark blue the other was a wrap for a purple silk dress my grandmother gave my mother and so on..

I put the silk wrap underneath the belt and it gave the perfect illusion like it was just meant to be.

Mom's don't always have to look and dress a certain way

In Texas it seems to be a trend that once you have kids you -let go.

^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

this outfit was in 2008, reason for the out-of-style booties. but at the time... it worked.

I run track and I never had to buy spandex, I always had a pair..

the season of the "tights" was easy for me because I had so many to choose from.

The jacket, ELLE on sale 22.00, at Kohls.

mind you: these hidden treasures can be found when shopping too!



New Years Eve 2010-2011
shirt forever 21 : 27.99 skirt Forever 21 12.99

sean john - burlington 9.99  i saw this shirt in macy's the next day for full price at 24.99
PERFECT example of where to "sometimes" shop!

Thanksgiving dress 32.99 - BabyGap
Holiday dresses don't have to be pumpkin colored or green and red where it seems odd wearing it any other day
when you are shopping on a budget consider multiple wears

hidden treasures aren't just quality items/nice looking items at low prices sometimes they are pieces of art or clothing made by a designer that is impecable & in budget.

this painting I found at urban outfitters by an unknown artist was 79.99 and I had saved for three months to buy it, in my eyes this is a hidden treasure!

armani exchange 42.99 originally 98.00 purchased at the Tanger Outlets in San Marcos, Texas
pure genius this vest!



knowing when to & when not to.

iiiiii daydream. I'm sure you do to.

I daydream about how to design a room or an outfit that I'd love to put together.

Our daydreaming may be different but each girl to their own.

Now although I like to budget that does not mean I like to cancel out quality.

I have a few tactics I use that help me stay within range of a reasonable price while finding items that won't tear apart after one wash. ( we have all had those moments )

Shopping sale racks can be hard because they are limited but that all depends on where you shop and when you shop. Shopping at the end or before a season is a bad time to shop, unless you are looking for last-seasons looks like a sweater and its summer, or a summer dress and its winter. Shop sale racks in stores like Guess, Bebe, Arden B, Nordstroms, Express, etc.

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Outlet stores are mecca for women like myself. I purchased this skirt >>

at BCBG for 19.99... I spent 120 that day what it would cost for one t-shirt from BCBG.

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You see an item, even on sale, or it may be a decent price not on sale, but your iffy about it. Never settle, there can always be something in the store next door that can fit you better, looks better, and is less expensive.

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Just because you feel like shopping - trust me its a stress reliever

doesn't mean you should.

I've blindly shopped because it made me feel good, but then I got home and realized I had nothing to wear with what I purchased. It seems silly but shop with a plan.

If you have a pair of shoes at home plan out what color shirt you'd like, and go from there or vice or versa.

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You don't always have to stay in one store when shopping or just on the sale rack

I just found out that Pacsun has an abundance of cotton slingback shirts for 12.99 :: they aren't on sale but they are a quality item for an inexpensive price.

&; yet I went to the sale rack and found one just like it for 9.99

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Lastly, budget regardless ---if you can spend 400 dollars---> budget!

It is so easy to overspend even when you have a higher budget.

That freedom can overcome some people, like myself, and backfire.

Imagine what you could get with what you have if you just looked instead of settled.

Budget when grocery shopping, design shopping, clothes shopping etc.

My one crucial tip!

If you splurge.

Splurge on an item you love.

For me it's a pair of heels, a pair of J's or a dress.

When the money is there a one item splurge may be necessary!

$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$

banana republic shirt 15.99 / pants forever 21 24.99/ ring & necklace aldo buy 1 get 1 free :) 15.99/watch (gift)

                                                                   world market 29.99

new direction

obviously has been awhile.

after much consideration & talking with a few people I have come to the conclusion that my blog is going to take an entire different direction.

As a woman we are faced with the dilemma of meeting fashion needs/wants but low on funds.

We are Mothers/Students/Entrepueners/Executives etc. & we are constantly looking for something that makes us feel sexy. For me, and a lot of women I know, its their clothes.

Of course. When we die and go see our Lord and Savior we don't take our clothes to heaven, so why should our clothes only grace the label worthy price range, can't we just budget and still look good/better than those who spent thousands on our copycat piece :)

I want to shed light on what variety exists in numerous price-ranges and nothing (maybe) will exceed 100 dollars. I want to let women know that you can still look good without going broke!

From fashion to design being unique can be pricey, but I know how to avoid the cravings and get rid of the dispair.

Stay tuned!!

false representation

You ever felt like you stayed in something for too long ??
For all the wrong reasons ??

You ever felt like, you went back for improvement and nothing improved?

What about, you ever felt like no matter the lessons you learned and who it made you into, it still was a waste of time?

You ever felt like you gave too many chances?

You ever felt like you couldn't escape?

It is hard finding what you want
there is someone for everyone right?

what if no matter all the searching you've done, your still unsatisfied.
I never was good and good-bye

I never will be.

Decisions are difficult sometime, it takes a natural born leader to make them
i "thought" i was naturally born a leader
apparently not.

I sacrificed a lot of time for minimal results.
I shared
lived a triangle

I won't answer any questions
Supply any answers
Simply keep quiet because my thoughts are dark
Because they will ALL ask one day
and they will ALL want an answer

ALL four of them
or is it five

who knows

the pain-staking reality of it all is that I have this perfect part of me
that deserves all he asks for
the one who calls me "mommy"
and supplies me with the hugs I crave

he is the answer
i am the question

that is all that matters
that is the solution
us.

just us.

nothing else seems to matter
because nothing else is apperciated!
I am still human
a human with emotions
a human with a heart that only has so many pieces left.

today is when I decieded
I refuse
to continue this way
allowing myself to be apart of this

society wants the rich to richer, & ignore the poor.

My beautiful wonderful boyfriend turned to me this morning while listening to 91.3 with Ricky Smiley, which we've done every morning while living here in Miami, and they had Nene on their show from housewifes of Atlanta and said see, even media wants the rich to become richer.

I looked at him, I'm usually looking for something interesting in my day to day life to write about... and I said you know what babe that is so true you just gave me something to write about!

I agree fully with rich become richer, while the poor become poorer. I've been neither rich or poor. A lot with what society protrays is that middle class which I am, usually don't stay middle class, they either can venture upwards to rich, or more than likely decline to poor class.

These housewifes are already rich... these snobby Hills' girls where born into riches, why does media give these already rich people these shows that people get hooked on to, and they just increase their riches by our ratings.

We dont' see media setting up a show called 'life in the ghetto'  where they follow around low class families and tune into their everyday disputes on everyday life...
of course that's because it's filled with real life scenarios, not being able to pay the light bill on time, sleeping on the floor, and finally after four months of doing so finding the money to buy a mattress to sleep on, enjoying sunday dinners with the family, tradition and food and family....

BUT NO!! WE WATCH PEOPLE WHO HAVE IT ALL, WHO SHOP FOR THE RICHEST CLOTHES AND FANCIEST CARS, LIVING LIFE DRINKING COSMOS' INSTEAD OF 40'S. (nothing wrong with cosmos' just making a point)


, or 'the charlie families trailer park rundown', families who have to live life while daddy drives around the country in an 18 wheeler, families who live 2 feet from the next... and how they deal with the drama of barking dogs and landlords

stories everyday people can relate to, not stories that make us envy others, not stories that make us look at these rich folk and laugh because they don't know how to control their children because they are too rich to care.

I am not going to lie I sat and watched the show, i've sat and watched all the shows where it's just the rich kids, rich families showing a day in the life of the sanders family... I mean no matter what color you are black or white... the black people are rich and the white people are rich

WE GET IT.
move on already.

show us something we can relate to , give us something that can aid us in our everyday life, not make us feel like will can live through these other people because they have it all and we never will. Show has families that have made it through a struggle and still manage to live everyday like it's their last.

show us true love and true living.
the viewers of these shows I doubt are these other rich folk.

Media should stop enabling these indivduals... it's time to venture out and be unpredictable.

AS IF THERE WASN'T ENOUGH SHOOTINGS ALREADY

Something about finding out the mental state of people and keeping them away from civilization beams critical to me. Recently I have watched a few shows of E! and TruTv about the shootings at schools by children, the murders by these children, so I am so what adhered to the idea of school shootings...

Is there something so wrong with Colorado that people just feel the need to shot and kill individuals that don't know any better.

At the end of a school day I bet no one saw it coming , @ Deer Creek Middle school a 32 year old mentally deranged alchoholic with counts of assualt on his record to pull out a hunting rifle and begin firing at students as they begin the descedant from school to home.

The man's name is Bruco Strongwood Eastwood... um yes that is his real name.

In his very short rampage he managed to only release 3 shots, and each shot hit a student, wounding two and keeping one hospitilized.

Until two teachers, one of them included David Benke a math teacher, whom felt it in his heart to end this before he got any worse, they tackled the man to the ground after he dropped the rifle to run and struggled with him until they had him pinned to be arrested.

Police are never sure when grown men go off to kill innocent children what motivated him.
The voices in his head maybe.

Here is what David Benke told media and officers what happened...

At first when I was walking over there, it was kind of what a teacher does," Benke said, still shaken hours after the shooting. "`Hey kid, what are you doing,' you know that kind of thing."


He said another teacher was quickly on the scene and both of them pinned the gunman to the ground. Eastwood was armed with a bolt-action rifle.

"I basically have my arms and legs wrapped around him, (the other teacher) has his forearm around his front and we were basically trying to get the guy to quit struggling."

"I talked to him while we were on the ground," Benke added. "I was underneath him and his face was pretty close to mine. I asked him, `Why did you do this? Were you a student here?'

"He either didn't respond or his responses didn't make a whole lot of sense," Benke said.

to read more...


the video of his interview

Watching his video I seriously cried, it's touching to hear from the person who potentially saved other peoples lifes, he risked his own life for other parent's children. We hear about individuals like him, but rarely do we get to see them speak on their own behalf.

:) I wish all the best for David Benke he is a blessed and lovely man. :)

wam bam here we are again.

Another twist and turn on an old goodie for all us movie seekers.

Alice in Wonderland.

I grew up reading the books and watching the animated movie. Fasinated by the colors and story line and lengths of imagination Disney went to in creating these characters. 20 some years later a new manifestation takes place and these characters i've watched, take the place of actors I've grown up watching as well. It is interesting and compelling. I am curious what the story line entells when Alice goes back to Wonderland!

And of course I went out of my way to find every actor which plays each role, because whelp I want to.

Mia Wasikowska - Alice

Anne Hathaway- White Queen

Johnny Depp- Mad Hatter

Helena Bonham Carter- Red Queen (queen of hearts)

Crispin Clover- The Knave of Hearts

Stephen Fry- Cheshire Cat

Christopher Lee- Jabberwock

Michael Sheen- Rabbit

Alan Rickman- Caterpillar

Matt Lucas- Tweedledee and tweedle dum

The production must have spent millions on animation and technological advances.

That brings your eye into a virtual 3d world of wonderland, that sometimes isn't so wonderful!

it will be a birthday gift to myself this movie!

indeed

biggest loser results my take :)

"holy macroni and meatballs" is what comes to my mind.
different things may come to other people's minds but we all are probably thinking the same thing.
How do these men and women lose that much weight that fast, the results are impressive.
I am never home when the show comes on, you can say that I have no say on the show because of that.
But I have seen bits and pieces from time to time I have watched an episode here and there
I know what the goal is and what it entitles.
There is a process that I am not so confident on on this show and that's the whole kicked off part.
If you don't meet your weight requirements or someone losing more than you, your kicked off.
And you no longer get the training by professionals or the atmosphere that keeps you focused on your diet, surrounded by others whom have to face the same obstacles as you building a mind frame of persistance.
Instead they kick you off bc "your still too fat"
I think it's pointless, putting them back into the world to face the scruntity and cruel reality of fast food and expensive trainers, we all aren't made of money, healthy food is expensive, even as a thin girl my healthist was in highschool, constant work out and parents to take care of me.
Now when I''m on my own budget and I have to forge for myself my health has altered and I am bent to the world of ramen.
I still wish mommy and daddy where around to keep my healthy habits stabilized but my pocket book doesn't allow the fabulous world of decadent dining.
It is kind of pointless for some and it can be punishing to some egos.
I mean I dont' believe at all that your obese because it runs in your genes, .5% of people in the world are because of a gene issue.

"A new survey by the NPD Group, a leading market research firm based in Rosemont, Ill., shows that about 62% of adults and 34% of children are overweight or obese, a percentage that has been virtually the same since 2001, says NPD vice president Harry Balzer. "I'm not saying we're getting skinnier, but no more of us are becoming overweight."

I believe it has to do with the parents,
one time i was walking in the mall, this child maybe not even 3, maybe 90 pds, sitting on the back of a cart crying her eyes out for more cookies, screams and throws a fit, mommy was short and overweight but not overly and auntie was just walking in front of the child feeding her face to get her to be quiet.

first of all i would have whooped the shit out of my sons butt if he was pulling a stunt like she was, two years old and everything.

but my son would never do that. bc I handle my child in a loving and caring yet stern way, children need rules to have structure.

so for the first time there is a show that doesn't enable the larger individuals with okay we understand your fat what's the physcological reason or lets see if we can get your gastric bypass.
no no,

in order to get the correct results, you work for it, you work for what you want...

and the results are amazing!!

 

I just found so many pictures I had to put them all, i do it funny though that most the women (besides shedding the weight) get so much more tan once they get thinner, it's like the cologen released spreads bronzer to all the pores I don't know. Ha, even the black woman seems darker, I just think it's funny.

But it's still amazing and beautiful to see.

Congrats to eveyone who has succeded in this venture.

And BOO to production who kicks people off.

you suck.

BLOWING MY OWN MIND

I've just decieded to blow my own mind right. I have been on national geographic for only 10 minutes and I'm already drawn in like a cat to tuna.
I can't stop reading and searching for new science stories.
I already knew that pluto was no longer a planet that happened my senior year of high school in 2005.
I didn't know that it's no longer a planet because it just plainly isn't special enough, it's too much like it's surrounding dwarf planets and is only 1/2 the size of it's own moon, when the other planets of our solar system or substantially larger then their moons which orbit them.
but then I sat and looked at the photo from a nasa space station of the earth in all it's glory, sitting in the universe like it's floating on a magnet, circling stars and constellations and this glorious star called the sun and my mind was blown I had to catch my breathe.
really the image of earth and knowing that I am but a fragment in this picture is astonishing.
Jusssssst thought i'd put that out there.

o my gracious goodness

I have no idea what has pocessed me to look up this information but women body builders are some of the most disturbing individuals to look at that i've ever seen.

They alter their feminine ways and completly take on the features of men.
who finds this appealing I don't know, and how these women make money off of it, I don't know either because these photo's are astonishing to me.
What would make someone want to do this is beyond me.
why are their faces never the same color as their bodies. I don't get this.
There are two catagories of these women body builders I didn't do any research but it seems like it's the on steroids women and the lean mean fighting machines.

This Vs. This

EWWWWWWWWWW.

I can't really find any type of urge to want to be that big... and have my man feel enadiquit to me.

This is just

nasty.