Nordstrom Anniversary Sale Public Access

July 20, 2017Sara Leave a Comment

The public access starts today for the Nordstrom Anniversary Sale . It is no longer just early access for the people who have a Nordstrom card. The sale continues until its end on August 6th (which is my birthday). While a lot of things have sold out already based on previous years they tend to restock many of them for public access but they go fast too. In my last sale post I offered up my favourites for women broken down into categories. In this post I am focusing on Kids, home, and beauty.

Now this July is more than halfway through we have officially entered prime back to school shopping time and stores are starting to fill with fall stock. Most of these sale items are new fall stock which means you can get some of your back to school shopping completed way before everyone else does. When I worked in retail the busiest time of the year was not Christmas, and we don’t have Black Friday here so that wasn’t it either. It was the Saturday before the new school year started which was hell (and Boxing Day, Boxing Day was hell too).

The thing with kids is no matter how well they treat their clothes they are going to eventually grow out of them. It always seems to be that my girls need new wardrobes at the same time which is super expensive, and this fall is one of those times :/ I actually picked up a dress last week at Nordstrom for Merle It’s this one but in yellow, along with these cat ears (because we all need to be a cat sometime). While the dress looks summery, it was her favourite colour and is roomy enough to layer a shirt underneath or she can easily wear leggings and a sweater over. It will transition to fall easily. One piece down, many more to go.

Here are my picks for Girls and Boys fall fashion, baby stuff, some things to spruce up your home, and some tried and true beauty items with a great discount. I’m not going to lie, when we walked through the baby section my uterus might have twinged a little. There were so many cute baby clothes. I swear every year the clothes get cuter and cuter. There are so many more options than when Roo was a baby, and even from only 6 years ago when Merle was an infant (and I thought there was so much back then). The Mini Boden, Tea Collection, and Masalababy were especially cute. Have a great weekend!

GIRLS FASHION

BOYS FASHION

BABY

HOME

BEAUTY

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What to Pack for One Month in Italy Outfit Options

July 19, 2017Sara Leave a Comment

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I really like the pieces I selected in this list. It wasn’t flowing well when I was first trying to piece it together but I found a couple of accent pieces and then built it around them. I think it turned out well. These 30 outfit options (15 at the top and 15 below) were put together using the pieces from the What to Pack for One Month in Italy from yesterday. The request was from a while back but it took me some time to get to it because I had a lot of summer destination requests. The trip is for a mom of 3 who is lucky enough to be spending from September to October in Italy with her husband and young children. She wanted a smallish travel capsule that will be versatile, and mom friendly, while still remaining cute and stylish.

The pieces I selected are as follows:

5 tops in varying cuts and styles, 1 tank or camisole for layering or for warmer days, a graphic tee for a bit of fun, a classic stripe, a blouse, and an airy peasant blouse.
two sweaters; I usually opt for a pullover and a cardigan but in this case I chose an edgy off the shoulder style, and an oversized one.
Four bottoms; a skirt in a midi length, a pair of casual slightly distressed jeans, an ankle skimming dressier pair, and some black trousers of some kind (black is so easy to dress up in a pinch so it is always a good idea to include a dark pair of pants).
Two dresses, one midi length print, and one black dress.
A light jacket like a trench or moto jacket.
A bathing suit since the month of September may have some beachy weather.
For accessories I added a couple of scarves; one yellow to add some colour, and one print, a hat, and sunnies.
Three pairs of shoes (which also include the pair you will travel in) a pair of sneakers, slides or sandals, and a flat in a fun colour or print.
Two purses, one shoulder bag or tote style, and one smaller crossbody.

I hope this list checks all of the boxes. Have a great trip!

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What to Pack for a month in Italy

July 18, 2017Sara 4 Comments

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Does anyone else constantly have cold hands, even when it’s a million degrees out? It probably doesn’t help that the central air blows out directly above my desk, but it is making me type in slow motion. I’m a little stir crazy today because there is an air quality advisory so we stayed in. Merle recently discovered that several of her Playstation games have the ability to go online to play with other people and that she can use a microphone to talk to them. She also thinks that she has to talk really loud for them to hear, so it’s hard for me to focus 100% since her Playstation is about 4 feet from my desk 😉

This request came from a while back. It has taken me longer than I hoped to play catch up so I am finally getting to it. It’s for a mom with 3 young children going to Italy for 4 weeks for September-October. She wanted a smallish capsule of pieces that should carry her through and transition through the month. Depending where you are in Italy you are going to see varying temperatures, especially at this time of year when it is making the transition to fall. September usually starts of in the low 20’s and will slowly decrease as the month goes on. Night time, rain, and being on water will also drop the temperatures so it is best to be prepared.

Having 3 young kids to travel with also means that the clothes need to be no fuss, and easy to wear so I stuck with basics and added pieces in. I decided to add a swimsuit last minute because I figured that at this time of year the weather can be unpredictable and you may find there are more than a few beach weather days on the trip.

I put together a full 30 days of outfits from these pieces which can be found in this post. I will link it as soon as it is posted.

The accent colour I chose is yellow, because I am really liking yellow at the moment. Do you have a current favourite colour to wear?

If you like this post you can find more packing lists and outfit options in my:
Packing Light Series
What to Wear Options

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What I Wore This Week

July 17, 2017Sara 2 Comments

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This Saturday was busy. We don’t usually cram that much stuff into one day but because Tom had to work on Sunday we had to fit our usual Sunday errands in to Saturday. Plus, there was a small carnival down the street that we promised to take the girls to and ended up there until past 11. To say they were bouncing off the walls is an understatement. The rides at those places are soooo expensive too. I think it worked out to $6 a ride per person which makes it really easy to spend a lot of money if you want to go on every ride even though there were only 10 rides (plus a games).

I also realized that while I once was super, crazy adventurous ride rider in my youth, as an adult they give me anxiety. I was even getting anxiety on the Ferris wheel (I’ve never had fear of height issues) which is something I would have thought was great a million years ago. Is this something that happens to us as adults?

I posted yesterday that I was able to go do a walk through Nordstrom to check out all the sale items (which I posted about). We have two in the city and we went to the one in Yorkdale which is a more upscale mall. I always feel like I am not rich enough to shop at that mall which is a reason we don’t hit it up often but I like it and I have become an expert window shopper there. Tom and Roo managed to find a great deal at the Disney store though and were able to add to their Star Wars collections.

I am getting stressed out trying to figure out what to get for Roo for us homeschooling her grade 8 this year. I can’t believe she is one year from highschool. I’m know that I am outsourcing for French to an online program, and I am thinking of doing The Big History Project for history to get a complete run through before highschool starts. I’ve heard great things about it and of course we would add a lot of books that tie in to it and documentaries. I also want to get a subscription to The Great Courses Plus (the online version of The Great Courses). It’s only $19.99 a month for access to thousands of lecture videos from great professors across the world. I think if you just watched these you will have a great education. I Beta tested the site a couple of years ago and I know I would get a lot of use out of it too. I’d honestly rather watch these than tv shows (geek alert). Aside from those ideas I am feeling stumped. Merle is really easy to plan for, except she wants an astronomy course and I’m not too sure where I will find a good, age appropriate one. Maybe a telescope and a star chart? 😉

Have you watched any good historical documentaries lately that I can add to our watch list?

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The Best of the Nordstrom Anniversary Sale (well, according to me)

July 16, 2017Sara 6 Comments

I don’t usually post on Sunday’s but we had a really full day yesterday and Tom had to work today so I really didn’t feel like leaving the house. For part of our outing yesterday I made Tom take us to the “expensive” mall so I could go through Nordstrom and check out the sale pieces in person. I’m not going to lie, I was hoping I would see the Topshop cardigan that I wanted but they didn’t have it and since it is now sold out online (it might get restocked, fingers crossed) and we only have two Nordstroms here (only 5 in Canada total) I am admitting defeat and I am probably SOL on this pick.

I am going to round-up some of my favourites by category based partly on my personal tastes and partly on seeing most of them in person yesterday. But before I do that I am going to talk about how easy it is to get sidetracked there. And how easy it is to fall in love with pieces that are completely and utterly out of my price range. First was an Acne leather jacket. This jacket has officially become my dream jacket in which I will add to my fantasy wish list. The other one is Golden Goose sneakers which I tried on and didn’t want to take off. I hate trying stuff on with no intent to buy but in reality these two pieces combined equal to more than my whole wardrobe so they are going to have to remain in my “wishful thinking” spot for a while longer;)

Now on to my best of Nordstrom Anniversary Sale 2017 picks:

Boots and Shoes

Purses and Bags

Jackets

Dresses and Jumpsuits

Fall Tops and Bottoms

Accessories

Have you shopped the #Nsale either online or in store yet?

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What to Pack for Greece Outfit Options

July 13, 2017Sara 2 Comments

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It’s cold and miserable today which is my favourite weather. On days like this I wish that our patio was a bit bigger so we could put one of those self standing hammocks and a Papasan Chair with a colourful cushion (this is a cute stool that would also make a great outdoor side table). Kind of like bohemian decor to sit out in and enjoy the rain. There is also Ribfest going on across the street until Sunday night so for the next few days I will be eating ribs like a boss. Yay for living smack dab in the middle of a city, you get access to all the cool stuff.

Tis the season for great sales and the Nordstrom Anniversary Sale started today (for card holders) and you can check out yesterday’s post if you want to see my early access picks. If only I had a never-ending supply of money 😉

This post has the outfit options to the What to Pack for Greece packing light list from Wednesday. The list is for a 14 day trip so I was going to put together 20 outfits, but ended up with 30. There are just so many ways to piece these selections together that I could have easily made more but it is 8 pm (as I write this) and I want to get to bed at a decent time.

The original post has all the pieces laid out in list formation but for those that don’t feeling like looking at that post the breakdown is as follows:

5 tops (a graphic tee, striped shirt, printed short sleeve, a plain t-shirt, and a chambray that you can wear buttoned up or over tanks, t-shirts, and the sleeveless dress left open. It also looks cut knotted at the waist).
Two different style and colours of sweaters for cooler evenings and travel, one cardigan, and one oversized pullover.
4 bottoms which include, one pair of shorts (you might want to bring two depending if you are a short wearer), jeans (for cooler times and travel), some black, slouchy, casual pants (here is a white choice if you prefer a lighter colour), and a midi skirt.
Two dresses, one black, slip dress style (which is great for layering t-shirts under and sweaters over), and one shirt dress that can be left open over shorts or pants as a kimono style.
A bathing suit or two for variety and in case one is wet when you want to go swimming.
A small and big lightweight scarf that can be worn around hair, as a shawl, and for a swimsuit cover.
Accessories for the sun like a hat and sunglasses
3 pairs of shoes; sandals, slides, and espadrilles.
Two purses are a good option, a regular size purse, and a crossbody

I used to have a fantastic pair of espadrilles years ago but I wore them basically until the sole fell off. They were the only shoes I wore when we went to Barbados even though I brought several pairs. If I would have known they would be back in style I probably would have tried to find a way to salvage them.

Have you ever had any regrets about getting rid of items from your closet? I still regret getting rid of a top from 1995…..

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