A word about fashion ... and maturing

www.publicdomainpictures.net

So this picture has nothing to do with the topic ... I just love chickadees.

First of all, I just wanted to say thank you to Jennifer and Melanie especially.  Your comments have been wonderful, I love your blogs and the only reason I don't comment regularly is because my available time in the evenings is so short.  But I know that since you follow my blog, I can usually get a message to you.  I appreciate you both very much.

And of course Barry is always my biggest supporter.  And for that I'm always grateful.

So I travel every evening with 3 other women.  There are 2 or 3 others who join us once in a while but there's usual Kandi, Jackie and Heather.  Kandi and I are friends outside the train (we met through neighbours) and I just seemed to pick up the rest of them on the train.  We're all 40-50.  We have some interesting conversations ... Heather has the quickest wit ... Jackie's a sweetheart and Kandi ... well ... Kandi's my girl.  And she's going through some challenging times so I try to be positive and encouraging  without being flip (I can inadvertently seem like that sometimes even though I don't mean it).

So our topic of discussion yesterday was on fashion.  I never would have seen Heather as having a shoe fetish ... but hey ... you learn something new about people all the time.  Since we're all over 40, the topic of dressing too young came up in the conversation.  I'm a firm believer that even as we mature (and I realize that most of the women reading this are in their 20's ... just you wait my darlings, your time will come) we can still dress youthfully without looking like we're trying to be 20.  Just because we're 40+ doesn't mean we have to dress like frumps.

This last 7 months has been rather interesting for me.  When I was growing up and well into my 20's, I was totally into fashion, hair, makeup, shoes, accessories, etc.  If I do say so myself, I looked pretty good back in the day.  Then I started really gaining weight, getting older and I somehow lost that.  Clothes were uncomfortable, the gaining of weight and losing of muscle and strength caused back problems so I couldn't wear heels anymore.  I ended up in "utility" shoes.  I started wearing pants all the time (rarely did when I was younger) because of the shoes 'cause really, utility shoes and a nice dress or skirt just didn't do it.  And I just kept spiralling down from there.

Last September I finally decided to do something.  My biggest stressor (my mom unfortunately) was gone, and it was finally time for me to take care of me.  I have a wonderfully self-sufficient husband so I've been free to take care of myself.  The fact that I do this at stupid o'clock really helps but he's very supportive.

Since I've been losing the fat (I say fat because I don't think the scale has moved) and gained the muscle back (explains the lack of scale movement), my back problems are under control and I'm back into 3 or 4" sexy shoes again.  Have I mentioned the boots????  OMG OMG OMG  I've gotten excited about footwear before (sexy red shoes) but these things are AWESOME!  Barry kinda likes them too.  Wearing them to bed came up ... can't imagine why. LOL

So now it's time to get back into fashion and looking my best.  I've been doing the hair and makeup for a while and the shoes are slowly coming back and the clothes (which is the biggest indicator of "age") are youthful, but still age appropriate.  Do I look like I'm almost 45?  I sure hope not.  Do I dress like I'm 21.  Not a chance.  'cause I'm not.  I don't have the body, nor do I want to be one of those 40+ women who people look at and think or say "OMG what was she thinking???"

So I'm going to start taking some pictures (or Barry is) of each other in our "outfits" ... he's becoming more fashion also .... of course the fact that I buy a lot of his clothes doesn't hurt ... even put them together for him once in a while ... remember the all black outfit.  I have a thing for men in all black.  I seem to have a thing for bald men.  This is all convenient since my hubby's bald (more or less) and dresses all in black sometimes when we go out. 

My shoe repair guy (who's just as big a flirt as hubby, maybe a little bigger and certainly likes me) is tall, bald, black man (40+), and today he walks into the shop wearing black shoes, black pants, black shirt, long black coat and smelling WONDERFUL!  Yes, Barry knows, he knows what I like, hell, he eggs me on sometimes ... we both do ... sign of a solid relationship in my mind.

One last thing ... Vitamin D ... my happy pills.  Today was a miserable, rainy, foggy, gross day.  Normally I am a wreck ... tired, listless, draggy, etc.  I met my naturopath a couple of days ago and he suggested upping my Vit D intake from 1,000 to 4,000 mg a day.  The past 2 days .. happy, happy camper.  Tons of energy, lots of smiles, humming away, bouncing off the walls, talking a mile a minute, not shutting up (can you tell???).
I LOVE IT!

Let's see ... time management ... I guess if I read more and wrote less I'd probably comment more.

Thanks for your support everyone!