Giftsgiving! - 25 Gifts Under $25

'Tis the official kickoff for holiday shopping season! Smart shopping can allow for great gift picking and sticking to your budget. To help get you started, here's my list of wallet friendly gifts for the loved ones on your list, that they will be sure to appreciate (and use)!

1. / 2. / 3. / 4. / 5. / 6. / 7. / 8. / 9. / 10. / 11. / 12.

Here's a chance to do away with the impersonal feel that can come with gift cards, and what's better, is there's no sizing required! Giving a thoughtful gift and all that's needed is having a tiny bit of insight into her regular activities or things that she's into!

13. / 14. / 15. / 16. / 17. / 18. / 19. / 20. / 21. / 22. / 23. / 24. / 25.

And you can always pair two gifts together and still be under budget - like a multi pack of fashion earrings with the jewelry box, the tea bag caddy (or tea bag variety pack) with the tea kettle, or a couple hand towels with the foaming hand soap.

It really takes less effort than you think! Happy Black Friday shopping to all of you!

Diva's Desires - Fall Dresses

I haven't done one of these in a minute, but let me just put it out in the atmosphere...for fall, I desire dresses, but more specifically dresses with sleeves.

I want weather appropriate dresses that compliment the figure, by skimming, not clinging, to my shape.

 

I want work appropriate choices that keep me warm in the office without needing an extra layer, but are chic enough to take me through the weekend with a scarf swirled about my neck finished off with ankle booties and patterned tights.

 

Give me cozy knit fabrics in flirty silhouettes, that leave me feeling fly, not frumpy.

 

And if you please, as wrinkle free as possible, with forgiving cuts that leave room, because I like to eat. 

 

I mean, 'tis is the season for apple cider, pumpkin laced everything, sprinkled with a bag of Halloween candy and a dash of Thanksgiving and Christmas dinner - so a little wiggle room becomes very necessary.

 

(this post has been sponsored by a frustrating shopping experience, as all these lovely ideas found online are not so readily available in stores.)

 

DD's Style File - It's Fall Y'all!

I didn't want to accept it. I was so against it that it was like being dragged someplace you don't want to go, practically kicking, screaming and clutching on for dear life.

Fall.

Yep, as in the fall season. Don't get me wrong, I don't hate fall. I find it to be an absolutely beautiful time of year and I love all the smells associated with autumn. Along with the impending holiday season happiness. And yes, of course, the love of fall wardrobes.

However, it also means I have to let go of my summer frocks. Light as air, frothy materials and mini skirts with bronzy, bare legs.

And here in the northeast, fall is brief.

The brevity happens to be the biggest problem with fall. It means "winter is coming" (shout out to all my fellow Game of Thrones fans!). Which, to me, represents cold, cold, cold. Oh, and blizzards. And ugly, frumpy boots made for shoveling and snow stomping. And big marshmallow puffer coats made for warmth, not visual appeal...even if it is leopard lined and from Betsey Johnson.

*sigh*

But I've finally accepted that I might as well embrace fall and enjoy the comfortable temps while I can.

So I did what comes most naturally - went shopping!

Red coat - Target
Black & white striped dress - Target
Polka dot blouse - The Limited
Cobalt handbag - Target
Snake print belt - The Limited
Nude pumps - old

You'll notice that the majority of this look came from Target. I have a love/hate relationship with this coat though. I mean, I love it's vibrancy and the weight of it and the cute bird lining. But I hate it for the same reasons. Because I couldn't just leave it in the store on the rack due to all it's cuteness and fall appropriateness. All on top of my need for a new trench. BUT I didn't love the price. One bit.

$50 for a trench from Target is practically wallet robbery. Yet, I paid it anyway. On the opposite side, I got this dress off the clearance rack for ten bucks. And it was ten bucks very well spent, I plan to mix 'n mingle this in my wardrobe regularly.

My "something blue" is my gorgois cobalt handbag. Which I gazed at lovingly early last month, but ultimately put it down and left the store without it. Only to ponder its eye catching loveliness for several days following... Great thing though, I got a Target gift card for my birthday, so needless to say, I made getting my hands on this bag priority one.

I will say, it is not the most well constructed bag, compared to others I've seen or purchased at Target. The quality leaves a bit to be desired. However, I plan to not love it too hard (i.e., not make it my every day bag from October to April) and enjoy the time I have with it.

Another plus to all this, is that I finally signed up for a Target Red card, the debit version. So I do get 5% off purchases and free shipping from Target.com. Why in sweet baby Jesus' name I waited so long to do that, as much a I shop at Target, I do not know.

Sike...I'm lying.

I do know. It's because I didn't realize they offered a debit version. I thought that it was credit only and I didn't need another one of those. But that Red card matched with weekly mobile Target coupons can save you enough dollars to make you feel a little less guilty about that buggy full of merchandise you rolled out of the store with. So, if you don't have one already, I'd suggest you sign up asap! (no, this is not a sponsored post, I am just a Target fanatic)

Speaking of Target....  If you haven't yet done so, today is the last day to enter to win my Fall Fabulous Mini Haul giveaway featuring a Phillip Lim x Target Yellow Mini Satchel! Now go quickly while you still have time to enter!

Have a great weekend!



This post is also a submission for IFB Project #116.

My Thoughts - 3.1 Phillip Lim for Target Review

It came. We saw. It conquered.

The 3.1 Phillip Lim collab with Target can be referred to nothing less than a success. It will pretty much rank right next to the Missoni, Prabal Gurung and Jason Wu collab sell outs. Doing so so quickly that it left fashionistas nationwide dashing for eBay and Poshmark attempting to get pieces that had sold out online and in their local stores.

Ok, so you don't typically see me saying anything at all positive about my hometown, here in little ol' nowhere Pennsylvania by the lake, but occasionally there's a sunny side. Interestingly, some of the ladies around here couldn't be less concerned with Target collaborations (unless perhaps it was from Oprah) and would likely only buy a piece from the collection because they thought it was "cute," not because of the connection to a fashion Gawd which they've never heard of.

So although our local store will stock just a small volume of the collab collections, they don't always sell out immediately (Missoni excluded, because I think that was an epic fail across the nation).

And this time, it meant when I visited our store on day four after the Lim collection launched, there were still pieces to be pondered and purchased.

Admittedly, some items were more popular than others, specifically the bags versus the clothes. Even the yellow bags versus the other colors. My personal thoughts on the clothes were that they would be cute on the right body, but that body does not belong to me.  Although several of the pieces were lovely and appeared to be well made, there was nothing that I couldn't absolutely do without.

For example, the cream ruffled top on the right in the pic below looked quite chic, but the material was surprisingly stiff to the touch, nothing like a softer chiffon-like fabric.

I considered the top or dresses with the jeweled encrusted necklines, but figured I could create essentially the same look on my own with a nice neck piece and a simple layering blouse or sheath. Actually the only piece of clothing I'm interested in purchasing seems to be the piece that no one else is lol! Which is fine by me!

The grey joggers are still available in all sizes online and there were still several sizes available locally. However, I am not at all interested in paying $30 for some sweatpants, so I'm just gonna bide my time until they go on somebody's clearance rack, feel me?

 

As an aside, the guys clothing was also still rather plentiful. Though I could tell it had been shopped, there were no gaps in the rack. I perused their pieces a bit too, but felt they looked better in the online photos than in person. Perhaps had I seen them tried on an actual body or a mannequin, I would have felt different. Did any of you grabbed pieces for the fella in your life?

 

 

Anywho... So obviously me and everyone else were all about those luxurious looking bags. My store sold out of all the handbags the first day. The only thing remaining when I visited four days later were two of the travel wallets. If you follow me on Instagram then you already know that I was lucky enough to grab the last of the yellow handbags and one of the ever so popular Boom sweatshirts (there were still several in varying sizes). But I was trying to not be greedy and stay budget focused, so I passed on the other bags.

The good news is, one of these lovely bags will be up for grabs when I host my FIRST GIVEAWAY!! I'm excited!! Be sure to come back and visit next week for all the details!