The Caliber Collection

I'll be the first to admit that I don't actually pay much attention to brands of any sort - I like the clothes I like, and it doesn't matter what's what if I can't afford it, personally.  A few weeks ago, perusing Yahoo! in an attempt to stop feeling useless, I stumbled upon an article about The Caliber Collection, a line of jewelry made from guns turned in to or confiscated by the Newark Police Department.  Each piece is engraved with the serial number of the gun it was made from and where the gun comes from, and they come in steel and brass. They're beautiful, and bound to a good purpose, which is allowing a gun buyback program to continue to flourish.  Take a look at their site, read their story, and share them with people!  Hopefully, the people who can afford will buy.

brass bangle

steel cuff

Enjoy!

ps: I forgot what days were what and set the wrong publishing time for this. Go me?

Escape Key, and My Bracelets

Last semester, my friend Betsy began work on her Girl Scout Gold Award project. I expected she'd do something related to making stuff for the school or something - so sue me, I didn't get past Junior in Girl Scouts - since that's what all the Boy Scouts do for their Eagle Projects. Instead, she started bringing an enormous jar of beads and plastic "string" (I don't know what to call it...) to school, and making bracelets. Two colors per bracelet, and then, in the middle, she'd just pop in a random one in a third color, and continued. What she said then, when I asked, and now, on her website, Escape Key, is that:

"The bracelets are more than just a bunch of cute colors. The two contradictory colors show that even the smallest differences are what make our own colors shine brighter. The blue bead cannot help that it is a different color and cannot change itself. It breaks the pattern. 
Without the odd bead, the world would be an endless, boring, binary pattern."

Now, not every bracelet has a blue bead as its different color - one of mine has an orange bead as its unique one - but most of them do. Betsy's bracelets really took off at our high school - I think every student and faculty member has at least one by now, and I think she's promoted them a bit at our lower school and middle school. It's a cool project, not for the subject matter - bullying sucks, and there are loads of campaigns against it - but for the way she has chosen to handle the subject itself.

While the bracelets aren't really available over the internet, on her bracelets page she has a video demonstrating how to make them, and what with. They're cheap, easy to make and explain, and generally a good thing.

"I'll Cook Like Betty Crocker/ And Look Like Donna Rees"

The dress you are about to see makes my brain go straight to this line from Somewhere Green in Little Shop of Horrors. It also makes my brain head towards Mad Men (even though I've never watched it), but that one makes more sense than the LSoH association. Ah well, the point is, it's a cool dress, and I'm totally in love with it. It's from a recent little mall haul, where I finally got some things I'd been craving. This is easily my favorite piece of the haul, though. It's all fun and floaty and gorgeous.

See it after the jump!

School Style

I have a majorly strict dress code. We have to wear either a blue or white polo (with school logo), a white oxford, or a white midi blouse (think Sailor Moon for that shirt), with a plaid skirt, as our regular uniform. On Eucharist days, we have to wear a plaid jumper that fits an eight-year-old better than it does an eighteen-year-old, with a white oxford or white midi shirt. Jackets MUST be bought at the school store. Patterned or non-white/navy blue/black/grey tights are not allowed. If you're in lower school, you aren't allowed to wear anything but tennis shoes (I do not miss those days). Girls aren't allowed to wear pants unless it's cold. (And even if it's freezing cold, ie, Snowmageddon of the South, we don't get to wear non-school jackets...)

This leads to wondering how on earth you can show your individuality at school, especially when your skirts even have a regulation length (at least two inches above the knee, for me). My solution is to go for the shoes, the hair, and jewelry.

 

My necklace collection makes frequent appearances at school, as does my gold cuff bracelet. I usually go for flats, but I finally gave in to the part of my brain that has been screeching about boots since I stopped wearing them last year, and pulled out the tights. It's still, technically, too hot for tights in Texas, but I justified it with the fact that all my classrooms are freezing. Another thing that helps is tailoring (though I haven't really bothered with most of my things for school...), and, if you've got something as open-ended as 'white oxford' finding something that flatters you. (I'm still looking for that, as you can tell - I could use tips on how to buy button downs while having a large chest!) Find a non-traditional hairstyle you look good with, get proficient at it, and you will stand out sooo much.

I hope this helps anyone out there who struggles with their dress code.

Earrings

I loooove clip-on earrings, but they hurt like hell to wear. I only wear them for special occasions, thus. (Why my ears are not pierced: my skin thinks earrings are a part of the skin and thus they can totes be grown over and I am NEVER again going to deal with the level of disgusting that was).

I did wanna display my clip-ons like I do the rest of my jewelry, though, so out came the ribbon stash. I have a white ribbon with little perforations in it, which I immediately decided to use that to hold my earrings.

These need to get turned into clip-ons...

YAY CHARMING CHARLIE'S!

shiny shiny

I don't know why, but as we're heading into fall, I have an absolute obsession with crescent moon necklaces.

From here.

From here.

From here.

I showed a picture of it already, but I ~kind of~ made something similar to this last one, from an earring. To refresh your memory of it...it's the necklace in this picture:

Which became this...

(Like my hair? Trying a darker red that looks better with light.)

Still need to figure out what to do with the mate of that earring...I may just glue it to some ribbon and prance around pretending to be Sailor Moon (because I have a short uniform skirt and have yet to grow up) for the heck of it. But any ideas are quite welcome!

And now I'm going to hunt for some other crescent moon necklaces...we'll see if I manage to find any.