Last Plaid Trouser Flashback and Christmas Vs. Cat

Happy Wednesday! I only know what day of the week it is because it's a work-day. 

My company issued a note for all Canadian offices today, notifying us that due to crazy COVID numbers now and anticipated going into the holiday season, we wouldn't be bringing our people back into the office until at least the end of March 2021, so my odd schedule will persist until then (I work Mon/Wed/Fri and have all the other days off). 

• Leather jacket - Cigno Nero, consignment; purchased here for $68.00
• Sweater - Intimate, vintage 60s, thrifted; first worn here in February with plaid and Star Wars shoes
• Trousers - Talbots, thrifted; last seen here in March with greens (and a crocodile)
• Shoes - Gadea, consignment; last worn here a week ago with more plaid
• Coat (below) - L'Atiste, consignment, Vancouver; last seen here in September

I'm okay with that, but I really miss all the people I usually see on a daily basis. If they all come back at the end of March, it'll have been over a year since I've seen some of them. So long!

Anyway, moving on! This outfit is built around the last plaid thing in my closet - L commented this morning, "You've been wearing a lot of plaid lately."

What can I say? I love plaid! 

I built this outfit around this new-to-me leather jacket. I went with matching up the grey in the trousers, and then added bits of blue. 

You can see how cool the front cuts away, almost like a "ringleader" set of tails. 

No tails here, though. 

It was lovely to wear - I popped out of the office mid-day to run an errand and it was fine in the grey weather. 

Without the jacket. 

This is another cobalt blue sweater - I love this colour, and I love the vintage shape of this one (it's from the 1960s!). 

Masked up. This is a navy blue mask with metallic lines on it, courtesy of Mom. 

Zipped up - I only wore it like this when I was walking to and from work. 

Anyway, I'm happy with the jacket. We'll be doing a wee Flashback on the trousers in a bit. 

Outerwear - I had to do plaid on plaid! 

It was spitty rain today with little wind, so this hat was perfect. I'm wearing my new-to-me silk (also plaid!) scarf that I picked up on the weekend (I wore it then too, but this is the first "Official" wear). 

• Hat - vintage, thrifted, Vancouver
• Scarf - Elaine Gold, vintage 80s, Lazy Susan's; purchased here for $18.00
• Gloves - Parkhurst

The stuff: 

I know I just wore these a few days ago, but I didn't feel like wearing heels today. 

Blue and pewter bling: 

Some favourites.

• Cuff - Robert Larin, vintage 70s, vintage mall, gift from L
• Pendant - Miracle Britain, furniture store
• Earrings - thrifted
• Lapis lazuli ring - Wendy Brandes
• Silver/crystal ring - Soul Flower
• Silver/sodalite ring - Scotland, 1995

Flashback: Plaid Wool Talbots Trousers

I started really getting into a trouser phase a few years ago - I used to skip the pant sections in consignment and vintage stores - and these are one of the pairs that I found when I opened my eyes and looked! 

"What are we looking at?"

They are a cropped cut, fully lined, and 100% wool. They don't have side pockets (I wish!), but have bum pockets (erm, thanks?) which I've never opened up. 

I picked them up here in March 2018 at the big WIN (Women in Need) store downtown on one of my weekend expeditions. The flower punch meant 50% off, so these were $12.50.

I wore them immediately, pairing them with my Vivienne Westwood blazer and a floppy silk bowtie in March 2018.

I'm a fan of this look - the red heels (Flashbacked here) elevate it. 

I wore them again for a weekend casual brunch in October 2018.

I now wear that sweater around the house (I'm wearing it now!). We saw those shoes in Flashback here, and they go so good with these pants, I wore 'em again.  

There's a white/dark green paisley ruffled blouse under my green velvet jacket here in January 2019.

Both pieces will get worn this season, along with my gold glitter loafers. We'll see that jacket again shortly. 

Oops, ha ha, my fly is open here - this outfit is from February 2019. 

I like the mustard blouse with it (it's in the wings, waiting to be worn). That Etro blazer is amazing - it'll get its own Flashback in due time. 

You might recognize this red sweater - it's the same one I wore on the weekend. 

This is a pretty plain outfit from October 2019 - I wore it for shopping, with the same outerwear as today. 

I loved this outfit from January 2020 - I was on my game with my pattern-mixing of this silk rose-print blouse. 

I'll have to do a Flashback on my Westwood blazer - this is the second time I've paired it with the pants. Love those red Fluevogs! 

And here's the last time I wore these trousers, in March 2020. There's my green velvet blazer again. 

I adore those shoes, and like how they pull the dark green blouse into the outfit. I need to wear those again soon, but I've got too many clothes, and not enough work-days to make outfits!

Mathy stuff: I'm at a respectable 8 wearings, which is $1.56 per wear, and I can still think of lots of ways to wear these trousers. 

Now, some of you may remember that I worked in a year-round Christmas store here in Victoria for 11 years*, from 1986 to 1997. I've done a post about being the Number One Elf (which is still on my resume!) here; I've also posted about all my Christmas decorations (Tree Pt 1 here, Tree Pt 2 here and A Peculiar Village here), and those posts are a fun read, she said, back from re-reading them! 

*Yes, 11 years. At one point, Victoria had 3 year-round Christmas stores! We did most of our business from May to September, during tourist season. It was a family business and I adored the mother-daughter who owned the store, and enjoyed my job. I did all the decorating, and also went on buying trips. Yes, I loathe Christmas music with a passion (Shut. It. Off.), and I dislike candy canes intensely. 

And while all that stuff in those posts is a LOT, it's not even the tip of the iceberg on my full Christmas collection. In that 11 year period, I poured all my creativity and curatorial, collectible powers into Christmas decorations, not clothes (I barely had any - I wore a uniform of a red polo shirt and a "Number One Elf" vest to work every day. Yes, I hated the vest). I got a hefty discount and I bought most of it on layaway over time. Sometimes my bosses would let me order things just for myself when we went on buying trips too. 

I haven't even put ANYTHING out in ten years. Why ever not? 

ONE GUESS.

"What are these delicious treats you've brought me?"

When we first got Vizzini, in spring 2011, he figured out how to open the hall closet where all my decorations and trees (yes, I actually have 2 trees) are kept and he chewed on the strings of lights (we referred to it as his "Secret Laboratory"). I care about my decorations the same way I care about my wardrobe - so I made the decision to not put my decorations up. 

If you've left it all alone with a bored kitty all day, and it falls down or things break, whose fault is it? Not the cat's - he's just being a cat! So in the Christmas Vs. Cat Conundrum, we chose Cat for 9 years. We did the Peculiar Village for a couple of years, but I lost the heart for it over time. I wondered if I should sell all my stuff off. 

Well, the years have passed, Vizzini's gotten slightly better at not eating everything in sight, and we've been in the middle of a pandemic for eight freaking months. I saw these battery-operated curtain lights at London Drugs, and bought 3 sets. My soul craves twinkle lights! More fairy lights! 

"I'll be supervising from a safe distance."

Make sure they work...Ooh, so PRETTY. 

"What is this foul magick!?"

I'll show you how they look set up in a second. 

A snowball effect took place when I unpacked these. I had to move some things around to make way for my short ladder to hang the lights...then I had to dust that...then I found some things that could be donated and recycled...and one thing led to another, and I spent the afternoon cleaning and rearranging.

I've decided that I'm going to pull out ALL of my Christmas stuff, and really think about what I want to keep and what I don't, and record all of it (you're all going to be so sick of it, ha ha), so I prepared our living room/dining room in readiness. L and I have many areas which will be excellent for displaying my décor. 

This is our Scotch Bar - it's a "baker's shelf" we bought at Sears about 15-17 years ago. I moved a bunch of our scotches to the top shelf, put our favourites along the back of the middle shelf, and left L's usual rums (Baron Samedi and Kraken) in their place on the bottom. The drawers have cat toys and some odds and ends of game stuff in them. Our regularly-played games are on the bottom shelf, along with a rolled-up mat for games that involve dice rolls. 

The Peculiar Village will be going here - I'm going to use the third set of curtain lights here to illuminate it, as there is no outlet on this wall. I bought a ton of lights (the green boxes) to replace the chewed-up lights I know I'll find when I unpack them. 

We have two back-to-back bookcases on this wall (more games, CDs, DVDs, and graphic novels live there). This is where my little Star Wars/Star Trek tree usually goes. 

The heavy crystal vase is from around 1987, purchased at Eaton's department store for about $24.95 on clearance. It's very good at refracting light, but it wasn't being seen - it's a lovely piece. I found two strings of my old lights (pre-LED), got them to work, and have plugged them in. Oh, that makes my soul so happy! 

This is all part of my plan to get Vizzini used to things in stages. Nothing to see here, just some lights in a vase! Move along!

Here are the curtain lights in the bright daylight. I had to make a lot of changes to this part of our living room, including moving Vizzini's giant scratching post from that corner into our bedroom, and putting his usual bedroom post out here. He's been nosing around that corner for the past day. 

I was worried he'd swat at the lights, but he's been good so far. L and I have sternly reminded ourselves not to yell or react if he whacks at them or chews on them, but to calmly get up and give him a firm shove away from them. He only chews at things when he wants attention (or food). 

Looking at these pictures, I can see we're really overdue for a remodel of our living space, but it's not been a priority. No judgments here! I've cleared away all our usual knick-knacks and dusted all those surfaces off for display space. Yes, L has a lot of CDs. I do clothes, he does CDs. 

Later on as the sun was setting, the lights took on a lovely glow. My big tree will be going in that corner (it'll be anchored to that wall so that it can't be pulled over), so I only put one set of "curtains" on either side. 

"This is not the view I'm accustomed to."

Vizzini wasn't interested in the lights at all, phew! I'm going to slowly unpack and decorate over the next couple of weeks to get him acclimated to all of it, but right now, he's pretty disinterested. My plan is working! 

He actually left me alone all afternoon while I moved things around and dusted - he doesn't like my ladder, so he skedaddled. 

"Oh joy, you found me."

Snug and warm, hiding under the covers! 

So...do you decorate for the season, or do you plan to this year? I notice that Vix and Jon have been decorating with chili lights and Eid lights (here and here), and it seems like people are decorating early, and are really getting into it this year. 

I know I'm so immensely cheered just by my vase and curtain lights - and I'm really excited to dive into my full collection, some of which hasn't even been looked at for close to 15 years! I have music boxes, nutcrackers, all kinds of weird and wonderful things. It's going to be an adventure!