bikes, hearts, jumpers, shorts, and sandals
Now it's not stupidly hot I'm determined to ride my bike more (a lot more) often, so I'm slowly but deliberately adding more shorts and pants (trouser-pants!) to my rail of things to wear everyday.
While it's not impossible, obviously, to ride a bike in a skirt or a dress (or heels, while we're here), I do find it much easier in pants or shorts. For one thing, Melbourne is very windy pretty much all of the time, and even a calm day can turn into a blowy one complete with a skirt vacuum-sealed to your face with little to no warning. Not great at the best of times, definitely not great when riding. Also, my bike's skirt guard is not fool proof – or should that be fabric proof? – and having had my dress get caught in the coggy area thing once, I never want to do it again.
And anyway, I actually just like wearing shorts and pants.
While it's not impossible, obviously, to ride a bike in a skirt or a dress (or heels, while we're here), I do find it much easier in pants or shorts. For one thing, Melbourne is very windy pretty much all of the time, and even a calm day can turn into a blowy one complete with a skirt vacuum-sealed to your face with little to no warning. Not great at the best of times, definitely not great when riding. Also, my bike's skirt guard is not fool proof – or should that be fabric proof? – and having had my dress get caught in the coggy area thing once, I never want to do it again.
And anyway, I actually just like wearing shorts and pants.
The shorts are a recent op shop buy, when I was also buying a pair of pants (appropriately enough, considering my last few sentences!), and thought I needed to get my basket's value to over $10 so I could pay by card. Not completely sure about them, I still popped them in, thinking $5 to charity and the option to try them at home was a gamble worth taking. It turned out they were half price and there was no lower limit to card paying anyway, but I'm pleased I stuck with them. I love the soft grey-green colour, the fact they fit on the waist and have their own belt, and that they are loose, longer and cuffed – and the fit is exactly what I was hoping for, too.
While they were going to be summer shorts, I decided to take them out for a winter sesh, with tights and cloggy sandals, and my new jumper and scarf, both courtesy of Princess Highway, who sent me their very sweet winter look book and a voucher so I could chose a couple of things. As I am that bit older than their target audience, I stuck to simple things, and went for this olive green jumper, as I had a bit of a basic knit shortage. I also got this slightly different one in the rust and the navy, and now have a very happy jumper collection. Very pleased! They'll all definitely be making a lot of appearances here over the next few months, as they go with everything and complete my little (ahem) capsule wardrobe rail very nicely. The gap is filled!
I also took a chance with these olive green gloves with the heart cut outs, thinking they would be a little big as their sizing options are S/M and M/L, and they are, but it's all good because it means they're spot on for bike riding: I can have my hands curled over the grips and brakes without having to worry about stretching or ripping them. It's also one more piece of encouragement to actually go and ride!
The colours here are kind of new to me, as I tend to have more of them at one time, but it was really nice to keep it all kind of simple and just add a pop of colour with the scarf at my neck. This one is an op shop find, and I love peach against dark olive and green.
I also took a chance with these olive green gloves with the heart cut outs, thinking they would be a little big as their sizing options are S/M and M/L, and they are, but it's all good because it means they're spot on for bike riding: I can have my hands curled over the grips and brakes without having to worry about stretching or ripping them. It's also one more piece of encouragement to actually go and ride!
The colours here are kind of new to me, as I tend to have more of them at one time, but it was really nice to keep it all kind of simple and just add a pop of colour with the scarf at my neck. This one is an op shop find, and I love peach against dark olive and green.
And then there's the tights and sandals, my Swedish Hasbeen cloggy wonders. I said I'd wear them in winter after trotting about in them all summer and true to my word, here they are. After I broke them in (I just wore socks with them the first few times) they are now really comfortable – surprisingly so, as I expected the leather would rub a hot bare foot eventually, or the plain wood sole would be too hard for walking long distances in, but apparently not! They're even better with tights, so expect to see a lot of them on here. Paring down is definitely happening!
The belt, too, is op-shopped, and I like this combo from a where-I-got-things point; one nice splurgey piece (the shoes), opshopped olde thingse (the shorts, scarf, and belt) and then some new things to top it all off (the jumper and the gloves), as it's nice to wear something not previously worn by someone else, too, at least sometimes. Spoilt as I now am by vintage cashmere, these newie jumpers are really good, not itchy, don't feel like they're going to be droopy and shapeless by the third wash, and the colours are very much up my alley. Now I just need to get on my bike more than once a week..!
*disclaimer: the jumper and the gloves were gifted to esme and the laneway. Mx*
The belt, too, is op-shopped, and I like this combo from a where-I-got-things point; one nice splurgey piece (the shoes), opshopped olde thingse (the shorts, scarf, and belt) and then some new things to top it all off (the jumper and the gloves), as it's nice to wear something not previously worn by someone else, too, at least sometimes. Spoilt as I now am by vintage cashmere, these newie jumpers are really good, not itchy, don't feel like they're going to be droopy and shapeless by the third wash, and the colours are very much up my alley. Now I just need to get on my bike more than once a week..!
*disclaimer: the jumper and the gloves were gifted to esme and the laneway. Mx*
