Squeal!! It's the first week of October! My favorite month, my favorite season. For my photo business it means I will be busy taking photos of my beautiful clients and their families. And, for my style blog, it means we are shifting into all fall all the time.  Pay no attention to the fact thas it has been near 90 degrees outside.  I am ignoring that, it won't break my fall spirit.  So, I’m back this week to chat about plaid. Do you love or hate it? If you ask me, it’s a definite love. I wasn’t always pro plaid. But I’ll get to that later. First, let’s talk about ways to wear plaid. Scarves, shoes, shirts, and skirts...they all start with S, "S" for stylish... LOL. That was cheesy, I know. And, actually as I sit here and write this post, I think that I will break this up into seperate posts, because my love for plaid runs deep. So, let's talk about plaid shirts....but see plaid scarves are so perfect too... focus, Lorraine, focus! Scarves will be next week.

 

 So, first, let’s take a look at the obvious, plaid shirts. Plaid shirts are fun to play with. You can of course wear them with jeans, but you can also pair them with skirts and dresses. This blue and teal one I just got recently at Target, here, and it's my current favorite. I have it it two sizes, XS and small. I can wear both, but it is rayon, and I always worry with rayon shrinking, so if the XS ends up shrinking, I have a back up. I'm obsessed with it that much.  

For the first outfit I tied the shirt at my waist, and have a sequin skirt on. I love the contrast of edgy with glamour. It's interesting, give it a try. Then I layered it under a vest, although I wish I put that one with grey booties.  The last two I have it layered on top of a graphic tank.  This plaid shirt is more fitted in cut, so it's perfect for using it as a cardigan.   

 

This is red/pinkish plaid shirt is another favorite. It's by Rails, and I recently found it on ThredUP.  You can find Rails shirts at Nordstrom. I didn't see this exact color, but check out this beautiful colorway, here.  At full retail, they are expensive. I will say, it is one of the most comfortable plaid shirts that I have.  It's also lightweight and soft, so it's easy to layer. I styled it similarly to the blue one above. Again, this shirt is a fitted cut, so it's easy to use it open, or tied at the waist. When looking for plaid shirts, look for a fitted cut, so they don't look too baggy and oversized.

 

Another versatile option is a black and white plaid shirt. I looked for one for a long time before I found this one, last year at Francesca's, but they don't have it anymore. I found a similar one at Target, here. It's also lightweight and easy to layer. I like it with anything olive. So, I tied it over an olive LuLaRoe dress, and then with an olive anorak jacket. Pattern mixing is fun to try with plaid - it can go with leopard print, like I did, or with polka dots, or stripes. I've seen women put floral and plaid together, although I have yet to master that pattern mixing. Practice makes perfect though, and I am no quitter. I'll report back, if I make it work.

 

So, I bet you'd never guess that I used to hate plaid. Like I just couldn't ever imagine wearing it. And now look! So, how did I overcome my plaid aversion? I started with one easy, versatile plaid shirt, which is now too big, but it was similar to the first blue one. I used to only wear them buttoned up, like a proper shirt. But now, I think it's fun to try them different ways. You can easily use the same shirt, 3 different ways, and it would look completely different. Seeing how versatile the pattern can be, I started a collection of other plaid things..my favorite being scarves. 

That sign is 100 percent accurate, I am out of my gourd for plaid. So meet me here next week, and I will talk about scarves (plaid of course, but others as well), and discuss how to tie blanket scarves, and now to work them into your outfits.   

 

Catch ya at the pumpkin patch.  I'm waiting for the Great Pumpkin to come.  

 

-xo