Girl's Best Friend.

On Monday night, I attended my first ever jewelry show, which can be another addition to my “I Knew I was No Longer A Child When…” list. My mom would attend jewelry shows and Pampered Chef shows and Tupperware parties when I was little, and I never got to go because it was an “Adult Thing”.

But guess whose the adult now?

This was a Premier Designs party, and I loved almost every piece of jewelry there but because of the prices (which according to my friends are actually very reasonable compared to jewelry from other companies like this), I was only able to purchase one thing: a beautiful pair of turquoise and gold earrings (at $39 a pop, $46 including tax and shipping. Kinda ridiculous in my very low budget opinion … but I wanted to support Brooke so I splurged).

Two years ago, a jewelry party like that with ‘high fashion pieces’ would not have at all interested me. It might have in high school, but high schoolers don’t get invited to those sort of things. 

You see, if you know me really well … like REALLY well, then you are already aware of what I refer to as my fashion phases.

If you aren’t aware, then please let me humor you.

In high school, clothes and jewelry and shoes were all very important to me (which is ridiculous because if you go back and look in the pictures, it’s just good classic ew). I had a ton of purses and they came in all sorts of themes, materials, colors and now they provide me with a good laugh.

I had a tan “I love Lucy” purse.

I had a light blue purse that was made out of that God-awful jelly like material.

I had a pink one with a monogrammed “A” on it … remember when everyone walked around with a purse with the initial of their name on it? What was the 90s thinking?

I had a fake Kate Spade with all the colorful stripes.

I had one with the sequins on it that scratched my arm each time it hung off my shoulder.

I had a big pink beach tote with even more sequins that I carried around as a purse (wish I was kidding).

And I could go on and on.

I thought that if I was wearing a blue shirt then I needed a blue necklace, blue earrings, blue everything and then I’d go about completing the outfit with my Birkenstock clogs or platform foam wedge sandals. You know, normal 90s behavior.

Then, I got to college. Clothes and jewelry and shoes fell completely off my radar because it was a land where all the girls wore were t-shirts and Nike tempo shorts and Chacos; a land where it was considered stupid to look good for class. Why put in the time and effort to look good when a) you can sleep longer and b) you’re gonna dress up and look good later that night when you go out to the bars was the mindset. And I didn’t go out in college so I REALLY had no need for these things on my radar. Needless to say, I had a ton of empty closet space!

I remember one time I went to a football game…I was meeting up with my cousin to sit with her and when she first saw me wearing khaki shorts, she freaked out in glee because she hadn’t seen me in anything other than Nikes in months (ps why did I wear khaki shorts and a t-shirt to a football game? The world will never know).

My wardrobe for nearly four years consisted of the t-shirts, shorts and Chacos. THEN near the end of the 4 years, I started talking to this hipster dude and eventually began dating him. I continued to wear my t-shirt, Nikes and chacos but I attempted to put a little hipster, indie, grungy twist to them which included

-getting more and more t-shirts from thrift stores

-tie dying my own v-neck shirts

-wearing cardigans with the Nikes and Chacos

And when the Hipster and I didn’t work out, my girlfriends in grad school sat me down and said, “Listen, Amy. You’re too cute to be a hipster.” And I began to see … not to toot my own horn, but they were right. Hipster pothead brought me down in more ways than I can count … but a big one was how I put myself together, physically. The first time we ever went out together in Tuscaloosa (this is so embarrassing)… I wore jeans and a t-shirt with a cardigan. He even made me LOOK ugly. Why why why why why was I ever attracted to that? WHY? Lord Almighty.

Anywho. I am now at the fashion phase that I think I was meant to end up in (in every sense except financially).

I love to shop.

I love to shop for clothes, shoes, makeup, jewelry … mostly anything. Except bathing suits. (But what girl, besides those rare Victoria Secret models, likes to actually try on bathing suits)

I love to look good and put together, getting dressed up and feeling pretty. I hadn’t really done that for five years until grad school happened. One of the many many reasons I’m so glad I went there.

And I’ve noticed, people respond better to you if you dress well and that makes complete sense. When you dress well, you’re indicating to people that you care. That you respect yourself. That you aren’t a lazy pig who just rolled out of bed and strolled into town. There’s a reason why you’re supposed to dress well for an interview … people dress to impress … and I so get that now.

Whenever I finally get out of the parent’s house, I wouldn’t mind hosting a jewelry party like that. Supposedly, the hostess gets like $200 in free jewelry and I’m super okay with that.

Just another reason I need to move OUT ASAP!