Christ is Risen! Truly He is Risen!
Христос воскресе! Воистину воскресе!
Χριστὸς ἀνέστη! Ἀληθῶς ἀνέστη!
Crist aras! Crist sodhlice aras!
Christus is opgestaan! Hij is waarlijk opgestaan!
Happy Bright Monday! Our Bright Monday started off with a bit of a bang, as my husband was involved in a fender bender on his way to the Bright Monday liturgy. He is fine, the other driver is fine, but our (very old, very decrepit) Toyota Corolla is on its way to the great car graveyard in the sky. Rest in peace, faithful friend. We are going to try and get by on car shares and Uber for the next few months while we evaluate whether we need to replace the car. Weekends are the toughest, as that is primarily when we need to drive and need two cars to accomodate my husband's clergy duties at church. But. It could have been much much worse, and we are grateful for all the mercy of the situation.
On to less serious things. I never posted a winter rotation wrap up for Project 333, nor did I post about my spring rotation (and here it is almost May already!). This was actually deliberate on my part, as I'm sort of experimenting with things right now. I've noticed, after doing this rotation thing for a couple of years now that March and April are kind of miserable clothing months for me, and I realized that rotating out most of my winter wardrobe at the end of February had a lot to do with it.
Our weather in March and April is completely bananas. 80 degrees and humid one day, down to below freezing the next. Snow storms and torrential rains and everything in between. It is epic. My spring rotation just wasn't up to the task. The problem is that by May, I do want some lighter things, but it usually isn't that warm for most of May (although, again, huge and extreme temperature shifts). Some years I am still wearing boots and stockings the first week of June and other years it is sandals weather by then.
What I did at the beginning of March was to rotate out the heaviest of my winter garments and to rotate in a few things from my spring that could be layered appropriately for the colder weather we were still having then. I didn't put my parka away for the season until April, so it was plenty cold. I also added a few heavy cotton sweaters to my closet from ThredUp, and found those to be extremely useful additions. (I'm wearing one today with wool tights and a denim skirt, as we're back in the 40s again after about a week in the upper 60s/low 70s).
I tried not to focus very much on the total number of garments in the closet or in the drawer. My style continues to evolve away from the relaxed silhouette/quirky art teacher vibe I've been wearing the last few year, but I can't quite tell where to land yet. I've been experimenting with different hem lines and silhouettes, trying to work out what makes me feel good in my clothes.
The side profile of the Everyday Skirt also doesn't do me a lot of favors. It makes me look much wider/thicker than I am, and that doesn't make me feel particularly good in my body either. My sewing limitations are such that I know I have some fitting issues to overcome, but lack the skills to figure it out.
There is also the perennial struggle of making new things when there are so many second hand clothes that could be thrifted instead, saving some waste and churn on the environment, but my proportions are such that finding RTW skirts that fit well are difficult.
I'm very much into slim skirts right now, but they can be hot in the summer (particularly the disgusting swamp the city becomes every summer) so I'm thrifting, trying to find something that will work for me (thank goodness ThredUp has a nice return policy!) I'm also between sizes which is always challenging. I have some navy yarn dye Brussels linen to make into some kind of skirt once I figure out a summer silhouette that feels good.
I didn't even bother to get or make a proper Pascha dress this year, because it just felt too hard. None of my me-made dresses make me feel great. I ended up wearing my basic navy knit dress with a new headscarf and a long navy cardigan and boots and calling it good. As it happened, I would have been better off in my wools, as it was quite chilly, and the AC was on in the church to keep the clergy comfortable. It was so cold all night!!
Blah-blah-blah, clothes are hard. I'll let you know when I settle to something!
Over and out.
We have had fluctuating temperatures in the UK as well. My summer dresses came out over the Easter weekend but it is chilly again so I am now back into warmer trousers!
ReplyDeleteChrist is Risen! I really, really like this shorter hemline on you - both pics you posted are great outfits! Sorry about the car. Have a great Bright Week!
ReplyDeleteoh wow! glad your Husband is OK! Lord have mercy! HUGS about the clothes. I liked your headscarf btw! :)
ReplyDeleteThank goodness your husband is fine! BTW - I only have 1 kid but I have not owned a car in her lifetime. We used public transit, walking and cabs (but just very occasionally because my kid would throw up on any form of transport except trains). Admittedly, I don't know how practical it is to have 4 kids without a car, but peeps did it for centuries and still got all the things they needed. Mind you, they weren't going to hockey and gymnastics :-)
ReplyDeleteWe don't really need a car much for our weekly stuff, but our church is an hour away by car and my husband is clergy, so he has to be there more than an hour before the service starts, which is pretty hard on my younger kids (who struggle to make it through the 2 hour service as it is). So that's the main issue. We have one car that seats all of us currently (the Corolla did not) so it is just a matter of juggling the weekend schedule for church.
DeleteI've lived without a car in Russia, but never in the States, and the city we live in, while reasonably public transit friendly, is not as public transit friendly as some of the bigger cities like New York, London, or Moscow. But we are blessed to be close to a bus route that runs frequently and mostly gets us where we need to go.
How long did you live in Russia? That is fascinating (esp as I've been eating through every BBC documentary on the Romanovs I can find). Are you fluent in the language?
DeleteI lived there for four months in the fall of 1998 as a student, and then I moved there to live for a year or so in the summer of 2002. I never meant to come back, but my job imploded after a year, and while I found another teaching English, I decided to come back to the States and go to grad school instead. I love teaching, but history is my field. I started working on a PhD in Soviet history when I was pregnant with Piglet, but had to walk away from the program after he was born. He was a high needs baby and my commute was an hour. I was a danger to myself and others on the road! But I've kept up my reading as best I can, and am happy to provide a reading list! (Robert Massie is the place to start for the Romanovs. His Nicholas and Alexandra is definitive. It has the added bonus of having one of the best explanations for the origins of WW1 I've ever read).
DeleteOh, thanks for that name! I always felt (before this brush up) that it was horrid how the royal family was treated, and then murdered?!?!, but I'm starting to see that they did play a part in the landscape that meted out their demise. Of course, it's still wretched and in no way ever ok, but what an outrageously complicated series of events. Weird question entirely: Do you know someone named Paul Pirie? He's an historian (former) that lived in Russia for a few years and a PhD guy. He's a work friend and we have had some fascinating convos. He's prob about 10 years older than you - I'm speculating that you are in your late 30s based on your student timeline.
DeleteI haven't heard of Paul Pirie, but then I've been out of the field (at least in an active academic role) for over ten years. I'm going to be 40 this summer. I lived in Nizhni Novgorod and Moscow. I always love to talk about Russia with other former expats!!
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