October One: The Red October Dress Project

Last year, some cooler friends of mine participated in the October Dress Project. At the time, while I was impressed with their creativity and, well, gumption, I never considered doing it myself. I don't like dresses. I didn't have the right dress. I didn't have any fashion sense. I didn't have the nerve.

As I starting hearing about the project again this September, I realized that I've come a long way since last year. I still don't have much fashion sense: my minimum criteria is whatever is clean. Since that's also my maximum criteria, you can imagine I'm not much of a fashion plate. But I and my family have made some major lifestyle changes this last year. We eat better: organic, more raw foods, more whole foods, less high fructose corn syrup, less fast food, and less processed food. We have shifted to using cloth napkins and kitchen towels in an effort to reduce our trash. We have limited our new purchases, and instead choose to re-use, re-purpose or purchase used items. We have stopped purchasing anything on credit, and upped our charitable giving. We had a largely handmade Christmas last year. Suddenly, wearing the same dress for a month seemed like a good way to continue our current priorities of simple, frugal living. It seemed like a good way to practice being content, and to consider how else we can extract ourselves from this consumer based society that promises the happiness of stuff, but just seems to bring discontentment and debt.

I have always had a rather anti-establishment bend. So this project fits right in with that. My current approach to fashion has mostly been one of sheer necessity. At one time, not too long ago, I had 4 children under 5: I mostly dressed to try and appear like I wasn't totally freaked out. Even after my girls got a little older, my focus was still on making them look presentable, and so mom jeans and comfy t-shirts made up the majority of my wardrobe. Additionally, I didn't GO anywhere, and if I did, I was hanging out with equally (un)freaked out moms, and our camaraderie was palpable. Even further, we belong to the most awesome diverse homeschool crowd possible: no one was ever going to comment on my mom jeans. These people are the epitome of acceptance and diversity.



This project is the perfect opportunity for me to reinvent myself, fashion wise. No more jeans and tees this month! I picked my favorite dress, which wasn't hard, since I only own a few. It's not black or brown, so I'm a little worried about my accessory options, since I'm starting from such a fashion-stunted place. I briefly considered buying a new dress, but since I might as well scrap the whole thing if I do that, I'm stuck with the red one.

Here goes nothing... my Day One photo.



Day one was easy. I hadn't even told anyone I'm doing this. We had a surprising thunderstorm, which was great, actually. Cooler temperatures lend well to layering: if it climbs back up to 110+, layering will be out the window and it will just be me and this dress. Everyday. Great. Anyway, I'm feeling pretty good, because I can still quit and no one will know. Yay me!