Owen is five. He is a strong, husky, generous five. He has been riding 2 wheels since around age 2. (Thank you to the adjustable handle on the Razor scooter..) So I believe it was a little after Max was born (about a year ago) that we ventured on our first family bike ride, meaning everyone but the baby had their own set of wheels. Before this, Owen used to ride in a child carrier mounted in the back of Chris’ bike. Micah (now 7, soon to be 8) was our craziest, swerviest, most unpredictable cyclist. No one ever wanted to ride anywhere near him. He just has this really noncommittal, easy going, carefree approach to directing his operation. It’s as though he is the only person in the world on a bike and the out stretched road before him is a canvas that he wishes to FILL with tire marks. Chris and I usually determine who of us will lead and who will bring up the rear. I’m usually in the rear. Once, on our local rail road bed turned bike trail I watched Micah really casually drift over in front of Chris and run him right off the edge and into a field of high grass. I was probably 20 yards behind when I watched Chris and Owen (3 years old at the time) bite it into the sunny little meadow. I let out one of those uncontrolled “where did that sound come from” kind of screams…and being far enough away that I still had to pedal quite a bit before I could be of any help, it was definitely one of my more awkward biking moments. Thankfully everyone was ok, just a little shaken up. And Micah got to see first hand what exactly it was that we were talking about when we mentioned his wreck less driving and why it is important to try to hold your handle bars steady. All that being said…it is 2 years later and not much has changed…except that Owen now has his own two wheels to navigate.

We recently returned from a trip to Florida to visit my mother and father in law. Riding bike in Florida, when you haven’t been able to ride bike in the north east all winter can be quite heavenly. By way of my husbands occupational skills, he was able to do a small job and trade my father in law some drywall work for his old recumbent bike that I fell in love with the moment I began pedaling. It remedied my least favorite factor of bike riding for me…the strain on my lower back…which sends tension into my neck which builds up and accumulates along with all the other tesion and stress that I like to wear like an all encompassing body armor and then basically paralyzes me for a few days out of the year (and that is where my kind, gentle, soft spoken chiropractor comes in). The recumbent puts me in this really relaxed, more aware of my surroundings state of mind. So when my father in law said he wanted to sell it and that he doesn’t ride it I wispered to Chris “I want that.” Plus, I feel kinda gansta when I ride it. There is some kind of irony about feeling gansta while riding a bicycle in Birkenstocks and a skirt that I believe I need more of in my life. I asked Chris what he would do if we got this bike home and suddenly there was no grocery money because I started sinking all the funds into trickin out my new wheels. Flashy rims, gold handle bars with studs, leather seat, little side mirrors, an air freshener. It wouldn’t be my first intervention.

Our return to Pennsylvania certainly didn’t present us with bike riding weather, especially not after being spoiled with Florida sunshine. Florida really has a way of ruining Pennsylvania for me. When we got home to Lebanon, it felt like someone had suddenly thrown garbage everywhere and turned off the lights. So much litter. So overcast. 😔

Thursday evening, it had been in the 60’s all day. The kids were already on their bikes out front, begging Chris to go on a bike ride. He hesitantly agrees. It’s 6:50, and thanks to daylight savings…people with five kids get to live under the illusion that they can still do stuff with their kids who are all actually as tired as they would be at 7:50…their freakin bedtime! I’m holding Max, who keeps crawling over to the glass window on the front door to see what’s going on. I mention maybe going along (that recumbent is just calling my gansta name “Autumn! ️️Autumn Louise Krouse! Let’s roll!”) if it’s not too much trouble to hook up the bike carriage for Max. He obliges.

All of our bike rides start the same. Chris gets out the air pump and his tools and tweaks every one of our children’s second hand bikes. It is 7:10 by the time we start scooting thru parking lots, headed to the south-er side of town…wide open streets…no traffic. I hang back to enjoy a little breather from the dinner madness with five kids and to keep an eye on the rear. We aren’t thru the second parking lot when kids lose formation and one emerges on one side of some parked cars while another is zipping from the other side and we almost lose Iris and Micah…right outta the gates.

“COME ON GUYS! YOU HAVE TO WATCH OUT FOR EACHOTHER!”, shouts their gangsta motha.

We make it to some wide open streets and the kids are mostly staying in line. I begin to think its a little cold. We are all bundled up, but when the sun, who clearly doesn’t care what we do to our clocks…starts fully dissapearing and the mid day 60 degrees that was an evening 50 degrees is quickly becoming a night time 40 degrees…and the wind is ripping past our faces…I’m basically done riding before we even started. But we all got ourselves out here, so I don’t mention how cold I am and that Max might be cold too.

We approach the first hill on our journey. I’m pedaling as much as I have to to not fully stop on the hill, and in doing so, I pass Owen. As I approach Chris he turns to me and says “Uh oh. Our little robot is out of steam.” I look behind. Owen is standing mid hill, straddling his bike. He does this when he tires out. Doesn’t mention it, just stops. I rode back to accompany.

“How ya doin?”

“My legs are tired. I hate this hill.”

“Yea. Me too. You wanna go home?”

“My legs aren’t tired anymore.”

He’s right back at it. Owen stands on his pedals almost all the time. I think it’s because his bike is so heavy that he needs the extra leverage just to keep the thing moving. As we’re approaching the stop sign where the other four bikers are, I see Flynn has laid his bike down to go tuck Max’s blanket in around his face. My sweet thoughtful Flynn. We’re off again.

I now mention to Chris that it’s pretty cold and I can’t imagine Owen having too much more energy. We agree that our return journey is under way. Flynn is pedaling beside me, and he keeps doing this swerving move, that makes it look as though only the tread on the very sides of his balding tires is keeping him from laying it over. I ask him to PLEASE stop doing that. I told him it really looks like an accident waiting to…

Up ahead there is a scream, I look in time to watch Iris rag doll it across the pavement in the middle of the road. Chris stops as quickly as he can and I am hustling to attend. From a distance I’m trying to see blood…I like to pre know about the presence of blood. It changes my state of mind considerably. She is sobbing and kind of holding her hip bone and wrist. Just scuffs and scrapes. As we are brushing Iris off, there is another scream. This scream I am much more familiar with. I hear this scream when a shoe comes untied. I hear this scream when the tip on a pencil breaks. This is the scream I hear from the bathroom when the wet wipes are all gone. Owen has no intermediate sound that he makes. He’s either cool as a cucumber or he has lost his mind with rage. No in between. He is laying in a small ditch on a little macadam hill/parking lot to a garage, a few yards behind the rest of us. I jog to the scene…as I am now housing a steady flow of adrenaline, allowing me to perform under such conditions with little or no emotion. Flynn gets to Owen before me “Hurry up mom! His ankle!” I run faster. His ankle is wedged between the rotating pedal and the frame of the bike. He’s howling. I get it unstuck and make sure it isn’t broken. Flynn and I calm him down and I apologize that I didn’t get there sooner. I told him that sometimes it’s hard to know when he is really hurt because he kind of screams like that a lot. He picked up his bike and we continued our return journey.

We are approaching the local park. Micah speeds ahead, there are a few kids in the park and Micah has assumed we are going. I holler to Chris that we are not going…

“People need baths!”

He passes on the message as kids begin u turning and swerving to reroute their course. Chris looks at me through the chaos…

“There’s just too many of us on bikes. Every bike ride is like the worse wreck in the Tour de France.”

I burst out laughing. I recall a brief conversation at the farmers market earlier that day when an acquaintance saw Max and asked

“When’d ya have that one!?”

“Well, he’s about a year.”

She looks shocked.

I said “Yea, I’ve been busy.”

She responded, “Well, get less busy, cause this world doesn’t need anymore people!”

No no. What this world doesn’t need is anymore people on bikes. That’s what we don’t need.

I will only briefly mention that this woman remains perched in one specific location inside the market and maybe once a week I run to market for a latte and some produce. She never moves. If standing in the farmers market, assessing other people’s birth control needs is anywhere in my future…I believe I would rather keep making people. To each their own.

For the rest of our brief ride home, I hung close to Owen. At one point he turned to me and said,

“Well, I’m glad we aren’t in Florida, since Florida conrete is harder. It’s all white and hard.”

I chuckled to myself and agreed with him. He rides a moment longer and turns to me again,

“At least my ankle works, Mom!”

I couldn’t be happier to agree with him again.

I would like to end with this deeply profound Sloan Wilson quote.

“The hardest part of raising a child is teaching them to ride bicycles. A shaky child on a bicycle for the first time needs both support and freedom. The realization that this is what the child will always need can hit hard.”

You wanna know what isn’t fashionable?  A stomach bug. Particularly a stomach bug that left Pennsylvania and stayed alive for 2 full days of travel and presented itself alive and well on the southern most tip of our country. We’ve kept five children alive this long, why wouldn’t those same nurturing qualities be afforded to a nasty stomach virus. Maybe 2 days before departure when our 7 year old was throwing up I might have mentioned that this trip could be a bad idea…but in my husband’s defense, we have had pukers at the beginning of our travels before and somehow no one else was afflicted. So we were hoping for more of the same.

Not so. Iris became violently ill our first night in the hotel. At one point she was headed for the bathroom and didn’t quite make it, therefore vomiting all over the closed toilet bowl lid and surrounding area. I had to wonder, is this the type of information you share at check out? So they could perhaps do a more thorough cleaning of the room? I’ll leave you with that discussion point for a moment…

By morning Iris seemed much better and the entire group was optimistic. After another full day of driving we arrived in sunny Florida.

The next day was filled with bike rides and lizard chasing and swimming and boat rides and a delightful evening in Disney Springs. It’s like Disney’s shopping/eating district. We knew we wanted to see the LEGO store…

 and we watched the volcano at the Rain Forest Cafe erupt a few times. Great kid fun! Then Chris started feeling it. Weird stomach…the urge to stay withdrawn from crowds in the event that he may need to evacuate his lunch. Boy, there is nothing like looking into the crowds of smiling, Disney going faces all while knowing that someone in your immediate group is ready to blow like the Rain Forest Cafe volcano.

So within hours my poor husband was back at my in laws house, sleeping and puking. Yea! The bug had officially made it with us to The Sunshine State! This made me nervous. I spent the next day just waiting for it…for my own queasy twinges…or the announcement from one of our other kids.

Tuesday was looking up. Chris recovered quickly and we headed to the beach after lunch. The beach was a delight as you could imagine. Children are naturally stimulated by water and the beach in March is quite refreshing!

As Wednesday dawned I sensed that this bug had formed an “every other day” kinda pattern but wasn’t letting it get to me. We were headed to Gatorland!! Kids were up with the sun, riding bikes and enjoying the warmth. After Flynn and I returned from a truly pleasant morning bike ride to a local lake (sometimes I can’t believe how little one-on-one time I get to have with each of my kids. Flynn is so smart and sensitive and intuitive…my kinda guy)…he mentioned that his belly felt strange. I told him he should be ready for what was to come. He headed to the bathroom. I was closely monitoring what would potentially alter our touristy day plans while Chris and Micah headed off on a bike ride of their own while my in laws pulled out to run a quick errand. I assume that it was in that very moment that it took place…

Fast forward roughly a half hour…Flynn is still in the bathroom…my in laws are still running an errand…I have now put Max in a pack n play on the front porch and Chris has just returned from his ride with Micah. Iris is riding bike out front and the front door is wide open. Chris is telling me about his ride with Micah when a police officer approaches the porch.

“Hi folks. Do you have a five year old son, named Owen?”

“Yes.”

“Do you know where he is?”

Chris and I immediately look around at the children on bikes…knowing Flynn is sick in the bathroom and Max is contained in the pack n play…there are only two…

“No. I guess we don’t.”(my heart has now stopped)

“Well, we have him.  We found him about ten blocks from here. He said he was on a bike ride with his brother and he got lost.” More appropriately, he took off after Chris and Micah and never caught up to them and also never mentioned to anyone where or what he was up to. Parent of the year award…I know. If this were his first time taking matters into his own hands I might feel worse, but Owen doesn’t spook easily. There is no telling him about consequences for actions and him saying, “OH.  I see, I should listen to you and stay close because it’s important for my survival and well being.”  Nothing like that. I’d also love to tell you that this was Owen’s first run in with the police, but it is not. The officer took our ID’s and made sure we were in fact his parents and up rolled Owen, behind bars…in the back of a brand spankin new Florida State Police cruiser, wearing a “Jurior Officer Badge” and one giant grin. Thankfully he knew how to spell his last name and the officer looked up my in laws address. By then end of Owen’s return there were 3 police vehicles in the driveway and a lot of relief. We can’t even express how thankful we were that some caring man saw Owen riding, tears streaming down his face and pursued him. He finally stopped in an autobody parking lot and the man called the police. As we probed Owen he said he was riding after Micah and couldn’t find him. I asked, “Were you scared Owen?”

“Yea. I was sayin’ ‘PLEASE JESUS! DONT LET THIS HAPPEN!”

Ironically, once when I was about 6 years old, I was almost abducted from a neighbor’s pig roast by a man and his elderly mother who were driving a vehicle with a Florida license plate. My mother and a slew of other intoxicated people discovered what was happening as I was being loaded into the car by the “friendly man” and my mom literally beat the living shit out of him. (As in, she was strattling him and punching him in the head and smashing his face into the stone driveway…)

I have thanked God continuously that Owen’s brief adventure didn’t end any other way. I held my loud, rammy, opinionated tough guy a little tighter that night before bed.

Actually, no I didn’t. (Not just then at least) Because that night, I was busy puking. Nothing like poor Flynn. When he gets sick, he gets SERIOUSLY sick. He ended up having 9 separate bouts of the pukes. At one point when I needed to leave our bedroom to let Max cry to sleep, I went and laid in the other twin bed in Flynn’s room. He asked how I was.

“Not so good. I know I’m gonna throw up again. Just waiting for it.  Waiting is the worst.”

“I know mom. When I was in the bathroom the last time, I was just saying ‘I’m ready.  I’m ready.'”

This dear boy. He really handles it like a champ.

Once Max was done crying to sleep I went back to my bed to let some much needed sleep wash over me. After lying down, Iris came in the room and sat on my bed. She asked if she could pray for me. I said sure. Her prayer truly lifted my spirits, even if it was only to help me to remember that soon I too would be well enough to pray for someone. She also used that moment to confess to me that she had stolen some candy from a small bag that I had stashed as bribe material. I told her that was ok. I used to steal candy too. She went to sleep with a clean conscious.

I dozed and reawoke when Chris came to bed. He was feeling bothered by a rattle that the ceiling fan was making, so he turned it off and went to the car and got a fan that I had packed to satisfy my own fan addiction. I hadn’t needed it till now because the ceiling fan had been sufficient. When he plugged it in and I felt that very familiar, pleasant breeze and heard the hum of white noise I immediately thought of Flynn…one of the other fan addicts in the family. He had no air moving in his room. I knew this because I had laid in his room with him. Chris used the bathroom and brought me the fussing baby to nurse and attempted to climb into bed. At that moment, perhaps spurred by all the goodness from my own children in the last few hours…I stopped Chris and begged him to do one more thing before he got in bed.

“Would you take the fan and plug it in for Flynn and let it blow on him…?…He needs it more than I do.”

Chris agreed. And Flynn thanked me later. The pukes really do bring out the best in us it would seem.

We’ve been healthy for the last 48 hours and we got to visit Gatorland and float down the very beautiful Rock Springs. We even celebrated an early 1st birthday for Mister Maxster.

So much for fashion blogging. The truth is, life has a way of killing fashion. When your head is in a toilet and you’re wearing a dirty tee shirt and a skirt with a little vomit on it…fashion just needs to shoot a flare into the sky and hope for better days. I’m convinced that Chris and I will never be the kind of parents who are going to hand our 16 year olds the keys to their new car…We most likely won’t ever take our kids to the actual Disneyland…They probably won’t ever get a serving of Dip-n-dots that they won’t have to share with another sibling (cause Damn! Those little ice cream balls are EXPENSIVE!) But you know what they will have. A whole lot of character. 5 gallon, drywall buckets full of character.  We will store all those buckets of character in the corner of the house that we keep saying we’re going to turn into another bathroom (and in depriving them of that second bathroom we are adding to the amount of character they will have, not that they wouldn’t gladly trade all the character for a second bathroom…but Chris and I are learning that with this many children, you can’t give options).

And so, tomorrow we depart. We are leaving behind our very benevolent in laws, one of whom was not feeling so well tonight before bed😔and a lot of germs that need to be lysolled away. The open road for the next two days is hopefully one of health and good fortune. But if not, that’s cool too. We’re ready for anything.

 It took me until my mid twenties to embrace my natural waist. For some reason I always felt like an old lady when I wore anything on my actual waist. As a teenager I can remember joking with a friend that we needed to buy stock in “low-rise jeans” so that we could ensure their existence for the duration of our lives. I think we didn’t want to ever have to wear “mom jeans”. Now look at us all! The higher the better and the bottom line is that fashion is a river…constantly flowing and changing and often times the scenery ends up being the same as it was a few miles back. And sometimes we chose to get out and stay on the bank where we feel most comfortable…whether that is in a fringed leather jacket or tight rolled boy friend jeans or a crop top you inherited form your free spirited aunt. I guarantee that if you wait around long enough, whatever your niche is will be back and you won’t have missed a beat!! Though there is something satisfying about staying current and enjoying stylish things while other people are enjoying them.

Keeping in mind that my waist has only been an appreciated part of my fashion efforts for a few years, I had to fully rediscover the wrap around skirt. I’ve owned wrap arounds since I was a teen, but I always wore them practically falling off my hip bones. How refreshing! The first time I tied a skirt where it belonged! Around my waist!! There is something very feminine and timeless about utilizing your true waist. May I also mention that nothing has made me appreciate my waist more than losing it for a season (quite a few seasons rather…). Having children has scared me into appreciating my waist more and more each pregnancy…each time, being 8 months pregnant and thinking “this is it…my waist is gone forever…there’s no recovering from this..” But the body of a woman is quite a miracle in itself and if you treat it ok, that helps too.

So this lovely reversible silk wrap around skirt, with some of that mustard yellow that I can only wear in small amounts, is one of my favorites.

 I got it last summer at some little hippie shop in Rehoboth, Delaware. The hippie in me refuses to die off. I can chop off the dreadlocks and donate all the patchwork I’ve ever stitched together…but I can’t stay away from a Nag Champa reaking hippie store filled with lovely, flowy fabrics and tapestries. This specific little store boasts 15-20 dollar skirts (very unlike every other store in the Rehoboth area)…and that doesn’t feel like too much to blow on myself on a family beach trip.

The whisper cotton v neck tee…MADEWELL. Can’t beat these tees. They’re cheap (on sale) and they are 100% cotton. I’m a bit of a textile snob. I won’t give you anything for the polyblends that are currently plaguing the “fast fashion” world right now. One stroll thru your local thrift store will open your eyes to the fate of every piece of poly/cotton blended clothing you’ve ever considered purchasing (or perhaps already own). It’s the ugly truth. (And a lot of ugly fabric.)

I don’t usually prefer to be very “matchy”, but sometimes you just gotta! I found these beautiful, vintage porcelain beads at our local Goodwill and they were strung on the most hideous, pale pink ribbon. I felt sad that the previous owner couldn’t see their potential. Set beside some antiqued brass beads they are just lovely. And while I wasn’t exactly thinking they would pair so well with this skirt…they really did…like they were separated at birth.

The Birkenstock Gizeh is by far my favorite style of Birk sandal. This is my second pair in 15 years. They have one fatal flaw…the cork always cracks near the base of the toes on the sides of the sandal. It’s nothing a little shoe goo and some elbow grease can’t remedy. The comfort is worth it.

 This outfit is exceedingly comfortable and fully sourced from my local Salvation Army. I’ve loved that bicycle print since it hit the scene some years back…but I did not own anything with the design until recently.

 I found this full, colorful, cotton skirt the same day I found the shirt and it was most likely made by a super talented, hardworking Mennonite lady. No tags. Just super tough seams and a zipper and a snap. When I saw these items, I imagined that those flowers could quite easily be in a bouquet in the basket of that bicycle and maybe that bike is being ridden thru the streets of Ottowa or Paris and I would want to be a part of that scenario. So while the mixing of patterns isn’t always the way to go…if there is an imaginary bicycle and bouquet of flowers that make sense somewhere in there…GO FOR IT!

I might normally have thrown a nice brown or golden leather belt on with this outfit, but lately I’ve only been wearing one belt…and his name is Max.

White is my color. My mother has always told me “You look SO nice in white!”…she has also told me to never wear that mustard yellow that is one of the only colors I feel immediately drawn to. It sorta makes my olive toned skin look a little pukey. And that’s ok. I’ve mourned the loss of that hue from my general wardrobe and I pepper it in by way of jewelry and purses occasionally.

Meanwhile, I trash white shirts…and white anything…like its my part time job. Let me rephrase that…all my homies trash my white stuff. I am quite tidy and even cleanly if I’m being honest. I always loved having a clean room growing up and I enjoyed taking care of my things. But children change things.  Children change things about you that you didn’t even realize were alterable, things that you might even consider some of your most indentifying qualities. Gone. Poof. Like they never existed. They can cause you to question every part of your identity…and make you reassess what is important and for the most part…it’s good.

So there came a point when I determined that wearing a white shirt could only take place under a few conditions…

1.  I have to mentally go into the future moment in time when a child with peanut butter and jelly all over their fingers will embrace me or lose their balance and use me to stabilize or spill chocolate milk while I am within the splatter zone…and I have to slay the demon that would attempt to rear its ugly head in the form of a frustrated pre motherhood ️Autumn who is still trying to feel radiant in a white shirt. Her cranium needs to be severed off like that of Medusa. Then and then alone can I freely wear the shirt.

2.  With #1 as a consoderation…#2 basically states that the white shirt that will eventually make its way to my rag bin must be acquired at an ultra low cost. This one was purchased from Salvation Army and I had to sew a hole on a seam before it was wearable.

3.  The proper undergarments must be in place. I don’t care what year it is…and you can call me old fashioned (there are worse things to be) I don’t want to see your red bra thru your white shirt. I wouldn’t do that to you. Let’s just respect each other. 😉

Those gaucho pants were purchased from an American Eagle clearance rack. That store makes me feel old. Being 32 in a store that feels marketed to teen girls has that effect. I purchased these pants shortly after my 5th child was born and I needed to not feel like a huge slob but needed something loose and comfortable. As the pregnancy weight dispersed back to wherever I store it in between bouts of human fabrication, these pants became less of a self pity purchase and more of a “Hey, I forgot that I like these for other reasons besides just their fat hiding abilities!” Plus, they’re perfectly cozy to wear while sitting in a vehicle for 8 hours. And pockets. Just love pockets. I fill them with garbage and Chapstick and bobby pins and these pockets are nice and deep. Mmmhmmm.

Lastly, my most fashionable advice for today…

 DENTAL HYGIENE! It doesn’t really matter how cute your outfit or style is…and your simple, classy accessorizing won’t matter a bit if your teeth are rotten and gone. I speak from experience. Root canals are the pits.

Now please excuse me while I go destroy this white shirt with that pile of humans.

I don’t enjoy traveling. Mostly because I’m not a good transitioner. All you do is transition when you travel. Hi-speed transitioning for the non transitioner can be quite taxing. Sleeping in beds that are not your own…making babies and children sleep in beds that are not their own…NOT SLEEPING…finding food for 7 people while traveling…having a headache while nowhere near ALL the comforts that usually comfort one with a headache. We have also been notorious for being ill on the road. Not just under the weather…I’m talkin everyone wearing diarrhea-intercepting diapers and toting puke buckets.  Considering that Micah was puking less than 48 hours ago, I can’t say I’m feeling super encouraged this go round. I won’t even get into what traveling was like for me as a child…that’s for the therapists office, twice a month.  Let’s just say everyone just seemed angry to be involved. Overall, I guess it’s mostly the sleeping and the eating and the comfort thing. I just like what I like and I have it pretty well honed after 32 years and it just so happens to all be present at my current address. (I’m basically becoming my 92 year old grandfather…except it’s happening 60 years early…) Some would say my standards are low and that’s somewhat true. I’d say my standards are just my standards. Camping is somehow different for me than traveling. Camping is the grandest, most painful pulling together of every ounce of planning and organizing that I have in me so that I can sit in a camp chair around a fire and ALL my kids can be dirty while my husband warms up a sad pot of soup that I made days prior. That is worth all the packing and heart ache that goes into every camping trip for me. But let me tell you what traveling has that camping does not have. FASHION. I do so enjoy packing for a trip wherein I will not be sleeping on the earth or in a mouse gnawed camper and I won’t (hopefully) be handling any hot, wet marshmallows. 

Practicality is always in the forefront of every clothing choice I make (can I nurse a baby in this…? does this color hide snot well…? can I run after a child in this…? Is it warm while remaining breathable…?) I will take things traveling that I won’t take camping. 

Allow me to begin by  saying that I have been a fan of fashion since the very first garbage bag of hand me downs was dropped off at our front door as a child. I have four brothers and we had very little money…so hand me downs and thrift stores were all I knew of “fashion”.  I could get lost in the bags that came from the homes of other girls. “This is what GIRLS wear!” Girls that aren’t surrounded by boys. Girls that shop at real stores. Girls that use undergarments for things other than mucking out the creek bed.  

 
I am not always eager to share my love of fashion on the blog because some part of me feels a sense of shame attached to it. I feel that there are better, more honorable things to enjoy. Trouble is, when you are born…you don’t exactly get to decide what your likes and dislikes will be. I have been hesitant to really let on that as deep and complex and thoughtful and dynamic as I can be…there is also this side of me that just LOVES style! And accessories! And fabrics! And colors and prints! And a full skirt twirling and blowing in the wind!!  I want to be “above it”…but it simply is not so. So here it comes. The first delving into my fashionable blogging. 

I’ve read maybe 1/2 of 2 fashion blog posts in my life. They don’t really interest me because I know what I like…I don’t need someone else to tell me what to like or why to like it. It’s nice to have some help finding likable things, but otherwise I’m pretty sure of my taste and preferences. So I imagine I would show you what I’m wearing and then wax eloquently thereupon. And that I can do quite easily and I can enjoy it thoroughly.  While I am a thrift shopper to the core and maintained a vintage clothing boutique for a few years solely from scouring other thrifty establishments, there is something really nice about just purchasing a garment that doesn’t have a stain to try to tackle or an alteration to perform or just one detail that you kinda hate. It’s also nice to simply save all the time that might have been spent hunting through several thrift stores and just pay a few dollars more for an item. 

 
Let’s start at the top.  That’s a greasy bun that I used some dry shampoo on. When I’m all out of the dry shampoo my friend Mia makes for me, I like to use this coconut lime stuff from LUSH. It’s a greasy hair luxury. 

Earrings. These are the strangest pair of earrings I’ve ever purchased. I felt surprised when I found them and fell in love with them. There’s a little place in Manheim called the Gem Garden and it is my second favorite jewelry store. They always have this 3 tiered basket of clearance jewelry and that is where I fished these beauties from. I’m usually drawn to antiqued and filigreed jewelry…but these were something completely different. The best part…I put them on layaway with some Christmas stuff for Iris two years ago and completely forgot about them until recently.  Perfect for spring!  

 
That scarf. I picked that off of my friends Goodwill pile a few years ago when I was helping her move and it has been my favorite scarf to date. It’s all in the details.  

 
The Florida necklace. I found this necklace in a filthy church run thrift store in St. Cloud the first time I ever went to Florida.  It was $.50.  It’s just a fun, simple piece of jewelry that Max enjoys playing with.  

 
The Joshua Tree jean jacket. That little jacket has been a coveted MADEWELL item of mine for quite a long time. Like most MADEWELL products, it was far out of my price range…until this one popped up on eBay one day…for a fraction of the cost…Or Best Offer! I love “or best offer” because you get to test the waters to see just how desperate someone is to unload something. Let’s just say that I embarrassed myself with my lowball offer…and they just so happened to be as desperate as I’d hoped. My favorite detail, besides the softness of the denim and the large, accommodating pockets…is the throw back, rounded collar.  

 
This post would not be complete without a shout out to my girl Shelly Wolfe of Stella Blue jewels. She is my favorite jewelry store…if it’s possible for a favorite person to also be your favorite place…then Shelly has accomplished that. I have known Shelly for almost a decade and she is a master of her craft. She not only manufactures high quality jewelry, but she also has a gift for procuring the most unique and interesting treasures I’ve ever seen, most hailing directly from India and possessing all the mystery and magic of South Asia. She hunts tirelessly to bring the rarest and loveliest fabulousness to her clients. Fortunately, I am not only a client but I am also a friend. The benefits are ceaseless. Behold, the Love Bomb.  

   
The other necklace is the Brass Fluidity. I have learned to love mixing metals in the last few years. It’s like wearing navy blue with black. I used to think it wasn’t allowed, but it IS allowed. Do yourself a favor and check out www.stellabluestones.com. 

Speaking of navy blue and black…that cardigan is a Ralph Lauren and it is 100% linen. Do I even need to say more. Yeah, it had a 250 dollar price tag on it…but not by the time I found it on the TJ Maxx clearance rack for 15 bones. My favorite detail, the thicker elbow patches. Is there anything worse than a linen sweater with thinning elbows!?! 

 
The tee shirt. Let’s be real people. I don’t ride motor cycles or do anything with motors of any kind…but I do love a nice, well made, breathable cotton tee. Thank you Brooklyn Motors Repair Shop…for a superior product. 

 
The pants. Once again, MADEWELL for the win. Allow me to throw in this brief disclaimer…I have never purchased a single item of theirs that was not first on sale and then I sit around waiting for their few and far between 40% off sale. Most things I’m stalking are long gone by the time the sales and stars align…but these little cuties were some leftovers that I got lucky on. Unfortunately, the elastic in the ankles was horribly tight and I removed it for a much more relaxed and enjoyable trouser. 

I will briefly touch on my favorite socks that will only be in place until we reach the Carolinas. They are STANCE snowboarding socks that I got for Christmas and my favorite trait of theirs…plays off of a pet peeve of mine… 

 
The “L” and “R” on the toe of the sock ensure that my OCD can thrive and feel embraced…at least by the snowboarding community. And for the record…I do snowboard…occasionally…if I’m not pregnant or holding an infant. And conditions are important. I’m a picky snowboarder. 

Lastly, those shoes. They really aren’t anything to write blog posts about…OR ARE THEY!?  I bought my first pair of Birkenstocks when I was 15 and I have never looked back. I read in a magazine once that they are “birth control for the Germans”. Well, that has not been the case for Mr. Krouse and I.  Turns out, when your feet feel this good, lots of stuff seems like a great idea…like having more kids.  Five children later and we are still in metatarsal heaven. 

I will mention that if you know me at all or have ever seen me…then you probably also know and have seen my leather backpack full of diapers and snacks. As soon as I found out that our first child was going to be children (plural) I had a flash of premonition that both of my arms would me full of babies and a traditional diaper bag would fall off my shoulder and make me want to blow something up. So I bought the only backpack a girl could ever need. Custom Hide out of Arizona makes the finest leather products I’ve seen to date. While you could place an order today at www.customhide.com, that raunchy petina will require years and years of spilled cherry cokes and general abuse with a peppering of leather conditioners.  

 In closing, I would like to say that this was fun. More fun than listening to my kids fight over a gameboy from the early nineties.  Stay tuned for more Fashionable Florida Fun. 

P.S.  This baby is an angel to travel with. I’m not kidding.