Today I'm working on what I like to call my closet line-up.
Ever since I discovered Jennifer over at the daily connoisseur and her french-themed books of polish and poise in the modern world, I have drooled over anything to do with the concept of a 10 item wardrobe, or capsule as it's often called.
It was funny when I found her about four years ago because it wasn't her beautiful writing that showed me the way out of my overstuffed closet trap, but rather my search for approval on ditching 98% of my attire that found her.
I know the small wardrobe thing has been tossed all over the internet, but at the risk of boring you, I'm going to tell you my own story. Just because.
Every couple of years my sister and I take our kids on a month long road trip to visit the rest of our family back east.
You heard me right. A month long road trip.
Thirty days, two adults, five kids, one car.
Yup.
We've been doing this every couple of years since there were only two kids, and needless to say, by the time we had grown to a full seven passengers, we learned to pack as light as we can.
It was on that particular trip four years ago though, that I really started thinking about how easy it was.
My entire family (minus my husband) had been packed into one large suitcase, and one small travel bag.
That's it.
It really struck me that trip because my kids had grown old enough to pack for themselves so I'd had to come up with guidelines ahead of time. My rule was seven outfits. One that you wear on the day we leave, one in the small travel bag for our first hotel stay, and five in the suitcase. In addition, we each had a swimsuit and cover-up, two pajamas, and a jacket.
We lived an entire month with just that.
Actually, along the way we lost one bra, one jacket, and a sock, so really we lived with less than that...
and it was heaven!
Every item we had with us was something we loved, fit well, and paired with something else we had. I did laundry whenever we were in a stopping place with machines, and I could do an entire weeks laundry in just two loads! One of lights and one of darks. That's it!
And have it folded up and distributed in no time.
Then we came home.
I did my last easy peasy two loads of laundry to wash the last of the sand out of our travel wear, and we began to stuff and cram our carefully selected items back into our bursting closets of crap.
That's when it hit me.
I didn't want to.
At the time, I hadn't heard of the capsule wardrobe or read about Jennifer Scott's 10 item system, so I thought I was crazy.
I thought I was crazy for wanting to pack up and ditch whatever crap I had left behind and keep only the limited few that had served me so well while we were gone.
I thought I was crazy, but I knew I didn't want to go back to standing in front of a thousand hangers, picking and piecing something to cloth my body for the day. And I certainly didn't want to go back to hauling eight loads of laundry up and down the stairs every week.
Eight.
So that's when I started searching for approval.
Now that's the real crazy, the fact that I needed some internet article, or self help chapter to justify an easier life for myself.
Crazy.
Anyway, if I haven't bored you too much, that was the beginning of my closet-venture. After coming to the realization that I could do whatever the hell I wanted to do with my clothing situation, because after all I am an adult (and Jennifer Scott said it was ok), I hauled twelve trash bags of clothing to goodwill and never looked backed.
Except to wonder how in the world I actually had twelve bags of useless clothing in my closet to begin with. I am not the type to keep useless stuff. I often "clear out" extra stuff, and I am a regular at the Goodwill drop off door...
The difference this time was in how I cleared out. Instead of standing in front of a thousand hangers and pulling out this and that to get rid of... I pulled everything out and carefully selected what would go in, what I really wanted to wear, and tossed the rest.
And that's what I'm doing today, not as a mass clean out, but as a seasonal change-over, or if you will... choosing my fall line-up.
This is my closet ten minutes ago...
It clearly has more than 10 items in it. It also has more items in it than it did at the beginning of summer because I have done some shopping through the months, and because fall items are starting to creep in there, crawling out from their summertime storage bin as mornings and evenings turn cooler around here.
That's how I knew it was time to do this...
That's everything I own, minus workout and intimates, all four seasons, pulled out onto the bed to be looked at, tried on, and judged.
At this point, I immediately start with the things I know I'm done with for the season, sundresses and true summer items that I can pack away or toss back to Goodwill, depending on how they lived it up this summer.
The bins that had been holding my fall/winter things are now empty because
everything is on the bed, so I can start putting in the sundresses etc. as I go.
Next, I sift through the stacks and pull out the most favorite things I see. The ones I can't wait to wear because I miss how great they feel on me.
I end up with a stretchy dress that I recently rescued from a resale rack, a 3/4 sleeve raglan tee that has been my go-to all summer and I'm not ready to part with, a plaid button down, and a soft and chunky, black cable knit sweater that feels like a cozy warm cloud, if clouds could feel cozy or warm.
Out of that entire pile, these are the only 5 items that I would live in every day if I could wear 5 items at a time, so I know I'm on the right track.
But... one often wears pants with their tops, which means I'm not done, yet.
I do the same thing, pulling out only the bottoms that I would happily wear on a sixteen hour flight.
As you can probably tell, I live for comfort not style.
This time I have the one pair of shorts that I believe were made in heaven because they feel great when all other shorts seem to shift or ride or pinch when I live actual life in them, a pair of dark blue jeans that can do that magic jump from casual to classy depending on the shoes, a grey jersey skirt, black J. Brand jeans that have their own magic ability to fit me well no matter how much weight I gain or loose, and a pair of light blue skinny crops from Gap.
The dark denim shorts and jeans are a give in with any of the tops, they go straight into the closet, but the other two items...
Less versatile.
I try them both on again with the tops and keep them in mind as I go through my stacks again for my secondary picks.
The skirt was a favorite last spring, but is just not holding its own this season. It goes into the bin with the sundresses.
The baby blues work well with the tee and the sweater, as well as the the other three tops I choose from the stack so they get hung up, for now.
I add in a couple extra dresses and a few tank tops because this is Kansas and the weather here knows no rules.
And there we go.
One fall closet line-up.
There happens to be 22 items there, if you're a numbers kind of person.
I don't have a magic number. I keep extra hangers in the back because I know I will come across something somewhere and decide to bring it home. But I do keep guidelines in my head. I know there's only seven days in a week and that I do laundry more often than that. I know that I don't like tight waist bands or fabric that doesn't breath. And I also know that even if there were ten pairs of jeans hanging in my closet, I would wear my favorite pair three times over before reaching for any other.
So what happened to the rest of those clothes on the bed?
They were sorted into three categories:
Goodbye to Goodwill - for anything that didn't make me say "Oh there you are my old friend!" as it came out of the bin, and a couple of summer things that didn't earn their keep.
See you next spring - into the storage bin - for all the summer things I can't wait to see again.
And the rest of the fall/winter that I love, but didn't meet my immediate hanger needs, got folded and put into my reserves.
This cabinet is opposite my hanging rod and easy to reach when I'm ready to swap out those tanks and short sleeve dresses for warmer wear.
I also have drawers with gym clothes and lounge wear.
And I keep a hook on the closet door where I hang my current sleep items.
I keep two or three here and swap out between washing. With my husband's work schedule, he's often asleep before me. I find it easier to grab something off the hook than rummaging around a drawer in the dark.
And that's it.
After my initial purge, and a lot of internet research, I have realized the excess of items that I used to have, came to live in my closet because
I bought them.
Research is key.
It turns out, I like to buy clothes.
I like the hunt.
But with even more research and many hours of blog reading and YouTube watching, I have refined how I think about the hunt and greatly cut back on what I actually bring home.
I have taken time to get to know me, and what I like to wear.
I have taken time to get to know what I don't like to wear, and I do my best at not buying those things in the first place.
Every now and then I make a bad call and something comes home only to hang untouched on the rod for an entire season.
That's ok.
No one's perfect.
Except for maybe, Jennifer Scott.
Oh, probably not even her.
But for the last four years I have been happy walking into a closet that doesn't threaten to swallow me alive. It's easier to get dressed every day when everything in there is something you
want to wear, and easier on the budget when you know your closet already has everything you need to get through the week.
And if there's one thing we like as much as comfort around here...
it's easy.
