ASOS Customer Service Review & Commentary for Ladies

First of all, if you are male, you may want to stay as far away from this post as possible. (I'm not too certain men are interested in fashion to begin with.)

I'm sure you've seen where I recommended ASOS before. At the time, I had never purchased from them, but I since have and I was VERY PLEASED with the service. However, with this post I wanted to make 2 points. (Ok, maybe 3.)

Living On A Prayer

Just to share a random tidbit of information that makes me happy: Did you know Bon Jovi's "Living On A Prayer" was originally written about a couple that was doing bad financially, became pregnant, and decided to give up?

We've got to hold on to what we've got.
It doesn't make a difference if we make it or not.
We've got each other, and that's a lot.
For love - we'll give it a shot!


Oh...we're halfway there.
Oh... living on a prayer.
Take my hand and we'll make it, I swear.

He didn't like the story, so he changed it. :)

*I have no idea if this story is accurate. It was seen during a google search.
**I also have no rights to this song.

A New Day

I've been very negative recently. Then Justin got more bad news today. Instead of focusing on the negative, can I share something positive?

As you may know if you follow my personal twitter feed, Justin and I are trying to plan a trip/budget to go to Germany in 2014. We already had crazy financial goals for 2013, so this was really stressing me out.

Then I had the crazy idea of contacting Justin's and my German teacher from high school. Justin took it a step further and suggested meeting her for a beer. I'm hoping she will agree. She may say no since Justin always did math during her class. *glares at Justin* She would always come to class and apologize for being mean to me in her dreams though, so maybe we have a chance? ;)

Really, truly though, I am excited about Justin's suggestion.

I've also heard from a friend I haven't spoken to in a while that said she'd like to meet up and discuss my budgeting concerns.

So all in all, planning this trip (that I don't have a date or a budget for) has been overall a very positive experience by putting me in touch with people I haven't spoken with in a while. :)

As an aside, I'm not quite sure where to direct this blog. Would any of my readers like to comment about what you want to hear about? I'm thinking food, store reviews, occasional wedding randoms, house development, and now travel information? I hope you stay with me as I continue to develop my blog this year. :)

Miroslav Sasek (a children's author)

So, I had never heard M. Sasek, a 1960's author of children's books titled This is _____ until today.


I had to share, because the books look exciting.

If you click on the "look inside" for the This is Paris book on Amazon, it shows how Miroslav Sasek incorporated words from the French language into the book. Plus, the illustrations are gorgeous! At the end of each of his books, the author has side notes about how the area in question has changed since he wrote the book originally!

I may be tempted to purchase a few of his books. :)

Random Sunday Update: Clothing Blogs

Ok. I will admit it. I have a problem. I truly enjoy reading blogs featuring Anthropologie fashion. I love seeing what other people are buying and how they are styling their new clothing. Occasionally reading these blogs inspires me to check out other clothing brands that often have the same high quality as what my favorite store offers.

1. One of my absolute FAVORITES is Effortless Anthropologie. Every week Roxy updates with sales, reader outfits, other places to buy similar clothing (like J. Crew), providing a place for people to sell their used Anthropologie clothing, and occasionally insightful commentary on the Anthropologie brand (how free shipping could improve the brand sales, how well the store is doing financially, and other customer concerns). If I don't look at any other website during the week, I always check hers out. :)

2. I'm also a big fan of Shannon Hearts. I love seeing the styled photo shoots and the different ways she puts together outfit ensembles. Shannon also frequently offers giveaways for the clothing brands that sponsor her website.

3. I also discovered SHEfinds, which coincidentally offers BRIDEfinds (aka SHEfinds Weddings) and MOMfinds for all the other women in the world that are less concerned about personal fashion and more concerned with either their wedding day or cute things for their kids! :) This website does not offer information specifically about Anthropologie, but they do occasionally mention my favorite store. I love that they share celebrity fashion, giveaways, department store sale information, and how to obtain your favorite styles for less.

Is there anyone that you follow that has gorgeous style and fun clothing advice? Feel free to share with me! I love checking out new and different blogs!

The Little Things In Life

I have to admit that sometimes the little things in life make me the happiest.

- falling asleep to rain
- a hug
- my husband making what I want for dinner
- a great song coming on the radio
- finding out a dear friend is engaged!

Yes, I said it. I just found out, a month after the proposal, that a dear friend (or 2?) of mine is engaged! You have absolutely no idea how excited this makes me!

Three years ago, at Christmas time, I found out an online friend of mine was pregnant... at like 3AM. She and her husband had had a rough time becoming pregnant. I was so excited for her, and I was so excited that she had confided in me. I couldn't sleep that night; she couldn't either. It was an amazing moment.

Then, last night I couldn't sleep... so I found out this other online friend is engaged! Ahhh... *sigh* I may never want to sleep again!! lol.

Anyway, I hope this post finds my readers doing well and enjoying their Friday. Am I the only one that gets amazing news late at night?

BuyTrends?

A few days ago, I was going through google reader and checking out the blogs I follow when I stumbled across one bloggers recommendation of BuyTrends. I went to check it out and the next thing I knew Justin had confiscated my computer and was looking at the website for himself!

The truth of the matter was that BuyTrends has cute Korean style clothing at very good prices (assuming of course that the clothing is in good quality condition and made well). I fell in love with Korean style clothing when I came across Liz Lisa clothing, which is very expensive and hard to obtain in the US (even on ebay!).

Justin said I could order a few things using paypal from the BuyTrends website just to check them out and share with my readers what I thought about the experience. While the clothes I have ordered have not come in yet, let me share my experience so far.

First of all, if you are looking for cute clothes at good prices, BuyTrends seems to be a great place to shop! Here are a few things that caught my eye:

Ladylike Two Pieces Set Short Cardigan jacket Coat
with Sleeveless Chiffon Floral Dress Purple


Elegant Stylish Long Sleeve Chiffon Dress


Bohemian Chiffon Lace Flower Maxi Skirt with Belt


As you can see, the clothing looks nice and very feminine. If you check out the prices, you will quickly realize that the prices are very similar to other cheaper US stores like Forever 21 or Wet Seal. However, in my experience, the clothing quality is not amazing, and I often either wear out the items I buy from those stores faster than I would like... or the style of clothing comes out of fashion and I decide the clothing item looks awful on me within a year. I'm hoping this will not be the case with BuyTrends, however, past experience indicates that you get what you pay for. Low price often equates to low quality.

I'm also a little bit concerned with the "free size" that almost all of the clothes at BuyTrends comes in. I'm use to, at the minimum, small, medium, and large sizing. I'm afraid the clothing will be too stretchy or not stretchy enough. The Korean models, whether photoshopped or not, all look very small in stature, and, while I'm not a large person, I'm wondering exactly how "free" the sizing really is.

I also don't like that the colors for the items are not mentioned on the website. For example, the elegant, stylish, long chiffon dress comes in apricot and white. With the white balance for the image being slightly off (I'm assuming), the dress looks more pink than white, so I had no idea if the dress shown was the white version or maybe if, when the site says apricot, they mean a slight apricot hue. The only indication of color mentioned is that 'color may not be as it appears due to discrepancies on computer monitors'. Helpful, yes?

Finally, the last concern for me was the misspellings on the website and lack of blogger reviews. I understand if this is a new site (which I think it is),  they may have a few kinks to work out. This is why I was grateful for the opportunity to order using paypal. I like the guarantee that I can get my money back if the items do not arrive as mentioned or if customer service gives me a hard time.

The shipping was a bit expensive costing $13 for 3 items taking my total above what I originally wanted to spend. (Also, the coupon they offer for you to sign up only works if you spend $99 or more which is not exactly what a new customer wants to do!)

At the moment, I can only recommend checking out BuyTrends if you like cute, Korean-style, feminine-looking clothing. I will definitely come back and let you know how the actual purchasing experience went and tell you more about the quality of clothing once I receive my items in the mail. :)

See Follow-Up here. This is where I finally received one of the items I bought.