Style v. Fashion

Usually, one of the best things about doing Outfit of the Day (OOTD) is the responses I get from the viewers. 

Most of them are supportive, but there are few critics out there. I’ve been told, for example, that what I wear “isn’t fashionable,” or that my look “is out of date.”

My first reaction is that the critics are missing the point of OOTD – to put it in modern terms, “You do you,” or, since it’s my reel, I’m doing me. 

But that got me thinking further about fashion versus style. There’s a difference, a big difference, in fact, that is the nub of the difference between me doing me and the critics who say something I’m wearing isn’t “in fashion.”

Several of you asked me to talk about the difference between the two. So here goes. 

Fashion is the mode of the moment. As Heidi Klum used to say on her reality show, when it comes to fashion, “one minute you're in. And then you’re  not.”

Style is less about whether something's in. Style is your look, what you like, the moment be damned. Sometimes personal style and fashion coincide. And sometimes they never will. I will wear  the cold shoulder look on the 12th of Never. 

 I have to confess that when I started doing OOTD I hadn’t thought too deeply about the difference between fashion and style, so I owe my critics a debt of gratitude for making me think about it.  

I've been interested in both since I was a little girl. I read my mother’s  fashion magazines from the time I could read.   

Vogue had a recent feature where they’d publish a photo or an article from 20-30 years ago and I  usually remembered seeing it in the original spread. Scary: that means I’m getting old. 

But not giving up. 

My mother had an idiosyncratic style and I come from a long line of “creatives.” My grandmother was an interior decorator. My mother was and is a post-modern realism landscape painter. 

So I grew up loving clothes and in high school I dreamed of being a fashion designer. My senior project was to design and sew a capsule wardrobe.  

When I got to college, my parents scared me into getting a vocational degree, with tales of liberal arts graduates working in McDonalds. 

Instead of becoming an aspiring fashion designer, I became a CPA. Feel free to laugh – a CPA is as far from the runway as Bianca Censori is from making wise fashion choices.  

That  dream didn’t come true, but my love of fashion and design endured. Along the way my mother and grandmother taught me a couple of rules that have stood me in good stead. 

The first thing they taught me is that the quality of what you buy is more important than quantity. 

As a result, I have pieces in my wardrobe that go back to the very early days of my marriage to Mr. Herr and I’d have pieces from my single days except six weeks after we married, we had a fire in our house that wiped out most of my wardrobe. I lost the perfect black pleated  skirt that I still pine for, among other things. 

Most of Mr. Herr’s, too, but I defy you to tell me the difference between one grey pinstripe suit and the next. 

The next lesson they taught me was not to chase the latest fad. You didn’t want to look like a grieving widow, but you also didn’t want to look like a desperate fashionista wannabe.

My mother and my grandmother always bought classic pieces which could be worn for years and then would mix in more current pieces to update their look.   To them, it was important to look smart and chic, but not so much so that the clothes would look dated the following year, as gaucho pants went out and high-waisted jeans came in. 

There was also an element of old-fashioned Protestant thrift built into this. If you buy something that is well made and that is a classic, you can wear it for 30 years. Accessorize a Reagan-era Saint Johns Knit sheath with a Hermes scarf from Trump II and you’ll look smashing.  

But the other lesson I learned – and this is the one I probably learned the most – is, to steal a line from Polonius in Shakespeare, “To thine ownself be true."

My mother had a very different sense of style from me. Long before the world had heard of Snead O’Connor, my mom had a buzz cut. She wore capes. Her heavy blue eye shadow was something Louise Nevilson could be proud of. And when I was in elementary school, I was the only one with a mother in white go go boots.

But that isn’t my style. While I was thinking about writing this I went back and looked at some old photos to see how my sense of style had evolved. During Covid I digitized most of of our old photos.   Here are some highlights.   These two are from high school.

High School W.I.H.

High School W.I.H.

What you’ll discover is that I tended to classics, but as I got older, I started to feel more confident and go with more color and bolder looks. 

The number one reel for responses was the one where I wore the pink houndstooth outfit. I don’t think I would have had the courage to wear it in high school or college. And this one is my college yearbook photo:

College W.I.H.

When I look at photos from high school and college I realize that the elements of my personal style were already forming.  Check out the pearls, costume back then.  All of these clothes are things that are similar to items in my wardrobe today. The pearls, I am happy to say, are now real, thanks to Mr. Herr, who bought me my first set of real pearls for our first Christmas. 

Next: motherhood. This is where it really gets tricky. You have these kids running around, demanding your attention, your time, your financing. How do you still look cool and chic while making orange foods for dinner (Chicken nuggets, Kraft macaroni and cheese, etc.)?

These are a few from the 90’s. 

Clearly, I’ve always loved animal print!  When our children were growing up, money was very scarce.   Most of our disposable income went towards new hockey skates and lacrosse sticks, not to mention the league fees and tournament hotels. 

That didn’t leave a lot for fashion.   

I focused on classic pieces that could be worn frequently and for different events.  I also worked part-time at Ann Taylor and got a discount.  One of my best purchases was a black wool double breasted coat dress which I wore until it was shiny at the seams.   It could be dressed up with pearls and heels for a cocktail party, but could work for a funeral too.  Unfortunately, in a pre-camera phone era there are no pictures of it.

And here are a series of our annual Easter photos plus one from our older daughter’s senior day for high school in the winter of 2007.

These are the 2000s.  

While the hemlines and the shoulders vary I clearly have favored classic sheaths for a long time.  And I haven’t lost my fondness for animal print.  The hair is longer, but with four small children, short was the look in the 90s.

This is all a long way of saying that style is what works for you – and it may evolve as you evolve. Fashion is a Polaroid photo, spit out of the fashion camera. 

Fashion is what the designers and fashion editors decree.  For example skinny jeans are out and barrel leg are in.  That’s fashion.  To look elegant and put together you need to navigate between the two.   

I’ve learned over time that with my height and figure classic tailored clothing looks best.  The bohemian flowing peasant dress will never be my friend.   I gravitate to bold colors.   That’s what works best for me.  They’re fun and I like them.

That doesn’t mean it’s what will work for you.   

My mother and grandmother weren’t the only ones with rules. There are a lot of  “rules” out there.

For example, short women should only wear single color outfits, women with large chests should never wear turtlenecks, flowing clothes are slimming, comfort is more important than style, women of a certain age shouldn’t have long hair or wear eyeliner, skinny jeans are over. 

I could go on, but you get the gist.   

Here’s my answer to that: to paraphrase Kiera Knightly in Pirates of the Caribbean, I believe that you should think of these rules as guidelines.  

Mr. Herr has a rule. He calls it Rule 66. 

It goes like this: He’s 66 years old and he’s going to do what he wants to do. 

Why? Because he said so. He earned that right through a life of working hard.

I’m now on Rule 62.

 In my 20s and 30s I wasn’t nearly as confident as I am now.   My color choices were more conservative, my budget was smaller.  As time has gone on I’ve gotten more daring.   Rule 62 means I can ignore all of those “rules” and can wear what I feel good in.

I say, whether you’re 32, 42, 52, 62, or 72, adopt your own version of the rule. 

Wear what you want.

Don’t be a slave to “fashion” and if anyone tells you about a “rule” you have to follow, I say, “bugger off.” 

Wear what makes you feel confident.  

Forge your own style. 

Don’t be afraid to experiment.  

What are “they” going to do? Withhold your transcript?

You do you. Have fun. 

And of course, never quit!

Planting Daffodils: Spring is Just Around the Corner!

When I was growing up my mother had a series of ever more elaborate gardens.  She started with a couple of beds at our first house when I was very little which I helped with.

As I got older, she used me for the less fun jobs, primarily weeding.  Ugh.

Her later gardens were beautiful and were featured in our local newspaper and a national home magazine.   My reaction to my experience in my mother’s garden was not to garden again for the next 30 years.  

The first two houses that Mr. Herr and I owned were on town size lots.   We kept the backyard mowed, but not much else. Not a lot of room for daffodils or flowers of any kind, really, at the first house and by the next house I was chasing flour children under the age of six. No time for flowers.   

When we bought our current house, on a bit over two acres, we didn’t really do much.  (See, children, running after; and rinks, driving to).

My standard joke was that we had weeds we mowed and weeds we didn’t mow.  We were busy working and raising four children.   In reality, we barely managed to keep the weeds mowed (In a stirring act of civil disobedience, one of the kids kept managing to run over the power mower cord). 

Sometime around 2013, coincidentally after we’d had one child finish college, I started to get an itch to do something more than mow.  The first thing I did was to plant some daffodils.   

Our property is across the street from a school which was originally a private home.   Behind that private house was a field that bloomed with daffodils every spring.   That was my inspiration.

That first year I planted about 100 bulbs individually with a bulb digger.   It was back-breaking.  This is a picture from the spring of 2014:

Not quite what I had in mind.   That’s when I developed the somewhat, unorthodox method I use now.

Because I’m usually planting 400-500 bulbs each fall I do it this way:

I dig a series of holes with a spade

And then place 4-6 bulbs in each hole. More bulbs per backache is a good trade to make.

I then cover them.   Using this method, I can plant 100 bulbs in an hour.   

The other thing I’ve learned is that, at least here in Climate Zone 6a, I can plant into January. 

The Fall is a great time to plant bulbs, but the Fall usually gets away from me for one reason or another and I still have bulbs in the garage in late December

But we always seem to get a thaw right around the New Year and I rush out to do my planting then.

This is a picture from 2019

So, here’s the big takeaway: something hit me later in life and revived that gardening urge. 

At least in New Jersey, it’s almost never too late to plant a bulb or six.  Bulbs need about 6 weeks of cold in the ground so you are probably safe until late January.

And it’s ok to invent your own planting style. Your back will like you better for it.  I’ve also tried several different bulb suppliers.  Even though they can be a little more expensive, The Works from White Flower Farm has the best variety and best quality bulbs.   

Here’s what all of this yields.

Look at that. That’s what makes it all worthwhile, 

I’ll post a more recent video on Instagram.   I haven’t mastered putting a video link here.  Happy planting!

7 Trees, 13 Wreaths, 3 Creches – 25 Days

Our Main Christmas Tree

Seven trees?  13 wreaths? 3 creches? 

Okay, I get it. Not everyone needs to do Christmas This Big. 

And that’s 100% right. 

But let me tell you why I do it that way. 

First, it’s just plain fun. 

Second, we tend to do things big here – and the Herrnation isn’t even in Texas. Four Kids. Four Dogs. Why Not Seven Trees? 

But, third, there’s a backstory.

When I was growing up Christmas was the only big holiday celebration that my mother did.   

Not in a celebration of the birth of the Savior kind of way, but in a pagan winter solstice kind of way – a lot of emphasis on the trees and presents, no religious overtones.   

My mother was an artist. My grandmother was an interior designer. The aesthetic was everything. 

So my mother had two identical trees that were placed in the living room because she liked the symmetry.  We had only white lights. 

High marks for presentation. Low marks for joy. Even lower marks for fun. 

When I was a little girl we had a mix of ornaments, including the Shiny Brite ornaments that everyone who grew up in the 1950s and 60s had on their trees.  

Taking them out of the boxes and decorating was a ritual.  

Everything was carefully stored in flat cardboard dress boxes with crumpled tissue paper that was reused year after year and each ornament had to be carefully placed on the tree in a very specific order.  

Plain glass bulbs first, fancies next and then other ornaments, fake song birds made with real feathers etc. last.   Woe betide any little hands that dropped something.   

As I got older my mother started to collect animal ornaments and then the trees were only the animals with a few miniature glass balls to add a little glitter.  

All of the presents were wrapped in themed paper and ribbons and put out under the tree early as part of the decorations.   This was definitely the Christmas of a family with only one child!

It was beautiful. It would have made a great Christmas magazine shoot. 

It wasn’t what I wanted for my Christmas. 

My first tree of my own was the first Christmas I celebrated with Mr. Herr.   We had a bit of a set-to about the lights.  Remember, I’m a white-lights-only girl. He came from a colored lights family.   

What’did we do? We negotiated and then compromised: both. 

That, in a nutshell, is the story of our marriage. We negotiate. My brother-in-law once asked, “Do you guys negotiate over everything?”

Yes. Sometimes like fishwives. With that settled, we went big: we started having both. Spoiler alert: that’s one of the ways Christmas got big for us. 

Then, of course, there was the whole timing thing about the tree. Mr. Herr’s family would buy their trees on Christmas Eve, when the prices fell (they weren’t cheap, they were poor and every dollar counted).

My family bought the tree right after Thanksgiving. I don’t remember what I gave up to Mr. Herr in exchange for December 1 tree acquisition rights, but I’m sure it’s covered by the Treaty of Lambertville. 

On that first tree, I had the Shiny Brite ornaments that my mother didn’t use anymore and we bought some other things together which are mostly lost, but we still have these. which I now use on my dining room chandelier.

Over the years, as the family’s size grew, so did the decorating. Double lights was like a gateway drug to Big Christmas. And so we went big.

Our own ornaments typically reflect something connected to the family like a team the kids played on, a team we root for,  a school one of us went to, or a place we’ve been. Or our dogs. We have a few Lab ornaments. Maybe more than a few.  

We also have ornaments I’ve needlepointed, including jerseys for the teams our children played on.

So, you’re sitting there and saying, “Well, One Informed Housewife, that’s nice, but seven trees?”

We didn’t add a second tree until our oldest child was about two.   My grandmother gave us an Advent Calendar that was 24 books which told the story of the Nativity and were also ornaments. Christmas in our house isn’t a pagan celebration, it is the joyful season of Christ’s birth. 

I bought a small tree which was in her room and later in the hallway between our children’s bedrooms and we would read one book each night and then hang it on the tree.   Those of you from big families will not be surprised to learn we had an elaborate set of rules to ensure even hanging rights (when you go man-down in families, you start inventing a rule book for everything, without which anarchy ensues).   

Original Advent Calendar & Tree

This is that tree, with the original Advent Calendar.   Years later, as our oldest was graduating from college, I discovered that this Advent Calendar was still in print.  I bought four more and as each child graduated  gave them their own along with a small artificial tree.

Somewhere along the way, my grandmother gave me the ornaments that had been my grandfather’s when he was a little boy.  When our children were little, I stopped using them because they were so delicate and I was afraid that small hands or large Labrador tails would turn them to dust. 

They have since re-emerged, safely ALTH – Above Lab Tail Height.

Now here’s an issue that can divide families faster than fighting over the inheritance: real trees only? Artificial, only? 

By now, you’re probably unsurprised to know that we do both. 

Why? Why not? 

More trees equals more fun, more Christmas joy.

Then, a few years ago I got these two artificial trees

And I use them for these special ornaments. 

Ok we’re up to four, you’re saying to yourself why would this woman want more?

I’ll tell you why and it goes back to when I was a little girl.

I was always fascinated by pink trees. My mother, the artist? Well, no. She thought they were tacky.

Nevertheless, I always wanted one and I raised the subject with Mr. Herr, usually an old school traditionalist if there was ever one. 

But he's also a man with few boundaries where having a little ironic fun is concerned, so he agreed. And, here it is my pink tree in my kitchen being guarded by the Pink Christmas Tree Honor Guard. 

Really, who doesn’t want a pink tree?

Once the fake tree floodgates were opened, there was no stopping us. This one is in Mr. Herr’s office.

It has the tinsel garland that he grew up with and I think is a little too much. Old school, what can I tell you, and helps explain his willingness on the pink tree.

Finally, this one on our deck. It’s real and, if I do say so myself, it’s spectacular:

Until a few months ago, there was an older fellow who sat behind us in church. We got to know him reasonably well over the years and he’d tell us that one of the things he liked doing was driving past the house to look at the deck tree and decorations.

When he went to Glory this year at age 96, his son told us Christmas was huge for his dad and our outside tree brought him joy. 

As I put up the tree this year, I thought, “This one’s for you, Alex. Merry Christmas.”

I told you Mr. Herr has few limits, but there is one and in our case, it’s the ceiling in our living room. Now we skip the annual argument about whether the main tree is too short because he has grudgingly – very grudgingly – accepted the limits of physics and ceilings.

As you might imagine, getting ready for Christmas here is a production, and in years like this, with a late Thanksgiving, it’s a little stressful. 

Harvard Medical School says the holiday season is stressful because it requires us to keep track of and pay attention to a greater number of responsibilities than usual, the brain’s prefrontal cortex goes into overdrive. Over time, a high level of demand can decrease memory, halt production of new brain cells, and cause existing brain cells to die. 

Very heavy stuff. Any Mom can tell you it’s stressful because there are so many balls in the air – many of them glass ornaments – that you have to land in the right places. 

It doesn’t have to be. It shouldn’t be. 

So here’s One Well Informed Housewife's thoughts about how to make sure those balls end up on the tree instead of broken beneath it. 

First, remember, this is supposed to be fun. It is a season of joy, whether you’re a person of faith or a person of It’s a Wonderful Life (Herrnation's favorite Christmas movie? Tie between Denis Leary in The Ref and Die Hard).

Second, if you need to, get organized. 

We used to try to wrap the kids’ gifts on Christmas Eve after we’d gotten back from church and they'd gone to bed. We’d collapse into our own about 4 AM, all measures of Christmas cheer long gone, with a son who was about to wake up in two hours wanting to open presents NOW! (We solved for that one: “You can empty your stocking, but you have to wait for the rest of us to get up –later!”).   

Now we wrap as we go.

Third, understand that the more intricate you make things, the more you need to make time for those things to happen. If you want personalized Christmas cards, you need to order them in enough time to get them, address them, stamp them, and mail them. Handwriting addresses takes longer than you think.

If you’re pointing, clicking, and shipping to buy your Christmas presents online, ditto. 

When the kids were small and playing on travel teams and I hadn't worked out the schedule, that was stressful. Did I mention those wrapping sessions? 

In those days I was just trying to get one tree (well maybe two) up, and a couple of wreaths on the doors,  in between driving to games and practices.  

Over time, I realized I needed to be organized if I wanted to do more. I even convinced the Count of Chaos, Mr. Herr, that his style of “help,” needed to raise its game and well, be helpful. 

Most important: don’t be fooled by our Christmas Bigness. More can be less. We were just as happy with one tree as we are now with the Christmas forest.

The most important thing about Christmas is being with people you love and seizing the fun and the joy – even if you’ve been up until four in the morning wrapping presents. 

So that’s how I’ve gone from one tree to seven.   We’ll leave the wreaths and creches for another post.

Merry Christmas!