Reading through all the lovely fashion, makeup, and hair blogs lately makes me wonder if I’ll ever earn the “fashionista” badge for real. I mean, I’m sure you’re reading this and wondering why I started writing about fashion, hair, and makeup in the first place. Good question.

I started DeluxeGrrl because I thought it would be interesting to go from geekalicious codermuffin to rockstar fashionista. There was a lot of things I needed to learn along the way — like becoming one with the makeup brush and realizing that not everything halter is good — but I’m getting there, slowly…

And then I realized that plus size fashion was more than just clothes — it was downright political. It was this stream of blogs that I had never really ventured out to read before — talking about this new-yet-not-new concept to me of size acceptance. It was amazing — and downright frightening. And yet, I dived deeper.

I discovered clothing stores like Kiyonna, Igigi, and my new fascination, Missphit. I also met interesting designers like Tara, and friends like Sarah, Glen, and Aja. I even learned, somewhere along the way, to embrace my hips and curves…

Creative link-love aside, I have found this journey through size, clothes, fashion, health, beauty, and style to be both a neverending source of wonder and also a level of frustration.

I blog because I want to reach out to girls like me that never really held up a piece of clothing and felt something intangible from it before growing into a vein where they had to have that, they had to start looking sharper, presenting themselves better. I could post some of my nerd pictures, but I don’t believe in torturing the innocent.

So, at two in the morning, as I sit coffeeless, I’m reviewing the numerous press releases, stories, link lists and other publicity drippings that get sent to me. To everyone that has linked to me, emailed me things, and, in the case of some of my commenters, dropped a line to let me know the other side of my argument, thank you! I hope as we merrily walk down this deluxe little path there will be much more to share. I have to say that sometimes it’s hard to come up with posts like this — I want to make sure that I’m being heard, but I also don’t want to stretch fashion out into this textbook thing that isn’t living.

All this, from the nerd in pinstriped slacks. My wardrobe just isn’t fashionista enough, I might want to give Di (of legendary, incredible Fat Chic fame) a call and let her pimp my ‘drobe? perfect my pants? pimp my hangers? There just aren’t enough streetcorners for everything in my wardrobe that needs to be pimped out, I tell you…

I’ve been thinking about price, style, fashion, and why we spend. As a shopper as well as a marketer, I’m often curious as to why certain lines/brands get a free pass for being spendy whilst others get raked over the coals to dare price a blouse/skirt/dress/pant higher than $X or so.

I might as well admit it: I am not a fashionista. I would like to think someday I’ll become a fashionista, but since it’s generally inappropriate (and ahem, illegal) to run outside sans clothes, I have to find something that fits, looks fairly nice, and wards off evil…I mean, oglers.

Fashion is so fickle. I have a hard time purchasing something trendy to watch it fall out of favor, then watch it come BACK in style 2 years down the road. To ward off this sadness, I generally stick to the classic pieces: pinstriped slacks, heather-gray pants, black, close-fitted jackets and button down blouses with adorable princess seams.

I’m often agitated when I surf through general fashion sites, as they carry an air of “oh, look at me, I paid all this money for these items…” — is that how we want to look as women, breaking the bank on the latest designer, yet struggling with the concept of automagically withdrawing money every month for that nest egg at the end of the rainbow?

Granted, you can do both — $600 shoes and the 401(k), but sometimes I get a little itchy when the expectation is that you have to be spending money on the latest dress from …you name it…no matter what the cost.

in plus size fashion land, the phenomenon seems to be even more intense, as it’s seen to be /expected/ that prices can skyrocket out of this world. Huh? What? If we’re going to make plus size fashion political, then I think pricing and justifications also need a close look-over as well.

I’m intensely interested in this, because I know that for every woman that can buy a Monif C., Abby Z., or Igigi / Kiyonna / SizeAppeal / etc creation, there’s three women that can’t. It’s not just college students that I’m thinking of — I’m also thinking of the woman that’s struggling to make ends meet, the one that’s trying to get an interview for a job that could pay a lot more than what she’s making now, but if only she could find proper interview clothing in her size…

Price, as most of you know, is always going to be relative, perception wise. A $125 dress may not seem like a lot to some people, but for the groups I’m speaking of, that could easily be groceries, or an electric/gas bill, or a car payment. I’ve seen the prices of looking halfway decent brushed off as “that’s just the way it is”, but is it really?

I attack the problem from the other side of the house — I write, coach, mentor, and speak to women (and men, I’m an equal-opportunity business builder) about starting microbusinesses and passive income streams.

Although I’m one person, my greatest wish isn’t that every woman in America can purchase a $150 dress from Igigi — it’s that every woman in American can freely decide to do that without having to juggle 2834982732092 other expenses that are keeping her up at night.

Today I went to the Lane Bryant Outlet Store in Branson, MO to check out what they had in stock, and also what steals and deals I could wrangle. It is, after all, an outlet store, and the inherent assumption is that there would be a deal that I couldn’t refuse, right?

The general consensus is more meh than wow, but it could have been worse. One prop that I appreciated: the ladies that ruled the counter there were efficient, courteous, friendly, and downright fantastic. I called earlier to get store hours and while the conversation only lasted a moment, the voice that greeted me definitely made me feel like the hour ride down the road was worth it.

I still think that if you’re going to shop in an LB, it may be best to stick to the retail store rather than the outlets — the one I’ve visited is a touch lacking as far as I’m concerned; then again, my style of dress is also different (I dress business causal year-round; I’ve found that the style covers a wide range of situations and makes me look darn cool in the process).

I have three LB gift cards. Silly me, I forgot that they cover Fashion Bug, Lane, and Catherine’s (don’t laugh, I like some of their stuff too). I cashed in a couple of “bonus” points at work for the gift cards, so it’s not like I’m at a loss. I have enough gift card cash to stock up on a few underthings, a couple of camis or blouses, and maybe a pair of slacks: I’ve been eyeing those high-waist trousers for a while, but OUCH — my college student id quivers.

Maybe I’m just super-picky — I can’t shop for clothes to save my life, because I consider clothing a huge lock-in of my overall dollars. I dislike buying clothing that’s going to go on sale two to three months after I purchase it, and fade/pop/crinkle/pill after a couple of washes. That’s a comment not directly aimed at Charming Shoppes’s lines exclusively, just to clarify — it’s merely something I’m beginning to get fed up with.

Something tells me that Singer hiding in my closet is about to get used, but I have zero experience with an actual sewing machine. We’ll just have to fix that too, now won’t we?