Moving through Midlife | Helping Midlife Women Move Better and Feel Better

123 | Boost Your Confidence in Midlife through Style with Ashli Anna Hurley, Personal Style Coach

• Courtney McManus • Episode 123

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Have you ever looked into your closet and felt overwhelmed by the choices or even underwhelmed by the lack of them? If you've ever felt uncertain about your personal style, particularly as you navigate midlife, you're not alone. Join me and personal style coach, Ashli Anna Hurley, as we demystify the world of capsule wardrobes and discuss dressing for midlife. Gain insight into Ashli's journey from working with Mary Kay and Premier Designs to becoming a style coach and learn how to dress for your body, right here, right now.

Ashli, a style expert with a wealth of experience, shares tips on creating a core wardrobe list and discusses the crucial clothing items every midlife woman should have in her closet. We'll get down to the nitty-gritty of personalized capsule wardrobes, exploring everything from tops and bottoms to underwear, accessories, and shoes. Ashli also offers strategies on finding the right clothes to fit your lifestyle and tips on creating a polished look that transitions well from day to night.

But beyond the practicality of clothing, we'll delve into the emotional and logical aspects of dressing for midlife. Help boost your confidence with Ashli's tips on how to create a balanced look that is authentic to you. We'll be discussing the importance of accepting our bodies in their current state, focusing less on our insecurities, and more on what makes us unique and beautiful. Lastly, we'll explore how to dress intentionally for our kingdom calling—how to change our mindset around dressing in a way that not only attracts people to us but also helps to share the gospel and build up the church. Join us for an empowering conversation on confidence, personal style, and midlife fashion.

  • 0:05 Capsule Wardrobes and Dressing for Midlife
  • 8:44 Personalized Core Wardrobe and Styling
  • 24:47 Confidence in Personal Style
  • 30:38 Essential Wardrobe Items for Midlife Women
  • 44:42 Dressing for Attractiveness and Purpose



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Speaker 1:

Welcome to Moving Through Midlife. I am your host, courtney, a personal trainer and movement specialist who wants to help you move through midlife with more grace. Each week, we will discuss ways we can show up better for ourselves and our children without the burnout. We will focus on overall health through habit stacking to help increase energy, provide movement snacks to help you move more throughout the day, while also moving your body more, and learn from professionals on moving through midlife with ease so that you can feel confident with aging. Gracefully, grab your earbuds and join me on a leisurely walk while we discuss moving through midlife.

Speaker 1:

Today, I am speaking with Ashley Anna Hurley about capsule wardrobes and dressing for your body in midlife. Ashley Anna is a Christian homeschool mama of three girls. Her passion includes leading worship, learning God's word and teaching women about their God-given features and capsule wardrobe hacks so they can feel empowered to show up and shine in their kingdom calling. She has been in the styling industry for over 10 years and has styled thousands of men, women and children. Through her experience as a stylist at Stitch Fix. She is now a full-time personal style coach and a your-color style certified color analyst, and she is here today to speak with us about all things women should have in their closet the importance of accepting your body in this stage of life and how we can dress for our body right now, along with some capsule wardrobe tips and a lot more. I hope you enjoy our conversation. Excellent, hi Ashley. How are you oh?

Speaker 1:

I'm good, so I have Ashley on here today and she is going. She's from bold faith and fashion and she is coming on to speak with us about capsule wardrobes and how one thing that I've noticed for myself is just being in midlife, how our body changes and how we can, instead of stress and try to be what we used to be, just really accentuate the positive and find things that fit us where we are so that we feel confident. So that's basically what I wanted to have you on to talk about today, but I wanted to have our listeners and our live people to just let me know what, like what, got you started in styling. I was going to say it's not really capsule wardrobe specific, but it is, but into the style industry.

Speaker 2:

So yeah, so like, where does my knowledge come from? What is that base? Essentially, it's kind of fun because it kind of started with my mom. My mom is actually a super stylish woman and you know she's in midlife as well. She was pretty young. When she had me, she was like 19. So she was always really stylish.

Speaker 2:

So I would say I had an eye for it because I grew up around it. I wouldn't say I was particularly super stylish right away. Like when I look back at like high school and even like my early 20s, it was like okay, you know. However, I got involved with Mary Kay first. Isn't that funny. I got involved with Mary Kay first and that's where I learned basically my own like formula for like a five minute makeup look, but I wasn't loving doing that particular direct sales. Okay, then I found Premier Designs and the thing I loved about Premier Designs now there's a lot of direct sales that are biblically based. I get it, but I got to go and see firsthand all of the ministries that they supported directly in their company and I loved the jewelry and I loved the training. So Premier Designs was an amazing experience. It was like a six year experience for me where I learned how to do, not only how to dress, you know, via, like all of the stylish women that were in there but also how to accessorize. And so I had the makeup experience that I like, did a crash course in for a year. I've even done, you know, weddings for makeup and hair I've always been good at doing hair and then I did this Premier Designs experience and I had my third baby around that five and a half year mark with Premier Designs. And the thing was is, if my baby, my third baby, was anything like my second, I wasn't going to be able to do shows at night. Okay, you know and here's the fun thing is, I can't forget this how I would book my shows, and the reason I was so successful and premier was I would give my clients, or my hostesses, I should say, closet consoles, so I would go in and I would pull out pieces they owned and I would help them style them and put the jewelry with it. So I have years and years of experience doing that, directly working with women of all shapes and sizes and ages.

Speaker 2:

Okay, so then I was. It was an easy transition then to go. Okay, I need to find something, because I still needed a little extra money to kind of help with the family finances and stuff, and had known about Stitch Fix and had thought, gosh, I wish I could be my own stylist because you know, my boxes weren't great, and so I decided to apply a long story short. They thought, wow, this experience you have is exactly what we need for someone to come in and style again women of all shapes, sizes and ages. And I ended up styling men and children as well, and I did that for five years so I really can style any person of any age and male, female, doesn't matter child, children, whatever. I have experience in that.

Speaker 2:

The reason why I have such a heart for women in midlife is number one because I love my mom so dearly and growing up I did see her kind of picking at herself, and even now she really struggles, and so it's always been my natural tendency as her daughter, right to encourage her and just point out all the beauty that I see in her, and I'm like that with everyone.

Speaker 2:

I really feel like women are just beautiful creatures. God made us so stinking beautiful and we all have not, and it's not just physically either. There's just something about us right, energy, wise, like we all have something specific that we bring to the table our giftings and our callings, and so I just knew that that was something I wanted to focus on, and so that's kind of the experience part of it. Like, so I do. I have over 10 years experience of styling in pretty much all categories, but I would say my specialty is the ability to help women find clothing that mixes and matches. Like I'm very I have a very good eye at creating a cohesive wardrobe, which is where the capsule aspect of it came into play.

Speaker 1:

Okay, yes, and I've heard of capsule wardrobes for a while now. I have always been intrigued by them, but I've never done it myself because I feel like then you have to get rid of so much and you don't have to. But that's kind of how my mind is like well, if it's only supposed to be whatever 1520 items, whatever I'm like, but then I got a bunch and I'm afraid to do that. You know, and I think most of us women deal with this just the relationship to our clothes which is so weird, but I definitely have it where you're afraid to get rid of certain things. So if you are working with or when you're working with, women, what, what would you say? Are some items like specific items for a capsule wardrobe that you usually recommend women have?

Speaker 2:

So, courtney, you're going to love my answer. Okay, really dependent on each woman, because here's how I'm approaching this. Is the bold, faith and fashion way. Okay, here's how I'm approaching it. We're going to have a core wardrobe and I thought about putting a number on it. I really did, but I don't want to do that because per the individual is what the number is going to be.

Speaker 2:

But I do have a list, a bare bones list, that we start with. Okay, that includes tops, bottoms, sweaters, blouses, outerwear, cardigans, underwear. Yeah, we got to get that to accessories and shoes. Okay, so I have a core list that we can work with. So, for those of you women who are like no, no, no, no, simplify, get rid of it. You're going to love that core list and you're probably not going to deviate from it much.

Speaker 2:

And that's what I do in my personal style coaching program is I build that core and that's like your year round stuff. Two, I mean there's some stuff you won't wear when it's hot or really really cold, but we build that core and then what happens is is that's your capsule. That's like based on what your ideal colors are, what your ideal prints are, the textures, the fit, the fabrication. I mean, it is super customized and that's going to be like these are my go-to pieces, and so there's not a number on that. And outside of that, though, what I've done is I've said we are going to have some mini capsules, because I don't want you to have things in your closet that you don't wear, so that can even be your spring stuff in your closet when it's the middle of winter, so you get a fall capsule, a spring capsule, and a summer and a winter capsule, but, in addition, to your whole capsule, your core, your core capsule?

Speaker 2:

Yes, exactly and so. But those get put away each season, that you're not using them, so that they're not taking up, they're not creating this decision fatigue in your closet.

Speaker 1:

Does that make sense? Most definitely, because the biggest thing that I deal with is you know day in and day out where I got that.

Speaker 1:

I mean it's the going out to lunch with a friend, going out to dinner like a girl's night out, no clue, Date night. Where were we? Yeah, like, and I'll just like aimlessly, or you know when you. And this isn't so much anymore for me. I'm a little bit older, so I don't have baby showers. Most of my friends already have their children. But you know, like back when I did have friends having baby showers, I would just like I have so many clothes but I just don't have anything to wear. So do you kind of go through with them on figuring out like, this is what you might wear for this and this is how you dress this up and how to dress it down, and all of that?

Speaker 2:

Absolutely so. That is what I call the four to five levels of dressing. So what we do is, in one of our sessions is we cover OK, what does level one look like for you? This is going to be your pajamas, because people forget about those pajamas and loungewear. And loungewear can be kind of an elevated type of loungewear where, like, you feel comfortable running errands in it. But what we calculate in each category so that's category one, and as you go up, the level of dress goes up Is you calculate how many days per month are you actually wearing that level?

Speaker 2:

Because here's the deal. You're telling me you're like, ok, I don't know what to wear when I go out to lunch with my girlfriends or when I want to dress up for church or whatever, but how often per month are you doing that? You're like well, I really only need, you know, four days a month or maybe six days a month to do that. So that means you really don't need more than maybe three or four blouses, and maybe each season you have a special seasonal blouse that you pull in, does that?

Speaker 1:

make sense so then.

Speaker 2:

So then that's kind of how we're dealing with that is, we're customizing the amount that you bring in because you don't want to buy a ton of stuff that doesn't fit your right now lifestyle or even like again, if your kingdom calling is to do something where you're presenting and you need to look, you know, dressier and more professional and you don't have that in your closet. Like girl, we got to build that up. But if that's not your kingdom calling right now, if your work from home right now, like we are, then we're probably going to be a little bit more like a polished casual most of the time and we don't need as much dressy stuff. So I do, I address that by going OK, what levels of dress are you actually wearing? What is your kingdom calling? Do you have what you need for that? And then we figure out the number of pieces that would make sense based on how many times per month you would wear them.

Speaker 1:

OK, ok, and then another question I have for you. So it's so. I am in the fitness industry, I wear workout stuff all the time, but I always go back to a girlfriend of mine. She was an instructor for me and she would always look adorable when she like she just knew I guess it's styling. When she would style like when I go out I look like I've just come from the gym, like I look like I'm working out, she would have a completely different look. She would leave class and she would do whatever she did and she looked like she was like a mom on the run. She was not. It did not look like she came from a workout. It looked like she was very stylish in that moment and I always think it's just me. I just look like that person. I don't know. Is there like? Are there little tips that you provide people to kind of make things like?

Speaker 2:

more stylish yeah.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, yeah, for the mom who is trying to run out the door and maybe is wearing her leisure wear all the time but wants to look a little bit less leisure.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, for sure. No, here's the thing it's. It's the athleisure trend, and I can't remember how many years that's kind of been a thing, but boy is it cute and it's so practical for like women who love to work out or who are just really active in what they're doing, just running around a lot, and so, basically, what I would teach you. So what, what actually makes athleisure stylish? Well, you're right, it's a couple of things. It could be she's front tucking her shirt, or she's really selective about the sneakers that she's wearing, like she's making sure they're both comfortable and stylish.

Speaker 2:

Or she knows her her absolute best colors and so she's really looking great because she's not buying athletic wear that isn't in her color scheme. She's maybe making sure that, hey, I have a go to hairstyle that I wear. I know I look great with my hair slicked back in a ponytail and that's quick for me. And it may even be like, does she have a couple of little accessories that she knows Like maybe they're real gold or they're sterling silver that she wears all the time, but they add that little bit of extra. It's just that eye for detail and making sure that what you select is it's harmonizing with your features and your energy and who you are, and that's what helps to create that style and that. Wow, she looks good, you know.

Speaker 1:

Right, right, okay, and you mentioned this color, like bright colors, and I know you're color stylist.

Speaker 2:

Is that what your color style program is? Kind of what I selected. There's so many, but I selected that one because it's the most customizable without being complicated.

Speaker 1:

Okay, okay. So and how does that work? You just look at someone's skin. Is that skin hair color, things like that? And then you determine is it like the winter, spring, summer, fall colors? Is that what it is?

Speaker 2:

basically it's so similar but it's a little bit. It's a little bit better, in my opinion. I do like the spring, summer, fall, winter color system. I started with that in the beginning of my podcast. I was explaining that. But then I studied your color style a little bit more and like how I could integrate that and use that, because I was having a hard time helping people to understand that system and because it was so complex in well, very detailed, which is not bad. But when you're trying to explain it to a client, it's not client friendly, is what I'm gonna say. Okay, okay, your color style is so much more. It's just easier to understand.

Speaker 2:

There's really only three things that you're determining in your color style. So the first thing you're determining is value, and this is really easy. Basically, it's how light or dark are your features overall? So, on a scale, are you really really light somewhere in between light, medium, medium or really dark, or somewhere in between? I mean, that's it's really easy to explain to my client. So, boom, check. Well, that's the first thing I determined.

Speaker 2:

The second thing we determine is, again, it's on a scale, which is another thing I love about your color style is she considers the scale. So in the middle is like where people are a little more neutral, just meaning they have a good amount of cool tones and a good amount of warm tones in their skin, hair and eyes as a combined look. So what my job is is, if you're in that really tough middle spot, is to say, okay, are you leaning a little warmer, are you leaning a little cooler? And that's what we're deciding. And some people are very warm and some people are very cool, so that's easy. So temperature so we get value, temperature check, check.

Speaker 2:

And then the last thing that we determine is okay, are you bright or are you soft? And all that means is how much pure chroma color can you hold? That means how do the colors that you wear have to be softened a lot or a little or somewhere in between? So I hope that makes sense. It's pretty so. Basically, picture the color red and some of us can wear pure red. We don't need any white added, black added or gray added. That pure chroma color red looks great, but there's a lot of us I use red because everybody is feels tricky, everybody is feels tricky about it.

Speaker 2:

Exactly so. If you wear red, though, and you're like but I have worn a red before that wasn't bright that I liked, it was likely because it was lifted with white and softened, diffused and lifted with white, or it was deepened and created a little bit more of a dynamic quality. If you add black, it was a little richer, warmer, and or it was softened and kind of like more of a blended color because it had gray underneath of it. And that is where I'm kind of bringing in my own little twist to this color system, because there's other color systems. I've noticed that that works super well. So once I figure out those three things, then I will tell you look, you can wear all these colors.

Speaker 2:

Your best colors from these colors are gonna be the ones that are brightened with white or deepened with black or softened with gray. So it's just a little bit more, just like I just did there. It's so much easier to explain. I mean, I did that in like five minutes where, like I was finding, like trying to even podcast about it was like oh my gosh, how do I narrow this down? So that's how that works. What do you think Was that kind of comprehensive? Did it make sense?

Speaker 1:

Oh, very, yes, very much. It's perfect when you work with women and that moms you work specifically. Well, no, you said you color or not color. You can work with men and children as well. I can, yeah, but moms in midlife is pretty much who you're speaking to, correct, what is the most challenging thing that you notice? Where is the struggle and how do you help them through that struggle?

Speaker 2:

I would say the biggest struggle tangibly like, outside of the like, mental, emotional struggle is that women tend to, in general, buy individual pieces that they love but they don't buy complete looks yes for sure. And then, right, they feel a little lost because they're like I do have pieces I like, but they just kind of don't, they're not as cohesive as I'd like them to be within the other pieces I have on my wardrobe. So that would be like a practical, tangible challenge. The emotional challenge of it all is, in general, I think we can all agree, especially in America, but across time there's just higher expectations and standards of how we should be visually appealing and what that should look like, and I think it's not actually straight across the board.

Speaker 2:

It depends on what you heard growing up, right, who you were influenced by, what you were influenced by. But we have this tendency to be a little more nitpicky about our bodies and about what looks good on us and the things that maybe do look good on us. Like, the women who struggle the most are usually women who are bright and light, those colors that, because they're kind of like, they shine and it can feel uncomfortable to shine. If you were told when you were younger. Can you just calm down? Can you just like stop being so playful? Like I know you're fun, but like, can you take this seriously? Like if you have this negative messaging around shining bright and wearing bright colors or it could be any reason.

Speaker 2:

It could just be you wanna sit back because of any other insert here, insert trauma here, no, Then yeah, it can be hard to wear the colors that are true to your coloring because they are so bright. I think that a lot of women tend to think I'm soft and I need the gray because, well, first of all, it's popular, so it's trendy, but also because we feel like we can hide behind it, it's diffusing.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, okay, yeah, do you notice, if we so a lot of moms come to me because of their midsection and they're uncomfortable with that and my goal is to help them accept where they are at, it doesn't mean we can't change for our health and our longevity, but accept our body how it is and then work to I don't even wanna say better, that's not what I mean but to be your healthiest version of yourself. And I think, just going through this, I've worked with women for many years and seeing all of us change. How do you have any recommendations for women in that more midlife where things are definitely changing in the midsection I mean it's happening To allow them to appreciate, feel confident, continue to feel confident, and how you may have to get rid of those genes that you bought 15 years ago Exactly, I swear I still have genes in there from, I think, when I was 20. Four or 25. I have not gotten rid of them yet.

Speaker 1:

That's okay, that's okay, all right.

Speaker 2:

Sometimes it's hard to let go because they're so darn cute too.

Speaker 1:

And they're not. They actually are popular again because they're bootpats.

Speaker 2:

So oh see.

Speaker 1:

Yeah.

Speaker 2:

Exactly. Yeah, I do so. That's probably the hardest, the thing that we struggle with as moms the most, because we carried multiple babies most of the time, and some of like I've had three C sections. It's lovingly called an apron stomach. It's great.

Speaker 2:

I think the thing that we have to acknowledge is simply that when you take so on the logical side because there's two sides to this right there's the logical side what's actually happening, what visually, when you style your clothes X way? And then there's the emotional side. So I'll cover the logical side first. The logical side is when you take a piece of clothing and you cover your entire midsection all the way down really, really long, what you end up doing is you create a big block of color pattern or whatever and you think you're covering your stomach, but what you're doing is is you're making it look longer and taller. So visually, logically, that's what's happening. So a lot of women are hesitant to do like a front tuck, for example, which is actually pretty flattering because they're like. But now I can see the little line, especially myself, and I have it and I'm just like I don't care anymore. Now I can see the little line and I feel like a little self-conscious about it and I'm like but the thing is is, visually it's more balanced and it takes it takes the eye away from just that spot. If somebody glances at you and looks up and down, will they see your little line? Sure, but overall they're going to go. If they're not going to stay focused on it, they're going to go. Oh, wow, look at that cute front tuck, that cute blouse. Look at her lip coat. She looks so put together. That is what you're going to get 99% of the time, and anybody else who would sit and focus on that part of you are just as critical, or even worse, to themselves, and that's the only reason they're noticing. So I would say that's the emotional side is. I know it can be.

Speaker 2:

It can feel like you're being naked when you start to wear your correct colors, do your front tucks, wear things that fit you better.

Speaker 2:

If you're used to hiding behind baggy clothes, I know it can feel like you're, you're coming out and you're like you're naked. But the reality is is now you shine, Now people are going to see you for you and psychologically, people just tend to take us more seriously when we dress in a way that's authentic to who we are and also it gives us an opportunity to shine for our kingdom calling, Like again, if you're out and even if you're just volunteering, and that's your kingdom calling when you look put together again. It doesn't have to be fancy Wear your athleisure and your correct colors and cuts, and all of that with cute little accessories, and people are going to be drawn to you and we want people to be drawn to us because that is the way that we can share the gospel, that is the way that we can show the kindness and love and mercy of Jesus is by attracting people to us, and sometimes I feel like we let those little things get in the way of being attractive.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, yeah, and I love how you put it that people will most people will not look at you and see that we focus on the imperfections within us. But when, when I'm in, I say I noticed this with myself. When I'm looking at other people, other women who are my age, you know, compared to myself, when I just am hard on myself about aging, getting older and wrinkles and stuff, and I think to myself like I'm not nitpicking that they have, you know, this or that on their face, so why am I so hard on myself? Same thing with your appearance in your clothing. Yes, you focus on that because you know that and that's a point of, I guess, contention with yourself, for whatever reason, not liking that situation.

Speaker 1:

But most people, when they're looking at you unless they are individuals like you mentioned who have their own issues as well most people are looking at you as a whole and they're not focusing on that. So thank you for that, because I think that's very important. People need to understand that and I think sometimes it takes hearing it over and over again for them to really sit with that and understand that. You know, not everybody's judging every part of you and most of us are. So I don't want to say consumed with, but you know, we're here to be a part of something with someone else. We're looking at you in a different light than you may look at yourself as well, that's right, that's right.

Speaker 2:

And you know, oftentimes, like you said, we're all kind of, we all have our own journeys and concerns and things like that. So that's why I just know I can say to you confidently, people aren't looking at you and judging all the things, because they have their own stuff going on. They have their own insecurities and again, the people who do that are deflecting from their own insecurities, their own things, that they're trying not to deal with by, you know, picking on other people, and we all know that really, those are just those are the people we pray for. Those are the people that we know need the love of Jesus, because again, it's like that's a really hard, like that's a hard place to be is so, so self critical that you can't even look at yourself that you have to look at other people. Right, yeah?

Speaker 1:

Yeah, can you give us a couple of things, like what would be three items that you recommend that us women in midlife should have in our in our closet? And if it's five, you know like don't worry if it's not specific, but you know what are those items that we need to make sure we have, and you can make it fall related if, because I know you've got your mini capsules. So if you want to make it more specific to now, feel free.

Speaker 2:

Okay, so I do have in my Facebook group. It's called capsule wardrobe outfit ideas for midlife working women and there I did an eight items for eight outfits fall.

Speaker 1:

I'm gonna have to find this. I didn't see it. I'll look for it, okay.

Speaker 2:

And so you can do that, like I have found that eight items does get you eight outfits, but let's just talk about I would. I do want to give you a top three. I think that's a good place to go. So right now, in our current moment, I think everybody can use a pair of dark wash jeans. Every person, every woman, should have dark wash jeans because even if you are a little bit more corporate, you're going to want those for your date nights or girls nights out, because those are going to pair beautifully with flouses. Now, as far as cut goes, that's going to depend on your body shape, but most body shapes are going to look amazing and either a slim or straight cut. I say a slim cut for those of you who are like more balanced shapes like a rectangle and hourglass are pretty balanced in the shoulder and the hip. But if you aren't as balanced like, let's say, you have more of a pear shape or a triangle shape, then a nice straight cut is going to look great on you and then, either like a wide scoop neck or boat neck or even a v neck to visually broaden your shoulders, we're literally balance your shape. So those are some tips that I talk about on my podcast, but definitely number one is a great fitting pair of dark wash jeans.

Speaker 2:

Okay, the second thing every woman should have is her ideal neutral color in like I'm going to put this in air quotes a white. So not everybody looks good in pure white. Okay, so it's going to be pure white. Ivory cream or even like what would you call this? Like a, I want to say crème brûlée a little darker than a cream. So it's almost like a. Yeah, it's just a darker cream. We'll just call it that for now.

Speaker 1:

I do have a color. Take it like a beige or a a limit.

Speaker 2:

Maybe a beige or a clay, like a warm clay or a cool clay, depending on how if you're warm or cool. Okay, so those are kind of the four whites that you can pick from, but you want to have like a solid colored shirt in one of those whites to go with your jeans, because that, literally, is a classic look like spans across some like probably 40, 40 years I bet Probably 50 now or more. Yeah right, like it's so classic, but you want to have your version of white. Okay, then I would say, cause I want to do a complete look. The third item that you're going to want to have then, if you have a great pair of great fitting pair of jeans, your white top. It can be any kind of white top, but I definitely think a nice cotton knit is ideal. Okay, and then your shoes. Everybody should have a pair of like fashionable sneakers, Again, that go with your colors. And I'm talking like I don't know if you all have seen, like the new Nikes that are like they have white and black and they're like really kind of cool, but then they also have a beige version, like they have like a warm tone, so they basically have a cool tone version of an awesome athletic sneaker and a warm tone version now. So basically, that is going to be something especially in midlife that you need, because I know most of you in midlife are not necessarily dressing up as much, even if you're working I know that a lot of you are not.

Speaker 2:

Because here's the deal. Then you can add a piece of outerwear to that look. Yes, with the sneakers too, it could be like a really cool blazer. And now all of a sudden you're like super stylish, like elevated athleisure looks awesome. Or you can add like a cardigan that's a little chunky or cropped or whatever. You can add a trendy piece of outerwear now to those three base items. But it's comfortable, you can run errands in it, you can do you know, your girls coffee and you're not going to feel over underdressed. So that would be my top three. If you twisted my arm, you made me choose.

Speaker 1:

That's what I would say. Okay. So I have a question for you, because when I think of putting these items on, I think, oh, like I look like the tourist going for whatever reason. I don't know if it's me, I don't know what it is, I may just be hard on myself. Like I look like that person, just frumpy looking, no style, but I see it on people and it looks amazing. So what am I doing wrong? Is it the belt? Is it the accessories? What One? What it's?

Speaker 2:

fit, it's fit okay. Because here's the thing when it comes to a t-shirt, you could go buy a t-shirt, but if it's really fitted and you either don't like fitted or maybe wearing a fitted t-shirt isn't as good for you, because, again, if you're a pear shape and then you wear a fitted t-shirt on top, now you're accentuating that you're smaller on top and wider on bottom. You're gonna want maybe you go one size up and you wear a t-shirt that's a little more of a straight cut. You do a front tuck, now you're balancing your shape, okay. And again, if you're wearing the wrong jeans, if you're wearing skinny jeans and you're a pear shape, well, that's accentuating again that your hips are widest in your individual lines when you're looking. So now, when you do a straight cut, it doesn't accentuate that curve underneath. It actually helps to create these straight parallel lines that are very long and elegant. And again, if you're wearing a nice straight fit shirt, now we have this balance.

Speaker 2:

And, of course, a belt is super cute, but you don't always have to have a belt. I don't always wear belts. I think really what makes it is the fit is probably what's missing. So you're probably just needing to really look at what's my body type? Where do I need to make sure I'm balancing my figure, and then you'll feel so much better in your clothes.

Speaker 1:

Well, and I've noticed for myself, I have always known like when I go somewhere I can tell clothing wise what's going to look right on me and what doesn't. I am a very boy. Cut that rectangle like my shoulders, my hips, everything is straight down. So for me I think that's difficult to style because I always feel like I look not like a boy, but kind of like this, always look really casual because of that.

Speaker 2:

I have a good tip for you. So I don't know if you wear high rise jeans. Do you wear high rise at all? No, okay.

Speaker 1:

Because then I feel like they're mom jeans. I mean back, because I'm a girl of the 80s, so that was like what we wore as kids and yeah, they were mom jeans and our moms were wearing them too. And it looks hey, are you ready? It gets you on board, right now, okay, okay.

Speaker 2:

So here's what a high rise gene will do for you Is it will create a one third to two thirds ratio, which is going to look great on you, on everybody.

Speaker 2:

That's what we want to do. It heightens that ratio of leg to torso number one. Number two when you do a high rise gene and then you do a front or a full tuck, now you're creating a waistline, because that's the thing with a rectangular shape is, you don't have a very, your waistline isn't as small, it's kind of the same as your shoulders and your hips, and so adding a belt, having a high rise gene, is going to make you feel so much better, and you may even benefit too from wearing not crop top shirts, but shirts that are normal length, right, right, with a high rise pair of jeans. Because, again, you can create that visual aesthetic that's more pleasing to the eye by really taking an advantage of that one third to two thirds golden ratio, and that's just art. That's not a style thing, that's an art thing. That's literally what DaVinci used in, like all of his paintings. So hot tip for you as a rectangle shape, thank you.

Speaker 1:

And I don't know if I Is there anything that you say us women in midlife should steer clear of? Okay, just because you mentioned the crop top and I would think, but maybe I would, and I feel like things have changed, yeah, yeah.

Speaker 2:

I mean okay. So the thing with crop tops is the crop cut is okay If it's like, again, if it's a little bit cropped, if you can get away with it. It depends on your body ratio. I think there are some women it doesn't matter what age, especially some of the workout wear can be cute. If you're confident in wearing that, okay, like, don't limit yourself, because you're in midlife, to wearing things that you know look cute on you. Okay, if you've worked really hard and you've stayed in shape and you're fine like and you feel really confident in your body and you want to wear a crop top with your high rise leggings, go for it.

Speaker 2:

But I would say it, as far as trends go, the trends that don't suit your coloring and don't suit your body type and don't suit your movement those are the three things I kind of cover in my coaching program just aren't going to be for you, no matter what the trends are. So what you need to know about yourself is I, it's like what you actually do like, and what prints, cuts, patterns, fabrications actually look good on you? I would just. This is for everybody, not just in midlife. The main thing to avoid is to wear things that don't fit you, period across the board, not just like physically, like we talked about, but that don't fit your energy, your style, your lifestyle. It doesn't fit you, it's out.

Speaker 1:

Okay, perfect, so you mentioned your program, your course, yeah. Can you tell us about that? Where can we find you what you offer and all of that information?

Speaker 2:

Absolutely Okay. So pretty easy to find me like. If you want a free 30 minute information session, it's at Callanjalicom, slash bold faith and fashion. So hop on there and basically what we cover in that 30 minute call is what we do over eight styling sessions. So you get one every other week. They're an hour long and during that time I actually have this style profile that I offer, like the initial part of it, for free.

Speaker 2:

If you want that style profile, you can email me at bold faith and fashion at gmailcom with the type you know title style profile and I will get you that. But what I do in our eight week or sorry, eight session coaching package is I build that style profile for you and we put everything in there like customized, like we're talking face shape, body shape, we're talking okay, what are your quick guide measurements? How do you shop online? Here's your core wardrobe list and we customize the heck out of it and then you get to keep that entire thing I mean at by the end of it. I think it ends up being like 10 pages of information about your style with all of the things that you need to feel confident to shop for yourself and to know what your God given beauty is and how to accentuate it and shine.

Speaker 1:

Perfect, and you also have a Facebook group, and I'm going to put all of this information in the show notes. But you also have a Facebook group. For those of you on Facebook right now, I'll put the link down below. What is that?

Speaker 2:

You mentioned it early on. Yeah, that is the capsule wardrobe outfit ideas for working midlife women. Okay.

Speaker 1:

And they can join there. Perfect yeah, is there anything else? You want to leave us with one thing that we could do this week to kind of change things up in our wardrobe.

Speaker 2:

Oh, gosh, that's a good thing to leave you with.

Speaker 1:

Sorry, didn't mean to throw I just did.

Speaker 2:

No, it's great. So if you really want to change your wardrobe, step one is actually to do your own lifestyle analysis, those levels that I talked about. Break it down into level one is loungewear and sleep. Level two is your elevated or polished casual. Level three is dressy or business casual and level four is formal. So you break down how many days per month that you wear each of those categories.

Speaker 2:

Then go to your closet and get rid of the stuff that doesn't fit into those categories or that doesn't fit your right now body. And that is literally number one, because then, once you know what absolutely isn't working in your closet, you'll know what's missing. It's hard to know what's missing when you have a bunch of stuff that doesn't pertain to your right now body or lifestyle. So that's what I would say, and I do have one more thing. The second thing is definitely think about showing up. You just need to change your mindset around it being just a visual thing, like a visual presentation, to an actual attractiveness for the sake of the kingdom. Like I said earlier, we want to attract people to us so that we can share the gospel, share our testimony and build each other up in the church and encourage each other. That is actually the purpose behind getting dressed in the morning. The fact that it's kind of fun and kind of artsy is just a blessing that God has given to us.

Speaker 1:

Excellent. Thank you so much for taking time out of your day for this. This was wonderful. I enjoyed it so much. Well, you're a ton of fun. Thank you, courtney. Thanks, I hope you enjoyed this episode and found something to take away to help you practice healthier habits, move more or handle the midlife in aging with grace. If you enjoyed this episode, please share it with a friend or leave us a review to help us reach more moms just like you. Head to movingthroughmidlifecom to join the free community or learn how you can move more and feel better in your daily life.