Are you ready for fall? Have you started to reach for your long sleeve shirts and close-toed shoes? I’m always a little sad to put away my flip-flops and resume wearing socks again, but overall, I do look forward to the changing of the seasons. I’m usually ready by the end of summer to pivot and return to a more predictable schedule. And what’s not to love about pumpkin spice everything?
Fall tends to mean that we slide back into routines and rhythms. School, sports, and activities resume, as do our weekly schedules. In our home, to help our weeks run more smoothly and effortlessly, we use our Sundays as a “supercharge” day. Having a prep day helps us to minimize the added stress that can often coincide with all of the increased comings and goings of the week. Taking time at the beginning of the week sets us up for success!
Five Ways to Supercharge Your Week
1. Plan Your Breakfast Menu
Have a plan for your daily breakfast. This way you can shop according to the plan, and your family will know what they can choose from during the week. I try to create self-serve options as much as possible. We’ve even followed themes for different days of the week (Waffle Wednesdays, Toast & Fruit Thursdays, etc.).
2. Plan Your Lunch Menu
By prepping veggies and fruit, stocking lunch and snack bins, and preparing any main dish items ahead of time (such as pastas, sandwiches, or soups), you’ll create more time during the morning rush. Pre-packing all of your lunches for the week can be a game changer!
3. Plan Your Dinner Menu
Designate how many nights you will eat in and how many nights you will eat out, considering any activities already on your weekly schedule, and plan a menu for the week. Also, make note of any meals or sides you need to prepare for upcoming events, and like your lunch menu, look for ways to prepare things ahead of time.
4. Plan Your Daily Outfits
For kids and adults alike, planning out your outfits in advance can be a super time-saver, especially on early school or workday mornings. Consider mapping out a week of outfits. Coordinate clothing ahead of time, try on the outfits and make sure everything is ironed and ready to wear.
5. Plan Your Schedule
Look at your week ahead and make a point to know the key items already scheduled and to anticipate any others that may pop up. Communicate the weekly schedule to all family members, and keep your calendar updated.
These five steps are tools that can minimize the chaos often experienced during the morning dash out the door or the quick turnarounds between school, work, and activities. Now, I’m not saying that we never have any hiccups (of course we do!), but by eliminating some of the daily to-dos, we are able to more seamlessly load up and go, and get to where we need to be on time.
Now go and grab that pumpkin spice latte and get ready to supercharge your week!
About Morgan
Morgan is a professional organizer (chaos calmer), writer (list lover), and exercise enthusiast (fitness fan), keep up with her on her site, Morganize with Me. Her mission is to share tried and true techniques that she hopes will encourage her readers and clients as they focus on their health and homes. Check out her new Book, Take Back Your Time, join one of her Organizing Challenges, listen to her Podcast, and be sure to check out her Shop full of fabulous organizing printables!
I couldn’t be more excited for fall and I’m even more excited to share with you this fall inspired Style Your Budget outfit. This also happens to be one of the outfits from the brand new Style Challenges Fall 2019 Capsule Wardrobe. I’m totally in love with the bright colors this season and the outfit I’ve put together is a direct reflection of that love. If you’re new around here, Style Your Budget helps you shop smarter by showing you one outfit prompt styled at six drastically different price points.
One of the things that makes Style Challenges work so well is that we don’t provide you the clothes. That may sound like a bad thing at first, but we promise it isn’t. By providing you with a style prompt rather than a box of clothes, you get to decide what the outfit ultimately looks like (and how much it costs).
If you already own all the pieces in the prompt you can shop your closet for a free outfit. Woohoo! However, if you need to fill in a gap in your wardrobe you get to choose which store, and more importantly how much you are going to spend, to fill in that gap.
Building a cohesive and affordable casual wardrobe may seem overwhelming but Style Challenges helps make it super easy! First, we give you a shopping list so you’ll know exactly what you need. Then, check off your list by shopping your closet or using our recommendations. Finally, you’ll get a complete guide of daily outfit ideas using the pieces from your list. It’s that easy! Learn more about how it works HERE.
We always recommend investing in the best quality that your budget allows when it comes to your closet staples. However, if you are trying out new trends, fluctuating between sizes, or need a more budget conscious option we hope this post has helped you see that you truly can feel confident in what you are wearing no matter where you shop or how much you can afford to spend.
It’s Your Turn:
What version of this Fall outfit is your favorite?
You’ll have access to this outfit plus 32 more immediately upon signing up for the Style Challenges Fall 2019 Capsule Wardrobe. Make getting dressed this fall the easiest thing you’ll do all day! Check out how the Style Challenge is changing lives here.
We had such a great response to the What the Pretties Loved in July post that I decided to make it a monthly feature! It seems, that like me, you are fascinated to discover what other Pretties are buying and loving. Plus, I’ll take any opportunity to dive into the numbers and spreadsheets (which I totally love) and pull the top items for you all! Plus if you missed them the first time around, here’s your chance to snag them up before they are gone. By special request, I’ve also included the top three Alison + Aubrey items from the month too!
In descending order, here are the top ten most popular clicked on and purchased pieces featured on Get Your Pretty On in August plus the top three Alison + Aubrey items.
Since all climates are NOT created equal, fall doesn’t automatically mean cooler weather. That’s why I thought it important to update and reshare one of my blog posts from last year to help those of us in warmer parts of the world make the fall transition. These crop straight leg jeans are the perfect item to help in that transition!
This is a trend and classic combo as you Pretties scooped these up in both black and the trendy snake print versions! These are perfect for fall and I can’t wait to see how you all styled them in our Facebook community Pretties Group! (Sizing tip – These booties run small; order up a half size.)
This shirtdress resurfaced in my back to school post for teachers and it’s still as popular and well-loved as ever! Easy, stylish, and versatile it can be paired with sandals or booties, styled solo, or add your favorite denim jacket! (Sizing tip – I got this dress in my regular size but overall reviews say it runs small. Size up if between sizes.)
Okay, last favorite item from my summer to fall transition pieces are these amazing white raw hem shorts. These have been one of my go-to favorites. They are comfortable, have some length to them, and they aren’t see-through. What more could you ask for in a pair of white shorts?
Summer may be coming to an end but these shorts were just too comfy to pass up and apparently you all thought so too! My partnership with Walmart over the last few months has yielded some amazing additions to my wardrobe and these are no exception! Easy to wear, cute print, and did I mention comfortable?
If you haven’t already figured it out, I love to find pieces that are both stylish and comfortable and this totally fits the bill. Also appearing in the Five Ways to Wear Leopard, this item looks amazing and with all the comforts of your favorite sweatshirt. I first posted this item through Nordstrom but sadly they only have one size left but don’t fear, I found it directly through the J.Crew site and they have all sizes available, score!
And your top shopped item was this leopard skirt which appeared in the Five Ways to Wear Leopard post where I expressed my complete and utter joy that leopard was still a huge trend for fall. Although it’s never really gone out of style, it’s just bolder this season. (Sizing tip – runs large; size down if between sizes.)
Recently I featured a sneak behind the scenes at Alison + Aubrey and shared what we learned over the past year. I also introduced some of our new pieces that I’m very excited about! For our Pretties it was all about adding a little something to our wrists and taking our Apple Watches up a notch! Here are the top three loved items from Alison + Aubrey.
Note: Currently the Leopard Pre-Layered Apple Watch Band is showing as sold out but not to worry, they’ll be back in stock next week! Click the link and enter your email to be notified when it’s back in stock.
In case you didn’t know, in addition to Get Your Pretty On, I also have a jewelry and accessories brand that I started with my college daughter Aubrey last year. This month we’re celebrating a relaunch of Alison + Aubrey along with a new web site and some really cool new custom products that we’re both super excited about! I thought it would be fun today to go through some of the challenges and biggest lessons of our first year and share some of the changes we have coming up.
(Psst…we’ve got a pretty sweet giveaway later in this post. Don’t leave without entering!)
As we all know, social media is often flooded with unrealistic portrayals of success coming easily. It’s rare to get a glimpse into the messy stuff that really goes on behind the scenes. In one of my recent Coffee Chats, I made a commitment to you that I’m going to be more open about real life stuff. As much as I love seeing (and celebrating) what makes others successful, I usually learn even more from reading about their mistakes and missteps. That’s what this post is all about.
Starting any business is HARD but I’ve had even more challenges with this one for a variety of reasons – most of which were my own unrealistic expectations. I entered into this thinking “hey, I’ve started businesses before, this will be a piece of cake!” In some ways, it was easier but in others it was way more complicated than I could’ve ever dreamed.
The first nine months were a constant uphill struggle through the learning curve. This product-based business is a totally different animal from GYPO. There were so many new things to learn – everything from setting margins to tracking inventory and finding reliable suppliers for products and packaging while balancing quality with affordability.
But before we dive into the mistakes and lessons I think it’s important to know WHY we started this business because that’s what’s kept us going when the going got tough. Aubrey and I have always loved fashion and shopping. It’s been one of our favorite shared experiences ever since she was a toddler. I’ll never forget pushing her in the stroller through the shoe department while she was instinctively kicking off her shoes so she could try on new ones. She was a natural born shopper! We always wanted to collaborate in some way over that bond. When we realized that we always borrow jewelry from each other a lightbulb went off and the idea for Alison + Aubrey was born.
Our main goals with starting the line were to:
Share our bond over fashion and jewelry in a bigger way and to help other mothers, daughters, sisters and friends do the same. Jewelry is one thing that crosses the generation gap and fits everyone. It’s so easy to borrow and bond over.
Teach Aubrey what it’s really like to run a business. She’s been involved in every single step of the process. In her business course last fall, her professor was blown away by her thorough understanding of what it takes to start and run a business. She’s already had so much real-world experience at such a young age.
Lastly, to help cover her college costs. I’ve always told my kids that they need to have some “skin in the game” with their education costs because it gives them a greater appreciation for it. We do what we can to help but she didn’t want to come out of school with a ton of debt from loans so we agreed that a portion of the profits would go directly to her college account.
Now onto the juicy stuff…the mistakes we made and more importantly what we’ve learned.
Five Big Mistakes We Made in Year One
1. Finding Good Quality
Honestly, this was probably our biggest rookie mistake. We struggled to find good suppliers, especially in the beginning. Because we were flying blind we ended up with a few products with quality issues. A few items tarnished easily, especially in humid climates and some of them were really fragile or were just plain cheap looking. All of these things were impossible to distinguish without seeing and wearing the pieces in person. We now both wear every piece in real life to take it on a trial run and hopefully discover issues before our customers do. We’ve also been able to weed out the bad suppliers and recently started designing some of our own pieces. Now that we’re more involved in the manufacturing process we have greater control over the end product and quality issues have been few and far between!
2. Managing Inventory
When we started I almost felt like I needed a masterclass in inventory management. It’s an incredibly complicated game of numbers that can make or break a business. Not enough inventory? You get customers frustrated by sold out links. Too much inventory? You risk having unsold items taking up space in your warehouse and hurting your bottom line. Because we are a small business, we always erred on the side of stocking lower quantities. Now that business is growing and we’re more comfortable with managing our inventory, we’re able to stock more of it. We’re getting into a good groove now with supply and demand and running into far fewer issues with availability. Our biggest delay now is restocking products but we can almost always get more within 4 weeks if we sell out.
3. Calculating Pricing and Margins
Yes, this is Business 101 but again a totally new concept to me. Shipping, labor, packaging, jewelry cards and inserts – it all adds up! I’m embarrassed to admit this but until very recently I was not calculating labor costs into our pricing and margins. Now we have spreadsheets built out with all of our costs per unit in a formula so we know that our pricing is set to keep our products affordable while covering all of our costs.
4. Going it Alone
At first, we were a two woman operation – Alison and Aubrey! It didn’t take long for both of us to realize that we’d need to add in some extra man (and woman) power to keep us going. My husband Craig is now involved as much as he can be in just about every area. We have a part-time hire Amanda who handles order fulfillment and customer support. I also have an amazing marketing and social media girl who takes all of our ideas and makes them even better!
5. Going “Radio Silent”
OK, so this one was my hang up but I hate being sales-y so instead of talking about Alison + Aubrey I’ve kept mostly quiet. You haven’t heard much about it here on GYPO because I wanted the brand to stand on it’s own. The fact is, by not talking about it I’ve been keeping a significant part of my life and something I’m proud to have built with my daughter from some of the people who mean the most to me…YOU. I’m kind of proud of myself for doing this post because it’s time to share!
Now that we’ve talked about the mistakes there is one thing that we can toot our horn about and that’s this:
The ONE Thing We Got Right from Day One: Customer Service
With five years of Style Challenges under my belt, I’ve had more than enough opportunities to learn what makes really excellent customer service. Even through all of the challenges and missteps, we’ve always, always, always made sure we do what it takes to make our customers happy. Great customer service is one thing any business always has control over. You can’t always control quality or inventory but you can control how you treat your customers – 100% of the time. I like to think that we get that part right.
Although it’s called Alison + Aubrey this is truly a family business. Our oldest son Devon steps in to help out with order fulfillment and our younger daughter Ava is happy to be a stand-in model for Aubrey while she’s off at college. Craig does everything from organizing and managing the warehouse to all of our photography. We all have our part in the success and we all take it personally. Even our husky Skye gets a piece of the action!
We’re excited to announce that we’ll be launching our own line of branded wrap bracelets next week. To celebrate this new product launch, we’re giving away a $150 product credit to Alison + Aubrey. There are two easy ways to enter:
Visit Alison + Aubrey and leave a comment below telling us your favorite piece. (each comment counts as one entry)
Follow us on Instagram and leave a comment on any of our photos. (each comment counts as one entry)
Enter as many times as you’d like! One winner will be drawn and notified next Wednesday, August 21st. Good luck!
I don’t know about you but one of my favorite trends of summer 2019 as been soft shorts. It’s been nice to get away from strictly structured and denim shorts and have some options that are both comfy and stylish. This is one trend I’m hoping continues into next year and beyond.
Although summer is coming to an end, I’m still picking up a few new pieces. Living in Texas means my summer wardrobe is about twice the size of any other season. It’s always nice to have a few new pieces to pull out when the time comes to get everything back out of storage for next year. It feels like a little treasure hunt! This is also the time of the year when I start to get really tired of the pieces I’ve been wearing the past few months. Adding a few new inexpensive items gives me just the little bit of momentum to finish out the season!
This past week I picked up not one but two pairs of these super soft tie waist shorts from Walmart. These shorts come in two different color/pattern options and since it was too hard to decide, I went with both. It didn’t hurt that they’re only $15 per pair. They paired perfect with this cute white eyelet top (it comes in 4 colors). I’ve had the pleasure of working with Walmart the past few months on their We Dress America campaign and have found quite a few pieces that are now permanent fixtures in my wardrobe – including these ruffled taupe wedges, monogrammed straw clutch and pair of red tassel earrings.
These shorts also come in this cute striped pattern. I’m planning to pair them up with some bright tees and tanks!
SHOP THE LOOK
Big thanks to Walmart for sponsoring this post and making it easy to feel comfortable and stylish this summer!
Do you struggle to put outfits together? Are you stuck in a yoga pants rut? Not sure if you can make the latest trends work for you? You’re in the right place!
I’m Alison, a mom of three and recovering yoga pants addict on a mission to make getting dressed and feeling pretty the easiest thing you do all day! Learn more about my story HERE.
I am so glad I was part of the Fall 2019 Style Challenge. It gave me confidence and so many great outfitt ideas. The ladies in the group were very supportive and I will defintetly be doing another challenge in the future.
Betty Weyandt December 20, 2019
I’ve been participating in the GYPO Style Challenges for three years now and I’ve loved it. I’ve always loved clothes, but I didn’t know how to put outfits together. My closet is now full of mix-and-match outfits, I have learned how to dress myself, and there is no more stress in figuring out to wear. The private FB group is full of wonderful ladies that build each other up. It’s so fun and is seriously the best group on FB.
Kirstin Rasmussen November 20, 2019
Get Your Pretty On has changed my life, seriously. I have always chased what is trendy but found from season to season, that things go out of style and I was wasting money on items that I would only end up wearing a few times. GYPO has enabled me to simplify my closet, helps me make smarter purchasing decisions, and I feel so put together and confident using the outfit formulas that are provided. This program is a GAME CHANGER. I've been following GYPO for a few years now and my only regret is not jumping on board sooner.
Michelle Kline November 20, 2019
Great community of ladies, helping each other look stylish, without breaking the bank, and using much of what you already own.
Chosen Faith November 19, 2019
GYPO challenges have been one of the best things I have done! It had taught me so much more than just creating a closet of clothes that I love but also to have confidence in myself, how to pick and choose colors that work for me instead of against, and had given a wonderful community of Pretties who are so special.
Maraline Freeman October 16, 2019
I love GYPO!!! I finally feel put together and stylish! The shopping lists and outfit combinations make shopping and getting dressed effortless.
Krista Probst October 16, 2019
SHOP THE ACCESSORY LINE
SHOP THE LOOKS
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Morgan is a professional organizer (chaos calmer), writer (list lover), and exercise enthusiast (fitness fan), keep up with her on her site, Morganize with Me. Her mission is to share tried and true techniques that she hopes will encourage her readers and clients as they focus on their health and homes. Check out her new Book, Take Back Your Time, join one of her Organizing Challenges, listen to her Podcast, and be sure to check out her Shop full of fabulous organizing printables!
