This pale yellow dress was meant to be used only to elongate another dress which I thought was a bit too short for me. As this dress has no sleeves I never intended to wear it on its own. Why? Do I think that you are not allowed to wear sleeveless tops or dresses when you get older? NO WAY. You wear whatever you please and let nobody dictate what you should do. The title of this post is merely a little try-out to see whether a “how-to post” attracts more readers. Are women really seeking advice in this matter and do they google on things like How to wear a sleeveless dress over 40? No idea, we’ll see. For myself I don’t like showing my arms anymore because of my own aesthetics. My skin is very wrinkly on my arms (thanks dad) and I just don’t like to look at it. Presenting my best version to the world (that is what my blog is about) means I hide them. Condemn me.

The pale yellow sleeveless dress was for sale in Bella’s Etsy shop (Citizen Rosebud) and a steal. Thinking of my Sportmax dress which is the same colour and a bit too short to my liking, I bought it, only to pay quite a bit to my seamstress as it was hell to get it to the right length haha. Trying to find an outfit for this post I searched my wardrobe and found three ways of wearing this sleeveless dress instead of only the one way. Which means my seamstress cost are a good investment after all.

Loes and I went to the Haarlemmer Kweektuin, which is a communal garden where you can grow vegetables and plants. And a lot more is happening in this place as you will see when you read on. Everything very sustainable. The weather was terrific.

Below: This is the dress on its own. It reminds me of a flapper dress. I know, I know… you are going to tell me my arms look fine. Trust me, they don’t when you come a little closer.

Below: The little black cardigan is ancient. The shoes are from 2017 (worn in this post with my orange leather skirt). They are surprisingly comfortable for my knee, very firm.

Below: Little statue to make the photo even more picturesque.

Below: Close-ups of two statues. Aren’t they cute?

Below: The earrings are the only new thing in this post. Bought them when I went shopping with Peggy in the 9 streets of Amsterdam.

Below: In this dress it looks as if I have a bum.

Below: Loes was wearing a charming dress, fashionably with sneakers. Coincidently her dress has the same colours as I was wearing: pale yellow, black and creamy white.

Below: Close-up of the earrings.

Below: And a close-up of her sparkly sneakers.

Below: We enjoyed all the lovely spring flowers everywhere.

Below: The Haarlemmer Kweektuin has a café, a corner with plants and more.

Below: This for instance, is a corner with clothes made in a sustainable way.

Below: I resisted trying stuff on because I like bright colours. Pastels don’t suit me.

Below: There were necklaces made of plastic. Fun. Wearing my Sportmax dress here with the sleeveless dress underneath, elongating it. The peeptoe pumps (Bruschi) are my best ones, no blisters in these babies. Bought them years ago in Turin when I visited Daniela of the blog The Pretty Cute. (I elongated another short dress with a pencil skirt while wearing these shoes in this post.)

Below: Plastic necklace. Made by children? Made to show what you can do with plastic instead of throwing it away?

Below: There are little corners, all different. This is a corner with sustainable products.

Below: And here is a mini library with a piano You are invited to play.

Below: The sleeveless dress works very well underneath this Sportmax dress. The colour of the pumps corresponds with the dress (no coincidence).

Below: When you bend over, a little bit longer is preferable 😆 .

Below: A better view of the back.

Below: We continued our photo shoot outside. Here is a goat, making small talk to his neighbour the rabbit.

Below: Plants and herbs are cultivated in front of and inside a big greenhouse. Every spring there is a big sale of plants, herbs and flowers on the premises.

Below: The third outfit I created by putting this yellow/cream jacket over the sleeveless dress. You saw it once before when I wore it to the UK Blogger Meet in 2016.

Below: We continued by walking the gnome route. This is for children and the sign encourages them to sing a song and asks them if they know what the word for the instrument is.

Below: Lovely lanes. It seems that the jacket is shorter on one side. Don’t know whether this is because I have one arm bent or whether I am lopsided. My physiotherapist checks regularly whether I am straight and I am.

Below: Cute bridge means I know what to do with my hands. Contrary to Ron, Loes does allow me to hold on to something.

Below: I would have made a terrible ballet dancer. Only had three lessons and during the third lesson I thoroughly disagreed with the teacher who said I was doing it wrong. When she didn’t change her point of view I announced that I was then leaving. She agreed to that and I never returned. I was 6 years old at the time, the lessons were free and I was very pigheaded. This started at a very early age. Another example: for my fifth birthday my mum and dad took me to a bicycle shop to find me my first bike. I loved one that had a stand which you could flick with your foot and wanted that one. It turned out the stand didn’t come with the bike, it was the shop’s property. I had the audacity to say: “Then I don’t want this bike”, turned round and left the shop. I mean… 5 years old! The nerve! Of course I got that bike anyway. It was what my parents could afford and in those days parents were not afraid to “damage their children’s poor soul”.

I nearly forgot, I did have 7 months of jazz ballet lessons when I was 23. I liked the exercises but when you had to put everything together and actually dance, it turned out I had no coordination to do so.

Below: End of the gnome route.

Below: Passed the aviary.

Below: One last shot of the church on the premises.

What happened in my life this week

The usual stuff really, which is very nice. Saturday was a hairdresser’s day again. My hair needs a cut and dye every 6 weeks. As I lead a very structured life, I plan my appointments 12 weeks ahead. That way I always have the best timeslot. Had coffee in our garden in the afternoon with neighbour and friend Froukje who showed me her new sneakers and at the end of the afternoon friends came over for dinner. Which of course my husband cooked. Leg of lam this time. We were silent for a minute at 20.00 hours to commemorate the people who fought and died for us during the second world war. An event that takes place every year on the 4th of May.

Sunday my friend Ayen came over and stayed for dinner. I took care of dinner for a change. Not by cooking but by ordering the same paella as I did a couple of weeks ago when the BVA girlfriends came to visit. It just needed heating and it was delicious. So nothing major over the weekend but thoroughly enjoyable. And with all the war commemoration, I realized once again how utterly great it is to be living in freedom. Little is as precious as that.

Monday at work we had the kick-off of the campaign I have been working so hard on. I have already left that team to join another team last week and I left the presentation to my successor. Of course they were nice enough to mention my hard work. Now it is on to new adventures with my new team.

Tuesday our neighbour Ina from across the road came to pick up a parcel we accepted for her and we invited her in for drinks and a pizza. Ever so nice, “gezellig” as we say in the Netherlands. We have such a nice street, filled with lovely people. A lot of people only look at the house itself when they buy or rent one, but the neighbours, access to shops or parks, noise or not…all these things are of such importance for your living pleasure. Alas, you cannot find out what the neighbours will be like before you move in. We were very lucky in this respect.

Wednesday I had lunch with the Shopping Saturday girls. We didn’t have time for a full shopping day, therefore we agreed on lunch. Always lovely to meet them. You will see the pictures next week.

Thursday and Friday were rather uneventful.

Update on Watson the dog

He is getting better and better. We got him off the couch and chairs, which means we can move back our beautiful couch again. Our nextdoor neighbours came back from holiday and as a “thank you” for watering the plants, they brought us a toy for Watson. A dummy Trump haha.

See you next week.

Greetje