Dressing in Public for the First Time!

 Hello There,

    Well friends today was the big day, it finally happened, I WENT OUT IN PUBLIC FULLY DRESSED AS A WOMAN!!! WOOOO!!!!! This has been months in the planning and years coming now. Strap in everyone and enjoy my story!

    But first, how did I get here to this moment? Well I had two things to decide, where to go and what to wear. Starting with where to go, this was no easy choice. Go somewhere exciting, where I can engage in some feminine fun? Go somewhere lowkey where I can fly under the radar and have no one around to notice me? Well the point of going out in public is to be around other people right? So I wanted to choose someplace where other people would be present. But where to go, a store, a park, a mall? What I ended up deciding on is a gas station. I know it sounds lame but hear me out!

    I've talked at length about what a massive influence the now defunct Lisagirl.net is on me. Lisa had some great advice (as always) about how to choose a location to go out in public to. While it's certainly true that women do things like go clothing and shoe shopping. They also do simple things like mail a letter or get some gas. Women running errands happen more frequently than them going shopping. Lisa first gained her confidence of presenting as a woman in public by running simple errands. It just so happened that I needed to fill my car up with gas! So I both had an errand I needed to run and needed an opportunity to dress in public. So many people when they dress in public for the first time either choose somewhere in the middle of nowhere or choose somewhere packed like going to a club or bar. Lisa's advice was spot on, somewhere like a post office or gas station is a great opportunity to dress around people but not have anyone get too close to you. Lisa was no stranger to getting gas while dressed, and I'd like to thank her for the inspiration!

    Now for what to wear, I've been trying to plan an outfit for months now. Although I'd love to wear one of my favorite vintage dresses they would probably stand out a little too much for what I had planned. So I needed something a little more casual, something you'd see the average girl my age wearing. Jeans and a T-shirt, plain and simple. I've already chronicled my journey to find the perfect pair of jeans. With my new Levi's in hand I was ready to take a step out my door. I paired my new jeans with one of my favorite wide-banded V-neck T-shirts, in a striking blue color. I thought I was looking great, so I couldn't help but take some selfies. 

    But I ran into a problem, I had put so much focus on finding the perfect pair of jeans, I didn't remember to get a pair of women's shoes! Whoops! Well that meant if I was going out today I need to wear a pair of my guy shoes. I opted for a pair of black sneakers since some women's sneakers are plain black as well. But this created a problem, black sneakers didn't exactly match my current outfit! After spiraling for a few minutes I found a solution. Change my shirt, duh! So I swapped out my blue shirt and white cami for a black shirt and pink cami. This also gave me an opportunity to add a pink belt as well since it would match my camisole. After putting my outfit together I was ready to go. My makeup came out pretty well and I had my new wig on so I was feeling confident. After some hesitant circling I finally packed my purse and headed out the door!

    I didn't run into anyone while walking down the stairs of my apartment building, but I still breathed a sigh of relief when I got in my car. From there I gleefully drove to my destination! I made sure to look at every person passing bye as I drove to see if anyone was looking at me, catching a glimpse of me behind the wheel. When I finally arrived at a Wawa gas station I parked at the far corner pump, and with full confidence stepped out of my car. Like any other woman passing through I pumped my gas, and didn't stand out too much. However to commemorate the moment I did take some pics of me pumping gas.

    With a tank full of gas, I got back in my car and headed home. When I returned to my apartment I let out a breath of relieve and satisfaction, "I did it". I went out in public as a woman. It has been years coming but I finally did it. Now that I've ripped the Band-Aid off I'm excited to go out and try it again! So stay tuned everyone, hopefully more of Carly outdoors coming soon!

-Carly

My Top Five Favorite Princesses!

 Hello There,

    Everybody loves lists, and everybody loves Princesses (or at least everybody should!), so this should be a fun read for all! I'm here today to list my top five favorite princesses! Choosing which lovely lady falls on #1 was pretty difficult, but I thinks I've made my decision! So which royal wonder will be my favorite, let's count them down to find out!

Honorable Mention: Princess Ariel

    I've decided to include an honorable mention because there's a non-Disney princess on this list, and you all know how I'm ride or die with my Disney Princesses, so I felt a little bad about leaving Ariel off of my list! I never watched little mermaid as a kid like many, so I have no nostalgia associated with her character, but she's still enjoyable to watch none the less. She falls down compared to the other princesses on this list because her wardrobe is a bit lacking. Sure the pink dress is fine, and her wedding dress is fun, but what I'd consider her best dress, the sea foam green ball gown, is worn only in marketing material and in the Disney theme parks! So while yes the dress is incredible, it's not even in her movie! Lame!

5. Princess Rapunzel

    At number five I've got Rapunzel. Like Ariel I've only recently become attached to Rapunzel. Her infectious glee, and free spiritedness are just to endearing to ignore. Funnily enough however, initially I HATED Rapunzel's dress, it was just way too busy and peasant-ish to me. It has since grown on me however, and has far and away become one of my favorite dresses of all time!! So Rapunzel really has it all, the look, the personality and her movie is great too, she was an easy choice for my list!

4. Princess Cinderella

    At number four I've got Disney's most iconic princess: Cinderella. Strangely enough I'm really not that big a fan of Cinderella's movie or even Cinderella herself! What draws me to her is what she represents: Transformation. Makes total sense coming from someone who regularly transforms their gender doesn't it? Yes I love how the idea of how anyone can transform themselves into a beauty like Cinderella. It's not just the characteristic of transformation that draws me to Cinderella, you just can not go wrong with that iconic dress! Sparkly blue, puff sleeves, the ball gown silhouette, just amazing! Lastly as I mentioned earlier she's THE quintessential Disney Princess, how could she not hold a special place in my heart. So although she's not my favorite character or in my favorite movie, there's more than enough to love about Cinderella to warrant her inclusion on my list!

3. Princess Peach

    Here we are at our only non-Disney Princess on this list, at number three I've chosen Princess Peach! She's the video game industries most iconic princess (get out of town Zelda!), and with her recent appearance in the Super Mario Bros Movie, she has taken her place among cinema's greatest princesses. I have a long history with Princess Peach, which you can read all about in her dedicated blog post. So much about Peach appeals to me, there was no way she was gonna not make my list.

2. Princess Belle

    The next choice of princess was a really tough one, but at number two I've chosen princess belle. I know what you're thinking, the princess behind your namesake is only number two?!?! Things change, and new frontrunner has moved past my beloved Belle. But we'll talk about that other princess in a minute, right now it's all about Belle! Belle is everything you'd want from a princess, intelligent, kind, graceful, AND WHAT A DRESS!!! Yeah her dress is just ridiculously amazing, there was nothing else I desired to wear more as a child than Belle's iconic dress. Belle really is perfect in pretty much everyway, and honestly is probably interchangeable with the number one choice on this list. That being said I had to make a choice and I've recently found myself enjoying...

1. Princess Aurora

    Make it Pink! At number one we have Princess Aurora! Like I mentioned earlier for the longest time Belle was my favorite Princess but as I dived deeper and deeper into princess culture I found myself being drawn more and more to Aurora. I think she just encapsulates all the stereotypical qualities of femininity that draw me to it: Beauty (she's literally called sleeping beauty LOL), grace, charm, kindness. While belle certainly embodies modern femininity with her intelligence and strong will, Aurora embodies the aspects of femininity that I find to be missing during my time as male. 

    Also that dress though!! We all know pink is my favorite color, so how could I not choose the Disney Princess with an iconic pink dress. Sure the dress is blue some of the time, but Disney itself seems to prefer Pink as the color for the dress since it is the color predominately featured on all of its marking material as well as worn by Aurora in the Disney parks. Sure it's not a ball gown with a full wide skirt like most other dresses on this list, but it's sleek and feminine, and matches Aurora's grace.

    Is Sleeping Beauty the best Disney Princess movie? No. But it does still have some really redeeming characteristics that make it an enjoyable watch. Prince Phillip is a bad ass, and not only is Maleficent Disney's greatest villain, but she also turns into a freaken dragon! All that surrounding the lovely Aurora makes her story a fun one. Aurora really has every thing that draws me to princesses: femininity's stereotypical characteristics, an amazing dress, and a dragon! She's stolen my heart and sits atop the throne of my favorite Disney Princess!

-Carly