Anyone who has been reading this blog for a while knows that I publish monthly accountability updates. These posts (see the most recent one here) include what came into and left my closet in a given month -and why, as well as how I’m doing with my clothing budget and item limit for the year.  It’s been very helpful for me to do these updates, as they help me to stay honest and on track with my wardrobe and shopping goals.

Last month, I started a new feature in which I review my purchases a year later to see how well (or not) they have worked out for me.  Although I periodically reviewed past purchases previously, I got the idea to review things from a year ago from Mette of “The Yogastic Shopping Planner” (see her most recent edition HERE).   Since I started this new series a few months into the year, I began with an update on my first quarter 2015 purchases.  Most of my purchase reviews will look back on just one month’s purchases to see whether these items have become wardrobe workhorses or closet benchwarmers.  Occasionally, if I bought very few items in a given month, I will combine two months into one update.

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Anyone who has been reading this blog for a while knows that I publish monthly accountability updates. These posts (see the most recent one here) include what came into and left my closet in a given month -and why, as well as how I’m doing with my clothing budget and item limit for the year.  It has been very helpful for me to do these updates, as they help me to stay honest and on track with my wardrobe and shopping goals. I will publish my February accountability update next week, but today I would like to introduce a new series that I will feature on the blog.

In past years, I have periodically reviewed my purchases to analyze which ones worked, which ones didn’t, and why (see examples here, here, and here).   Although these posts were helpful, sometimes I did them too soon after the time period I was reviewing, so I was not yet sure whether certain buys were good or ill-advised.   I can now look back at these purchase reviews and see that many of the assessments I made at the time were wrong.

How do you feel about the items you bought a year ago?

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If you’ve been reading this blog for a while, you know that I’m big on tracking, numbers, and statistics related to my wardrobe and shopping (see how I do my tracking here).  I think that tracking can be highly beneficial for recovering shopaholics, as well as anyone who wants to shop smarter and better utilize the wardrobe pieces they own.   I’ve been tracking how much I spend, what I wear, and how often I wear it since the beginning of 2011, and last year I added photos and an outfit journal to the mix.  Using these types of analysis can help us make fewer buying mistakes over time.

It can be helpful to periodically review and analyze our purchases.

Another thing that I find helpful is to review my purchases and see how they have worked out for me. In today’s post, I’m going to look at the items I brought into my closet from January through June of this year and see whether my new items have become wardrobe workhorses or closet benchwarmers.

It’s a bit too early to look at the pieces I purchased during July through October, as I don’t yet know whether those buys were smart or ill-advised. For one reason, many of those items are for fall (looking at you, Nordstrom Anniversary Sale purchases), and the cooler weather hasn’t even started yet where I live.   I will address what I’ve bought during the second half of the year in one of my end of the year wrap-up posts (check out what I called my best and worst purchases for 2014 – I don’t agree with all of those assessments now!).

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