Feel Good Friday

Happy Friday!!! Only three & a half more school days until Christmas break for me!

outfits of the week…

For the past few months or so I’ve started *trying* to consistently share my OOTD (outfit of the day) just for fun! I’m typically able to link most pieces, but I also just share it to hopefully give a bit of inspiration & show you that you can recreate my outfits by just using pieces from your own closet.

Friday…

I totally flaked & did not take a pic for Friday — oops!

Saturday…

Saturday’s outfit for the championship games of our high school basketball tourney that we hosted!

Sunday…

It was a Chiefs Sunday!

Monday...

Day six hair means I’m styling it the same way as I have the past three days! This sweater is super old from American Eagle, but I linked some similar ones below.

Tuesday...

Teacher (or counselor ;) t-shirt Tuesday!

Wednesday...

It’s starting to get real festive up in here! Pulled out this crewneck that I got for $10 at Old Navy last spring when all their Christmas gear was on sale!

Thursday...

Cozy little outfit for Thursday’s middle school game day! My sweater is from Amazon.

in case you missed it...

On Tuesday I shared my monthly book review post! I read four books in the month of November & three of them were super festive & got me in the holiday spirit. You can read through my reviews in this post.

On Wednesday I shared one of my classroom guidance activities that I did this year & really liked! I found this idea on Facebook (I’ll be totally honest, I can’t remember where from & I didn’t save it — so this is me acknowledging that I did NOT come up with this activity on my own) & used it for one of my classroom guidance activities. It’s kind of two separate lessons that I combined into one. The first one teaches about baggage & how we all have something hard going on in our lives. The second one teaches us how meaningful it can be to tell others how much we care about them. You can read that post here.

As you may have seen, I started a new weekly post where I share my Weekly Sale Finds! I’ve been sharing them daily on my Instagram stories & I figured I could compile all of them from the week into one post so that y’all can see them, too! You can click here to read that post.

I could not agree more with the message of this t-shirt, especially this year. No doubt about it, this year has been HARD for a lot of us. Taking care of yourself + your mental health matters! Check out my Instagram post to enter my giveaway! Winner will be chose on 12/21.

friday favs...

The last couple of weeks during classroom guidance we did a little activity where the kids each got to write down a highlight of their year & color it. It was a great opportunity to focus on the good that has happened this year, even though it has been a challenging one. I hung them all up in the hallway as Christmas decor. The kids have loved reading each other’s yearly highlights & it gave me some really great insight into what really matters for our kids. I got the template for free from Creations in Education’s Teachers Pay Teachers site!

I truly loathe cooking & meal prepping, but I know that it makes my life so much easier so I do my best to do it every week. This week I got the Birds Eye southwest style power blend from Walmart (super easy, you just heat it up in the bag, no thawing or venting) & added some avocado & used tortilla scoops. The whole bag is one serving, but I split it into two. Super tasty & kept me full all afternoon.

This year has been a rough one for sure, but this shirt really says it all. Life won’t always be easy, but it’s important that we don’t let those difficult moments / situations harden us. One of my intentions for 2022 is to focus more on the good! 💗 Let’s all grow through what we go through! Use my code (ALLI10) for a little discount from MessyBunMakings.

I haven’t worn my hair like this for awhile since it’s been so short, but used to wear my hair like this almost every single day in college! I love scrunchies & how it keeps everything out of my face but is still pretty cute.

I was craving some chocolate chip pumpkin bread on Sunday so I whipped some up using a Trader Joe’s mix I had. Scroll to bake!

I love this grey floral bread pan from Amazon! It’s dishwasher safe & looks darling in my glass cabinets in my kitchen.

I have this sweater in green & it’s been one of y’all’s favorites for a couple of weeks! Aerie often runs sales so I grabbed this color when they were 40% off. I love this rust orange color & actually don’t own anything so it was a great choice. The material & fit is exactly like the green one — I’m wearing an XXS & it fits like a medium.

Mini Target haul comin’ your way!!!

I can only imagine just how wonderful our world would be if more people took the advice of this crewneck! I’ve talked about this probably one hundred times before, but I love wearing clothes that express my views as a school counselor & this crewneck fits that perfectly — I love it! I’m wearing a medium & it fits true to size.

I absolutely love chunky sweaters & this knitted red one is too cute! I love that there are almost like little knits of other colors. It isn’t the softest material ever, but it’s definitely not scratchy. It comes in some other color options as well, I just thought this red was perfect for the Christmas & winter season. I’m wearing a size small & feel like it fits true to size.

Okay this one is pretty out of my comfort zone with the puffy sleeves, but I actually really like it! I got a medium because I didn’t want it to be too tight & I’m glad I did because it runs on the small side, in my opinion. The body of the shirt is a soft stretchy material & the sleeves are a bit stiffer & feel like a men’s dress shirt. I’m pleasantly surprised by how much I like this one! I feel like it’ll be even cuter in the spring!

I actually saw another influencer wearing this bright purple color in this sweater & ordered it immediately! I’ve tried this sweater in black before so I already knew I’d like the fit & the chunky knitted material. I ordered a small this time because the medium was just a little too oversized for my liking. I love it! This pop of purple is so fun for the winter months & will be so darn cute with some floral accents like earrings or jewelry in the spring time.

This sweater has been out of stock in almost every color option every single time I look, but finally, they’re restocked! & now that I have one (three lol) I totally understand why they’ve been sold out for so long — they’re that good!! This is a size small & it’s definitely oversized. My mom got an XS (scroll down to see it on me) & it fits more like a small or even a medium — I NEVER wear XS & it’s the size I’m going with for this one. Super super soft material that’s actually fairly light & thin so you won’t get too hot. I love the subtle mock neck too! Great for days when I’m wearing my hair up & I don’t want my neck to get cold.

This is that same sweater but in a different color & in an XS instead of small! I tried the black with white stripes on first & was in love, but after trying this one on, I can’t decide which is my fav! Is it crazy to keep two black & white striped sweaters that are opposite each other? Lol probably considering I already own a few other black & white striped pieces!

Same sweater & size (XS), different print! Loving this grey speckled look!

I’ve been on the hunt for some new black joggers. The ones I own are starting to wear out & I need a replacement that I love just as much. I ordered two different pairs from Target — both are great options, but I do like one of them more than the other. This pair is pretty thick & almost a stiff material. It feels like the joggers the school had us wear during my middle school track days… that’s probably not a great thing lol. I love that they have a thick cuff at the ankles, this helps keep my pants in place since I’m so short. I’m wearing a medium & feel like they fit fairly baggy, but the length is good (I rolled them twice). These aren’t my favorite of the two, but they’re a better price than my favs (of course).

These are my FAVS!!! Super super soft & comfy & fairly stretchy too. They feel like I’m wearing pajama pants which I love! They come in a few other color options that I’ve got my eye on now that I know how good these are. They’ve got good pockets & a functional drawstring. I think there might even be a top that matches? Wearing a medium & they fit true to size! I also grabbed some new open-toed slippers because my cream ones had seen better days. I decided to go with black because they will look less crappy in the long run lol. I have tiny feet so I ordered the small in the kids size & it fits perfectly. They have them in medium & large in the kids sizes, but they also have an adult pair for women with normal feet as well. ;)

Follow me on Instagram for more outfit inspiration including try ons in my stories! // @simplysmalltowncounselor

I’ll be spending the weekend wrapping things up for next week & wrapping Christmas presents! I’m meeting my family for church & our annual Christmas light tour on Saturday & I’m super excited about it!

What are your plans for the weekend? Drop them below in the comments, or feel free to message us on Facebook or Instagram! We’d love to hear what you’re all up to. We hope you all have a wonderful weekend!

Don’t forget to go to the home page & sign up for emails so you never miss a post!!

PS – this post contained affiliate links… thank you so much for reading & supporting our blog!