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Frugal Friday’s Workwear Report: Flower Polo Sweater

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A black, white, and blue short-sleeved polo sweater

Our daily workwear reports suggest one piece of work-appropriate attire in a range of prices.

This cheery floral polo from Nanette Lepore is just screaming “summer” to me. I love the retro-inspired flowers and the Johnny collar for a more relaxed business casual vibe. It does look like it might be a bit more cropped than I would normally prefer, but I think it would look great paired with a swingy midi skirt and some flats for a casual Friday look. 

The sweater is $29.97 at Nordstrom Rack and comes in sizes S-XL. It also comes in two other color combos. 

Sales of note for 7/29:

142 Comments

  1. Any recommendations for a handbag brand with a similar aesthetic as Cuyana but with more structured totes? I’ve been looking at resale sites for a gently pre-owned Cuyana tote and am struck by how floppy they look. I want a bag that will stand on its own.

    2. I had a beautiful Dagne Dover leather tote that was very firm, definitely not floppy. Gorgeous and sleek, although it was very heavy and I had to sell it along because it caused me shoulder issues.

        1. Presumably any bag that size made with similarly thick leather would weigh a comparable amount.

          1. Yes, this was my experience. I was looking for similar bags as the OP, and in the end they were just too heavy for me.

    5. Mulberry Bayswater Tote. Beautiful craftsmanship. I have it in two colors and it’s my primary work bag.

  2. I’m not a new law grad but have been working PT from home for about a decade and am ramping up with a new job at a firm that is in office. I am very excited to be around people again but want to show up looking competent and fitting in. What are you 40ish lawyers wearing on days where you want to look sharp and put-together? And I need to have head to toe help, since most of my formal pieces were purchased before COVID and a size or two ago. East coast city.

    1. I would try to get a gauge on how formal or casual the office is before you buy too many new pieces. My NYC biglaw office is still very casual – it never returned to pre-covid norms. Yes, people dress up for meetings (or court appearances, but I am not in litigation, so rarely interact with people on the litigation floor), but day-to-day is quite casual.

      2. +1. I’m 40 and a partner in a mid-Atlantic boutique, and we’re pretty casual on a day-to-day basis. I keep an emergency jacket, but don’t wear one unless I have an in-person meeting that would warrant it. I also don’t litigate, so the dressiest I get for a regular day in the office pants + blouse.

        We’re causual on Fridays, especially in the summer, and today I’m doing work at my desk in wide leg jeans, a white knit blouse, and loafers. Last week on Friday I wore a shirt dress and flats.

      3. This. The biggest factor is understanding if day to day is jeans casual, chinos casual, or dress pants + dress shirt casual. I wouldn’t worry about buying too much more than a couple outfits to wear your first week until you’ve sorted out how formal or casual the office is. For general vibes of 40 something lawyer, think Veronica Beard.

  3. For the more tech savvy among this group…I’m doing a digital clean up at home and have two questions. Years ago, when my kids were young, I would back up my digital photos on CDs. That seems antiquated at this point, as I don’t even own a machine that would read a CD at this point (I don’t think). Any thoughts about what to do with these?

    Relatedly, I have about 100 blank CDs (most CD-R, some CD-RWs). Is there any use for these at this point?
    Appreciate any advice from those who have kept up over the past 15 years….

    1. For the CDs that functioned as your back-ups, do you need to get the photos off of there? If you need to get the photos off, buy a DVD player that plugs into your laptop, and make the transfer to wherever you store your photos now.

      The only use I can think of for your blank CDs would be if you know techy person who likes doing computer stuff, but is old-fashioned enough to want to do it via CD.

      1. +1
        if you need to get the pics off the CDS I’d find a way (plug in drive, or borrow a computer that still has a cd drive) to pull them from the CDs to an external hard drive. megagigabyte drives are so cheap these days, you can pack a lot of pics on them for safekeeping

    2. I go through and print the ones I love and delete everything else. It makes the special photos the ones that will live on without the clutter of digital photos.

    3. If you have the digital photos backed up somewhere else at this point (like a hard drive or online storage); I’d just toss the CDs. If you’re looking for a way to back them up, check if the library has equipment to do it (ie a computer with a disk drive), and dump them all on an external hard drive.

      There’s really no use for your extra CDs unless you know someone who’s into retro tech or wants them for an art project. Otherwise, they’re ready to be trash.

    4. Yeah, long-term storage is not something current tech companies are interested in supporting. I think the best suggestion is to print out the ones your want to keep. And donate the blank CDs, you’re never going to use them but there are hobbyists out there who would.

    1. It would look super cute with yesterday afternoon’s purse. On someone else, not on me.

  5. Any advice on how to deal with young death? For context this is not my first rodeo with death, I’ve lost many aunts, uncles, grandparents etc, but as morbid as this sounds there is a certain inevitability when a 100 year old passes, I cry, I’m sad, but my world isn’t shattered. My best friend just died, 32, her baby is 8 months. I’ve never experienced a death where the obituary read 32. It felt like the floor fell out from underneath me, physical shock, my body ceased to function, my mind could not process. I’m at work, numb, occasionally sobbing at my cube (sorry if you’re a colleague). This is just so different from all my previous experiences. Any advice? Wisdom? Commiseration?

    Please be nice.

    1. Let yourself grieve, what you are experiencing is normal. Take time off, spend time with others who will also miss her. You don’t get over it, it just becomes part of you and easier to handle.

    2. One of my close law school friends died in 2016 and I still remember her all the time and wish I could talk to her. Its another reminder to live each day to the fullest. Do something in her honor.

    4. It sounds like this is very recent, so give yourself lots of grace for the time it takes to grieve, and the physical way that grief hits.

      Lower your expectations for how much you can accomplish, how productive you should be, or that you should be able to “go on” like normal.

    5. I’m so sorry! I lost my best friend last year and even though she was twice as old as your friend, it was still a horrible shock. Echo the advice to be kind to yourself and take time off. Also remember grief isn’t linear — you may feel better some days and then other days it’ll hit you like a ton of bricks.

      When something reminds me of my friend I often send a short text to her husband or a close mutual friend. It helps to have somebody to share both the grief and the happy memories.

      Sending you big hugs.

    6. I’ve used that same phrase about the floor falling away before in similar circumstances. Hugs. I agree that it is a different sort of jarring than a much older person who has lived their life.

    7. When I was a kid, my 21 year old cousin died in a car crash. It was absolutely devastating to the entire family. He was just so young. It hurts a lot for a while but over time it’ll hurt less and less. I am so sorry for your loss.

    8. I’m so sorry for your loss.

      I think this is pretty normal. Young people aren’t supposed to die and it feels much more shocking when they do. I’m 41 and three people in my high school class have already died from cancer (all apparently pretty healthy lifestyles, to the point yesterday about not blaming cancer victims). The deaths hit me hard even though we weren’t super close. Someone dying young with a young child is especially devastating. I second taking some time off work if you can.

    9. I’m sorry. It sucks. In the let yourself grieve but not the advice your therapist will give you… there are times that call for drinking (just a day), this is one. Clear your schedule, give yourself permission to watch all the old videos, pull out a bottle of Jack (or poison of your choice) and just scream and cry it out. If the tears aren’t coming, Marley & Me or Homeward Bound normally will do the trick. Sometimes you need to stop holding back the tears and just break down. Friends are harder – with family you have a whole system around you that is already feeling the loss. With friends, not everyone is experiencing the same thing as you.

    10. I am so sorry. I agree with the other comments. When I was a teenager, a friend died tragically and suddenly. I still feel traumatized by that loss, as do his other friends. We all still commemorate the anniversary, whereas I do not recall the exact dates on which my grandparents and other relatives died. It is just different. And it hits hard when it is a peer, because it can make you reorder how you think of your own life. Give yourself time and grace.

    12. First, big hug. Second, if you have sick time, I think this situation is okay to use a sick day on – you’re not feeling well, you’re crying in your cube, you’re not up to being productive, message your boss and say you need to head out. I fall on the pretty stingy side of “sick days for non sick things”, and even I would do that in the case.
      Third – it’s hard. I think there are two things: young death is hard for many reasons, and unexpected death is hard for many reasons (and, of course, many but not all young deaths are unexpected). It sounds like you may have been hit by both.

      There will be lots of time for grieving. For me, personally, in the first ~24 hrs, I just really really needed to be physically close to friends and family. Do you live alone / is there someone you can message to come be with you?

      I think it’s kind of a cliche but also kind of true that grief doesn’t go away over time but it kind of gets less frequent. Last weekend, I was out hiking, and I had a moment of just needing to step off the trail and cry for 5 minutes, fairly out of the blue. But that happens very rarely now, and 99% of the time my grief is quiet. When it does come back to the surface, it feels almost like a gift – like still painful but a way of continuing to love and remember the person that is gone.

      1. The sound primarily when spoken, but also the good chance that the person describing themselves this way has a fair amount of sanctimony behind their statement. I don’t mind people describing themselves as cheap though. That has fewer connotations (I think.)

        1. Cheep and frugal are different descriptions. I’m frugal, regardless of your thoughts about me, but am definitely not cheep. My sister is cheep but doesn’t have a frugal bone in her body.

          1. Apparently my phone has been listening to my toddler learn her animal sounds. Cheap! cheap!

        2. To me “frugal” used to mean “made wise and prudent purchasing decisions” and “cheap” meant “always bought the least expensive thing no matter what.” A frugal person would not necessarily deprive themselves, but a cheap person would. A cheap person would probably also make decisions that were pennywise and pound-foolish. Frugality was a positive attribute; being cheap was negative.

          Nowadays people who call themselves “frugal” are usually just cheap and asserting a moral superiority in their cheapness.

          2. “Sanctimony” is a weird take. How is it sanctimonious for a person to seek the best value? What is sanctimonious is bragging about how your purchasing habits make you morally superior, but “frugal” does not imply that on its own. It’s how you use the word that adds that implication.

        3. To me frugality is to be mindful of expenditures, and averse to wastefulness. Cheap is unwilling to buy or share.

          2. I disagree that frugal is self-congratulatory. Are the connotations of the word generally positive? Yes. But positive doesn’t have to mean self-congratulatory of sanctimonious. I think it’s weird to attribute that connotation to someone using the word frugal. Why assume the worst when there’s really no need to?

        5. ha the responses to your comment prove your point… it’s like “we have religion, they have magic”…”I’m frugal, but she’s cheap.”

          And I totally agree about the santimony/veneer of superiority. At least “cheap” feels cheerfully honest.

          3. I think your analogy is great. There’s nothing wrong with the words “religion” or “magic”, they’re definitely useful words and different concepts, but the words come up often in situations where people are just being biased and judgmental.

        6. For me the problem with using it here is they mean cheap but say frugal. There’s nothing frugal about picking up the poorly made clearance items featured on Fridays.

        7. This is not at all the connotations these words have for me.

          Someone who is frugal is making things work on a shoestring budget, minimizing waste, doing her best to avoid debt while coming up with low cost and creative ways to find joy.

          Someone who is cheap is stingy, selfish, wasteful, and flashy about being trashy.

          2. Merriam-Webster’s definitions:

            frugal–characterized by or reflecting thrift and efficiency in the use of resources
            cheap–stingy

          3. I feel like frugal is not necessarily doing things on a shoestring budget. I know lots of frugal people who have a lot of money. I think it means being careful with your money, but also being willing to buy one nicer, more expensive thing than a bunch of lower quality things. I feel like being cheap is more like not being generous, buying more low quality things, not tipping well, stuff like that.

          5. This: Someone who is cheap is stingy, selfish, wasteful, and flashy about being trashy.

            Merriam Webster didn’t make her use these descriptors.

          6. Words have connotations behind them. If you think they don’t, hopefully this thread is helpful for expanding your horizons.

          7. A lot of people here don’t seem to know the proper definitions or connotations of words.

      1. I don’t mind frugal people! I mind people who self-identify as frugal. Similar to how I’d judge someone for calling themselves a “hot mama.” I don’t mind people who are hot. I mind people who self identify as hot.

        1. And I maintain this “bragging” quality you appear to assign to the word frugal is all in your head and you are being needlessly judgmental.

          1. +1 that is such a weird take. Pretty sure the OP hasn’t experienced the word used in any other context than irony.

        2. I usually think of it as aspirational, like something someone is working on. I wonder if people are using the label to explain their choices and it’s coming across in a weird way?

          It doesn’t bother me if people are hot and know it though!

          1. Maybe—it usually sounds like “I’m frugal—my values are better than yours.”

        3. Sounds like you might just not like women who are comfortable describing themselves as they actually are, tbh. Maybe explore that a bit more. Why do you think hot women shouldn’t acknowledge that they’re hot?

          1. Because I know that behavior hides an iffy personality, and possibly extreme delusion.

          2. And what kind of personality leads to wanting other women to make themselves smaller so you feel more comfortable?

          5. Idk, being a jerk online about other women being too big for their britches has got to be up there.

            You know you can just keep all your little misogynies to yourself in the future, right?

    4. I’m with you. Mostly because at least in my circle, those that identify as “frugal” don’t like to talk about the chunks of cash they got from their parents. The rest of us that paid off our loans, saved for our own down payments, paid for our weddings and know we will need to support our family just call it life.

      1. This doesn’t bother me. There is a virtue in managing real chunks of cash wisely and responsibily. They had the option of just blowing through it and ending up broke, right? I would give yourself a little more credit too!

          2. I’m not saying it’s evil to party away a windfall! But in my mind it does fall somewhere on a virtue/vice continuum.

          3. It’s easy to live within your (enlarged) means when you have excess funds given to you. Some people don’t, sure, but it’s not exactly a virtue.

      3. You can be frugal and also receive money from your parents. In fact, I bet most parents who were generous enough and able to gift their children large chunks of money would appreciate it if their children were frugal.

        Sounds like you’re annoyed that these people got money from their parents but act like they reached their financial goals (house, loans paid off, etc.) through frugality alone. That’s valid, but also not related to the definition of the word frugal.

        1. +1. I also suspect that this poster resents that frugality is a choice for the wealthy, but a necessity for those of us who work and pay our own way. I feel the same way.

          1. A lot of things in the general “virtue” category are like this. Eating moderately is a choice for people who can afford to eat to excess, and a necessity for people who are skipping meals to make rent. Resentment doesn’t change it. And sometimes if we came from a background of food insecurity, it takes some time to adjust and learn how to eat moderately since we never really had to worry about it before.

          2. I grew up pretty poor, and I really hate the stereotype of the noble poor. One thing that has become clear to me as I move up in income is that there are idiots with money at every income level, as well as frugal people at every income level, and a wide array of people in between. But I can assure you that there were plenty of working class people in my orbit who absolutely did not view frugality as a necessity (or even a virtue). I am about to be responsible for clearing out one of their garages when they die, and I promise, I wish they had thought of frugality as a necessity.

    1. It is supercute. I am wondering if it is a bit cropped for me, though. Don’t want to reach up and expose skin.

  8. Making Mexican food for family dinner tomorrow. Any really good salad recipe to go alongside? Cooking for the English so have to scale back the spice on everything…

    1. Elote salad?

      Somewhat related, I ended up stuck in England for work travel one night so I just went to the grocery store for snacks. Grabed salsa and chips. The salsa was so mild and sweet it was functionally inedible, truly traumatizing experience.

      1. I’m still traumatized by the quesadilla I grabbed in London at a food hall, the cheese was flavorless and the salsa was sweet. I don’t understand why you wouldn’t just import Tostitos brand and call it a day!

    3. A salad with basics but add cilantro lime vinaigrette and avocado would pair well with most Mexican dishes and has lots of flavor but no heat.

    4. A cabbage slaw, or a corn salad. If you want to go all out, a green salad w mashed avocado.

    6. If you want something more hearty, the Cookie and Kate recipe for southwestern roasted veggie salad with chipotle-balsamic dressing is very good.

    8. I love “Mexican caesar salad.” You can use this recipe, or just buy a bottle of dressing at the supermarket and add crumbled tortilla chips, cotija cheese, and pepitas (the pepitas are key!) to romaine and call it a day. Skip the jalapenos for the English and skip the cilantro if your family doesn’t like it (we love it around here). https://butfirstwebrunch.com/mexican-caesar-salad/

    9. Mango cabbage slaw/salad- thinly slice a cabbage, massage a teaspoon of salt into it. (Or more to taste.). Julienne a mango and thinlu slice a red onion add it to the slaw with a squeeze of lime juice and a handful of chopped cilantro. Sprinkle with Tajin if you can.

    10. Instead of a salad, cut up melon with tajin for sprinkling and lime wedges or juice. Cool and refreshing!

      Here in our area, we like a mixture of watermelon, cantaloupe, and honeydew melons. No idea what melon is readily available in your area…

  9. Do any of you have a wood burning fireplace? Do the logistics of storing wood, letting the fire die out naturally, and cleanup make it too much of a hassle to use often?

    1. I love a fireplace but they are so drafty. Everyone I know who had a wood burning one has either blocked them off or converted with a gas insert.

    3. Building the fire with the right kind of kindling and size of wood pieces so that the wood would actually catch and keep burning — not get to smoldering point and then die out — was something I never truly got the hang of and didn’t enjoy enough to really learn how to do.

    4. Totally a hassle. We actually put a wood burning stove in our fireplace, and it’s much easier to deal with letting it die on its own while we sleep. And yes, storing wood is a pain. I do the dance of dropping each piece on our porch to make sure there are no bugs before bringing it inside.

    5. I have 3, which is ridiculous, but they came with the house. We use the one in the main living room occasionally and have a stack of wood for it that will last several years at the rate we are going. It cost us something like $150-very cheap for the amount of wood we have. I like having wood as a back-up heat source in case we lose power during the middle of a blizzard. Sure, it’s Georgia, but still-it has happened before and could happen again. We use it maybe 10 times a year, which means I only have to empty it of ashes at the end of the season. I have always had a fireplace, but if I were building from scratch, I don’t think I would. Or, at least, I would not have one in the main TV room. I do not like having a TV over the fireplace, and there’s just nowhere else to put it.

      1. True. You can upgrade to a EPA certified insert that will also provide much more heat, but it won’t be the same (I believe in just having a bonfire outside for the full experience).

    7. We have a wood burning fireplace and use it most weekends in the winter. Caveat that my husband manages all fire-related activities, so I just get the enjoyment without the work. It really isn’t a huge hassle for him, though, and we all love a cozy fire. But yes, it’s a lot more work than flicking a switch to turn on gas.
      In terms of logistics, we get wood delivered and stacked against our backyard shed, we cover it with a tarp, and it usually lasts us most of the winter although this past year, we ordered a supplemental delivery. We have a chimney sweep come in the fall for cleaning and checkup.

    8. we have two and use one of them at least five days a week in the fall and winter and occasionally on spring and summer evenings. I love it so much and don’t care that its bad for air quality and not an efficient heat source. It is cozy.

      My husband loves axes, saws, and wood chopping so we have enough wood for two years or so in our backyard at pretty much all times.

    9. OP here, I appreciate the comments. I may be buying a house with a wood burning unit. Right now I live in an apartment with a gas fireplace and it reeks. I need to keep the windows open during and after running it because the fumes are so bad.

      Is this a crappy apartment fireplace thing? Or do you also notice a gas smell in your SFH?

      1. You should never smell gas – whether with a stove, a water heater or anything else. You need to tell your mgmt yesterday.

      2. Do you really mean you’re smelling mercaptan, the odor added to natural gas to serve as a warning system that something is seriously wrong, inside your house where you live? This sounds extremely dangerous!

      3. You should not be smelling gas. A gas fireplace is supposed to be sealed so no air gets into the house. The heat radiates through the glass front. The air is vented outside.

      4. My parents have a gas fireplace and it stinks. Occasionally they light it for the ambience and while its visually appealing, I can’t stand the smell. No one else is bothered by it.

        We have a woodburning fireplace and love it! We read, play cards or board games, and even roast marshmallows over it. Similar to the poster above, we get wood delivered that is stacked on our side porch and we use the fireplace regularly throughout the winter. We’ve never had a problem with indoor air quality, but also we live in a cold climate and only burn the fireplace when we’re below a certain outside temp so that the physics work in our favor. My DH grew up with a wood fireplace so there is a string nostalgia factor for him and he is fully in charge of it all.

        1. There should not be a smell from a gas fireplace. That’s a sign it is either leaking gas (an explosion hazard!!!) or is not vented properly (a kill you dead hazard!!!).

          1. Every gas fireplace I’ve ever been around stinks. So either they are all dangerous, or they do emit some smell.

          2. FWIW, the only gas fireplaces I have smelled had confirmed problems. Just because the problem hasn’t hurt anyone yet doesn’t mean it’s acceptable, normal, or safe.

      5. If you are smelling your gas fireplace that is an emergency. An evacuate the building emergency. You should absolutely not turn it on again, and you should let the landlord know immediately, like right now. If the landlord does not fix it (regardless of whether you ever intend to use it again), you should call the fire department non-emergency line and tell them you have a gas fireplace that smells when you use it and your landlord isn’t fixing it.

    10. We added a wood burning insert to our regular wood burning fireplace. The insert produces so much more heat and is much easier to just let burn down. We store wood on our front porch, plus more on a firewood rack in our yard.

    11. My house has four fireplaces; two have been converted to gas. We enjoy the two gas ones more times each year then I can count, but it has been at least a decade since we lit either of the woodburning ones. And I love a woodburning fire, but apparently not enough to overcome the ease of the gas fireplaces.

  10. I’m so sorry. It’s so horrible, and none of the cliches about “well they lived a long life” apply. It just sucks. My cousin died as a kid and we remember him all the time – he would have been college aged now. My friend from high school died and recently I was going through some old papers and it hurt to see her name on everything. Give yourself grace and space. You’ll randomly think about it at work for a while. All of that is normal.

    Sometimes rituals, like lighting a candle for her every time at church, can help. It varies from person to person a lot.

  11. This looks like something Travis Kelce would wear. I’m not sure if I mean that as a compliment.

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