I've got a wedgie...or two

Warm weather is here and that means it's time to break out the good ol' wedges. I, like many of you, live in strappy wedges all during the summer months.

Due to the shopping diet, I've had to pass on many that I'm in love with, but that hasn't stopped me from at least grabbing a few new pairs - besides the Mojo Moxy Guilty wedges that I won.

Everyone swears that wedges are all comfortable and easy to walk in but that just ain't true. Usually, if they're really uncomfy, it's because of one of two things: An unstable bottom or a shoe that weighs a ton and a half. Marguerite from JustFab is victim of the first and The Bardot from ShoeDazzle is an example of the second. There are bad wedges. Some are damned near impossible to walk in.

But, then, there are real gems. I got two pairs of Chinese Laundry wedges a few weeks ago and both are to-die-for! First up is DJ Mix. Known in other colors and materials as Dresden, Dasher, Stalker, and imitated by many, including ShoeDazzle's infamous Mulberry wedge. These are fantastic. They fit like a glove, are soft on the insole, light weight, and stable. We truck shopped while I wore these. We schlepped all over about 10 car lots - we're talking miles of walking - and my feet felt perfectly fine at the end of the day. I have tennis shoes I can't do that in. Hell, I can't usually do that no matter what shoes I'm wearing. I got tons of compliments on them too, including from the guy we ultimately bought a truck from. (With their height, they also allowed me to be eye-to-eye with the jackass sales manager at John Elway Chevrolet, when he needed his ass stomped and I had to stop my husband from doing exactly that. That's a whole other Oprah, though.)  I want these in other colors or patterns but don't really like any that are currently available. <sigh> I even had a fellow shoe whore try to track some brown ones down at her Macy's but they could only find one of the shoes in my size. I blame their merchandising department for that.  These are true to size and run 5" tall and have a 1.5" platform. There is one little quality issue on them: where the brads are tacked in on the platform, two of them are out of line and it bugs my OCD side, but no one else would probably even notice. Overall, I give them 5 out of 5 acorns.

I also got the Chinese Laundry Desert Queen in cream. These are great too, BUT, as with all shoes of this style, those tiny little straps irritated my pinky toes by the end of the day. This does not have anything to do with the quality of the shoes, it's just the style. They're really comfy otherwise, enough so that the black are on my wish list, also. They measure at 5" with a 1" platform.

I also did something I swore I'd NEVER do. I bought orange. Bright orange. And I LOVE it. I was at DSW a couple of weeks ago and saw these in the clearance racks and ran to them. R-A-N. I tried them on and they just didn't fit for crap. They're too wide and my heel slips in the back. So I decided to go home and find them online 1/2 size down. But they weren't on clearance online. I slept on it and decided to go back and get them the next day. I got them, stuffed them full of inserts, and will never let them go. This doesn't mean that my hatred of the color orange is gone, or even waned, it just means I really really like these shoes.

And on a sad note - I bought the Jessica Simpson Carrack in coffee/ultra violet. This has turned out to be the must-have wedge this season, and they're gorgeous, comfy, light weight, and just not for me. I couldn't shake the feeling that they make my legs look short and stumpy and knew I'd be too self conscious to wear them. Everyone else seems to think I'm neurotic, which may be the truth, but it didn't make me like these any more. I sent them back.

Now, I'm off to the gym and to DSW to hopefully spend my Free Shoesday card.

Hopefully I'll be back tomorrow with some other recent goodies and upcoming news and events in the wide world of shoes.

Until then, Happy Shopping!
-A