Hurrah for fall! (And thanks all for the birthday wishes!) I love how the light starts to sleep. I love the smell of decay and compost and fall-blooming flowers. It’s probably my entire motivation to for gardening in Texas. There is nothing like those cool mornings and starting from a fresh palette after the hard summer. (I’m sure it works in reverse in spring-oriented climates!)

Back in July I was already oogling over the mustards, ochres, turmerics, old gold colors that showed up in a lot of fall trends. I’m finally getting around to making up my list of fall inspirations, and put together a color palette as a start:

{Marc Jacobs Spring 2011, Gucci Fall 2011, myrakim at Etsy, Mucha sketch, my fall palette, Jaeger Fall 2011}

I’ve been really inspired by other bloggers who use Pantone or Colour Lovers to come up with schemes. I might form an addiction to Pinterest. Finally, I can collect all those visual ideas and save my hard drive.

I really enjoy planning my wardrobe seasonally as a creative exercise. It helps me define my mood and personal life goals for the next few months–visioning through fashion!

Once I get a mood, I start thinking about actual pieces I’d like to add to my wardrobe. I make a huge, unruly list of dream clothes, shoes, accessories and then pair it down to the manageable and affordable (I have a budget twice a year). A little over a year ago I started adding sewing projects into the list, as I finally started sewing enough to rely on it for fashion.

My sewing ideas are also unruly at the moment but I have a few things I’d really like to try, like a take on the saffron cropped jacket:

It’d require some drafting, and probably be my most ambitious sewing project yet, so we’ll see how far I get.

And something like this 60s-ish coat dress.

I love the military silhouette and found a similar style in a pattern, but am thinking it’s those colors that are really attracting me more than anything else (can you tell I liked that collection?).

Practically speaking, fall and winter planning is difficult for me–I love fall clothes the best but serious outer layers are only necessary for two months and the rest of the year just plain hot. So while I’m having fun plotting fall ideas, I’m trying to look ahead to February, when I usually ditch my must-have-wool-cape fantasies.

How do you keep track of sewing or fashion inspirations? Do you make plans with fashion or do you just go as you go?