Our fab friends Morgan and Christina hosted a delightful Rosé Party on the deck of their home late last Saturday afternoon. The sun was out, the air was warm and there were plenty of delicious eats. We had a lovely time!

Christina, who loves the colour orange, inspired me to wear a billowing asymmetrical blouse that I bought at Zara during the YLF gathering in Pasadena. Orange is not my best colour, but every Dutch gal needs an orange wardrobe item. This is my patriotic piece.

I adore BIG boxy blouses in soft fabrications and wear them very frequently. I find it awfully liberating to not have the waistline tailored, or rein in the volume with a belt. Since it was a casual affair, I paired the blouse with zippered skinnies and new Stuart Weitzman ballet flats.

I also wore Chanel accessories, which would have ordinarily been too glitzy and dressy for this type of casual setting. But it also happened to be my birthday – and I wanted to be a Chanel girl on my birthday. I figured that my flat shoes, jeans and voluminous blouse dressed down and relaxed the Chanel accessories. The picture would have been quite different if I’d worn dressy heels and a form fitting top. I kept the bag on at the party because I was standing for most of the time.

Morgan, Christina’s husband and the wonderful gentlemen who worked with Greg on the YLF iPhone app, takes fashion and style very, very seriously. He’s a superbly spunky dresser who sports peroxided white spiky hair and killer specs. I was warmly greeted by Morgan who said: “Look at you! You’ll all shiny and jangle-y! I love it!” Christina said: “Oooh, I like your top! I love orange.” I also matched Biscuit, their French Bulldog, who almost always wears an orange collar.

This is the outfit that inspired me to write about approachable style earlier this week. Some people may think that my glitzy Chanel accessories would make the outfit less approachable in this sort of casual home party setting. I’ll probably never know for certain, but it didn’t seem that way. I laughed and yakked with people I had met for the first time and felt perfectly at ease. People were really nice and very friendly. Perhaps that’s because I was 100% comfortable in my outfit. Perhaps it’s because my body language made me approachable.

Or perhaps it’s because it was my birthday and nothing was going to get in the way of me wearing Chanel!