Please bear with me, ladies! This is my Inspired by Nature Challenge keepsake post, so I can have all my outfits in one place for my YLF blog! This challenge was SUCH FUN!!

1/2. Day 1: African Elephants at Twilight by Frans Lanting. I chose my big pearl earrings to represent the moons. The wide leg pants and the texture of the croc bag remind me of the elephants, the watercolor print blouse is the water, and I went with a slightly-brighter-than-the-photo rosy coral for the sky.

3/4. Day 2: Water lilies (Nymphaea nouchali), Okavango Delta, Botswana by Frans Lanting. This was a fun one! I tried to go with both the colors and the shapes of the lily pads by teaming my chalet green Halogen seamed skirt with a dark teal Halogen cotton blazer for the water, and my beloved Hinge silk pussy bow blouse for the lily pads. Even though the colors aren't really the same as the photo, I felt like the overall vibe was similar. I added the yellow belt and shoes for the yellow in the photo, and nude fishnet hose to pick up the texture in the lily pads! Finally, I added dangly earrings as my nod to the floating vegetation!

5/6. Day 3: Stone Canyon Petrified Sand Dunes and Reflection, Paria Canyon - Vermilion Cliffs Wilderness, Arizona by Jack Dykinga. In the original thread for this day of the challenge, I posted my picture with the one-line comment, "Some days it's just too easy. ;)" I was surprised to find myself a little stung by a few lighthearted comments by other posters to the effect that my almost-identical-to-the-photo dress was "cheating!" LOL Still, I had fun with fashion and that was my best effort at interpreting the photo (note purple bag for the expanse of water, and light shoes for the driftwood at the bottom), so I'm happy and have no regrets and no hard feelings!

7/8/9. Day 4: Morning Mist, Rock Island Bend, Franklin River, Southwest Tasmania, Australia by Peter Dombrovskis. Photo 8 is what I'd planned to wear. It seemed to capture, more than anything in my closet, the feeling, colors, and shapes of the photo. Plus I thought it would be hilarious to wear the same Nine West "magic dress," in different prints, two days in a row.

But in light of the "cheating" comments and my unexpectedly thin skin I called an audible that morning and went with green on top, blue on the bottom to evoke the trees and water. I liked how the ruffles on the neckline of the top echo the leaves on the trees. The pearl brooch and light bag and shoes represented the white water and sky! I didn't realize until I uploaded the photo that Kitty had gotten in on the aciton, and decided she would be the representative of the wildlife in the forest!

10/11. Day 5: Tortoises at Dawn, Galapagos Islands by Frans Lanting. This one may have been my favorite. I loved the shape of the "chain" of tortoises and the pretty morning colors. To me the photo evoked blush and brown and I was surprised to see that others saw it as a "gold" photo, although that was totally obvious once it was pointed out. It's funny how we can loook at the same photo and see it so differently, even something as basic as the colors! Anyway, I went with the blush/brown color scheme as the basis for my interpretation. I added gold chains in my bracelet, earrings and bag to remind me of the "chain" of turtles in the golden water.

This was a wonderful challenge! Thank you so much, Bella for organizing it! And thanks so much to all the fab ladies who participated!!