What Modern Moms Wear: Prints, Prints, and More Prints

Today's post comes again from the ever-stylish guest blogger Courtney.

If there's one trend right now that I'm totally loving and obsessing over, it's mixing prints. It all started a few months ago when I saw this fabulous outfit of a J. Crew employee posted on Pinterest.

Love it. Love it. Love it.

Inspired by this look, I thought it would be fun to put together some outfits that show off how to mix your prints the right way. Because, let's be honest, a bad mix of prints can look like you're back in middle school on clash day.

There are a couple things I try to keep in mind when mixing prints - first, I usually mix a smaller print with a big print, and second, I look for items that have complementary colors or similar hues (not necessarily matchy-matchy, but you know, colors that go together).

Here are six examples I thought would be helpful in illustrating how to successfully mix prints. (Starting with the top left and working our ways clockwise...)

Combo #1 and #2 - this floral blouse is a slightly larger print, so I paired it with orange bermuda shorts with small white embroidered polka dots. If the shirt and shorts is a little too loud for you, another option would be to add the navy and orange striped v-neck sweater. The colors are not an exact match to the shirt, but they are similar hues. Additionally, the stripes on the sweater are small enough that they don't become distracting to the floral blouse. Hate florals? Why not pair the shorts and sweater together?

Combo #3 - using different prints, I again went for the one large/one small print combination, and stuck with two classic colors.

Combo #4 and #5 - using this navy and white polka dot cropped sweater, I first grabbed the striped tank to go with it. The prints are actually around the same size, but neither print is too bold that they distract from each other. The second option I paired with the sweater is this bird print blouse. Again, the print sizes are about the same, but the polka dot print is slightly wider than the bird print, making it so they don't compete too much next to each other.

Combo #6 - Stripes go with just about any print, in my opinion. I love this thin striped button-up with the paisley skirt. I would also pair stripes with leopard any day of the week.