Weekend Casual?

Today I wore a plain black long sleeved dress that had a cotton bodice/sleeves upper body part and velvet skirts, with a textured black belt, black (almost) flat boots and my medium size shoulder black leather bag. I know, it sounds really black, but it is what I would consider a very safe brainless casual everyday outfit. Because really, even though the dress has velvet parts, it IS still very plain and casual and is really suitable for all occasions. But anyways, you get the picture.

So, dressed like that, I walked into the restaurant and met my mom and aunt up for Saturday lunch. And the greeting I got were affronted expressions followed by, "Oh dear, what are you wearing today?" Granted my outfit is boring and black, but I didn't think I looked THAT bad. Turns out that they thought that I was dressed too formal for a weekend! Apparently while it was fine to dress up so on a weekday, on a weekend one always dresses very casually with jeans, t shirt and flats/sneakers!

Generally I take these edicts my mom says with a grain of salt, because most of them contradicts previous edicts and I get thoroughly confused, but this time I couldn't help but wonder if there IS a grain of truth to it. As I glance around the streets, people indeed were all dressed very casually (though I WAS in a casual part of town). And I'm sure that the term weekend casual didn't just come out of thin air. One of my friends recently even bought a pair of "weekend shoes."

Personally I don't dress any differently on a weekend than on a weekday. Mostly because I'm a student and its casual day everyday so I wear the same things everyday regardless of the day of the week (though I DO dress differently depending on where I go, my mood and how much time I have). Over the summer, while I was working and wearing semi formal clothes every weekday, I DID miss my jeans. So I guess "casual weekends" could just be a social by product of this. But that doesn't mean that I want to wear the "casual" outfit every weekend. Weekends are the also the only time I get to experiment with what I wear and have fun with fashion! I really don't think that just because everyone else decides its casual day, I have to follow it as well.

But just out of curiosity, what are everyone's preference for weekend dressing? Do you generally dress down or is it an arbitrary decision subjected to many other factors that don't include the day of the week?