They say you just know when its right. That it’s a feeling which comes naturally when you’re not expecting it and you just…know. I have to admit I was skeptical. While most of my life I’ve been a romantic, being in a mature relationship has shown me that everything is not black and white. More gray…or champagne. My moment of truth came in the boot closet of The Wedding Shoppe in St. Paul.
When I set out to find my wedding gown, I had a solid idea of what I wanted. There wasn’t much criteria, just a few key components I knew I had to have. And of course…my dress doesn’t possess any of these things. The idea of the dress is exactly what I thought of…romantic, just like the rest of the wedding, but that’s about it. I’d give you more details, but call me old fashion, Spenser can’t know about it or see it until I walk down the aisle a blubbery mess.
The best part about picking out your wedding gown…taking your bridesmaids with you! While I wasn’t fortunate enough to have all the ladies with me, I did have four of the five sisters that will be standing next to me on that glorious day, as well as MA!
Heading out to find THE dress
Such classy bridesmaidsAs many of you know, I try to be extremely punctual everywhere I go. You know my motto…if you arrive on time you’re late. So against my inherent nature, we left the house a little late, and slightly malnourished. When we arrived at The Wedding Shoppe my first priority was price range. I’m highly aware of my innate ability to pick out the most expensive item in a store without even looking at price tags (Foster genes I believe), and like most women, if you put me in a $4,000 dress, I’ll somehow find a way to convince myself of two things: (1) I deserve it, and (2) my luck is already changing, so I’ll probably be winning the lottery soon anyway. Case in point: my senior year prom dress. A pink tye-dyed chiffon gown with lacing up the back and ruffle embellishments around the bottom for about $200 above my price range…don’t act like you’re not impressed.
Senior Prom
From there, I tried on a little bit of everything. I went through a lot of dresses that day, and I’m fairly certain Sisty and Amanda saw more of me than they bargained for. At the end of my runway extravaganza though, I was left wondering if I was just too practical of a buyer. So many of the dresses I tried on were so beautiful, but I found a reason to dislike each one.
My personal dresser
After dress number 452, we were collectively starting to scare the other customers because our stomachs were growling so loudly. Everyone but Amanda and I headed downstairs as I stripped for her one last time in the dressing room…or so we thought. As I was putting on my boots, I glanced up at some of the dresses in the boot closet and saw a beautiful swatch of fabric. I pulled the dress out further and it was gorgeous. Surely it was $4,000. No! It was near the lower end of my price range! Amanda quickly convinced me that it was worth trying on, even with four other starving women down in the lobby. So I did. And I knew. It was my moment of truth.