Wedding Dress Shopping Take 1

First this:

Comment from my mom on my last post:
Next time I get to go too.....that is part of getting to be mother of the bride - I get to go the bridal shop and cry as I watch you become a vision of loveliness over and over again.

Response:
Dear Mom,

Are you on crack? What is all this about “next time I get to go too”. This is ME we’re talking about here… you HATE shopping with me. Remember in high school, when I *finally* got my own room, and I got to upgrade from a twin sized bed to a full sized bed, which meant that I got to buy a new bedspread. Do you remember the nineteen stores I dragged you to in search of the *perfect* one. Do you remember shopping for hours on end, in store after store, patiently standing by as I hemmed and hawed over scores of choices that were nice but weren’t quite right. Do you remember me liking the border on this bedspread but liking the lace detail on that bedspread and if only the yellow were sunnier on this one or maybe the blue richer on that one, and oh! look at this one over here! It’s absolutely perfect on one side, but, oh, the back side makes me want to vomit, and you know, this one might work but I’d have to find just the right throw pillows to really pull it off… Do you remember being exhausted, and at your wits end, and finally breaking down and begging me to JUST PICK ONE ALREADY!!!! Remember???? And that was just for a freakin bedspread! Don’t make me remind you of the time you decided to help me pick out a new pair of jeans! Gah!

I am not fun to shop with. I am picky. Piiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiicky. And I plan to bring it to a whole new level with this white fluffy number. I foresee the process taking 6 months. And seriously mom, you do not want to subject yourself to 6 months of crowded bridal boutiques – they’re hot and noisy and sales women run every which way carrying 20 pound dresses wrapped in plastic while frazzled brides shout after them, “Lace! I need more lace!!” After an hour and a half yesterday even *I* had had about all I could handle. You’ll be sitting on a little bench outside the dressing room while I’m naked inside being dressed by a strange sales woman desperate to extol the virtues of the new taffeta numbers they just received. Every 15 minutes or so, I’ll emerge, listing off the things that aren’t quite right about gown, you’ll take one look at the price tag and say, “Oh Courtney! That’s too expensive, I can make this for you.” And then I’ll say, “Yes, Mom, I understand that you are very very talented in the dress making department, but do I really need to bring up the fiasco that was you making my prom dress, and the dark dark day that you *gasp* hemmed it too short and I all but committed suicide so horrified and forlorn I was that the dress would never be perfect? Do I!?!?”

I love you too much to do that to you. Trust me on this one. When I’ve narrowed it down to my top 35 choices, and I've given up on finding a dress that is both backless and very supportive, modern and traditional, made of rich heavy silk satin that is suprising light and easy to wear, with buttons AND a lace-up back, painstakingly detailed while remaining simple and unfussy, with straps that magically disappear whenever I need to lift my arms to hug someone, one that slices and dices and juliennes potatoes, all while making me look as if I've lost 15 pounds, then you can come. OK? Let me run around the block a few thousand times to wear myself out a bit before you start tagging along. I think we’ll all be happier.

Love always,
Your beautiful first born daughter, who you love unconditionally, even though sometimes she's a bit crazy

:)


Then this:

:( No pictures. Booo. Not that I found anything that I would even consider walking down the aisle in, but still, pictures would have been fun. I took exactly one (of my girlfriends patiently wiating for me outside the dressing room) before being reminded of their stirct no photo policy.


Patient ladies

I think they're afraid that you'll find a dress you like, snap a picture, and then go buy it cheaper someplace else. Which is probably what I'll do, so I can't say that I blame them. But still. I MUST find a way to take some sneaky pictures. Because, HELLO, the way the dress looks in picutres is sorta the most important thing. It could weigh 400 pounds and be held up with a thousand tiny daggers digging into my torso, if it makes me look good in my wedding photos, I'm buying the thing.

So anyway, the hunt continues. I'll keep you all posted. (Even you, Mom.)