Another One Down

Do you know whats slightly more irritating than traipsing from store to store, trying on dress after dress in order to find the perfect outfit to wear for your wedding? Dragging your sister around from store to store, asking her to try on dress after dress so that you can find the perfect outfit to be worn for your wedding! Actually, I probably exaggerate a little. The Boy and I were shopping for weeks for my dress. In three different states. We only put in one concerted day of shopping in order to find The Pussycat’s dress. In 40 degree heat to boot! And find it we did. Or rather The Boy did. He’s got a pretty good track record so far. He picked out my dress, he found the designer for my jacket and he selected The Pussycat’s dress on the weekend for her to try on. Now all we need to do is get my mother up to Sydney so he can have a go at the Mother-of-the-Bride outfit too :-).

So yeah, I was both relieved and impressed on Saturday when we managed to find something that could potentially satisfy all parties. We found the dress at the first place we went to but we did go and see a number of other bridal stores just so we could make sure. We went to the store where we obviously weren’t “wog” enough to be a prospective customer. All the dresses were full of sequins and beads and whilst there was nothing inherently wrong with the gowns on display, they all seemed a little boring to be honest. I think that some of the women in the store could have benefitted quite substantially from the “less is more” principle too but if you don’t feel like a bride unless you glitter from every angle then you should be allowed to do so on your special day I guess.

Then we went to the one stop shop with the grooms and attendants on one side and the brides on the other. There was nothing else really impressive to note about this place other than the fact that it offered the “tarts ‘r us” option for the bridesmaids. This particular dress came in black and hot pink and looked a little more like it should feature in the wedding night rather than in the wedding day. It was that hideous kind of outfit that you stare at in an Oh My God kind of way but at the same time do not really take in all the details as if the mere memory in your brain will taint you forever. I seem to recall for example that there were some dyed feathers of the tawdry feather boa type variety that adorned the dress and would most probably malt throughout the day in irritating places such as on the brides gown. I could of course be completely mistaken and there were no feathers whatsoever. It just seemed like there should be some because that would just be the icing on the cake for this dress. I do remember however that the bodice was of a transparent mesh and the skirt was a cocktail length frou-frou affair that could easily make a female with hips look like the size of a cow. Needless to say, it really wasn’t our thing.

We visited another salon where some friends of ours bought their bridal and bridemaids outfits but although there was a possible dress there, it just didn’t look quite right. The dress in question did actually look good on The Pussycat. The assistants were also very nice and helpful in ascertaining that the dress could in fact be made in colours that would match my gown. There was just something about it though that was a bit “so what”. It looked like just another formal dress. I don’t exactly want my sister to outshine me on my day (even though she has reiterated on a number of occasions in jest that my day is so totally and utterly about her) but I don’t want her to look inferior either. It would be good if we both looked totally $hit hot together. For an agreeable price of course. Money can buy you a multitude of things but although I love my sister dearly, I am absolutely not prepared to spend more on her dress than I did on mine. That so isn’t fair.

And the money thing leads me to one of the other bridal stores we visited on the Saturday. At this point in the afternoon, we were all tired and dehydrated and I think we were starting to grasp at straws a little. We drove down Parramatta Road towards the couturiers to have a look and see if there was any inspiration there. As I vaguely had in mind that I would like my sister in an ivory dress because I was wearing a coloured gown we were mostly looking at plain wedding dresses for her. You don’t really expect to find “bridesmaids” dresses in white and ivory after all. A lot of the gowns we saw were obviously extremely “bridal” and therefore out of the question but there were some plainer styles that might have suited her quite well. We wandered into this one store however where we found it quite difficult to extricate ourselves from the store before the designer got to us as we would obviously be wasting his time with our request. We therefore ended up sitting down with him to be told that all of their bridesmaids’ outfits pretty much started at $3500 so what was the budget we were thinking of for our dress? We flat out lied and then sat there politely until we could tell him we’d go away and think about it because we were still deciding on just the right dress. He had drawn us a quick sketch that would have been really attractive except for the price tag which is so not an option without the Powerball jackpot.

After that it was definitely all downhill and the last place we went to was just plain creepy. Well, the store itself wasn’t but this guy opened the door for us and he was apparently the son of the designer. He said his mum wasn’t it but we should come in and take a look. The gowns were a bit, I don’t know...tacky is the word that comes to mind. Its like they were themed or something. There was a more fantasy feel to them rather than glamour or style or you know, taste. The place might have been perfect if I was marrying a biker. Thats the impression that I got. It just felt wrong though. And then as we said it wasn’t really the kind of thing we were after at all and went to leave, the guy said he’d give us his mum’s card and his too in case we wanted a videographer/photographer for our day. Now I know that we haven’t chosen anyone to document our wedding as yet and I haven’t actually seen any of his work but I would not let that guy anywhere near my wedding. I can’t say exactly what it was about him because he seemed fairly clean and he wasn’t rude or anything but just.....icky.

So after all that, I was pretty sure that one of the first dresses which was originally $2000 but down to $350 was the way to go. The colour was great, the dress was plain enough, my sister looked fantastic in it and everybody liked it. On the Sunday, we went back and got it. One more decision down. Yipee.