We last left off with my pre-dress-shopping neuroses. I was convinced that the world was going to end, planets were going to crush me, and all that jazz.
We had two appointments scheduled for the first day of dress shopping, and I was prepared. I had on no makeup, as not to get any on the dresses, as well as my proper undergarments, so that I didn’t flash the whole world.
As a quick sidebar, I’d like to HIGHLY recommend wearing the undergarments I wore for dress shopping– the Spanx Hide & Sleek Hi-Rise Panty (or any other Spanx!), as well as a nude strapless bra. This way, while the attendant is stripping you drown and putting you into dress after dress, it just feels like you’re wearing a conservative swimsuit. Win!
Anyway, back to the story!
That morning, I was determined to breathe and try to stay calm. My mother picked me up from HQ (aka our apartment), and the second I sat down in her car, she plunked down about 20 bridal magazines in my lap. “I-read-last-night-that-you-should-have-bridal-magazines-marked-with-tabs-of-things-you-like-and-don’t-like-so-you-can-show-the-people-in-the-salon-and-not-waste-their-time.” That all came out of her mouth with one breath, as if it were just one giant word. I immediately started (frantically) flipping through the magazines, and I ended up marking more dresses that I was horrified by rather than ones that I loved. This continued for the entire 25-minute car-ride to the first salon, Bridals by Lori.
The moment I walked into the doors, everything I knew about weddings, dresses, anything, all flew out of my brain. There was a front desk with a small yet intimidating woman who stared me down as I walked to the desk. “Yes?”
“Uhh. Um. I have a. I have an appoin- I have a thing for the… I’m here to try on dresses.”
“Your name?”
“La–laauur–Lauren.”
She checked to see that I was in the system, and as soon as she saw that I was not some crazy off the street, her face softened somewhat. “Take the elevator to the second floor. Marta will be waiting for you.”
On the second floor, there was another desk, and after they checked who I was… again, Marta appeared and began with a barrage of questions. She asked me what I was looking for, what I liked, what I thought I wanted, etc. All questions that I could have answered easily and with great zeal prior to my brain taking a I’m-too-scared-to-work vacation. Thankfully, Marta realized that I was totally and completely overwhelmed, immediately took control of the situation and attempted to put me at ease.
“Ok? We go!”
As we followed her like ducklings, she whooshed around into the individual rooms for each designer, grabbed dresses, held them up to me, and quickly explained why each dress she pulled could possibly work for me. Seeing all of the dresses in person was so overwhelming. Online, I knew each dress by heart. In person? I couldn’t remember a single fact about a single one.
I had just begun to relax when she finished grabbing all of the dresses. She had Mom sit next to a massive tri-fold mirror in the dressing area. Thankfully, for my poor sweet sanity, we were the only ones in the salon, and thus had the entire space to ourselves. Marta took me into the dressing room, and so the trying on began!
I won’t bore you with the details of every single dress I tried on, and how I stumbled in and out of them, acted like a general awkward fish, but let me say again… I am so glad I wore my high-waisted-Spanx-and-bra combo. The on-off-adjusting-grabbing-clippingness of dress-trying-on would have been unbearable for me if I’d gotten a case of the shys.
After trying on the 15-20-or-so dresses that Marta had pulled, I was left with three major contenders:
The Julianna by Christos (also known as Mrs. Cowboy Boot‘s fabulous dress!)
I especially loved the Ella, and was *thisclose* to sealing the deal when I decided to take one last walk through the dresses to see if I had missed one– the one, perhaps.
And I almost did.
What had I missed? What dress did I choose? Does this story have a happy ending? Stay tuned, my dears.
How did your first dress-shopping experience go? Did you totally blank like I did, or did you retain (in your brain!) all of your wonderful research? Also, what did you all wear underneath?
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