The Dress Party & Decision

Here it is, this is the one I picked! Everyone has been asking so I am posting. I am not posting photos because I don't like doing that on my blogs, so you just have to imagine. I will be sending pictures to some people but not right now.

People have been asking have I found "THE DRESS." Well, I thought I might have a reaction like that, like OOOOOOOOH THIS IS THE ONE !!! .... But I didn't, it's a nice dress that looks good on me. I guess I shouldn't be surprised, I haven't really been like that for anything else so far I think? Yes, I have a dress, hooray! Another thing to check off on the list! I was putting a lot of importance into this dress that wasn't really there, I guess. Some of it feels a little artificial, "The Dress" and all, but I am excited that I have finally picked a dress and now that pressure is off!

(I still wish JewishGuy had asked my permission before opening the boxes of dresses while I was out of town)

For the party, a few of my friends came over and brought breakfasty dishes. We talked and ate and then I tried on dresses :) It was nice, even though I had to kind of kick people out so I could go to the art studio (this winter class is killing me).

I am glad that I did it this way. I really hate shopping - I mean I like shopping, but by myself, I don't like shopping with other people at all. And I realize I don't really like shopping with people when they are there just for you, it makes me really self-conscious not only of how I look but also that I am wasting their time and they are just sitting around waiting for me to make a decision. In my house, people are hanging out, eating, relaxing, warm, etc, and either way - even if I hadn't decided on a dress - it would have been a good time.

I think this party was the girliest thing I have ever done in my entire life. I feel good about it but I also feel uneasy for some reason.

All Accounted For!

Yay! The new dresses have arrived! Now I have all four, ready for my party on Sunday. :)

JCrew! Dresses!! GRRR!! :(

JCrew just sent me an email saying that the dress I ordered from them that was scheduled to ship on Friday isn't going to ship until April! WHAT?? So I had to cancel that order. :( That was the one I liked the most.

So I ordered two more dresses from JCrew, this time overnight delivery, if they don't ship this week then I will cancel those orders, too, and will have to just decide between the two dresses I already have.

- ALSO, as a side note, my winter class voted to have off on inauguration day instead of MLK day, and I had scheduled to have my dress-trying-on-party on MLK day since a lot of people have that day off and my winter class is too intense to do it on a regular Sunday. SO I had to reschedule my dress party to the Sunday before (Jan 18), which is annoying, because Sundays are so precious. I am racing around trying to get supplies today and also I have to go to the studio to catch up for the hour I missed on Friday to get home before Shabbat. (Why am I posting, then? Good question...)

Anyway, the two new dresses are:


(I ordered this one in ivory)


Maybe it will work out after all because I actually think I like these more than the one I had originally picked out. So if these come in time I will have 4 dresses for my party, 3 long ones and 1 short one.

Dress Nightmares!

I had the most annoying dream this morning. It was annoying because it played on my worst fears of the dress-deciding process.

To make it short, because I know reading dream posts is boring, in the dream I was in the car with some people from school and I said, let's stop at the mall and I will try on some wedding dresses, it won't take very long. It ended up taking 6 hours and I was unsuccessful. After trying on no fewer than 15 dresses, other people modeled them for me, and my friends were getting impatient. In fact, all of them at one point or another had gone into the mall to do their own shopping because they were bored. I wasted their entire afternoon and didn't even have a dress to show for it!

This is honestly my worst fear about dress-deciding. This is why I'm having a trying-on party at my house. At least then if it takes a while, everyone's sitting down and eating and drinking and talking to other people. I don't want to waste my friends' time. I know when people volunteer to help me shop for dresses they know that they are just watching me, but I assume they don't mean for hours on end with a picky shopper who also always thinks she looks fat. It's exhausting, I'm sure.

Mysterious Dress

This dress... I saw it a year ago, before I was even engaged, and I said, that is the dress I want.



Unfortunately, this dress doesn't exist anymore. I looked on the designer's site and it isn't in the last two years' collections. It's an old dress.

I don't think it would look good on me but it is so pretty.

Also, since the trying-on party isn't until January, I am still looking around. Ha!

(EDITED TO ADD: I think I need to say why I was looking at wedding dresses before I was engaged. My friend was getting married and SHE was looking at dresses and sending me to those sites. Of course I looked, too! I wasn't pre-planning the wedding :-P )

Arrivals!

Two of my dresses and my fancy underwear arrived! So now I'm waiting for the other dress and my trying on party will be in January ... I kind of want to take them out now but I think I will save that for the party.

Question about dresses

Wow a lot of posts today.

My question is, why is it assumed a man will rewear the suit he was married in, like the purchase is not a one-time-only deal, but a wedding dress is not to be reworn? Something about it is weird, even if you aren't buying a bridal gown, the idea of wearing the dress again is weird. I know some people do it, but there's the element of surprise - wow, that's your wedding dress? And you're wearing it again?

I mean, why not wear it again? But it feels weird somehow.

Dresses Ordered

Here are the dresses I ordered:

from jcrew.com


from nordstrom.com


from nordstrom.com

They are all somewhat similar but I think they are nice. I had some dress drama last night as you can tell from the one-liners. But I think this will be good.

And here are the shoes I want, but haven't ordered yet:



I like the silver shoes because I think I can wear silver shoes again, but white shoes probably not as often. I have these exact shoes in black and they are so cute, except I really need to have them stretched. They are rubbing hard core and are really uncomfortable, only because the leather needs to be broken in. So maybe I will have them pre-broken in.

So I ordered these dresses to my apartment and I am going to invite some people over to see if they look good on me. I am thinking of it being some kind of little party. I have talked to many people about this, it makes me so uncomfortable for people to sit around and wait for me to try things on, but if they are at my house and eating and drinking and hanging out, it will be a lot more comfortable for me and probably fun as well. :)

Dress

Three dresses have been ordered! Now I am arranging a dress-trying-on party...

One-liners at 3:30am. Hooray.

Kittel

Are there kittels for women?

... I am exploring a range of options for bridal attire, apparently.

New top contender?

One of the brides on my reading list recently bought a JCrew dress.  There is another one on the site I really like (I think this is the one she bought!), but I think this one might be more what I want.

EEE!

HOW cute.  So cute.  (click image for info/link to site)  Besides the fact that it's sold, it's actually kind of yellowy (according to the site), so I don't know that that will work for me.  BUT the silhouette is adorable.  Thank you, CankeyB for pointing me towards Posh Girl Vintage!

Sorry so few updates recently... swallowed by class and job hunt... will be back on the wedding planning train soon!

Dresses... sigh

So many pretty dresses at Nordstrom... (click to go to dress page)

I might end up ordering a bunch of dresses and then returning the ones I don't like.  It sucks, but none of the ones I like online are in the store.  I still love this dress the most, but I don't know how it will look on me.

I know I was talking about getting a custom dress, but I think if I could find one without having to go down that road, that would be best and easiest.

Custom Dress Part 1

Pictures from websites of places in Chicago that make custom dresses. This post is as much for the OOH PRETTY as it is for me to remember these places so I can bookmark them when I get back home (I'm out of town right now, yes, playing on the internet looking at dresses!).



meen-kyole
I like this designer because she seems to do really simple lines. It seems like she mostly does not do wedding dresses, but that isn't really a problem. Her dresses look really fun to be in, like the dress above - very flowy, fun to spin around in, and comfortable.



dame couture
This designer looks excellent but expensive. I especially like this dress. They do have some dresses in their collection that I like, and will also custom-design dresses if you want to tweak some of their designs to your personality. I want to check them out, but may not end up there unless the less expensive options turn out to not be what I want.



simple silhouettes
I've looked at simple silhouettes before. I like the idea because it's custom-made, but from pre-chosen pieces. So you choose your top, bottom and middle from pre-designed pieces. You basically build your dress from dress legos. There is a location in Chicago, but that store only carries the pre-made dresses (I think). They will send swatches and other materials by mail, but I'm not sure how I feel about that without being able to try it on and meet with the seamstress. I think I will check out the shop that sells them, though, because it's a bridesmaid shop so I could also look at white bridesmaids dresses while I am there. The shop also carries Jenny Yoo, which was recommended to me by Kim :)

Still looking...

Entertaining Thoughts (re: dress)

I am beginning to seriously entertain the thought of a custom-made dress. I have a feeling I am going to be too picky to find something in a salon or too weary to go to many, many department stores looking for the right evening gown that happens to be in stock when I am there. JewishGuy's cousin suggested this to me a while ago and now I am reading about it on various blogs.

My thoughts:

• PRO: I would be able to get the exact dress I want; CON: I don't know exactly what I want (I assume if I come in with pictures and drawings we would be able to work something out, if I find a good seamstress)
• PRO: I can take my time working on the dress because the wedding isn't until March - getting a custom-made dress means I won't be tied to the fashion "seasons;" CON: it will be a lot more involved than simply trying on a dress and going, this is it! Although, that is also a PRO, I think.
• PRO: I would be supporting a local businessperson, rather than a large company, which I like. CON: I probably will have to pick someone based entirely on their portfolio rather than ratings I find on the internet, which I have come to depend on.
• PRO: It may not be as expensive as most bridal salons, and I will get exactly what I want. CON: It will still be more expensive than an evening gown.

I think the PROs outweigh the CONs, so maybe I will start looking into this after we move to Chicago. This also takes a lot of stress off of me to find something while the summer/spring dresses are still out.

I don't know yet, but this is sounding like a better and better option. :)

Dress Shopping Attempt #1

Well, I wish I could say I found the dress.

Remember all those pretty white evening gowns I posted constantly? Well, they exist on the website, but not in the stores, so I couldn't try any of them on. There were NO white gowns in the stores. We went to a bridal shop and I tried on some expensive gowns, but wasn't overly thrilled even without the knowledge of each of them being $3300 minimum. (I know, my parents say, do not think about the money, but I am thinking about $3300 and how at least $2300 of that could be spent on something more fun)

It didn't help that I was put on some medications the night before that made me ridiculously drowsy, and I think we only made it to about 5 stores (in 3 hours) before I really had to go home. I probably shouldn't have been driving. Luckily, I am over that now, but unluckily it was the day when I wanted to be awake and excited and shopping. I am doing fine now, I was on some strong anti-nausea medicines that knocked me out and some strong antibiotics that weren't helping with the nausea, but now it's OK :)

Anyway, I am going to keep looking, but I am very annoyed at the stores for advertising these beautiful white dresses on their websites and then not putting them in their stores. People have suggested ordering them and then returning them, but I really have no idea what is going to look good on me, so this sounds like an unnecessarily expensive way to go about this.

L'sigh (dramatically).

The dress I'm not getting

Here are pictures of the dress I saw in Israel that I am now 100% sure I don't want to get. It looks amazing on the mannequin, and even though it fits me perfectly it still doesn't look amazing in pictures. Therefore, it is Rejected, but fondly Remembered.

A close-up should show the design on the fabric better, even though the picture was taken through the store window...

Pretty.

Dress Hunt Prep

We are preparing for the Great Dress Hunt of 08. CankeyB and DesignerChick are coming with me for a shopping extravaganza. It's going to be all afternoon + dinner, I think, because CankeyB has a photoshoot in the morning (yes! I am friends with someone who does photography for magazines! I feel so cool by association).

Since I don't want to spend most of my time in bridal shops that seem overpriced and not really what I want, we're going to go to two massive malls in the DC area while I am visiting next weekend. These malls should have enough stores that sell evening wear to have white evening gowns to choose from, as well as maybe some bridal shops. There are also bridal shops right near the malls just in case.

I was looking at the websites for these bridal shops near those malls and they are pretty pricey. One website had a ranking system for how expensive dresses were, and the lowest category was "Under $2,000." Eep! I do want to go to bridal stores but I just can't see myself buying a dress for more than $2,000, one that I'm only going to wear once in my life. It just doesn't make sense. I am going to focus on the white evening gowns, I think.

Also my goal is to give CankeyB and DesignerChick their color palettes to work from so they can shop for bridesmaids dresses at the same time, if they want. If only HillelLady could come! But it's a complicated weekend and she is way, way up North now. For the palettes, I am thinking of going to a paint store and picking up some paint samples so they can have real colors that they can keep with them for future reference. This means I'll have to decide on a palette in the next couple of days so they have time to buy their dresses while spring dresses are still in style. Otherwise they will have to wait until the last minute and hope they can find something at the beginning of the season.

...Maybe I will put together some kind of bridesmaid "kit" that I will also send to HillelLady in the great white North (I'm going to have to give her another name now that she doesn't work for Hillel). Color samples, dress suggestions, lists of important information (like dates, events I hope they can come to, etc), information on Jewish weddings, and other things. HillelLady is probably the only one of them to have been to a Jewish wedding before, and I've only been to three small ones so I also don't have much experience with it. Oh that would be cute. Maybe I will try to do that in the next couple of days, too...

Okay, well, I am making more work for myself so I'd better get moving!

The dress, no longer

I decided I don't want to get that dress from Israel. When I got home and looked at the pictures, I don't look very good in the dress - at least in pictures. And we're going to have a TON of pictures from the day, I assume, so I don't want to wear something that's going to make me look wider than I am.

Oh well!

Yay Tallit! & Dress stuff

I bought the tallit for JewishGuy! I happened to be walking around Jerusalem and stumble on this little shop for an artist who hand-weaves tallitot in Rehovot. She said she could make a custom one if I wanted, but I saw one in the shop that I think is perfect. I had my friend try it on so I could see what it looked like on someone, and I think it's good. He won't get to see it for a while, though! I'm not going to describe it here but it's nice, not crazy colorful, understated but I think he will like it. And if he doesn't like it, the lady said as long as it's clean and new we can bring it back next time we're in Israel (honeymoon?? :P). So that is nice to know.

In other news, I am glad I didn't spontaneously buy the dress. I showed my friend pictures of it on my camera last night and she seemed unenthused. Granted, she didn't know what I was looking for, but it doesn't matter, if she didn't think it looked good then maybe I was just caught up in the moment. Really, it's good I didn't buy it, because it was at the upper limit of what I wanted to spend on a dress! Plus I would have to carefully transport it back.