First Un-Official Fitting

Dave doesn't read this blog, so I'm safe posting this.

As many of you know, I bought my dress on Ebay from a bridal salon that sells their samples online. While I was able to get a gorgeous expensive dress for not so much cash, I sometimes think that I've really missed out on the whole bridal shop experience. Unlike other brides, I don't have scheduled fittings, a seamstress, or that long wait for my gown to come in from the designer. I also do not have pictures of myself in the store sample gown to show friends and family who ask.

That aside, people ask me a lot about my dress, and I don't mind sharing unless their name is, well, Dave! For a brief time, I considered psyching him out by dropping hints about my dress; a 'fake' dress that is. I thought about making him think that I had some giant, poofy gown with lots of jewels, a corset back, and pickups in the skirt (no offense to such brides, it's simply not our thing). It might have been fun to make him imagine me showing up on July 12th in a mermaid gown and veil (two things he not so much as said 'don't even think about it' to), but I decided to play nice. While he doesn't know what my gown looks like, I'm pretty sure he knows that it's not a poofy princess dress.

Until now, nobody has seen me properly in the dress; going back to the bridal shop experience I never had that 'first fitting' when my dress came in. Instead, I've been at home with the gown tucked neatly away on the guest bed, laid out flat in a white sheet waiting for the day when I felt I had done enough workouts to actually look good in it.

I fell in love with this dress when I found it online, and while I never expected to land myself in a strapless gown we found that it really was the best neckline for my narrow shoulders. The caveat? It was a good size or more too small, and yes, I bought it anyways! Something about this dress begged me to bring it home; it was the perfect combination of simplicity and elegance.

So I've spend the last 6 months running with my dog and doing weight sets. I've really enjoyed getting back into great shape and it was so rewarding when I was able to put the whole thing together for the first time.

I found 'pearl' jewelry on clearance at Kohl's (A necklace and earrings that I would have paid full price for) which are an amazing match for my dress. Not only that, but after budgeting $100 for a strapless long-line bustier I was able to find one for much, much less. The dress fits and I couldn't be happier with how it looks!

I love how the color of the fabric photographs, and the silk satin looks so rich. In June my mom will help me make any alterations (right now it's a perfect fit, if I lose any more weight it will need to be taken in, wow!) and we'll decide on a bustle for the train.

The sash presents a unique problem as far as bustling goes. While it can be removed after the ceremony, the sash is 90% of the reason I love this gown so much, so that's not an option. The only photo I could find of this dress all bustled up on another bride is very tiny, so I did a Google Image search for bustle photos of Amsale's famous blue sash gown (of which my gown was inspired, I'm sure). I loved the way this bride bustled her sash gown: a simple french bustle on the train with the sash tied up over it, leaving a small sweep train to brush the floor.

I really like bustles on wedding gowns; it's very interesting to see how brides pick up their train off the floor. It's important to me that in doing the bustle, it makes the dress. The bustle is worn longer than the train is down, so it has to be something that makes sense visually and design-wise, rather than just be a way to get the train out of the way!

DIY Bridal Bouquet

As with the bridesmaids pomanders, we chose to use silk hydrangeas for my own personal bouquet. I though a pomander might have been awkward for me to walk down the aisle with, so I opted for a more traditional hand-tied bouquet. I chose ivory hydrangeas and decided that it would be best to keep it as simple as possible.

Originally I had planned on the addition of purple berries to this bouquet, however when placed it looked like the flowers had measles! The addition of a few purple and yellow hydrangeas were just as bad, and Dave and I both agreed that the bouquet would be best as-is with just the ivory hydrangeas and green leaves.

I used 5 stems of flowers, which I arranged so they formed a full, round ball and secured with green floral tape. The leaves were places using floral wire and hot glue, and the bouquet was finished using ivory and purple ribbon wrapped around the stems.

Like the pomanders, the bouquet looks professional and real, compliments my dress, and goes well with the elegant mountain theme. I think a lot of people expected us to go with a more busy, wild-flower like bunch-type bouquet, but this is one thing I wanted to be somewhat traditional about.

I don't want things that distract from the mountain backdrop, so this seemed quite appropriate and I'm thrilled with both the result, and the fact that nobody has to be put on 'flower duty' the weekend of the wedding!

Break-a-Way Toss Bouquet

Today's project was inspired by both my desire to do something different than a usual bouquet toss, and by a bride who had come up with this fun and unexpected idea and posted her project online to inspire other brides.

I made a 'Break-a-way' toss bouquet, that when thrown will break into 5 smaller bouquets for the girls to catch. Each one is hand tied of purple silk carnations and has a fortune attached to it's ribbon:

a. You will marry your best friend
b. You will be the next to marry
c. You will marry the man of your dreams
d. You will find your true love this year
e. You will fall in love when you least expect it

I used three carnations in each bouquet, and satin ribbon wrapped around the stems to hold them together. A hot glue gun came in handy for securing the ribbon ends, which were wound tightly so the flowers are going nowhere!

For the fortune, I used a length of the same ribbon we'll be making belly bands for the invitations out of. I printed the text on plain white paper and used hot glue to attach it to the green invitation ribbon. I also added an ivory shimmer card stock flower (found at Michael's, Brides.com table confetti) for effect.

Held together, the bouquet looks like a large, round bridal bouquet. Once tossed, it falls into the individual pieces and offers a fun surprise. Another easy, DIY project!