Wedding Wednesday: The Dress

Last week kicked off the Wedding Wednesday series with an overview of our big day we love to relive memories from over and over again even two months later. We are newlyweds, it's allowed, right? Thanks.

Today is all about the dress. I am somewhat of a downer in the sense that I don't really believe in finding the perfect dress. There is so much built up to this one day and one dress that it puts undue pressure on brides to look and feel their absolute best. Quite honestly I felt completely normal and natural on my wedding day and that is the way I think it should be.

When I went dress shopping I knew a few basic things I wanted it to have: 1. A casual and fun yet elegant feel. We planned on having a garden springy wedding and I wanted the dress to go along with that whole vibe. 2. Modest yet flattering. Feeling comfortable and beautiful was huge in my book. I desired something that was true to my style and represented me. 3. Sleeves. Sleeves. Sleeves. My one specific was a dress that had some sort of a sleeve.

I found "the dress" at the second store we went to (The Wedding Shoppe in St. Paul, MN-I highly recommend it) after trying on several other styles and types of dresses. I wasn't sold. Let me tell you, everyone else in the room with me was but it took a bit more convincing for me. Believe it or not the dress didn't have sleeves originally. It had straps that barely graced the top of my shoulders but no sleeves like I had really desired.

After dwindling it down to two dresses, this one and another that was much more formal but did have sleeves, I was confused and overwhelmed. The decision was finally made to compromise my desired sleeves for the overall look and feel of this dress. As the months went by I began to doubt my decision more and more. I went through periods of feeling like I choose the wrong dress and hating the one I ended up with.

Here my friends is where my philosophy on wedding dresses comes into play. My non-married friends, there will probably always be a better dress for you out there, it's disheartening but true. I encourage you to not focus on finding the perfect dress because it will stress you out and put undue pressure on choosing a dress that makes you feel most like you. Feel confident in what makes you feel beautiful and go with it!

Okay end of rant. So I picked up my dress in January and simply out of curiosity asked what the chances were of ordering extra lace to make sleeves for my dress. Thinking this is a one in a million chance I did not have my hopes up. But sure enough my friends, do you see sleeves on my wedding dress? That is right, it worked! We ordered in extra lace fabric and my wonderful alterations lady whipped up some sleeves as easy as that.

Everything came together just in time and bada-bing-bada-boom it transformed into the "Laura" dress I had been searching for. Jacob's biggest question the entire engagement was what I would do with my head. His wondering mind simply could not imagine how I would wear a veil with being bald. Sticking with the garden springy theme I decided to wear a simple flower crown to jazz up my head a bit. Paired with a pearl bracelet and lace oxford shoes that matched the bridesmaid's, the whole look came together.