Hello! Today is the first edition of Wedding Wednesday. I have so much to share with you so I expect this to be an 8-10 week series! I chose this as the first post in the series because, let’s face it, the dress is always high on everyone’s post-wedding talk agenda.

I have been dreaming about my wedding dress since I was a little girl and with the introduction of reality TV shows like “Say Yes To The Dress” my dreams were only inflated. I am a pretty picky person, so I figured it would be quite the task to find the “perfect dress”. So, once we settled on a wedding date I started dress shopping. My mom and I went shopping one weekend last January in CT. We started at a small boutique in Farmington. They had a limited selection of dresses, so I only tried on 2 or 3. But I was able to rule out a ball gown at this appointment. Although beautiful, I felt completely consumed by the ball gown and the one I tried on had to have weighted 100 pounds, I could barely walk from the floor to the viewing platform, let alone down the aisle! I was really only considering a ball gown or A-line, so that really helped me narrow down my search.

Our next stop was Mariella Creations in Rocky Hill, CT. Dora, my dress consultant, took me up stairs to my own private room. She was so nice and very efficient. I told her that I knew for sure I wanted A-line and lace and that I wanted either long sleeves or strapless. She brought me several dresses to try on, all strapless and a few long sleeve overlays. Apparently, there are actually very few long sleeved wedding dresses these days (at least where I was shopping). Instead, there are these half jacket-like overlays that you pair with a strapless dress… I quickly bagged the idea of long sleeves when I saw these because I did not love the way they looked and they were outrageously priced… like 1/3 the price of the dress for a little piece of lace! Once I had decided to focus solely on strapless the process became surprisingly simple. I fell in love with the second dress I tried on at Mariella’s. I never got tears in my eyes, or really had a true “bridal moment”, but something about the way it made my ring sparkle (I know that’s weird, haha) and beautiful train trailing behind it I just knew it was the one.

I did not want to make a commitment on my first day wedding dress shopping after only trying on, at most, 10 dresses. So I planned for Steph, my maid of honor, to come down to DC a few weeks later to dress shop with Kelsey, a bridesmaid, and I in Old Town Alexandria. We battled near blizzard conditions on our shopping escapade. Aside from that, it was a lot of fun, but I did not love any of the dresses I tried on that day.

That was all the confirmation I needed to go back to Mariella’s and order “the dress”. My dress was by Allure Bridal. Dora did an amazing job fitting me. It needed a custom hem and I wanted the back lowered. When the dress came in in October I went and tried it on and it fit almost perfectly! Aside from adding a bustle and taking it in a pinch on the side lining it needed no other alterations (a huge relief because alterations can often get very pricey). The woman at the front desk in the Mariella’s alteration department said I was “the easiest bride she had seen”, which I owe entirely to Dora 🙂 

When Walter and I first got engaged I figured that wedding dress shopping would be one of the most fun, but also stressful parts of the wedding planning process. I assumed I would have a horribly difficult time deciding on a dress and want to keep looking and looking. But once I committed to my dress I never second-guessed it. I had no reservations about it, I just knew it would be the perfect dress and I did not worry about it. I want to thank everyone at Mariella Creations for such a warm, positive shopping experience. I would recommend them to any bride!

As a bride-to-be you have a lot of things to worry about, not the least of which is your bridal look. It is your one day to be completely transformed into your most beautiful self. All of your beauty decisions are coming together to form your desired bridal look. However, you don’t ever actually put all of the pieces together until the day of. I found having to see all the pieces separately and make decisions for one intangible look very stressful. But, I could not be happier with how they all came together. I have no regrets about any of my dress or beauty decisions. I am very grateful for that and feel extraordinarily lucky that it all came together how I dreamed it would 🙂