Wedding 2010 - Rebecca

My first wedding was with Rebecca, my sister. We needed to find a dress that would cover her religious clothing she would be wearing for the temple (aka something with sleeves, please!). Now how hard is it to find a dress with sleeves? Well before Princess Catherine set a gorgeous new standard in 2011, sleeves, let alone decent straps, were harder to come by here in New England than gold encrusted edible ice cream...if that's even edible...

I remember going to the bridal shops with Rebecca, trying on dress after dress, and one of her sisters asked "Why are we doing this? We can't possibly find a dress that will be modest out here!" But she was missing the point. With each dress she tried on Rebecca would say "I love the lace," "I love this mermaid style dress," "I love the frills on the bottom of this dress," "I love this going across the bustline," etc, and I would sit and listen to all the things she loved. 

One evening I was browsing my favorite website etsy.com, and I typed in several different words describing wedding dresses, just for fun...and I found...THIS!

I quickly ran and showed Becca - it was all the things she wanted, combined into ONE dress! A miracle!! All we had to do was line the inside of the shoulder straps, make some cap sleeves to match and it would work! Becca emailed the designer and found out that this dress could be ready for her in...gulp...one week before the wedding. Could I be able to fix this dress in time? I was up for the task!

So the week before the wedding came, and so did this dress. It was a little different, because we found out that the entire lace was beaded by hand. Incredible! She loved it. But since it was a true mermaid style, it was so tight around the thighs she couldn't seem to sit down all the way! I was going to have to take out the sides a bit.

I literally gave my daughter to whatever family was in the house, and went to work from 8am-11pm every day to get this dress done. I bought fabric and beads that almost matched the dress perfectly (enough that no one would know). When I took out the sides of the dress I hand sewed the same pattern of beads as on the rest of the dress. I lined the inside shoulders with a stretchy white satin fabric, which definitely helped in a comfortable fit. The sleeves I used similar lace, the stretch satin underneath, and hand sewed the beads on top and attached them to the dress. Lastly, I put hooks on the train and back to bustle up the back train so she could be able to walk and dance without tripping on her train. Thursday afternoon I shouted throughout the house "THE DRESS IS DONE!" She tried it on, and what do you know?

Beautiful, right? Well not as beautiful as when she wore it the day of her wedding! When her husband saw her in the dress, all he could say was "WOW!" When she stepped into the sun, she sparkled like the brightest diamond you ever saw. It was a success (and a miracle on such a short time!)

And they lived happily ever after!