When you get engaged, what’s the first thing you do? Buy bridal magazines! And of course the magazines are filled with pages and pages of advertisements for wedding dresses. And you mark the pages you want, go the websites and drool, and start dreaming of your wedding dress.
When choosing your dress, the number ONE rule is: DO YOUR HOMEWORK!

• Look at all the different designers and styles.
• Go and try some on, with NO intentions of buying at all.
• Know what style and fabric you like.

Well, I made a huge mistake. I did look at what I liked. I knew what style I liked. I knew I wanted lace. But I didn’t buy it. I bought something different than what I had been looking for. It was the first time trying on dresses, and the first store I went to. I went to another store, didn’t find what I wanted, and went back and got the dress. I was rushed due to other people’s schedule constraints. I wanted my wedding dress.

Don’t get caught up in the moment!

I now tell all of my friends that they are NOT allowed to buy a dress on the first day of looking. So now I’m sharing that advice with all of you.

I should have known, my mom should have known, my sister should have known. Maybe if my best friend had been there, she would have known. When buying a SHIRT, I have to search all of the stores in the mall before buying it. We should have known.
5 months after purchasing the dress and 3 months of the dress sitting in the dress shop, I became very upset. I could not walk down the aisle and be married in the dress I had. It just wasn’t me. I thought about it for months. I tried to convince myself that it was fine, that I did like it. It sounds awful, but it happens all too often to other brides.

So, I went on a covert mission-to a different bridal shop by myself. I tried on dresses in their “Boutique” section of the store (aka cheaper than the $5000 dresses), and found 2 dresses I loved so much better than the one I had.
Then I brought my sister there. She loved it. My wonderful husband (then fiance of course) saw how upset I was and said it was okay to put the dress on our credit card so my parents wouldn’t have to buy another dress. He hadn’t even seen the first dress or the new dress. What a keeper.
So I told my mom. She was NOT happy. She didn’t speak to me for a few days, and I finally convinced her that I really wanted her to see it before I purchased it. So she did. She convinced ME to keep looking, since the dress I had found wasn’t PERFECT.

Well, I didn’t get THAT dress, but a whirlwind of going to stores within a 120 mile radius began. I knew the brand I wanted, and it had to be lace. When I wasn’t completely in love with anything, I went to the designer’s website that I frequented pretty much every day, and wrote down all of the style numbers of the dresses I liked. I then emailed and called stores that were further than a one hour drive, and asked them how many of those styles they had.
Having done my research, my mom drove down to Bonita Springs (2.5 hour drive) with me one Thursday morning. We walked into the small store and dresses just lined the walls. It was amazing how much they fit in a tiny store! I probably tried on 20 dresses, and we were there for 3 hours. The dress I ended up getting wasn’t even on the rack- they had just received it the day before, and it came straight out of the box. Thankfully, for this reason, we were able to take it home with us that day.

I was so blessed that my mom was agreeable with this whole ordeal, and she did admit that my new dress was so much better than the first one. And yes, I’m still absolutely in love with it. I’m planning on wearing it for our 10 year anniversary. That’s the plan anyways.

The moral of this story is: Don’t buy a dress the first day you look!