The Wedding Dress

Finished Projects 10 Minutes

As you’ve probably noticed, I’m not into blogging anymore. The world has gotten too weird and crazy since Covid, and in addition to not being keen on putting myself out there anymore I’m very busy doing other things. I made an exception this time though, because…

I got married!

We got formally engaged in June, and married 2.5 months later in August.

I did not want the standard 1-2 year engagement. Covid and everything that happened in the meantime had caused enough delays! I’m 37, he’s 43, and on top of dating for several years I’ve known him as a friend since I was 20. I had no doubts about his character or suitability as a husband. As soon as I had that ring on my finger I got to work planning the wedding!

There was a church:

flowers and candles:

My bridal bouquet
Reception centerpieces
Decorations behind the sweetheart table

and a cake!

Of course I made my dress.

With such a tight timeline I had to be extremely organized and deliberate in how I worked…and not too picky. We had a LOT going on in those 2.5 months. Some of that was directly related to the wedding, like Pre-Cana and wedding planning. But a lot of it was not at all related to the wedding, like dealing with the unending nightmare that is managing and settling his parents’ estate. (PSA: actually talk to your heirs about your wishes and expectations, both with regard to your estate and any potential health crisis. Make sure you make use of “payable upon death” and keep your beneficiaries updated. Consolidate accounts and make sure all of your documents are in order. As you get older and/or your health starts declining, try to de-clutter your home and keep it maintained. And if you have a child that is special needs, make sure there is an actual plan in place for them after you pass. No one likes to think about their eventual death and estates tend to bring out bad behavior in people, but doing this will make the process much less stressful for your executor(s) and/or successor trustee(s). As soon as my husband and I got married we made sure to update our beneficiaries, as this experience has taught us that it never hurts to be prepared.)

We had less than 30 people (including us) at our wedding and while the small size helped, it still takes time and effort to pull these things together. There wasn’t much time to second-guess and be picky. I had to make up my mind and work quickly to coordinate everything. I used Pinterest sparingly (helps with keeping costs down and expectations reasonable) and did not micromanage. I gave my vendors a general idea of what I wanted and what I was going for, then stepped back and trusted them to do their thing. I was not the least bit disappointed. Vendors have been there, done that, and know what works and what doesn’t work. Listen to them; they know what they are doing and want your event to be successful.

The Dress

Planning Stage

I actually didn’t already have a dress in mind, so I made a few muslins of various patterns to see how they looked.

At first I was going to make this dress, Burda 4/2017 #105:

During the muslin process I discovered a possible error in the pattern with the back waistband. I found all the gathering was getting annoying and would complicate fitting. Rather than spend my limited time trying to work it out, I decided to abandon it and try something else.

The next one up was Burda 3/2017 #110:

My mom urged me to try this one because of the elegant lines and feminine sweetheart neckline. While I loved the bodice, I wasn’t crazy about the skirt. It tapered too much and I didn’t like the back godet. I wanted less of a fishtail and more of a trumpet shape.

Next I tried Vogue V1616:

I liked the skirt on this one, especially with the little sweep train, but I found the bodice fit was pretty bad. It also lacked the feminine sweetness of the Burda pattern, so I didn’t have the patience to keep trying to make it work.

So for my final dress, I combined the bodice of Burda 3/2017 #110 with the skirt from Vogue V1616.

Fitting

I didn’t do a great job this time recording all of my adjustments because there was so much tweaking and this was a one-time project.

I started with a size 40 for the Burda bodice.

  • I moved the front princess seam inward 1/2″ on each side.
  • Lengthened the bodice 3/4″
  • Took in the back princess seams at the waist, I think around 1/2″ each
  • I found the straps very short as drafted, and they dug into my armpits and made the shaping of the princess seams too high. I had to lengthen the front and back bodice straps about 1″ each.
  • I found the back straps set very wide apart. They said that you can wear a normal bra with this bodice; I found that was not the case, at least not out of the envelope. I ended up taking in the middle back panels and widening the side back panels by the same amount (around 1/2″?) in order to get the strap to not be so wide-set. On my wedding day I wore a strapless bra with clear straps, and my husband dutifully applied double-sided tape in the back to ensure that my bra straps would not be visible and the top of the bra back would not peek out from under the dress.
  • I found the entire upper back was too wide, and had to take it in probably an inch or so.

I started with a 14 for the Vogue skirt. (14 in Vogue is like a 40 in Burda.)

  • I added some width to the hips, basically traced out to a size 18. I took in the upper back of the back princess seams the same amount as the bodice, and then tweaked the shape of the curve to match my lower back.
  • I found there was too much extra fabric in the front skirt, and it was too curved and didn’t hang right. I took in in the front princess seams to make them straighter, I think about 1/2″ each.
  • I had to lengthen the skirt much more than I thought I would, I think about 2-3″

I did a bunch of nips and tucks along the way, then took apart the muslin and transferred the adjustments to my pattern pieces before cutting out the dress.

Materials

For the fashion fabric I used the heavy crepe de chine from Dharma Trading. This is basically 4-ply silk crepe. This was the most economical source of four-ply silk crepe that I could find. The fabric requirements for this dress are on the more modest side so I could afford to splurge for a luxurious fabric. The nice thing about undyed silk is that the color is this very flattering color that isn’t bright white but not quite ivory. (I think they call it diamond white.)

I used Pro-Sheer Elegance Medium for the bodice and straps. The entire bodice and the straps are fully interfaced.

Per the book Bridal Couture by Susan Khalje, I underlined the bodice and skirt. To keep the character of the 4-ply silk crepe as unchanged as possible I used a silk crepe de chine I found in my stash, also from Dharma Trading. This made the dress nearly opaque, though it was maddening attaching everything by hand. Plus no matter how careful I was there was some shifting. With less of a time crunch I would have soaked the silk in gelatin to help stabilize it, but I didn’t want to have to prewash, soak, press, sew, then wash AGAIN to rinse out the gelatin and do all that pressing again.

The lining was a white superfine bemberg from Cleaner’s Supply. It was great for the skirt, but it had a tendency to stick to my skin during the heat and humidity. On the day of the wedding I dusted my torso with some translucent face powder before slipping into my dress, which helped a lot.

The zipper was an ordinary YKK invisible zip, also from Cleaner’s Supply. I was going to use a bridal weight zipper, but it was way too heavy duty for this style. Those are designed for bodices that are more structured, beaded, etc.

To finish the hem I used bridal tulle from Bodikian Textiles.

All my stitching was done with a lightweight silk thread.

Construction

Working with four-ply silk crepe is a dream. It has a thick, buttery feel and is much easier than other silks when it comes to pressing and sewing. I used a silk organza press cloth when working on the face of the fabric. When it came time to press the straps and neckline edge of the bodice I used a wooden clapper to make sure the edges would be nice and crisp.

I still had to adjust the fit once the dress was put together. I found that letting out the side seams for a total of 1″ more room made it not quite as form-fitting, but it was much more comfortable to sit in and flowed a bit nicer. Plus I didn’t have to worry about my side seams suddenly ripping apart in the middle of the ceremony. The downside is that despite my fine thread and needles the silk had tiny holes in the side seam from removing the stitching. I steamed it, I lightly misted it, I gently rubbed the holes with my fingers, but I still couldn’t make them entirely disappear. No one noticed though since you had to be very close and looking at the side seam in bright light.

When it came time to hem there was one section that was higher than the rest and as a result I had to hem my dress a good 3/4″ shorter than I had wanted. I had no choice but to shrug and let it go. It was actually it was a blessing in disguise because it was much easier to walk in, especially when we did our photos outside. I had a giant bouquet (2.5 pounds of flowers!) so I literally had my hands full much of the time and was glad to not be fussing with my dress anytime I needed to walk up a little hill or on uneven ground.

To do the hem I used the technique recommended by Kenneth King for 4-ply silk crepe. Since I had the underlining I was able to stitch the tulle to the underlining only, for a completely invisible hem.

I made my lining stop at the front hem length, rather than go all the way back to the train. I’m not sure if this is the proper way to do it or not, as I have zero experience with trains and I’m almost certain the Vogue pattern had you cut the lining the same length as the train, but at least I knew my lining would stay hidden the entire time. Since I had just a little sweep train I didn’t bustle it. It was easy enough to manage when I went around talking to our guests during the reception dinner.

After the muslin stage the entire process took me around a week, from start to finish. I remember I took a couple of days to cut it out and then spent an entire day constructing on the sewing machine, with another evening or two spent finishing up the lining, sewing the straps to the inside by hand, and pressing. I needed help with marking the hem so hemming was done separately a few weeks later, with another couple of evenings dedicated to sewing the hem in place by hand and doing final pressing.

To make things less chaotic the morning of the wedding we stayed at the reception venue the night before. I took along my steam generator iron and and pressing ham and gave my dress a blast of steam the night before hanging it up overnight. The morning of the wedding, while I was waiting for my hairdresser to arrive, I took my pressing ham and carefully pressed and steamed out any wrinkles I had missed the night before.

The Big Day

A lot of people, even random strangers, came over to say “I love your dress!” I was surprised as it was so simple compared to the usual bridal gown, with none of the usual beading and tulle and elaborate tucks and draping and sparkly trims. I felt like it was the right choice though for our daytime micro-wedding.

With such a simple dress I wanted a big cascading bouquet. My florist certainly delivered!

Originally I was going to use a beaded bridal belt, but I felt like it was too bulky and formal and just not the look I was going for. Instead I accessorized it with a simple ribbon and flower sash I found on Etsy. It fit perfectly within the front princess seams.

After the Wedding

The day went better than I thought it would. Everyone rallied around us! The children we had invited were so well-behaved that you wouldn’t have even known there were kids there. It was 90+ degrees and very humid but the church and reception venue were air conditioned. By the time we did our couple photos after the reception it was early evening and just starting to cool off a bit.

When I finally took my dress off at the end of the day it was in quite a state. Somehow bits of twigs and grass made their way between the tulle in the hem and the underlining, not to mention the hem was pretty frayed and dirty in some areas. Some of the hand stitching had come out from the tulle too. I decided to take a chance and washed it by hand. Despite being very gentle it shrunk quite a bit. I was not surprised or overly upset, as I didn’t prewash/preshrink the fabric and knew this had a high likelihood of happening. My work was captured in many photos and wedding dresses are not something you wear more than once. And as my husband pointed out: “I didn’t get to keep my tux!” I know people sometimes like to save dresses thinking that a possible future daughter might like to wear it, but I feel like if I had a daughter she would probably want to choose her own dress. I would happily make her a dress of her own choosing and she could always wear my earrings, hair clip, and/or sash. If she really wanted to have the same dress I still have the pattern.

People keep asking me how married life is. It is great, better than I thought I would be! Neither one of us has been married before so it has been an enormous life change, but adjusting to living together and operating as a new family unit has gone more smoothly than I anticipated. We’ve had a lot of support, and everyone has been super happy and excited for us.

Credits

Published

69 thoughts on “The Wedding Dress”

  1. CONGRATULATIONS!! You were a stunning bride, and the dress is beautiful. I’m so very happy for you!!! I admit I miss your blog posts so very much and was beyond excited to see your post pop up.

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    1. Thank you! I sometimes think about regularly blogging again, but I’d rather not be the next target of some random angry/bored/crazy person that happens to stop by. I’m a private citizen and not trying to do personal branding or promote a business, so it doesn’t seem worth the risk. Fortunately weddings seem to be one of the few things everyone gets happy about!

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      1. I understand, so sad that people like that ruin things for the rest of us who just appreciate your skills. If you ever decided to start a private blog I’d sure sign up to read! I learned so much reading your posts.

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  2. Oh Anne! Congratulations! The flowers, the cake, the setting … all beautiful. And the dress, I love it. You are the best at getting the perfect fit. I too have missed your posts. But I’m happy to see that you are happy. I wish you and your husband a life of love, joy and fun.

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  5. Congratulations! I wish you and your husband the very best.
    I missed also your posts in the last years. But now thank you for this wonderful post.

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  6. Congratulations! I’m so happy that you shared your lovely day and beautiful dress with us. I wish you a long and happy marriage.

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  7. Congratulations! It’s lovely to hear your happy news. Thanks for making time to share your day with us. All the best to both of you!

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  8. Congratulations and much happiness and contentment in your marriage.
    You had a lovely wedding and a gorgeous dress.
    I occasionally wondered how you were doing so I am happy to find out.

    All the best,

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  10. You are a beautiful bride, congratulations! I get it about not blogging regularly. I think I’ve only made one or two posts in the last 5 years! I still enjoy reading a few, (like yours) when they come up in the feed that I still check periodically, but not nearly so many anymore, and only WordPress blogs where I have the app. Marriage is awesome, I highly recommend it, but it does take some effort and care to really be great. After nearly two decades I can safely say “never stop dating! No matter how busy you are!” Is probably one of the biggest secrets to success. Others with longer marriages seem to concur. Congrats again, and if you decide to peek in with more sewing, we’ll love to see it. 😊

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    1. I checked myself last week and it seems a lot of people stopped blogging in favor of using social media.

      I think it is not only important to marry the right person but for the right reasons. You have to have similar goals and want the same type of lifestyle. And you have to have strong boundaries, high standards, and realize your value! In every other species the males do all sorts of crazy, impractical things to impress the females. Meanwhile women are socialized to bend over backwards to impress and accommodate everyone but themselves, and it never ends well.

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      1. Yeah, IG is a favorite for many, but I’m not a big fan. I actually quit using my account over a year ago. Last time I went to check it, my account was locked for suspicious activity or something. Oh well. I haven’t missed it and don’t need it.

        Oh yes, for sure all those things, I just meant after it was done. We had to take classes in preparation for getting married in our church, and there were a few couples who actually called their wedding off during the class. Sad, but it seems like people are too worried about how attractive someone is, or how much money they make instead of important stuff like how many kids you’d like, how they should be raised, how each person handles their finances, what roles (stay at home vs working, etc) are expected, and so on. Our class covered all of that, but honestly, coming from a divorced family I’d already scoped out much of that info beforehand (I had no idea there was a class for that). I wanted to have a marriage for life, and so far, so good! 👍

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        1. I’ve been off social media for around five years now, and I don’t miss it one bit. Not using it has has only benefited my mental health and happiness. Even when you know that a lot of what you see is heavily edited there’s always the temptation to compare yourself to others rather than stay focused on your own life journey.

          We had to do something similar as we had a Catholic wedding, though due to Covid the inventory and training is now done online. I found the online training rather unhelpful because it was obviously geared for much younger people that hadn’t had a lot of life experience, and a lot of the featured couples were difficult to relate to. I felt like it kind of told me stuff I already knew. I was asking one newlywed husband about the training (since he was also married in the Catholic Church this year) and he admitted that he really didn’t know because his wife had done most of it for the two of them! Meanwhile it took my husband and I many hours to make our way through all of the videos because he insisted that we watch it in person together, and we would have a discussion after each video.

          I feel like while poor communication can cause couples to drift apart over time, a lot of marriages I know of that failed were due to immaturity, selfishness, personality disorders, addiction, lack of respect, in-law issues, mental health issues, etc. No matter how much the wronged spouse communicated their distress, the other person just didn’t care enough to actually work on the issue.

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  11. I, too, have been missing your posts and was delighted when your post appeared this morning. Your wedding dress was absolutely lovely. The style was a great choice and you did a beautiful job on it. Wishing you and your husband a long and happy life together! Selfishly wishing that you find a way to share your sewing skills with us in the future.

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  12. Congratulations A.! I’ve often thought of you over the past few years and wondered how you were doing so this post came as a really pleasant surprise…in a couple of ways!! You look radiantly happy and healthy and in the pics – so nice to see.

    Thank you for chronicling your wedding dress project for us. Your posts were always such a delight to read through with all of their details and pics. I’m sorry to hear that you were subject to unpleasantness as a result of your effort to share your love of sewing with us and hope that, if you decide to do it again, your experience will be free of that.

    Wishing you both a wonderful future together!

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    1. Thank you! Ironically, during a time the world is a total mess, my personal life has never been better. I am mindful about what I eat: plenty of meat, dairy, fruits, and vegetables, minimal to no grains, and using olive oil and animal fats instead of seed oils. I also take a few choice supplements like magnesium L-threonate, Vitamin C and D, a methylated B-vitamin complex, and the freeze dried beef liver, intestines, spleen, and fish eggs from Ancestral Supplements. It has made a huge difference in my general health and how I feel. Waking up in the morning is easy, I rarely get sick, and I’m pretty strong despite not really having a formal exercise routine. There’s a noticeable decline when I get too lax about my dietary choices. I envy the people that can exist entirely on take-out and processed foods and still keep going!

      I had some minor unpleasantness years ago and while nothing has recently happened, I just feel like people are so volatile now. It is a real turn-off.

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  13. Huge congratulations on your marriage, and best wishes for your future together. I absolutely love your dress, and I’m so impressed you made it – so beautifully – in such as short timeframe!

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    1. Thanks, it wasn’t easy! But I felt like I had more control making my own vs buying something off the rack and trying to “retrofit” it. I would have had to spend three times what I did if I bought a silk wedding dress off the rack too.

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  14. So happy to hear from you! I do miss your blog. I wish you and your husband all the happiness in the world! Just an FYI, my aunt did not save her wedding dress for her daughters. They re-made it into a christening gown. All her children wore it, all her grandchildren wore it. And now, her great grandchildren are wearing it!

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  16. It is stunning! Oh my gosh I’m so happy for you. I read your blog religiously back in the day and was so excited when you popped up in my Feedly. Congratulations to you both, may you have a long and happy marriage.

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  17. Congratulations on your wedding and marriage, Anne! I wish you and your husband nothing but love and happiness well into your future, it sounds like you are well matched in values and temperament, which I think is so important.
    It makes me so happy to see your name pop up in my reader, I have missed reading your blog. I’m sorry that you’ve experienced unpleasantness: you don’t deserve that. I’m sorry to hear that you won’t be blogging nore regularly, you’re one of my favourites to read as we have a similar approach and style: indeed, when you wrote your piece on masks, I immediately chose that as my mask pattern of choice as I knrw that you would have carefully considered the options and picked the best fit. I ended up making about 100 to distribute between friends, and uniformly the feedback was that they were the best fitting and most comfortable to wear.
    I hope that you do consider doing a private blog when you have more time to do projects: I would absolutely subscribe!

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    1. I said for a long time he needs a good woman…little did I know it would be me 😉

      My sewing production isn’t nearly what it was before. I felt like the clothes I had already made were enough for a while, plus with all the lockdowns and mandates I admit I just didn’t care to dress up much. I also found some RTW pants that were amazing and fit perfectly off the rack too. Unfortunately they stopped making them and my current ones are getting pretty worn, so I’m going to have to DIY again! I did keep one brand new pair to use as a reference. At least I have more dedicated space to sew in now, even though I’m still slowly moving my mountain of fabric over to my new home.

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  18. So many good wishes and lots and lots of congratulations!! You have always been so talented, it only makes sense that you would create such a fabulous dress for your wedding. And in such a short time! Fearless! You look gorgeous and thank you for posting an update for all your long time readers. All the very best to you!

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  19. Many congratulations on your wedding and marriage! You look radiant in these photos, and I loved reading about the dress construction. Seconding everyone else’s comments about how nice it was to see you pop up in my feed, too.

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  20. My best wishes for you and your husband as you start your life together. The road is not always bump free, but my husband and I have found that together we can manage just about anything. I read your process as you made your gown with great interest. In 1976 I made my wedding gown as well. It was not as beautiful as the gorgeous gown you fashioned, but it was a joy to make, and it fit our budget. All of your pictures show a delightful wedding .Congratulations

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    1. I’m sure you did a great job, and more importantly you were married at the end of the day while staying within your budget. I cannot imagine going into debt to pay for a wedding but people do it all the time. It just seems like a stressful way to start your new life together. But then again there’s a lot of social pressure surrounding these things, especially in the age of social media and Pinterest. Some peers of mine had very nice big weddings and ten years later they said they mostly did it due to social pressure and if they could have done it all over again they would have done something much smaller and simpler. And these were people that had good jobs and/or generous parents and could easily afford it. I kept this in mind when planning my own, though I never wanted a large wedding for myself.

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  22. Congratulations to you both, and best wishes for happiness.
    I have missed your blog as I learned so much from it.
    Even if you are not as prolific as before, I hope you will post in from time to time with your projects.

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  23. So many congratulations on your marriage and your stunning dress! I was so happy to see your post; you have always been one of my favourite bloggers. Your day looked like it was just perfect, and I wish you many happy years together.

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  24. Congratulations on your union! You both look so happy, so beautiful! If you are done with blogging, I understand and appreciate the time you did give us. I loved the knowledge you shared here. I wish you every happiness in the future. And you are so right about arranging your will and estate matters!

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    1. Thank you! And yes, people really need to be very careful about arranging their will and estate matters. For example, it seems to be getting more and more popular to put your house into a trust as part of estate planning, but most insurers either don’t insure homes held in a trust or limit the coverage so much that you’re left significantly unprotected.

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  25. Congratulations, and I will echo what others have said, that it was great to see your blog entry pop up! I always enjoyed your writing, and I especially loved whenever animals made an appearance. Best wishes to you both!

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  28. Really enjoyed your detailed explanations of fit changes in your blog posts, which gave me the courage to do some for myself. Always enjoyed seeing the patterns you made and, like the other commenter, knew that your suggestion of mask pattern would be good, which was also fed back from many people I made them for. It is also nice to think of that knowledge zipping around the world – Italian pattern recommended from the USA and made up in UK. Thank you. Verona

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  29. Congratulations! Your dress is gorgeous and just perfect for you! I have certainly missed your blogs–I have read them all and enjoyed each and every one. You are an inspiration! I hope to see more blog posts when you have time. Congratulations, once again!

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  31. Congratulations on your marriage and best wishes for a long and happy life together. I was checking out patterns on StyleArc and seeing your picture showing pants you had sewn compelled me to look up your blog and see if you were posting any longer. I was thrilled to find this post. You were always one of my favorite bloggers. I loved the detailed information your posts gave and the items you sewed were so beautifully made. I don’t believe I ever commented back in the day, so let me take this opportunity to thank you for all the blogging you did for so many years!

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  32. I’m a little late in finding this but wanted to add my congratulations on your wedding. You were a beautiful bride in every way. I too have missed your blog posts and have often wondered how you were if I saw a reference to a pattern you had made, probably a Style Arc!
    Best wishes for your future happiness.

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  34. Oh Anne – I am so happy for you. You look lovely in your dress, and the warmth and joy of the day shows through. Like so many others, I learned so much from your blog through the years. I can honestly say that I would not be the quality sewer I am today without them. So, thank you.

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  36. First time I’ve been back to your page since before Covid; a fitting end to it all. You looked lovely. I didn’t get married until I was 30 and Sunday will be our 47th wedding anniversary.

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  37. So Happy For YOU! It’s unanimous we all miss your blog. I learned so much from you. I’m sorry for the way you were treated when you put so much of yourself and all that work into your blog. Some people are so small that the only way they can feel better is to try to diminish others. You are undiminishable! You soar and your happiness is the best revenge. Best of everything to you.

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    1. Cancel culture is absolutely terrible now! I see what happens to people and it really scares me the lengths others will go to destroy every aspect of their life. It seems like it got a lot worse after covid too. It makes me very uncomfortable at the thought of inviting that into my own life. Seems like no one can just chill and relax anymore!

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  38. Hi Anne
    I too was missing your very insightful, descriptive posts. Congratulations on your marriage. Your dress is beautiful. A very radiant bride.
    Also congratulations on your expected arrival of your baby boy. Enjoy parenthood.
    Kind regards
    Sue. X

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  39. Congratulations on your marriage and new baby to be. I saw the notice email of your maternity pants and checked back and there was a wedding blog. You and your dress were lovely.

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  40. Congratulations!! I’m so impressed that you mulsined more than one style, given your short time frame. The end result is stunning. I’m happy to have found your blog again.

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  41. I wondered what happened to you. I’ve been getting email updates from you for ages and suddenly nothing. I’m so happy for you–Congratulations to you both. You were a beautiful bride and I love the elegance and simplicity of your wedding. Lovely ring too. Now you’re going to have a baby soon so congratulations on that too.

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    1. Thank you! My engagement ring is a deep blue 1.55 ct sapphire and was less than half the cost of what a similar diamond ring would have been. Of course now I am starting to have a bit of swelling from the pregnancy and warmer weather so for now it is safely tucked away.

      I think when you get married later than average (late 30s in my case) it is easier to stick to what you actually want for wedding budget, size, etc and not feel so beholden to what you feel you “should” do. I know so many people that wish they had spent less, but hardly any wishing they had spent more. I also feel more confident about advocating about what I want in this impending journey into motherhood and as a result I don’t feel like I am facing the same pressure and unwanted suggestions that younger mothers-to-be often face.

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      1. When I got engaged eons ago, I also chose a sapphire ring instead of a Diamond ring. I also wanted a small wedding with just close friends and family, but I was living in England at the time and my father wanted to throw a big party, so we had about 250 people and I spent the night going around to everyone greeting them. I didn’t have any fun at my wedding and was the first to leave! I think your choice was perfect. That way, you could truly enjoy your party! Congratulations again.

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        1. 250…not sure I even know that many people! I felt intimidated enough with less than 30 people looking at me walk down the aisle with my dad! My husband and I covered the cost of everything ourselves so that gave us ultimate control in the size, venue, etc. It was what we wanted and very much a cherished, unique memory for us as a couple.

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  42. I’m late to the party – but congrats to you both! You did an amazing job pulling this together in the timeframe you had, and the outcome is just so beautiful. Simple, elegant, classic and so very flattering. I absolutely love the colour of your bouquet, especially that lovely shot of you at dusk! All the best for your impending arrival, and if you do start up a private blog, I’d love to be a reader (I don’t have the time or energy to document like I used to, and a part of me misses it).
    Best,
    Melanie

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  43. Hi Anne, I pulled up your Wedding Dress post to look at your sources (so helpful). Just an FYI, the Esty vendor for the flower sash is using a photo of you and a photo of you and your husband on their Esty site.

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