Finding Danielle
Disclaimer: I know I neglected the blog last year. I have said to many of you that I treated wedding planning like my work "to do" list. Unfortunately that didn't include documenting some of the funny moments from planning... and at times it didn't even include sending newsy emails to friends about life. I realized this when I was catching up with Cooley (soon to be Bruggie) and Sauce (via email) a few weeks ago. So I hope you'll indulge me with a few retroactive posts about some of our planning during 2011. This post goes out to my many close friends who are busy planning their weddings! I can't wait to celebrate you all.
One of the more fun events in planning the wedding was finding the dress. In talking to friends and reading articles, I know wasn't the only bride out there who didn't really grow up planning every detail of the day, so I didn't have much of an idea of what I wanted to wear. I did have a budget in mind though, so I started scoping out upcoming sample sales in the DC area online in November and December. One particular dress caught my eye. It was an Ulla-Maija dress featured online as part of the preview of the January sample sale at Hitched in Georgetown. I emailed some of my DC girls to find out if anyone else (three of us were engaged at the time!) wanted to brave the crowd on a Thursday afternoon to scope out the steals. Four of them awesomely agreed to join.
I took off a few hours early from work to meet my girls to go stake out a good place in line. I am kicking myself now that I don't have any pictures of the five of us psyching ourselves up with Prosecco at the cafe next door to the shop before the doors opened at 5. We created a strategy. Julie had a "connection" inside the shop and I had written down two dresses. Number one on the list was the Ulla-Maija dress I'd spotted two months before - style name Danielle. It seemed like the instant the doors flew open Julie's curls disappeared and we had the dresses in-hand. You were only permitted to take two dresses into the room with you, and there were so many ladies there you had to share dressing rooms. I put Danielle on but I just wasn't sure. She seemed to be just what I was looking for, but it was the first wedding dress I'd ever worn. I looked at Julie and she said something along the lines of "Girl, just give it a few minutes." Just then the shop owner poked her head into the room and said "Does anyone in here have the Danielle dress? We've got two people who want to try it on." Well, this had just become a competition. Perfect.
