Ahh Thursday. The day that separated the men from the boys.
Thursday I wore black shorts with this great, loose black and white striped top. It doesn’t sound like much, but is actually a very 90′s-chic get-up when worn together, for realsies!
This will be a good time to introduce the Thursday-Saturday dress siege. Probably the closest I came to outright wedding disaster. See, I had gone to the wedding “salon” place back in April to pick up my dress after having its alterations done. In the back of my mind I noticed something a bit off on the side seam where the waist had been taken in- just a little pucker/budge of excess fabric sticking out of the side. At the time I was so in love with the dress and busy getting to know it, I didn’t read too much into it- and the alterations broad brushed it off as “boning.” RIGHT. Boning my boney butt, LADY.
Unfortunately none of this had occurred to me yet. However, my uneasiness did grow as I tried it on a second time when Jeff was out of town at his bachelor party over Memorial Day. It occurred to me that for an extremely simple dress with NOT a lot going on, every component of it kind of had to be a slam dunk for it to work. AKA, the tumor of chiffon jutting out of the side of me might, actually, be sort of a problem.
STILL I took no action. When I made it home on Wednesday, I tried on the dress for a third time in front of my mom and sister, asking them if they thought I should be worried about my little bulge issue. I expected I big old “NAH! Bridal over-analysis, SILLY BRITCHES!” and instead got that sharp intake of breath through the teeth with accompanying raised eyebrows.
RUT ROH.
So, Thursday I threw the dress in the car and set out to fix this dilemma. First, I dropped Jeff off at the spa for some epic groom pampering- actually my birthday gift to him (which was about 2 weeks before the wedding!). He still has no insecurities telling everyone what a content recipient of a massage, facial, manicure, and pedicure he was. This is a special the spa marketed as the “the gentleman’s special,” which Jeff also delighted in referring to as “the gentleman’s package.” What a winner, I tell you! : )
I considered driving the dress back to the salon, but with it being close to an hour away, nixed the idea. Instead, I became possibly the first bride in the history of the universe to drop off my dress at the dumpy neighborhood dry cleaners for alterations three days from go-time. The very nice seamstress lambasted the original butcher of my dress and told me to come back Friday night for it. Good enough for me!
From the parking lot, I had my last check-in with the band to go over final details. Then I called my mother and we got in a fight over the groom’s cake. Then I stopped to get my engagement ring cleaned and switched over to my “decoy” e-ring, putting the real thing in a clean quarantine until the rehearsal. I went back to the spa to check in with Jeff (they fed him a gourmet lunch between treatments… being a groom is hard work, I know).
And off I went again! By now it was a sunny afternoon and things were starting to feel closer : ) Bridesmaid Kim arrived in town. I drove across the river to get a sneak peak from the florists, after having received an ominous call while drying my hair that morning that the flowers were in, and “possibly not what you were envisioning.” Sure enough, I was a bit disappointed to find buckets full of MAGENTA flowers instead of blush pink, and PEACH flowers instead of light peach-y pink. And YES I know I sound ridiculous saying that, but there is a BIG difference between light, blush, pastel peachy-pink and PEACH. SALMON peach. CREAMSICLE peach.
Oddly, I wasn’t all that worked up about it. After a year and a half of fussing over every little wedding detail, I kind of had a “the die is cast” attitude by three days out. Peach flowers, magenta flowers, WHATEVS. The show would go on. We were getting married! (suckahs.) Oh also going behind the scenes at the florist was super cool.
That was it for the errands. I fetched my preened and polished groom and back home we went. Thursday night was absolutely one of the best parts of the weekend. I sat around my parents’ dining room table with my mama, sis, auntie, and Bridesmaids Kim and Michele. We finished putting together the programs, made cones for the petal toss, and then sat up till 11:00 making the big flower initials. So, so fun! All the boxes and decor and crap got labeled and lined up for tomorrow, when we would load up for the hotel!
