Say I LOVE IT to the dress!

I found my dress! I took a few days off of work to go down to Houston this week to do a mad rush of wedding planning with my mom. We looked at 7 receptions sites, 4 bridal shops, and a cake baker (all in 3 days!). I won't post pictures of the dress in case a certain fiancé is reading this, but here are reviews of the bridal shops I went to:

Jill's Fashions (League City):
I've been told this is THE place that Houston-area débutantes go for their gowns. There were certainly a lot of high school girls looking for prom dresses! I was not impressed with the small selection of wedding dresses at this shop - I tried on a few dresses, but none were really my style. The staff was more focused on the high school girls, and didn't help us navigate the bridal area or ask what I had in mind for my dress. To be fair, we did not make an appointment beforehand. We left pretty quickly.

Houston Bridal and Formal Gallery:
This shop is in a beautiful old house, and has a very nice staff. I brought along pictures of what I wanted, which they asked to see before anything else to get an idea of what to show me. Their selection was smaller than I expected, but they had absolutely beautiful dresses. I found a couple that were definite possibilities, but were a bit out of my price range. This shop has trunk shows regularly, which I planned to visit if I hadn't found the dress.

Anna's Bridal:
The dresses in this shop looked more like white prom dresses than bridal gowns to me: lots of beading, flash, and cheap fabric. I wanted something more traditional and demure. I did NOT want to look like a teenage princess. We found a couple dresses that were somewhat similar to what I was looking for, but they always went a bit over the top. We didn't find any serious possibilities here.

Weddings by Debbie:
This is where I found the dress! This is a huge shop with a huge selection. They have several mid-priced and couture designers, but the biggest selection is by designer Audrey Hart. Their Audrey Hart dresses have a big price range and a big style range, plus if you find something by another designer that you like, the store can arrange to have her make it custom for you for cheaper. They carry many more designs than are even on her website.

I searched and searched through their hundreds of dresses, and didn't have much luck until I had about 10 minutes before the store closing. I saw a dress on a mannequin that I thought was so-so but might as well try on. As soon as I put it on, I completely changed my mind. I started petting the fabric (which the saleswoman says happens when brides find "the" dress). The saleswoman put a veil on me, and I was SOLD! I started to tear and blush! The dress wasn't at all what I started out looking for, but I fell in love.

General tips for bridal gown shopping:

1. Take advantage of trunk shows if you're interested in a particular dress or designer. Most bridal shops only carry a subset of a designer's line, based on what they think their clients will be interested in. I had a certain dress I wanted to try on by a designer, but none of the shops who claimed they carried that designer had the right dress. Check the website of your local bridal shops for their trunk show schedule, or check the website of the designer for his trunk show tour dates.
   
2. Don't get discouraged if the search takes a while. At one point during my search for the dress, I was at the last shop of the day after dozens of dresses, and a girl was trying on her second dress EVER next to me. She walked out of her dressing room, and said "Yep, this is it. That was easy!" I really wanted to push her over! I felt like I would never find the perfect dress. But I did! And it will happen for you too!
3. Get emotional about it. When I started looking, I was totally business-like about finding the dress. I had a criteria that the dress had to meet, and I overlooked anything that didn't meet it. If I had kept going like that, I could have walked out with a dress that I didn't LOVE. Wait for the dress that makes you blush, tear up, and imagine your husband-to-be seeing you walk down the aisle in it. THAT's the one you want to splurge on!
4. Don't focus on the dress you're trying on; focus on the possibilities of the design. Unless you plan on buying a sample dress (where you buy it off-the-rack for cheaper), the dress you eventually get will fit you completely differently from the sample (which are typically sizes 8 or 10, and may be a bit stretched out). So, unlike when you're buying a dress at Macy's, you're probably trying on the wrong size, and it looks wrong. Don't focus on that: focus on what it would like if it fit you perfectly. Focus on what you would change about the dress to make it what you want: I plan on ripping a bow off of my dress and adding thick straps. With just a few trips to the seamstress, it will truly be the perfect dress.