Wedding Blog

In my last post, I showed you about 30 purple bridesmaid-worthy dresses that I had come across in my online searches.

Sadly, although several were very lovely, almost all of them were out of our $100-but-if-we-find-one-for-$150-I’ll-ask-for-forgiveness-later budget range, and none of them sparked a twinkle in my eye.

So, bridesmaid Pepperpot (who just so happens to be my awesome cousin) and my brother’s wife, A. (who totally would have been a bridesmaid if she wasn’t going to be looking after my darling one-year-old niece) flew to Vancouver, and together, we three musketeers headed south for a road trip to Seattle.

Wait, did I say road trip? I meant shopping trip!

And at the top of our list: bridesmaid dresses.

I had such high hopes for this trip, and in many respects, it didn’t disappoint.

The first night we were in Seattle we stayed at the brand spankin’ new Tulalip Resort & Casino. Of course, we mainly booked it because it was literally a stone’s throw away from the outlet malls, but the gorgeous room pleasantly surprised us!

Pepperpot, me and A. luxuriating in our surprisingly cool room.

Some of us were more impressed with the, er, creative decor, than others.

Contemplating how many hours of shopping we may have had left in us at that point. Estimated: 57. Actual: 3.

We ended up spending more time in the hotel than we had planned to because we were exhausted after so much shopping. Sadly… no bridesmaid dresses were found at the Tulalip outlet malls.

Because most of my best girls live far away from me, I don’t plan on having a bachelorette party. Luckily, whenever we get together, it’s a party every time, no matter when or where! So in that spirit, we decided that a little R&R was in order. After we hit (the very disappointing) Nordstrom Rack in Bellevue, it was girly pedicure time.

Really, what’s girlier than group pedicures?

Much to our amusement, A. was verrrrry ticklish.

Rejuvenated and re-energized, we finally made it to our destination: downtown Seattle.

Canadians love anything non-Canadian. Nordstrom is like Disneyland to us.

Nordstrom, Macy’s and countless other stores-which-I don’t-remember-the-names-of later, the reality of our hopeless situation started to sink in.

We thought maybe some mid-afternoon beverages might help…

 (Just kidding—we didn’t actually drink that jug of wine, but we almost got escorted out by security for taking that photo. Oops.)

We actually indulged in Kir Royales, but you can see the doubt in our eyes as to whether or not those glasses were big enough to drown our shopping sorrows in.

Unfortunately, we finally had to admit defeat.

I know we said our Seattle mantra was “bridesmaid dresses or bust,” but it looked like we’d have to bust.

Ouch!!

At least I had an amazing time with two of my favorite girls in the world! My sore stomach muscles following that trip were testament to how much we laughed our Polish butts off (wait, should it have been our butts that were sore? Hmm…).

So I had the priceless memories, but no dresses.

It was back to the drawing board.

(To be continued)

Did you take a specific trip to find wedding apparel? Were you successful?