Wedding Blog

The Finale!

Read up on parts one and two!

When I set foot in Brides by Demetrios, I was floored. The store was uh-may-zing. It was huge. So far, I had only tried on about 5 dresses, and I was about to try on about 25 more. I kid you not, their selection is virtually endless. I’m fully convinced that there is a dress there for anyone and everyone.

Walking in, I was immediately greeted by Deja. If you’re in Tampa and happen to go to Brides by Demetrios, ask for her, seriously! She is literally the nicest and most welcoming salesperson I have ever met in my life. Her sister also works there, and I felt like they were my sisters from another mister. Awesome, I tell you! This place was growing on me fast! Now if only there was a way to work a dress from there into my budget…

I temporarily put the budget issue out of my mind and told Deja exactly what I was looking for—lots of lace, no sparkle, A-line silhouette, empire waist. We looked around the store and gathered about 15 dresses that fit my criteria. Here are my favorites from that round (yes, I tried on so many I had rounds!):

This was by far the most simple one. It was lovely, and a great starting point, but I didn’t love it.

The lace on this dress was to die for, but the ruching on the bust made my already D-Cup ladies look even bigger. No good.

I loved the lace and the neckline, but it was working the hanger better that it was working for me, unfortunately!

*Sigh* I thought this was the one for a moment.

I didn’t get that fuzzy feeling, but I was starting to think that was all a myth. It was a gorgeous dress. If we could change the neckline to a sweetheart, it would have been everything I was looking for—so why was I not getting that “oh my god” moment? I put this one to the side as a “definite possibility” and kept the search a-goin’. I was determined to get that “this is it” moment, come hell or high water. Clearly, at this point, I was on a mission. I thought, maybe I’m not feeling my “criteria” as much as I thought I was. So I tried on some poufy dresses.

I thought this one was really pretty, but the flowers were a little much for me. I absolutely loved the drop waist, though.

I knew going in that I was taking a chance on this one. It’s even poufier than it looks in the picture. It just so wasn’t me. Next!

source for all above dresses

I really loved the style and shape of this one, but my only qualm was that is was a crinkly taffeta, or something funky like that. Basically, it was supposed to look all wrinkly, which really wasn’t the look I was going for.

I felt like I was doomed, so I tried on my favorite lace dress again, just to make 100% sure that it wasn’t “The One”… and it just wasn’t. Maybe lace doesn’t like me as much as I like it.

Ahh well. What’s a girl to do? I remembered I told myself that I would try on at least one dress that wasn’t really in my criteria, so I grabbed a pretty little sparkly one and tried it on. It was the only dress that wasn’t too big and needed to be clipped, and also wasn’t too small to be zipped. It fit perfectly. To be quite honest, it zipped up so easily that I was terrified. Is this it? Is this my dress? I walked out to the mirrors and almost died. Literally. I almost had a stroke. It was the only dress I had tried on that I felt like I didn’t need to change anything. Not one thing. I had tears in my eyes, the salesladies had goose bumps, and I had that fuzzy “I hope I don’t puke all over this dress” butterflies in my tummy “this is The One” feeling.

I tried on the lace one again, just in case, and then went back to my sparkly dress and got butterflies all over again. My sparkly dress. For a minute I totally forgot about the price tag. I hesitantly looked down at it and dun dun duuuun. At $1700, it was almost twice my budget. No, no, no, no, no! What was I going to do?! Then Deja looked and the tag and said to me “Oh my god, this dress has been discontinued, we don’t make it anymore, it shouldn’t even be out on the floor.” I was thisclose to crying when she said “you know… this one fits you perfectly… you can buy the floor sample and we can discount it because it’s been discontinued…” SOLD!

HAAAAAAAALLELUJAH!

And that’s how I found my dress. It wasn’t at all what I initially thought I wanted. No lace, all sparkle; drop waist, not empire; trumpet silhouette, not a-line; but it did have that elusive perfect sweetheart neckline that I was having such a hard time finding. She was right there waiting for me all along. My exact size, diamond white (I didn’t want stark white), and at 45% off, it came right under budget. Here she is:

source

*personal photo*

What about you? Was your dress completely different than what you had originally envisioned? Did you get that warm fuzzy feeling when you tried it on?