Most of you know that my mom made my wedding dress. She is an extremely accomplished seamstress and makes clothes for me all the time, and I always knew I wanted her to make the gown I would wear on my wedding day. She made hers back in 1979, and made most of her clothes throughout her teen years, because that was all she could afford to do. It's true that necessity is the mother of invention, and my mother is a talented, diligent and creative person for it.

The pattern I picked out is a readily available one, McCall's pattern number M5047.  I knew I absolutely did not want a strapless dress like every single woman I know who has gotten married. I wanted a simple, slim silhouette without much decoration, more of a sheath dress to make the most of my tall height and frame. A long train or a full skirt would have been impractical and out of place in the small cabin where we were married. I wanted something that was romantic and sweet without being princess-y.

Before we bought expensive special-occasion fabric, I had Mom create the dress in white muslin to see if I liked the shape on me. With something as important as your wedding dress, you cannot wait until your mother has sewn her soul into a gown before you try it on for the first time. Luckily, I loved the dress and so we went ahead and ordered fabrics.

To keep the costs down, I decided to forego the $90-a-yard silks and picked out a satin polyester. The fabric cost us about $20 a yard, not including the $35-a-yard silk georgette Mom used for the ties across the back of the gown. Unfortunately, first fittings (and second fittings) of the dress did not go well, and we figured out the width of the straps the pattern called for in the front was too thick. In the picture above, the straps look nice and slim, but on my body they were spilling off over my shoulder.

During this time, we also decided we didn't like the drape of the silk polyester we'd picked out, and ended up scrapping the whole dress and buying new fabric for the body of it. I picked out a (still fairly inexpensive) polyester silk shantung that had a beautiful lustre, lighter weight and gorgeous texture with the little slubs in the fabric. 

Mom restructured the pattern and redrew the lines of the straps, and created the dress for a third time in the new fabric. It turned out perfectly ... the fit, the look, the comfort. The only thing that was missing was a bit more customization for the dress.

I had a fantasy for some sort of quilted or appliquéd birds swirling around all over the skirt of the gown, but Mom wasn't able to come up with a viable prototype. Instead, we ended up taking the dress to a lady who runs a sewing shop in town and having her embroider two pairs of doves on the front and the back of the dress near the hem. She did the embroidery in shades of cream, white and eggshell, and it turned out to be the finishing touch I was looking for.

I would recommend having your dress made if: A) you are an excellent seamstress, want to save money on your wedding dress, and think you can handle the stress if your dress is not "perfect" the first--or even final--time; B) there is someone close to you for whom making the Most Important Piece of Clothing You Will Ever Wear would make the dress more special, and the other two qualifiers above. For me, having Mom make my dress was a way to continue a legacy of handcraft in our family, get a treasured heirloom to pass on to my children and give Mom an opportunity to contribute to my wedding day in a tangible, incredible way.

Worth every bit.

Photo by Steve Barnhart. 

I feel like time is speeding up. Twenty-nine hours til Wedding Day, and my to-do list is a human impossibility. What I'm most afraid is going to happen: the wedding will go by so fast I won't even feel it, and suddenly, I'll be standing on the other side wondering how I missed the train. An hour is an hour is an hour, but I feel like I should be able to harness time and slow it down somehow. I know I've been saying that I can't wait for this to be over, but I don't know if that's really true. I am going to try really hard to pay attention on Saturday, to notice it as it's passing. Because if I can capture it in my mind, I think I'll be able to make the moments last longer. Or at least, I'll be present as they go.

Well, there are 51 hours until it will Officially be Wedding Day, and I'm more than a little stressed. I've got so much to do, and I don't know how it is going to happen.

I just got back from David's Bridal, which I visited for my first and last time as a bride. While I was there letting my mom tell me what wrap she liked best for my dress, I just felt absolutely sickened by what the bridal industry does to people. Their advertising is some of the most insidious, I think, because it plays on nearly all the major insecurities of women. Way-happy salesgirls go bouncing around the store, probably convinced that they're helping to make someone's dreams come true, while they're just part of this massive materialistic black hole. I hope I sound pissed, because I totally am: I don't take kindly to the idea that there is a whole industry that's trying to make money off my hopes and fears surrounding the thing that's most precious to me on this earth.

I'm pissed at myself for letting it get to me. Don't think you're stronger than the Bridal Industry. You are not. It will get you. I thought that by having a tiny wedding the Bridal Industry Demon would think me too small a fish to be bothered with, and I would go unnoticed, unpossessed. I was wrong. Just because you don't buy any bridal magazines doesn't mean your mom won't. And we all know the untamable power of a mother on a mission. I can't believe the things I've let stress me out during this whole process. Finding the Perfect Soup Bowl, a journey of many miles and much profanity; who should have a corsage, maybe everybody? because it's so small; the registry--did we get the right stuff?; the list goes on. At the top of my list of regrets is that I don't feel like I've had as much fun with Conrad during the past 4 1/2 months as I should have. The fact that I've let these petty things take precedence over just enjoying my relationship with him makes me heartsick, and I'm so glad all this hoopla will be over soon.

For now, I have to put together the menu cards for the wedding dinner. It is possible that I will need to be wheeled to the ceremony on a stretcher.

This is an excerpt from one of my favorite books, Otherwise Engaged, by Suzanne Finnamore. This is the end of the book. I always love it and I've been reading passages from it lately, for comfort.

The music starts to play. My brother is playing Handel's Largo. As in a dream, I recognize the melody. The processional is beginning.

Lana has to go down. She is carrying her bouquet and wearing the same dress she married Raul in. I feel abandoned as I watch her rose-colored hat descend. Then it is just me, waiting at the top of the spindly spiral staircase. And for the first time, I realize that the bride is left alone to come last.

I am fearful that Michael will see me before he is supposed to. And then the marriage will fail. It all hinges on me, on waiting long enough.

I go down the stairs, pausing at each one, clutching the slim banister. When I get to the bottom, I turn the corner, and I see that it's all right. I've done it right: Michael is just in front of the huppah, waiting for me.

And the expression on his face. Let me memorize it. Let me never forget it.

I grow aware of the others, the wedding guests. Standing in small rows in the sun, like wheat. They all turn around at once, to look at me. Their faces are hope. My immediate impulse is to burst into tears. I will myself not to.

Something more than music is in my ears, a humming that is my father and Leigh and Dusty, and I think, This is what it must be like to die. I smile, pressing my lips together to stop the trembling.

I take a step. My veil lifts in the breeze. A sail.

I take another step.

When I reach Michael, he holds his arm out to me, as if we are about to dance.

And what I do is, I take it.