Wedding Dresses

OKAY. I have tried, on three separate occasions, to link this blog to some pictures of wedding dresses that I'm considering, and it has never once worked. The links either just take you back to the main dress webpage, or show you a completely different dress than the one I was trying to show you. I don't understand why they make this so impossible to do.

So all I can post is this: check out all of the dresses I will not be wearing on my wedding day.

I bought a dress!

Heyguesswhat? I bought a wedding dress!

Well, I suppose that technically my mother bought it for me. But the important part is that I have a wedding dress! All ordered and stuff!

And the most shocking part is: I GOT A VEIL. I know, right? I wasn't planning on using one at all-- in fact, I used to think they were kind of creepy. Like, why do I have to veil myself? Can you say fundamentalism? But wedding magazines always say to try one on just in case, and it turned out that the one I tried on look perfect with my dress!

Okay, so since the linking-to-dresses operation hasn't been going very well, I'm going to place a lovely photo on the dress on the side bar here, and you can peruse it at your leisure. This picture doens't show the full dress, though, and you can't see the lovely back, so if you want the full picture, do this:

1. Go here.
2. Click on "bridal gowns" in the top left corner.
3. Choose "view all dresses" from the left sidebar.
4. Go to page 2.
5. My dress is in the top row, second from the left. It's style T9264. Click on the dress and it'll show you all the details.

The version of the dress in all these pictures is in white, though, and I got mine in ivory, so it looks a little bit, well, more refined. In fact, with the veil on it looks slightly antique, which is cool.

Oh, and I can't find any pictures of the veil online, but it's ivory too, with detailing that almost exactly matches my dress. I always thought veils were awful, but now I'm totally in love with mine.

And just so future brides know: when you buy a dress from any official wedding dress place, they expect you to buy the special slip and bra, too. These two things are actually what make the dresses look so nice, because they suck you in (the "bra" is actually more like a corset) and give the skirt its shape (the slip contains a massive amount of tulle). So calculate those into your budget as well-- they'll probably run you a little over a hundred dollars unless you get them used, which I certainly didn't count on (although thankfully my mom did).

So to my friends who might get married in the future: if you happen to need a wedding bra in a 34B, or a slip in a size 4 (sizes run small in wedding dresses, so calculate two sizes up-- I usually wear a 2, so they gave me a 4), you're welcome to them once I get married. All yours!

Trying on dresses is such a crazy, weird experience. They have this platform, right, with all sorts of lights, and there are a couple of dressing rooms there, and a huge mirror. And you just try on the dresses and parade around in front of everyone in the store-- in fact, since I had on my bra and slip and was completely covered from bust to toe, I just changed into the different dresses right there in the middle of the store. And random people (other brides, other brides' moms, curious salespeople) will just show up and smile at you and offer their two cents. It's kind of a strange process, and it can feel a little bit stressful. My main problem wasn't that everyone was looking at me, but that they all wanted to know how much I liked or didn't like each dress. The thing is, wedding dresses are specially made to make you look gorgeous, so every wedding dress looked like a million bucks. How could I say anything bad about any of them?

But I'm done with it, now. I feel really really really bad that my mom spent all that money on my dress (I feel gauche telling everyone how much I paid, but just so you guys know, the price of the dress isn't all you have to pay-- you also need those two undergarments as well as alterations before the wedding, and I got a veil, so that was even more). She assures me, though, that it's okay and that she budgeted for this much, and my dad said he planned on spending almost twice that much, so that makes me feel a little bit better.

So this shindig is really going down! Let's do this thing, yo!

Body image post, retooled

So while I deleted the previous post regarding my hurt reaction to my fiance's use of the word "fat" to describe other women, it turns out that it was a pretty popular post, and a lot of people found it interesting and were kind of disappointed to see it disappear. So I'm going to sort of generally discuss my feelings on weight issues and body image here, while first making the disclaimer that my fiance is totally wonderful. I think he made those comments about other women because he thought it would flatter me, not hurt me, and he was just trying to make me feel good about myself, which is one more reason I love him and want to be with him for the rest of my life. In fact, Adam's misunderstanding of women's bodies and the way women perceive themselves is a result of what our culture says about bodies, and was not in any way his fault.

Okay.

Have you noticed how obsessed we've become as a nation with dieting, weight loss, and thinness? I'm not just talking about the constant pressure to get ready for bikini season or shed those pounds and look great in your wedding dress. I'm talking about a pervasive, nation-wide obsession with losing weight as a test of character. Look inside any magazine marketed to women, and you'll find dozens of "inspirational" stories about women who lost 50, 60, even 70 pounds and now are held up to the rest of us as shining examples. Or observe the popularity of "The Biggest Loser" and "Celebrity Fit Club," in which we can follow the entire process of weight loss from tearful start to determined finish. As my friend Erin pointed out, every day on the Today show there's a new "miracle" story about some woman who lost half her weight and is now able to feel good about herself-- as though her intellectual accomplishments are nothing compared to dropping six dress sizes.

I propose that America's fascination with weight loss has two main roots:

Root 1: Thinness as an impossible ideal
I think it started with the models. Fashion models are supposed to embody what we think is most physically beautiful, and they weren't always anorexic fifteen-year-olds. There was a time, in the eighties and early nineties, when we scoffed at Twiggy, and models were supposed to have curves-- they were supposed to have figures, to be like ideal women, not like starved street children. Sure, they were still thin, but we were able to imagine that they still sometimes, occasionally, ate food.

Now, though, designers want models who look will act as hangers for their clothes, not as examples of beautiful women who wear clothes well. They want women who starve themselves until they disappear, and all that is left is the clothing. And thus, the women who model in advertisements, the women who we look at everyday, who the advertising industry tells us are perfect, are women who are starving themselves. And that makes us think hard about what WE, the normal women, look like, in comparison to these toothpicks. Therefore, we are obsessed with watching people lose weight because we think that's the highest ideal, and we want to imagine what it would be like to lose weight, too.

Root 2: Insecurity
Let's face it: we're not watching "The Biggest Loser" because we think all the contestants are nice people and we genuinely want to see them succeed. We want to feel good about ourselves by looking at obese people, and then think to ourselves, "Well, at least I'm not THAT bad."

And the result of all this is that we feel like we MUST lose weight, or else we're big fat cow losers. For example, check out this pitiful post by a sixteen-year-old girl, who happens to be the same girl who posted a freaked-out rant about getting into Vassar on the Vassar LJ last week. She's fucking anorexic, but the comments on her journal are WORSE, because so many strange people are actually encouraging her to continue this one-carrot-per-day, burn-500-calories thing. It's sick and sad, and it's just one more reason why we should stop this ridiculous love affair with thinness and concentrate a little bit harder on improving our minds and characters.

So next time you feel the need to call a girl "fat," think about it. Is she really overweight? Do you know what a normal girl looks like? Or are you comparing her to women you've seen on TV, or in magazines? Real women have hips, and breasts, and a butt to boot, and there's no shame in that, none whatsoever.

An Apology

I've deleted the last post, due to the fact that I am an enormous bitch.

It was very very very unfair of me to make my fiance sound like that. He is good and kind and he loves me for who I am, and he is the most patient man in the world to put up with me as well as he does. He is NOT some cruel, verbally abusive guy who enjoys making me feel fat; he made an offhand comment that wasn't even about me, and I just happened to take it the wrong way, that's all.

We've talked, and he promised not to joke about me getting fat, and now I feel like such an awful bitch for making him so upset. I'm just really insecure, but I hope he can stand me in spite of it.

I love him more than anything in the entire world, and I know he loves me, too. I can't wait to be his wife!

It's Getting To Me...

I'm starting to get a little upset about how big and unwieldy this wedding has become. When I imagine my perfect wedding day, I imagine being surrounded by, I don't know, fifty or so people. I don't like big crowds of people, even if they're family and friends.

But now it seems like everyone in the world has to be invited, or else. Adam has about a bazillion relatives that apparently all have to be invited, and this means more people I don't know, more people staring at me the whole time, and much much much more money than I ever wanted to spend.

I think I'm actually beginning to sympathize with those Bridezilla types, the ones who stamp their feet and insist childishly, "But it's MY day!" The thing is, everyone pays lip service to the idea that the wedding is all about the bride, or all about the married couple, but really it's not about either. It's about everyone else. I mean, this forum on The Knot shows how many brides are afraid of their families and friends A.) not showing up, or B.) not having a good time. With weddings, you spend almost all of your planning time worrying about everyone else, and what they think or want. The whole time, you spend every second trying to make everyone else happy, because if you don't, you'll ruin your relationship with your new relatives, or you'll make friends mad at you. But then you end up with too many people in the wedding party, too many people at your wedding, too much money being spent. And the whole time, you just want to shove the hypocrisy of "but it's all about you!" in everyone's faces, to stand up and shout, "Hey, what happened to what I want?" even if it makes you sound bratty and spoiled.

I'm starting to hate the very idea of a wedding. I feel like I'm married to Adam already-- we're so close, and I love him so much, and want so much to help and protect him, all the time. So why do we have to have some big ceremony? Nothing's going to change when we're married, except that we'll get tax incentives and I'll start referring to him as "my husband" instead of "my soon-to-be husband." So why make a big deal?

Sometimes I wish Adam and I lived on a deserted island.

Notes From The Wedding Summit Meeting

My mom, Adam's mom Alice, and myself all sat down today for a summit meeting regarding the wedding plans. Here's how it's shaping up:

My mother is taking two days off of work before the wedding. On the 18th, we'll spend the day doing things we can do in advance: finishing the jam jar favors, making candied/caramel apples for the kids' favors, getting some small things together for out-of-town gifts (my proposal of Burning River beer for adults and Giannos chocolate for the kiddos [both local products] was met with wholehearted approval), gathering together decorating materials, and so forth. On the 19th, we'll start by decorating the clubhouse for the cookout, then head over to the church and decorate for the ceremony and reception. That will leave us ready at the church for the rehearsal, and then afterwards we'll have the rehearsal dinner at Adam's parents' house (Claire, I hope you can make it for the rehearsal-- I want you to get to come to the dinner so you can meet my new kitten, Charlotte Bront's new little brother! He lives with his mother and brother in a horse trailer at Adam's house. His name is either Macbeth or Titus Andronicus-- we haven't decided yet).

The wedding day will happen like this: I'll go get my hair done with whatever bridesmaids would like to come along and get their hair styled. Then we'll go to the church, get dressed, and at noon, we'll have a wedding. This will be a traditional Episcopal wedding, with communion and everything. The Episcopal Church doesn't care about things like who was baptized what, so anyone can take the sacrament if they'd like, and anyone can choose not to.

Then the bridal party will all go outside for some pictures (which my dad's friend, an amateur photographer, will be taking). After a couple poses, we'll all go upstairs to the parish hall and have a light reception. There will be piano music, a traditional cookie table, and some light fare, like cheese/veggie/fruit platters.

After this, there will be some schlepping, as the cookout (which is the "dinner reception," although it will be incredibly informal) is down in Columbiana County, about 30/40 minutes away. It's on a lake-- the same lake where my shower is going to be held, although in a different building. We'll have cookout food (roasted pork on a spit, chicken, pasta salad, beans, etc.) and also some hunky food (halushki, and maybe pierogi). There will also be some champagne, and a cupcake wedding cake. Mmmmm!

Sound fun? It will be!

Church Pics!

I've stolen pictures of my church, St. John's Episcopal of Youngstown, from the St. John's Facebook group, so that everyone can see the beautiful place where we're getting married! (Don't worry— I don't think the group's moderator, the wonderful Rev. Jeremiah, will mind that I'm borrowing the images.)

Jeremiah also published the banns of marriage for our wedding on the St. John's Facebook group today! The banns are a traditional Anglo-Catholic ritual in which a priest or minister publicly asks the church community if there is any reason why two engaged people should not be married. They do this for the three previous Sundays before the wedding. Our banns will be read aloud at church this Sunday, next Sunday, and the following Sunday. Hopefully no one will stand up and object to the union! :)

I know it seems a little out of character for such a hip, young, modern girl like me to have her banns read. But really, I hate so many modern wedding trends (vulgar excess, credit-swelling expenses, the snubbing of guests and family members in order for the bride to "be a princess") that it feels nice to get back to a more modest, sensible approach to a wedding. Also, my parents had their banns read when they got married, and I'm fiercely proud of my family's wedding traditions (not changing one's name, having an alternative reception) and I want to incorporate my family's customs into my own ceremony!

One Month!

Oh. My. Gosh. Today is August 20th, which means we have one month exactly until I get married!

So many things have been happening that it's hard to really recount everything. In fact, that's why I've only been updating A New Philosophy every other day or so, instead of every single day: I've been so busy, what with wedding stuff and looking for a job and enjoying Adam every second whenever he has time off.

Adam and I went to Men's Warehouse yesterday and bought him a gorgeous suit for the wedding, with a burgundy dress shirt and a lovely paisley-ish tie (see pictures). He's even got red and grey silk handkerchief things to put into his pocket!

My sisters and I went to The Winner (a crazy-ass dress store in Sharon, PA, with a piano player in the middle of the store and four different floors and very ugly, very expensive statues of fauns in every corner of the place) and they got dresses for the ceremony. Tatiana got a brown gown with a matching brown scarf thing, which can be used either as a neck decoration or as a wrap (see pictures). Sarah got a red and black dress with a weird neck strap, the kind that looks all asymmetrical. We still can't figure out on which side of her neck it belongs, since it seems to sprout out of the exact middle of the dress, but she likes it, so whatever. I don't have pictures of her yet, but will corner her today or tomorrow and put some up.

And then my mother's outfit came, all the way from Lahore, Pakistan (see pictures)!

So everyone is pretty much taken care of, other than my dad, and he's just going to wear a nice pair of pants and a clean shirt. We're basically done with clothing! Isn't that exciting? :)

Hymn Help

Does anyone know where I can find a score for this version of "For the Beauty of the Earth"? The score on the website doesn't want to download.

The Episcopal Hymnal includes the words to this hymn, but set to a different tune, and on another page it gives the tune of this song, but set to different words! I want this particular version, since it's what is sung at the wedding of Meg March in the modern movie version of Little Women, and Meg's wedding in the original novel has been my inspiration for my wedding. But since the right version doesn't exist in the hymnal, I need to find a score that I can photocopy and put in my programs for everyone to sing during the service.

So if anyone can help me out, let me know.

Menu!

The menu is finalized (at last)!

The cookie reception (immediately after the ceremony):

Cookies (too many varieties to count...the Youngstown cookie table is an epic tradition! The cookies will be baked by my family, Adam's family, friends at church, family friends...the list goes on and on, and it seems that the one thing everyone wants to do to help is bake cookies!)

Fresh fruit (from Chapters)

Punch (homemade)

The lakeside picnic:

Roasted pig (roasted by my mom's friend)

Chicken (possibly chicken romano from Chapters, if we can afford it...)

Baked beans (homemade)

Green beans (homemade)

Pasta Salad (homemade)

Sweet Potato Salad (made by Vanessa, my mother's friend)

Pierogies (bought frozen from GFS, then sautéed in butter and onions)

Halushki (made by Alice)

Chips (bought)

Cupcakes (some homemade, some from Chapters)

Champagne punch (homemade)

Soda (bought)

Favors:

Homemade jam (again, too many varieties to list, but to name a few: raspberry jam, blueberry jam, peach jam, strawberry jam, orange marmelade, apple butter, pear jam...)

Candy corn bags (bought)

Dates and Data

Well, this was a cool article. Seems a lot of Chinese couples will be tying the knot tomorrow, since it'll be 08/08/08, and 8 is a number that symbolizes wealth in Chinese culture.

I wonder...if we had access to American marriage statistics, would we see an increase in marriages taking place on 08/08/08? I mean, August is a reasonably popular month for marriages anyways, but would we see more than usual because of the interesting date? Even though I don't think the number 8 has any specific cultural significance to most Americans, lots of people seem to pick their wedding dates based on what sounds nicest (even numbers, powers of ten, lucky numbers, etc.) or correlates to another special date (the same date as the bride's parents' anniversary, for example, or the same date the couple first went out together, or whatever). I mean, Adam and I chose the 20th because my sister (who is also the Maid of Honor) and I both have OCD, and I can only deal with even numbers, while she can only deal with numbers divisible by five. Thus, the 20th of September.

Anyways, I wonder if dates where the numbers make a pleasing match (06/06/06, for example) book an increased number of weddings?

A Somewhat Mean Rant About Unity Candles

Disclaimer: I just got off of The Knot boards, so I'm a little worked up right now. I'll calm down, I'm sure.

Over the past thirty of forty years, a shifty little wedding tradition has sneaked out of obscurity to become one of the most popular wedding ceremony styles in the United States. I'm talking, of course, about the unity candle ceremony, which stands as a testament to how stupid people must be if they need to have everything visually represented for them. It is also, I believe, indicative of something Judith Martin (otherwise known as Miss Manners of Washington Post fame) has seen coming for a long time: the theatricalization of the American wedding.

During such a ceremony, the couple's parents (usually the mothers) each light a candle, than present the candle to their respective children. Each member of the couple then uses the candle to simultaneously light another candle, representing the newfound "unity" of the couple and their families (and, I suppose, also representing how fully the American candle industry can dupe people into doing the silliest things).

Why must everything done at a wedding be a performance? I've seen this sort of thing more and more since I started planning: bridesmaids and groomsmen forced to execute elaborate choreography, mothers and grandmothers decked out in painfully identical dresses, and wordy, awkward attempts at poetry during hour-long "personalized" vow recitations.

Why are we all trying to hard to put on a show? It's a wedding, not an audition for the Russian Ballet. Your guests are there because they want to witness a very important moment in your life, not because they were looking for a sweet party on a Saturday night. If they wanted to see a performance, they'd save their gift money and go to the movies instead.

And of course, I might be a little more inclined to indulge unity candle practitioners if they were simply confining the candle to non-religious ceremonies. After all, ever since the 1500s, weddings have been pretty tied to churches, and that sucks for people who want to get married but who don't like/believe in/follow any particular religion. They have a lot of challenges to deal with in terms of planning a ceremony, and for them, I suppose, a unity candle could possibly be a nice, secular moment.

But unity candles aren't only for secular marriages; in fact, they're almost always performed in churches, so much that many people mistakenly assume that they are Christian in origin. In fact, however, the unity candle is not part of any religion's official wedding ceremony, and is usually banned by more conservative Catholic Churches and Jewish Synagogues (and even by some Episcopal Churches, even though we're so accepting and stuff).

Now, this church-and-unity-candle thing I cannot understand. Assume that you are an adherent to a particular religion or denomination, and that you believe in it/ respect it enough to get married in one of its churches. Wouldn't it stand to reason that you'd be okay with at least one of its versions of the marriage ceremony? Why would you need to add in more crap for your guests to sit through? Why is saying "I promise to be with you forever" not enough?

I bet some of you are saying, "I don't believe in God, but there's a very attractive church down the street, with nice stained glass windows and everything. I want to get married there so my pictures look nice, but I don't want any of that God stuff." Well, I say to you: atheism is fine, and a wonderful lifestyle, in my opinion. However, if you don't believe in God, don't get married in a church. I can't believe I have to actually tell people that, but apparently some people believe churches should be used exclusively as photo ops. I, on the other hand, believe that there are plenty of lovely non-church places to get married. Parks, for instance. National landmarks. Wineries. Farms. Waterfalls. Take your pick.

Just because lots of people get married in churches doesn't mean you must, and does not mean that you are entitled to do so. The sense of entitlement among many of my fellow brides is astonishing at times. No, the US Constitution does not guarantee the right to a floofy white wedding dress, a church wedding, and a reception with drinks and dancing afterwards. Do what you can afford, and only do it if it makes sense to you, if it gels with your values and your beliefs. Just because you always wanted to get married in front of a Tiffany window does not give you the right to drag your unity candle into my church, thanks very much.

My aunt and uncle had a great atheist wedding, and they did it whtout having to use a church or a priest. Really, people, the church is optional. I'd also like to point out that they did it without a unity candle as well, but if they would have used one, it would have been far more appropriate (although just as silly and sentimental) to use one in their backyard wedding than in a church affair.

When Adam becomes a priest, I'm going to urge him to ban unity candles, too. What a waste of time and money. Sheesh.

Wedding Nightmares

So just for my own sick amusement, I decided to tally up the responses to this Knot post. The question was about what each bride's worst fear was about their wedding day. I tallied the number of types of responses, and have set them down below, in order of most popular to least popular. The number following each type of response indicates how many brides articulated that response, with some brides giving multiple answers.

What is the biggest fear you have for your wedding day?

Weather will be bad: 30
Family or guests fighting/misbehaving: 30
Will look fat/stupid/ugly/will fall down: 29
Everyone/certain people will not show up: 17
No one will have a good time/like the food/dance: 14
Timing will be off: 9
Uninvited/unexpected guests: 7
Something bad will happen to fianc before wedding: 6
Wedding will be too expensive: 4
Relative will die/get sick before wedding: 4
Will cry the whole time: 3
Allergies/food poisoning/guests getting sick: 3
General anxiety/ social anxiety disorder: 3
People will have trouble finding venue: 2
Will forget something important: 2
Migraines: 2
Not taking enough advantage of "the moment": 2
Will turn into "bridezilla": 2
Will hate decorations: 2
Groom will call off wedding: 1
Church will forget about booking: 1
Priest will mess up vows: 1
Won't have good time: 1
Will get period during wedding: 1
Fianc seeing bride before ceremony on wedding day: 1
Will hate pictures: 1
Have somehow offended groom's family and not known it: 1
Microphone will malfunction: 1
Will mess up own vows: 1
Wheelchair-bound relative will have difficulty: 1
Late guest will ruin everything: 1
Cake won't be delivered: 1
Will feel sick: 1
People will be mad at absence of alcohol: 1
Chose bad date for wedding: 1
Rushing into marriage: 1
Leaving parents' house: 1
Groom will faint: 1

I think this forum said heaps about the self-confidence issues that weddings can cause. I never had a bad dream about my wedding until the night after I read this forum-- that night I had a dream that it was time for the ceremony and I 1) didn't have a dress, 2) had huge knots in my hair, and 3) hadn't actually arranged for any food to be had at the reception.

Do you suppose it's the milestone nature of a wedding that brings out these insecurities? Or do suppose that wedding planning in and of itself has fashioned us into hysterical micromanagers?

Quoi?!

Anyone else entirely horrified by the concept of divorce rings?

The American Wedding Industry: Bringing You More Crap to Buy Since 1776!

Salwars and Songs

I spent most of the day today doing wedding things-- writing the last of my shower thank-you notes, speaking to the organist about the wedding date, and helping my mother look at dresses for the big day. Now, my mother isn't your typical mother of the bride, so typical matronly dresses seem a little...not her. Therefore, she decided to go Indian-style, with either a black or an orange (see picture at left) salwar kameez. My mother has long been an Indiaphile (and not in your typical "I'm a hippie so I love vaguely Indian skirts and things with elephants on them" kind of way), and these outfits are really her style-- they completely suit her.

In other news, we're trying to figure out the music for this shindig, and I'm a little uncertain as to what I'll do. I know I actually want the traditional wedding march and recessional (especially after so many people derided those songs on The Knot as being "too boring," when they themselves were already doing overdone schticky things like unity candles), but I dunno what to do for the processional and the prelude. I'd like Arrival of the Queen of Sheba (one of my favorite flute pieces to play!), but I think Dick (the organist) kind of prefers the slow stuff.

Anyone have some suggestions? I don't want Canon in D, the Four Seasons, or Water Music, because every silly Knot bride seems to think those are "like, totally original and stuff." Anything else classical but not overdone?