The Easiest Dress Hunts of All Time: Part II.

See below for Part I, where I found my wedding dress!

When we purchased the dress in late July, I was told that it would probably come in to the store around mid-September. Imagine my surprise when I received an email about three weeks later, informing me that the dress and veil had arrived! And also that they only hold merchandise for 14 days. Which meant only one thing: a trip to Austin was in order. This way, I could get my dress fitted and look for bridesmaid dresses at the same time! The timing actually worked out quite nicely, since it was still summer and we wouldn't have to worry about school interfering.

Me and my roommates/bridesmaids...when we hosted our Cinco de Mayo fiesta. :)

We chose a Tuesday, because I figured out that Lisa only works Tuesday, Thursday, Saturday, and Sunday. Saturday was out- the store would be crowded and stressful. Sunday was semi-out, because we didn't really want to miss church. I scheduled an appointment with Lisa for 2:00, then the lady transferred me over to the Alterations department.

That exchange went something like this:

Me: I need to schedule an appointment for this Tuesday.
Asian lady: We don't have any appointments on Tuesday...you can come Wednesday?
Me: Well, no, I live out of town, so I actually can't. I wanted to come Tuesday because we also have an appointment for my bridesmaids.
Lady: Oh, it is a bridesmaid appointment?
Me: No, it's for me. The bride.
Lady: It is for the bridal gown?
Me: Yes.
Lady: You can come Wednesday?
Me: No...no, I live two hours away. I can only come Tuesday.
Lady: You can come Monday?
Me: Um. It's okay...I'll just pick the dress up and do it another day.
Lady: No appointment?
Me: No.
Lady: Okay. Please call me if you want an appointment!
Me: Thanks, I will.

So, in the end, I just ended up picking up my dress, but it was fine. I'll probably just wait and get it done over Christmas at the DB in my hometown. We also got the BM dresses shipped there, so that way we won't have to go back to the one in Austin.

Due to the AC in our apartment backing up and causing some carpet flooding, bridesmaids Carly and Carolyn and I were up til 2 AM one night the week prior to the appointment. We put our time to good use by looking through the DB bridal party catalog. We decided that we really liked these dresses:

(From davidsbridal.com)

Though not in these colors.

There were several reasons we liked these best. The chiffon is summerier (yes, I just made that up) than the sort of satiny fabric the rest of the dresses were made of. Also, our church is very earthy, with a lot of natural wood and large windows looking out on trees and grass (hopefully they won't be dead yet, since it'll be May). I personally thought that the other dresses would look a little pretentious in our friendly sanctuary.

The original plan was that BMs Laura and Carly would wear the ruffly-necked one, and MOH Carolyn would have the halter...since those were the ones they thought they'd like. So my ladies would look like this:

(from davidsbridal.com)

...but in this "cocoa" color:

(I can't figure out a way to change the color on the DB site where it'll then let me copy the picture. So just try to use your imagination. :) )

In short, we had a plan!

After a delicious lunch at Chuy's, we set off to our appointment and arrived somewhat early. I went ahead and tried on my dress for them, and we pulled their dresses off the racks. 

The brown Carly's got on is a little darker than what we'll have, but at least it's close!

After seeing how the halter dress fit, Carolyn decided to try the ruffly one, and she actually liked it better. So, despite all my plans to not dictate exactly which dresses they got, we actually ended up with three of the same. But it looks so pretty on everyone! Unfortunately, I don't have a picture of all of them wearing it, so you'll just have to be surprised. :)

Speaking of surprises...

All-in-all, this appointment took us less than an hour (have I mentioned that we're laid-back people?), which left us plenty of time for a trip to the mall. :)

For all you other brides out there, I'm sorry: I have the most wonderful bridesmaids ever! I'm so excited to get into more planning and craft stuff with them this fall. And they're going to look so pretty in these dresses!