My wedding dress, a.k.a. perfection

Hi, I have a wedding dress and it is perfect and everything is perfect and oh my god I can't get over it because it is just so amazing.

Okay. Deep breath. Let's start at the beginning. On Friday I didn't have to work and my sister had a short day, so she and I planned to meet up around noon and drive to the bridal salon to pick up my dress. I had planned to sleep in, but I woke up when Torsten did and couldn't fall back asleep. So instead I took a bath, and thought about my dress, and was nervous about it not fitting or looking terrible, but mostly happy and excited about the whole thing.

Sorry, speaking of happy and excited, there needs to be a brief interruption--OH MY GOD MY DRESS IT'S PERFECT IT'S SO PERFECT I CAN'T BELIEVE THAT THERE IS A BAGFUL OF PERFECTION HANGING FROM MY CLOSET DOOR RIGHT NOW.

Ahem. Where were we? Oh right. So, in the early afternoon I met up with my sister and we drove out to the bridal boutique. The middle of a Friday was a nice time to go, because the store was nearly empty. I told the woman at the counter why I was there, and she went into the back and returned holding the dress in a big, clear plastic garment bag. As soon as I saw it I got this overwhelmed happy feeling. She brought us back into a dressing room and said she would be right back to help me into the gown.

Obviously though, I was not about to wait for her to come back, so I unzipped the bag immediately and had a little moment with the dress just to take in how beautiful it was. Then my sister helped me put it on and began lacing up the back while I looked in the mirror.

And, you guys, the second I saw myself in that dress in the mirror, I just knew. It wasn't even ON all the way and I already knew that I had made the exact right choice. I didn't cry, or get goosebumps. But it was so perfect. I immediately knew that Torsten would love the dress, despite my obsessive fear that he won't (which manifests itself through me showing him tons of pictures of dresses that have even one detail in common with mine and saying, "What do you think of that? What about the embroidery? What about the ruching?"), because it was just... I don't even know how to say it. It's just so perfect and amazing and also perfectly suits me and my style, even though I never would have thought that when I first picked it off the rack. And there is no way he can't like it because it is just so correct.

Seriously, everything about it is perfect. It is the exact right length and won't need hemming at all. The neckline is gorgeous. The detailing is amazing. The color is exactly right. Everything about it is just exactly as it should be.

And also? It gives me an amazing hourglass figure. I am a total pear shape and have a disproportionately small natural waist, and this dress totally emphasizes that while simultaneously disguising my stomach and hips. I won't even need any kind of bodyshaping undergarment, because the dress does that itself.

Plus, because it has a corset back, it needs hardly any alterations--it needs to be taken in a little bit at the chest (like I said, pear shape! All hips and no boobs!), and if I lose a whole lot more weight between now and the wedding it will have to be taken in a bit at the sides because the corset is already pulled pretty much as tight as it can go, and it needs a bustle added, but that's it. It's going to be very straightforward. I'm extremely happy about that.

I stood on that pedestal thing in front of the three-way mirror and admired the dress, and then they spread out the train and gave me a hand mirror so I could see it from the back, and it was just... well, all I can say is that for the first time that I can ever remember, I looked in a mirror without feeling fat. The dress was just so right. I didn't feel anything but happy and bridal and pretty. And that is such an amazing feeling, and so new for me.

Yesterday I unzipped the garment bag and looked at the dress again, stroking the satin and straightening the train and thinking about the day when I will wear that dress. And I felt simultaneously gleeful and peaceful, and I zipped it back up, and I went back to my computer and looked at all the pictures on Flickr again, and I was happy.

Yes, there are pictures on Flickr, in the same set as the original dress photos featuring my sister modeling the sample dress for me, but the new pictures are set to private, at least for right now. It's another one of those things where I feel like the element of suspense matters. Torsten hasn't seen any of the dress photos, including the original ones, and he knows not to look on Flickr, so it isn't that. It's just that the dress feels so special, and I don't want to make it so public, not right now when the wedding is still months away. But I love that the pictures are there, so I can look at them whenever I want.

I can't wait for the day when I will walk down the aisle in that dress to meet the love of my life on the other end.