{"id":25338,"date":"2016-09-01T00:01:18","date_gmt":"2016-09-01T07:01:18","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/barbarafalconernewhall.com\/?p=25338"},"modified":"2016-09-01T00:01:18","modified_gmt":"2016-09-01T07:01:18","slug":"wedding-dress-shopping-when-your-daughter-lets-you-tag-along","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/server.stagingweb3.net\/barbarafalconernewhall\/wedding-dress-shopping-when-your-daughter-lets-you-tag-along\/","title":{"rendered":"Wedding Dress Shopping — When Your Daughter Lets You Tag Along"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Barbara<\/a>
Christina donned a dress to go wedding dress shopping. Photo by Barbara Newhall<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

By Barbara Falconer Newhall<\/em><\/p>\n

When I picked out my wedding dress forty years ago, I did it all by myself. It didn’t occur to me to phone my mother and ask her to fly 750 miles from her retirement home in Phoenix to my place in San Francisco so she could help me find a dress. As frugal, sensible, mid-century Midwesterners, we didn’t fly all over the country just to go shopping.<\/p>\n

But that was 1977, and this is 2016. Things are different now. Grown-up kids live all over the planet, and keeping up with them means getting on airplanes. Often. My daughter, therefore, didn’t think twice. She needed to pick out a wedding dress, and she needed her mother’s help. She needed a wing man. So she phoned me from Los Angeles to ask me to fly down for a shopping weekend. \u00a0I said yes.<\/p>\n

Wedding Dress Shopping — My Idea of Fun<\/h5>\n

It turned out to be\u00a0one of the most fun weekends of my existence so far. Three whole days of shopping. Three whole days of shopping with my daughter. Three whole days of shopping with my daughter for her wedding dress<\/em>.<\/p>\n

Life doesn’t get any better than that. Especially when our three days of wedding dress shopping\u00a0progressed as magically as\u00a0they did. On Friday, we found two lovely dresses at Le Marriage Haute Couture in Santa Monica. On Saturday, we found two gorgeous<\/p>\n

\"A<\/a>
Wedding dress shopping: A rack of gowns, each poofy enough to stuff\u00a0a queen-sized comforter. At Le Marriage bridal salon in Los Angeles. Photo by Barbara Newhall<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

dresses at Panache Bridal in Pasadena. And on Sunday we found an off-charts-spectacular dress at the Nordstrom Wedding Suite in Brea.\u00a0No doubt about it: the\u00a0Brea dress was\u00a0The Dress. We were certain of it. Both of us.<\/p>\n

We had a great time finding The Dress\u00a0— driving all over Los Angeles, missing our freeway exits as we talked up the pros and cons of our latest discoveries.\u00a0We — Christina, that is — tried on ivory confections\u00a0garnished with appliqued lace, pearly sequins,\u00a0seed beads, metallic thread, rhinestones, pearls, Swarovski crystals. Saleswomen talked to us of satin, tulle, \u00a0organza, chiffon, charmeuse, silk and\u00a0horsehair.<\/p>\n

\"Wedding<\/a>
A frothy gown and a slinky one. Photo by Barbara Newhall<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Wedding dress shopping included peeking at sparkly\u00a0headpieces, some of them encrusted\u00a0with Swarovski crystals at $1,500. It meant trying on\u00a0bling-bordered veils\u00a0— elbow\u00a0length, fingertip length. Gowns with trains. Gowns with enough poof to fill a queen-sized comforter. Slinky mermaid gowns that curved scandalously under the butt — something a nice girl wouldn’t think of\u00a0wearing in public in my day. Which was 1963, btw, give or take.<\/p>\n

In Lace From Head to Toe<\/h5>\n

My mother was miles and miles away in Phoenix when I picked out my wedding dress at Saks in San Francisco forty years ago. I was used to doing things on my own in those day. Indeed, I insisted on doing things on my own. I wound up choosing\u00a0an ivory gown appliqued with lace from neckline to hem.\u00a0It was a safe choice and one that the saleswoman at Saks assured me would be appreciated by\u00a0my mother and the ladies of her generation.<\/p>\n

But I wonder now, had\u00a0my mother been with me on the day I went wedding dress shopping, would I have have bought a different dress, the one\u00a0I was actually leaning toward? It was a crisp white gown\u00a0with elegant\u00a0lines. No lace, no frills. Modern like me.<\/p>\n

Yes, I was used to doing things on my own in those days. But maybe, like my daughter, I\u00a0needed\u00a0a wing man. Maybe I\u00a0needed\u00a0my mother.<\/p>\n

For a peek at me in my 1977 wedding gown, go to “The Day She Popped the Question — And He Said Yes.”<\/a>\u00a0 For a glimpse of\u00a0my future daughter-in-law trying on my wedding dress for size, go to\u00a0“I’m the Mother of the Groom, Now What?”\u00a0<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\"Bride<\/a><\/p>\n

When I went wedding dress shopping forty years ago, I went all by myself. My daughter was smarter. She phoned and asked me to go with her. Read more.<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":25367,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[30],"tags":[1773,146,34,1774,1775,38,55,82,985,1776],"class_list":["post-25338","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-my-changing-family","tag-brides","tag-christina","tag-dont-miss","tag-long-distance-parenting","tag-mother-of-the-bride","tag-mothering","tag-family-stories","tag-on-the-funny-side","tag-wedding","tag-wedding-dress-shopping"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/server.stagingweb3.net\/barbarafalconernewhall\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25338","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/server.stagingweb3.net\/barbarafalconernewhall\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/server.stagingweb3.net\/barbarafalconernewhall\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/server.stagingweb3.net\/barbarafalconernewhall\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/server.stagingweb3.net\/barbarafalconernewhall\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=25338"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/server.stagingweb3.net\/barbarafalconernewhall\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25338\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/server.stagingweb3.net\/barbarafalconernewhall\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=25338"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/server.stagingweb3.net\/barbarafalconernewhall\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=25338"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/server.stagingweb3.net\/barbarafalconernewhall\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=25338"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}