HOW I FOUND MY WEDDING DRESS IN 22 DAYS

Somehow, I found my wedding dress 22 days before our wedding. Maybe it was magic, fate, luck. I’m not sure, but I’m excited to tell you all about it. Starting with my bridal session with Allsen Photography. It was so much fun. She was so easy to work with, and the pictures turned out so beautifully. They were totally worth waking up before the sunrise, and that’s coming from a night owl. We were able to take pictures at the Young Living Lavender Farms just as the sun was coming up over the Utah mountains. Camie Allsen is a really special person, so I wasn’t surprised at all when we got the photos back and found that she had made them really special as well.

I have to start this post by saying, I had been out in the sun earlier that day and ended up with a wicked sunburn on my arms and legs. This sunburn was there when I found my wedding dress as well as in all of the pictures in this blog post. I have no idea how Camie Allsen worked her magic when editing these to make it so nobody could tell, but she is clearly an incredibly talented photographer.

I had no idea what I wanted to wear when I got married. I had never really thought that I would ever get married, for some reason. It wasn’t something that I really thought very much about. I didn’t even know what kind of ring I wanted. I actually had to google “wedding rings” to get some ideas. Looking for wedding dresses wasn’t that easy. There are so many weird sites, and it can take months to alter a wedding dress.

Since we decided to get married in thirty days before my sister and her family moved across the country, I had to decide quickly. I couldn’t choose something that needed alterations because there wouldn’t be time for any, and I couldn’t choose something that needed to be shipped. Somehow, I found the perfect wedding dress 22 days before the wedding.

Choosing a dress made me feel overwhelmed. In Fort Collins, Colorado with my mom and best friend, Andrea, I tried on a dress that I was really tempted to get. I tried on a few other dresses, but kept coming back to it. I loved the skirt but hated the top. Finally, they talked me out of it because it needed so much work to be what I wanted. I am SOOO glad that they did. Looking back, I think I was feeling too rushed to decide on the right dress that day. I needed to slow down and trust the journey. And when I did, I ended up finding the perfect one.

Later, we went to Utah to see family and find the perfect dress. People get married in Utah so often that I knew they would have more options. We walked into a store, and out of the corner of my eye, I saw a really pretty dress that stood out against all the white ones. Bre, the girl helping us, told me to pick five dresses to start with, so I grabbed the one that caught my eye as we walked and a variety of other gowns.

I got into the dressing room and put on the dress that I had seen when I was walking into the store. It fit like a glove. It was stunning, and I still remember so vividly the look on my sisters’ faces when I came out of the dressing room. We could all tell that it was special. It was gold, sparkly, and lacy in the most romantic way. I had been trying to decide if I wanted to wear a traditional white dress because I didn’t think Wyatt would expect it, but none of them stood out like the gold one. It was perfect.

I decided to try on some other dresses just to be sure. They were white and lacy and all very pretty, but for some reason, a lot of them reminded me of heavy window curtains. The choice felt too clear. It turned out that the gold dress that caught my eye right away was even the only one of its kind in the store, and it was my size. A perfect fit. It was almost too easy. I decided it was the one.

I got nervous at one point that people would find it strange that I didn’t pick a white one. I started feeling a little bit of pressure to meet other people’s expectations. My older sister quickly put me at ease when she told me she was surprised that I even worried about that because I never have before. She brought me back to the present moment, and I felt reaffirmed in my decision to wear something that was a little bit different and unexpected.

Bre told me to take one more walk to the mirror in it to make sure that it was what I wanted, but I had already made up my mind. I stepped up onto the pedestal and told everybody that it was the dress. The store had a wedding bell that you could ring once you’d found your perfect dress. Bre made the moment really special when she came out with a little gold bell that she grabbed instead because it matched my dress.

I guess that’s how I found my wedding dress 22 days before the wedding. It felt like it was just meant to be. Finding my perfect wedding dress was a really magical memory and one that I was so glad to share with my bridesmaids and my mom. I don’t believe in coincidences. I felt so blessed that I was to find the perfect dress just in time for our wedding. It was so fun to write this post and reflect on that day and on our wedding. You can read more about our greenhouse wedding here and watch our wedding video here. You can also read about our honeymoon and the gorgeous, historic hotel we stayed in here.

I am planning on making a blog post just about Wyatt next because people ask so many questions about him, so stick around if you want to read more about him.

xx, Haley