6 Hours in a Dressing Room

Since I have mad crafting skillz, I volunteered to make the veil and jewelry for the bridesmaids.  Since I'm me, this meant everything was finished at 3am the day of the wedding.  Yes, I craft like I write papers.

The full effect of this thing will be visible in the professional photos, but I'm very happy with the way it turned out.  It's ivory tulle with ivory organza flowers.  I made the flowers to match the flowers on her dress.  I bead embroidered the edge to give it some sparkle and to control how the veil draped.  Size 11 seed beads are 2.1mm wide, I applied them three at a time, and this thing has a perimeter of several meters.

The tulle is gathered and stitched to a silver comb.

Emily was staying overnight alone in a room at the lodge (or a nearby hotel, can't recall which) so it was our duty to load up all the garments into the car.  This involved Mom yelling at Dad a lot on the nature of fabric wrinkles.  But we got everything in.  Dad drove me to the lodge because we had to be there at 10am.  I needed to have my hair done and he had a golf outing with the other guys.

The weather was gorgeous and Schoolcraft is flat.

It took a little over an hour to get there.  Did I mention that on top of sore feet from Salzburg and jet lag I only slept for three hours?

The bride and bridesmaids had a room to get ready in, and the groom and his guys had their own room.  They allegedly had a pool table.  Still looking for an aspect of wedding preparation that doesn't involve sexist bullshit.

Anyway, by the time I arrived the others had gone to the effort of decorating the room.

We took turns getting hair and makeup done while trying to keep Emily sane.

The dresses were hung up where they wouldn't get wrinkled.

Brandy knew her way around a steamer.

Stacey was our makeup artist.

The dress.  Unfortunately I handed off my camera to Dad to give to Austin so I don't have many pictures of her in it.  The professional photos will be ready in about a month and a half.

Hair for the groomsmaid.

My turn.

 My hair went a lot faster than I thought it would.

 End result.

Everyone got a personalized hairstyle.

Then it was time for me to get spackled.

Then it was Emily's turn in the chair.

I'm not into make up but as a crafty person I've got to respect Stacey's kit.

When Emily got her petticoat she was complaining about how huge and poofy it was.  My expectation of what a petticoat should look like is based on the Victorian period, so my reaction was "Is that all?"

 A couple hours before the ceremony they fogged the area around the tent to keep the bugs away.  The ecologist in the group was cringing.

In addition to the veil and the bridesmaid jewelry, I made Emily's hair ornament.

The florist arrived with the bouquets.

We all really liked her choice of flowers.

I decided to attempt a selfie.

We had fun in the dressing room.  At one point we started singing the Jurassic Park theme and were later told that you could hear us throughout the entire building.  We had a table of snacks to keep us from rebelling.

After delivering the bouquets to us and the corsages to the guys, the florist decorated the archway in the tent.

Stacey was the last to get her hair done.

Here's about where I run out of pictures for the prep stage.

Mom and Dad arrived.  Mom got into her dress and Stacey's mom (who was doing the hair) helped her with some heavy duty hairspray.  We got Emily into her dress, which involved the professional photographer.  I got laced into my corset in a scene that slightly resembled that scene in Gone with the Wind only with me holding onto the edge of a table.  It worked, the dress fit, and everyone thought it looked pretty good.  Score one for supportive undergarments.

After we were all dressed, Emily was taken outside for pictures and then we joined in.  Then we brought Emily back inside and started picking pine needles out of her hem.  I'm sure the photos will be great but I was about to murder the photographer for having her stand in the dirt.  They also got a picture of Emily and Kyle holding hands around the corner of the building where they couldn't see each other, which took some maneuvering.  They decided to do the don't see each other the day of the wedding before the ceremony thing.

Once we were done with pictures but waiting for the ceremony to begin, Emily was getting queasy from nerves ("I don't feel anxious but I feel like I'm going to throw up." "That IS feeling anxious.") so a quick-thinking bridesmaid pulled up the Fruit Ninja app on her phone and handed it to her, which calmed her down.  Then it was time to line up on the deck which was the staging ground for the bridesmaids, groomsmen, and groomsmaid.

Up next: The few photos I have of the actual wedding thanks to Austin borrowing his camera back and blurry photos from the reception.