My Perfect Wedding Dress

Well, I've been invited to the wedding of a person that used to be my best friend. The story behind why we aren't "best friends" anymore is long and tidious but suffice it to say that we grew apart. We've since found our way back to common ground, knowing that the friendship we once had will never be again but realizing that we have to start somewhere.

I've known about the wedding since the beginning of the year and as excited as I am for her that she has found someone who makes her happy, the last three weeks have brought on anxiety in me because I had not been able to find the "perfect" wedding attire for myself. I made the resolve this past Friday to go out looking for a dress to wear and low and behold the 'shopping gods' were on my side. I headed into Macy's looking for a dress but was very disappointed. What I found not only was unattractive (to me at least) it was also too expensive. You see, with me not working full-time anymore shopping is a luxury I simply can't afford. I left the house with three gift cards totaling $61 and I needed to find both a dress and shoes without spending large amounts of my own money. After leaving Macy's feeling a bit defeated, I headed into JC Penney (more out of proximity than anything else) to take a look around. JC Penney has changed over the years because I was pleasantly surprised at how nice the dress selection was. I found five dresses that were cute but I wasn't sure if they were the "one". I continued looking around and found dress number six and I immediately fell in love with it, praying all the while that it would look good on me once I tried it on. After feeling that I had scoured the place clean, I headed into the dressing room to try everything on. As soon as I tried on dress six, I knew I had found my perfect wedding dress. It was everything I had in mind - black in white in color, umpire waist, chiffon material with movement but best of all I looked AMAZING in it! The decision to buy this one was sealed in that moment, so I headed to the cashier to ring up my purchase. The 'shopping genie' was sprinkling her magic all over me because the dress was on sale - $70 down to $34.99 and after using two of the three gift cards ($36.31 in total), I walked away having only paid $1.57 of my own money. Talk about a score!

I was on my own personal high and feeling really good about the dress. I still had one gift card left and was thinking that maybe I could find a great pair of shoes. Though I knew I wouldn't find as good a deal as I did with the dress, I was committed to at least looking and considering my options. I headed back into Macy's to take a look around before heading home. I found a couple pair of shoes that were beautiful but a little too 'matchy-matchy' - a fashion faux paus. So I decided to check out the clearance racks to see if anything jumped out at me and there it was - the perfect shoe to match the perfect dress. I'm not sure how to describe it other than to say it is by far one of the sexiest shoes I've ever owned, Sex in the City kind of sexy (lol). I was sold. I asked the cashier if she could give me the mate so I could try them on, they were fabulous. I looked at her and said "I'll take them". Once again, the 'shopping genie' was sprinkling her magic my way because the shoes were $89 marked down to $62.30. The store was having a sale - 15% off one pair of shoes - and the sale even applied to clearance items. After all discounts and using my last gift card, I paid $15.94! Can you believe it, a dress and shoes for less than $20 of my own money...I simply couldn't stop praising God.

I'm now set to attend this wedding knowing that I'll feel like a million bucks and secretly knowing I paid only a fraction of that amount!