Wedding Dress Insanity

I have finally gotten to the point in my wedding planning where I'm starting to enjoy planning. For a long time I just couldn't see the big picture and it was just becoming an overwhelming mess. And like any normal human being I put off the unpleasant until I absolutely had to face it. I probably should have started planning from the moment we got engaged in November, but I think I was reeling from the shock of him proposing so soon, so no planning happened that month. The most I did was reserve the Temple and Recteption location. During the month of December I did relatively no planning other than the merest of thoughts, in the name of "It's Christmas, the busiest time of the year, I'm too busy right now to really take on any of that." Then right after Christmas it hit that I needed to start planning. So I started to call up Wedding dress shops and make appointments to try on dresses. The first time that I called a location I was given the impression that I was calling really late and four and a half months simply wasn't enough time to find a dress and have it ready for a wedding, and could I come in that day? I was a little shocked, and thought what kind of a dress shop have I called. Then when I called up several more locations and they all gave me the same kind of speech. Feeling horrible about myself for having procrastinated getting a dress and even more stressed about a wedding I started to make room in my schedule for trying on dresses sooner than I had anticipated. Unfortunately this re-arrangement of scheduling meant that I would no longer be going to these dress shops with my sister as was originally planned, I would be going by myself. I would not recommend this practice to anyone. More than half of the places I went to they would bring you some dresses to try on and you would go in the fitting room and try to put it on yourself, the most they would do is zip you up when you were done. On top of that they would give you this corset kind of thing and have you put it on instead of your bra. I have never seen so many hooks in my life. After ten minutes of trying to put it on straight, I finally caved and put it on with the hooks in front, then when they were all hooked I would try and spin this corset around my abdomen and try to get it into place. One place would only let me try one dress at a time, so I would wait in the dressing room in a tulle slip and boostea (I have no idea how that is spelled) and wait until they brought me another dress from up stairs, all the time remarking how if I lost some weight I would be better equipped to find a dress I liked. And finding a dress I liked wasn't easy in spite of me having what I thought was a broad idea for a dress (square neck, clean lines, empire waist, with pearl beading if possible). I was starting to settle for any dress I could. Not all the places were that bad, I did go to Allyse's Bridal and they were so great at finding dresses I actually liked, within my price range, and they helped me put on my dresses. They even had the dress I was beginning to think I would buy, even though I wasn't quite in love with it. As I was starting to get towards the end of my list of appointments ( I had made 6) I realized that I would probably have to go to a few more stores to try and find something that I was wiling to spend a fair amount of my savings on. Then the last place I called was a place called Bridal Corner, they were the first people to take my call with absolutely no comment on the lateness of my planning, not even a hing, and were all congratulations and best wishes. Jokingly I told Sean I would probably buy my dress from them just for that. Well I went to my appointment there and they were so great to me, I explained what I wanted and they told me they could do that. They let me brows through the dresses if I wanted to and picked out things that I thought I might like. And the attendant, Darci, was so good to me. She helped me pick out dresses, helped me put them on and even did up my corset thing for me. And when I said that I had a pearl ring and was hoping for a dress with pearl beading, she brought me not one but three dresses with pearl beading on them (none of the other dress shops had dresses with mostly pearl beading, they were mostly sequins and diamonds with little hints of pearls). One of which I tried on and it was "the dress" so happy to find something I was actually in love with I did what I promised I wouldn't do. I payed for it right there and then, disregarding the fact that I still had two more appointments to go to. I figured after trying on between 60 - 70 dresses, it was unlikely I would find something I would like, much less love this much. So to all those out there that have gotten married and have gone through the wedding planning process, I now tip my hat to you. How did you ever stay sane?