Wedding dress stores

Note:  This post is not sponsored and I am giving 100% of my own opinions.

I had also stated in the post, where I announced that daughter ‘A’ had gotten engaged, that my Father-in-law had lived with Parkinson’s for many years.

Due to that fact, when daughter ‘A’ was searching for places to go wedding dress shopping she was interested in going to the Glamour Closet store in San Francisco, CA since each year, a portion of Glamour Closet’s profits will be donated to foundations dedicated to finding a cure for Parkinson’s.

http://glamourcloset.com/closet/html/about.asp

In April, daughter ‘A’ and I made a very quick trip to the north end of the Bay Area.  We decided to swing by the  Glamour Closet store and just look around (we had already promised the bridesmaids that we would go dress shopping with them).

Well, daughter ‘A’ found her wedding dress!  No photos of it will be seen until after the wedding, but I will say that the family of another bride-to-be gasped when the curtain was opened.

When the store clerks were told about daughter ‘A’ ‘s grandfather they said that he had a hand in her finding that dress for multiple reasons and we agree:

• the dress was dropped off on a Friday and we were there the following day
• the dress was a sample and had never even been tried on by anyone else
• the dress was smaller that the sizes they usually carry (it needs a couple of tucks taken and a lot taken off the bottom, but we are not surprised by that)
• the cost of the dress was less than her budget

So, if you know someone getting married and you live or are visiting the North Beach in San Francisco, West Hollywood in Los Angeles, River North in Chicago or Chelsea in New York areas I would be grateful if you check out the Glamour Closet store.

I have no connection to this store, but I love, due to first hand knowledge, that they also want to find a cure to Parkinson’s and are donating money to the cause.

Do you have a future wedding in your family?   Later – Heather

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Christening Blanket from wedding dress

Last week I met up with a friend who happened to say that her grandson was being Christening this coming weekend and she wanted get a blanket made with parts of her wedding dress, but another friend hadn’t called her back yet.

I first wasn’t sure whether I should offer to help since I have too many projects of my own to do.

So, I picked up her wedding dress and started to panic as to whether I could make what she envisioned (if you know me up to now I have only made gifts for people and they usually don’t know what they are getting until it is done).

My friend wanted the top layer of her wedding dress to be the ruffle on the blanket and thought the lining of her dress could be used also.  Well, it turns out the lining was spotted so that wouldn’t work.

I then did a Pinterest and Google search and found that most Christening blankets were usually crocheted (i.e. not something slick that you would have to worry about holding a squirmy baby in).

So, I figured I would make one side of the blanket of slinky material and the other side of flannel (with the wedding dress material as the ruffle).

The top layer of the wedding dress was cut into strips and sewed together into a long strip (240 inches).  [240 inches allowed me to make a roughly 40″ x 40″ blanket.]  I then folded the strip in half and added a running stitch to hold the ruffle together for when I sewed it to the blanket.  Oh, and the pinning and adding the running stitch was done in the car while we traveled last weekend (otherwise, I knew there was a chance I wouldn’t get the blanket done in time).

I picked up a piece of cream flannel, a piece of white slinky material, a package of sharp needles and a package of pins for slinky material (since I never sew on slinky material).

The ruffle was sewn to the flannel (with a ton of pins holding it in place).

I then practiced stitching on a slinky / ruffle/ flannel sandwich scrap.  (I was actually surprised how easy it was to sew – no pulled threads, etc.)

Yesterday I sewed the three layers (flannel, ruffle, slinky material) together and topped stitched it so it the edges would not roll.  I then hand tacked the flannel and slinky material together in nine places so it would be stay together.

Last night I was able to give my friend the completed blanket.  She loved it!  (I was pretty proud of it, but I have to say that was a relief.)

She asked how much she owed me (we hadn’t talked about the cost) and I was happy to say that it was a gift.  (She said she will pay for my hot chocolate / iced tea the next time we meet at Starbucks.)

I have asked for a copy of a photo taken with the baby and the blanket this weekend.

Here is the photo I thought to take before I gave her the blanket.

So, what special project have you worked on lately?

Later – H