Wedding Season...

Good morning!  For those of you who do not know me, I have been very blessed to be close enough to many of my good girlfriends to have been asked to be in their weddings.  It is a definite commitment of time, effort, travel and money, but each time it is completely worth it.  I was recently asked to be in another one of my friend’s weddings, and of course, I was honored and thrilled.  I am going today to get fitted for the bridesmaid dress so that I can have it ordered and delivered in plenty of time for the big day!  She picked a black dress!  Of all the colors I have, I do not have a black dress, so I am definitely looking forward to this one (who knows, I might actually be able to wear it again!!!).

I have been asked, often, if I mind being a bridesmaid in weddings.  I LOVE it!  To me, it is one of the greatest joys to be able to stand as a witness with your friends, before God and others to say you support your friend(s) in their decision to marry and start their life together. 

That being said, I’m not going to lie, I have had some very interesting (and often humorous) experiences as a bridesmaid in several of the weddings I have been in:  a bachelorette party that involved getting to-go gallons of frozen daiquiris from a local pub and bicycling with them in our beach-bike baskets to the condo, getting into a VIP club in Las Vegas for a bachelorette party, wandering around Chicago on St. Patrick’s day… in the rain for a dear friend’s bachelorette party, wandering around Buckhead in Atlanta with giant pink feather boas, inflatable paraphernalia (if you catch my drift), having a huge after-party in Hilton Head after a wedding, seeing two uptight groomsmen doing their rendition of Patrick Swayze vs. Chris Farley on SNL (too funny!), playing a football game at midnight before a wedding (bridesmaids vs. groomsmen – I am happy to report that the bridesmaids WON!), holding a friend’s hands while her dress was being discreetly repaired during a reception followed swiftly by handing her a cocktail, riding a party bus after a wedding only to circle the block to find the nearest convenience store because we were “smart” and forgot to bring anything on the bus, being in a wedding and having my groomsman escort about to pass out and him leaving discreetly during the service and being told afterward (the entire reception!) “I’ve never seen such a pretty girl left at the alter!”, sitting in a fountain on a hot summer day with the rest of the bridal party to cool ourselves off, traipsing through a field… on a mountain top… through spider webs and more, walking in on the brides and grooms parents doing keg-stands, running a 5K during a bachelorette party (at 7 AM the morning after…not my smartest decision), having a last minute dress emergency fixed with duct tape, doing the Tennessee Waltz with one of my dear friend’s Dads, and many more!  Those moments are the reason that I love being a part of my friends’ special days.  I can’t wait to see what memories are made in future weddings I am in.

To end with, some quotes from the movie “27 Dresses”

Kevin: Wait, what are those?
Jane : [nervous] Nothing.
Kevin: Are those...?
Jane: No!
Kevin: Are they bridesmaid dresses?
Jane: This is none of your business!
Kevin: Oh... good God. What, you kept them all? You have a whole closetful? Why?
Jane: I have a lot of friends and I like to keep them.
Kevin: [snickering] Right. Well, that makes complete sense because they're... *beautiful*.
Jane: Some of them are not that bad.
Kevin: Not that bad? I'd like to see one of them that's not that bad.

…

Kevin: [motions to a "Gone With the Wind"-style dress] What the hell is that?
Jane: Theme wedding.
Kevin: What was the theme? Humiliation?

JCP