Attempting to find the dress - Bridal Mart, Burlington, NC + David's Bridal, Greensboro, NC

Finding the perfect dress has been a long journey. I’ve tried on 45 amazing dresses and I’ve finally found THE one. But before we do the big reveal of THE one, thought I’d share some of the dresses along the way.

I didn’t want to share my first dress shopping experience with anyone other than my best friend, Cathy. And since she lives nearly two hours away and just had a baby, I thought I’d take the experience to her. So, on a rainy Saturday in January, I drove up to see her in Greensboro, NC.

First, we went to the Burlington Bridal Mart. This store is known for being a large outlet store for all things wedding and formal dress. They have amazing discounts on their dresses and you can pretty much search the racks for your size at your leisure. Unfortunately, we had a horrible experience there.

First, no children are allowed on the actual floor where the dresses are. It makes sense, but it was just me, Cathy and a 4-year old. Seriously, you couldn’t do anything to help us? I walked the racks all by lonesome while Cathy and Ada waited – which was miserable for all of us. I attempted to try on three dresses there and gave up. We didn’t get any help with finding a dress, trying them on and it even took us a long time to get attention for a dressing room. Probably a bad idea to go to an outlet store on a Saturday. Ugh.

So we took a break. Had lunch. And decided we’d try David’s Bridal – which highly recommends appointments. In fact, I called earlier that day and asked them about doing a walk-in, which was not likely going to happen on a Saturday… But we did it anyway – and I’m glad we did. We had a much better experience and got a good idea of where I could pick up dress shopping. I tried on about six dresses. I honestly feel like we could’ve gone through a lot more but the person helping me was pretty busy that day – and that made the experience a little bit of a challenge. She would put me in a dress – and walk away for about 15 minutes. Even if I disliked the dress, I had to stay in it for longer than I wanted. Arg.

Anyway, here’s an initial look at one of the dresses I tried on - a strapless organza print ball gown with dropped waist (style PK3502). The dress also had a ruched bodice.

 

The little princess and me. She was THE MOST patient 4-year-old.

We were at David's Bridal for THREE hours!

Pros:

• LOVED the colors and the dress had a personality of it's own.
• The price was right at under $1,000.
• It's a very unique dress - for a very unique person.
• It was very light.

Cons:

• It just didn't sit on my hips or waist area right. Maybe it was the sample size?
• I was not a bit fan of the way the fabric wrapped around the bodice. I didn't feel like it was flattering.
• Cathy really disliked it - and from the start. Probably should've taken that as a sign. LOL
• OK, OK... Maybe too funky.

Dress on the model:

So... on to the next dress!