Dress Rehearsal

First allow me to clarify: Dress Rehearsal is NOT Rehearsal Dinner, the get-together that celebrates all systems go for the wedding day to follow. It’s Dress Rehearsal. That is, going through the motions well before the Big Day. Motions in which the engagee ( accent on the last syllable,long double - e)  will don her dress, walk in it (as in down the aisle) bend in it (as in crouching down low enough  to  hug toddlers of full- grown cousins) , and , after a hearty dinner, dance the night away in it as a married lady. That’s a high order for a single garment  – any garment – on a single night -- not to mention a reconstructed full length wedding gown(with train) that has been altered to fit like a glove.

Dress Rehearsal discoveries:

·    That the bride must put  the gown on over her head, not step into it, because the slip that poufs out the A-line of the gown cannot be tucked down into the dress’s skirt without stressing the seams of its  lower half . Good to know. We don’t want stressed seams (or stressed bride or stressed MOTB) the day of the wedding.

·    That the hooks on the bodice of the gown will stretch to the farthest row of eyes on the built-in corset as long as the bride sucks in her  breath as deeply as  possible  Do not underestimate the extent to which a bride will inhale to  zip the snug bodice of a fitted gown. I understand there is no need to worry unless – after all hooks are eyed – a bride-to-be’s complexion matches the latest craze of wedding party gray. Fortunately, Em retained her rosy glow throughout the Dress Rehearsal.  

·   That there is one concern. The threaded  loop designed to hook the lower half of the gown to the lowest button of the bodice's back, thus  lifting the gown’s train high enough to let  the bride dance the night away, that loop doesn’t look as if it can stand up to  the job through ceremonial pomp and celebratory circumstances on the dance floor.  

Time to get out the sewing box – which is what Dress Rehearsal is all about.