You can TOO wear it again!

Back in the early 90s, my brother got married in a place called Olga, North Dakota. It consisted of a couple of houses, a Catholic church, a town hall, and a bar. All the buildings in town were used in the festivities.

My sister and I were both bridesmaids. We were to make, or have someone els make our own dresses, the design of which positively screamed "early 90s bridesmaid dress."

The bodice was black velvet, and had a sweetheart neckline. The skirt was poofy and tea-length, the sleeves were puffy princess 3/4 length, both in iridescent emerald green.

Every bride thinks that the dresses she has chosen will be beautiful, practical, and can be worn again for some other function.

On this one, though, I was kind of unsure. It's not like I was likely to be invited to a Leprechaun Prom anytime soon.

(Incidentally, when got married myself and I chose a dress for my ONE bridesmaid, it was exactly the same as my wedding dress, in blue instead of white, and I told my sister The BeerHound who had to wear it that there was probably no way in hell she could ever find another use for it, but I was paying for it, so it's not like it was a financial loss on top of a fashion loss.)

So. The dress from The Boy's wedding. It was actually exactly in fashion, at the time. The biggest issue I had with it was that it was difficult to sew.

Yes, I sew. I sew better than most professional seamstresses. It would have been a waste of money (that I didn't have) to pay someone else to make it.

It is phenomenally difficult to sew velvet. You could pin that stuff together every 1/4 inch and it would still move around on you. I know. I tried.

So I made the dress. It was nearly done, except for the hem, and it was one day away from having to leave for the wedding. No one had told me the length the hem was supposed to be. I tried the bride, but she was out with her friends, my sister wasn't home, and finally I called my mom who also didn't know, but she told me to wing it.

First, I had the ONLY totally irrational temper tantrum my ex ever saw me have. I scared him.

Then I picked a hem length, and sewed it.

I have NO idea why it was so important to me at the time. Like I said--irrational.

The whole deal was, I didn't particularly want to be a bridesmaid. While some young women really enjoy that, I never did. I'd rather be the personal attendant, or the wedding party liaison, or whatever. I really like being the person who shows up at a wedding with a bag of tricks and fixes all the problems and makes the crises go away.

Either that, or I'd rather just be a guest. Give me some alcohol and I'm happy.

The wedding itself was lovely. Fun.

But then...I had this dress that I'd worked my ASS off making, and I couldn't just get rid of it. I was probably going to put it up for sale at the consignment shop, when Sweet Irish George called me about a week and a half after the wedding and asked if I had a sewing machine he could borrow. I told him sure, and he could borrow a seamstress as well. He needed a Halloween costume; he wanted to be Robin Hood.

I asked if he'd like a green iridescent cape. He said sure. I said how about a matching hat out of my scrap fabric. He said great.

So George came over and I gleefully sliced the skirt off the dress. He was a little nervous that I was ruining a dress I'd obviously put a lot of work into, but I told him it was my work and if I wanted to ruin it, I would.

George looked great in his costume. I guess he still has it.

Once I looked closely at the rest of the dress--that bodice that had taken so many hours and so many pins--I decided it could be made into some type of renaissance-era dress with just a few eyelets and a leather shoestring up the back. Oh, and another skirt.

It was the start of my "beer wench" traditional halloween costume. I think I wore it several times as that, with different skirts and stuff.

Then one year I got it into my head that I should be a Dryad for Halloween. (Look it up; I'll wait.) So I grabbed the bodice, finally cut off the iridescent green sleeves, and cut the underskirt into strips. Then I stapled craft leaves that I bought at Michael's onto the strips and around the sleeves.

The color from the leaves got all over my skin and I looked like I had a liver disease. And the following week, I finally threw the whole thing away.

See? You CAN wear a bridesmaid dress again!