1 year until the wedding!

In a post that's almost 2 weeks late, but so it goes :) Dan sent me an email two Fridays ago to remind me of this fact. It was devoid of punctuation so I don't really know whether it was 1 year until the wedding! or, 1 year until the wedding... and he likes to be coy about these things. Most likely he was just stating it as a fact, kind of like an 'on this day in history' but for the future. I like to think it was with at least some enthusiasm, though.

One whole year (minus almost two weeks) seems like a pretty luxurious amount of time, especially since we don't have a real to-do list put together yet. Still working on the apartment, enjoying the summer, etc. I'm getting a 4-day weekend from work for July 4th and it'll be a goal of mine to for real catch up on comments and clear out some of my 'to blog' list's backlog.

Here's a quick one, since the most common question I get (after just "How's the wedding planning going?" in general) is on the dress. This dress from Gertie of Gertie's New Blog for Better Sewing is a great template for what I have in mind.

The fabric is actually hot pink, but it looks red to me. It's a textured cotton from Mood, and Gertie says it's simple enough for beginners to work with but with added interest from the texture. Hmm...

Look at that full skirt! And without a petticoat or tulle or any kind underneath, courtesy of a horsehair braid hem, score (note that it's not actually made out of horsehair nowadays).

The weather in the Manhattan area has alternated between perfect clear sunny blue skies with a cool breeze to miserably sticky and grody for the last couple of weeks, so I've been a little bit worried about the weather The Day next year. Princeton is further south in Jersey, for one, but on the other hand, cities do tend to hold a lot more heat in all the buildings and concrete so maybe it'll be fine.

Either way, not having to wear extra layers underneath for volume would probably be a good idea, since I'll probably be wearing pettipants as well, like I have been under all dresses that I'm not wearing leggings with. Read more about pettipants in this post at Fashion for Nerds. My friends made fun of me for wearing bloomers during our weekend trip to Lancaster PA a couple weeks back, but don't knock it until you've tried it.

Back to the dress: I'd definitely do a different neckline, at least a scoop or v-neck (the What Not to Wear people beam proudly in the distance) if not a sweetheart neckline like in this pattern (New Look 6273) I bought off eBay awhile back.

Images from patternreview.com. It would be the style of the blue/green floral version.

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View D, here.

I'd like to have some gold pattern in there too but it'd probably be easier (and cheaper) to make it some kind of wide belt rather than finding fancier fabric with a gold print on a red background. Maybe some kind of border print along the hem and edges too, though.