Search for a Dress: Part 1

Even before I got engaged, when I thought about dress shopping I pictured all of the important women in my life there - my mom, my sister(s) (I wish my sister in Arizona could've been there, but that's a little unrealistic), my FMIL, my FSIL, and my bridesmaids. So I scheduled an appointment at David's Bridal at the end of June and invited my mom, David's mom, David's sister, my sister (and Matron of Honor), and my 2 bridesmaids that live close enough to come.

The whole group:

From left to right: BM S, BM M, me, MOH/Sister A, FMIL, Mom

Second row: FG R, FSIL/JrBM K

I thought I knew exactly what I wanted and gave her a few style numbers that I definitely wanted to try on.

Babe, I know you don't want to see pictures of me anyway, so go ahead and close this window now. :)

Dress #1:

Dress 2:

I liked the style of both dresses, but I didn't find the boning (on the 2nd dress) as slimming as I thought it would be and I didn't like the sheer overlay on the skirts.

Dress 3: 

This was the first dress I really liked (as you can tell by my face), but my mom didn't think the skirt was full enough so it reminded her of whipped cream. Uh, that's not exactly what I want people to be thinking about when I walk down the aisle.

I tried on 3 or 4 others and none of them were even close to being 'the one' - So my mom pointed to one of the hanging pictures and asked my consultant (whose name was Jess - she was SUCH a sweetheart!) to get that one:

Dress 4:

This dress was the only one that made my mom cry. I'm incredibly emotional, so I figured I'd cry when I found my dream dress, but it didn't happen. I liked it a lot, but since it was Oleg Cassini, it was $1,050. While I'm sure that's a fraction of the price of some girls' dresses (and that's perfectly fine!), I just couldn't do it. I've never been someone to buy things, especially clothes, at full price, and thinking about my parents spending that much on a dress I'd wear for one day just made me sick. It may have been different if I was in love with the dress, but I just didn't get 'that feeling' in it, so I put my foot down.

Dress 5:

I actually ended up almost buying this dress. I don't know if I was just so frustrated that I wasn't LOVING anything or that my mom was still hung up on the last dress or what. I did really like this dress, I just wanted to take off the beaded belt type thing, or at least make it straight all the way across. I also wanted a corset back put in. So, while it would've possibly been my 'dream dress' after those changes - It would've ended being almost as much as the last one.

Knowing that I didn't love any of them enough to buy them, we walked out empty handed. While I was kind of sad none of them worked out, I knew I wanted to go to Brides Against Breast Cancer at the end of July, so I thought maybe it was a good thing I hadn't found anything. But going through the pictures later, I kept coming back to one of the dresses...

Did you run into this problem (feeling like you were disappointing someone for not going with the dress they loved) when you went dress shopping?