"I feel like we're planning a Walmart wedding..."

Yesterday, I finally got to experience one of the events I have been most excited about in the planning process: The Southern Bridal Show. The week of our engagement, one of the first things I researched was the date of the next show in Birmingham. Luckily, I didn't have too long to wait. It was 3 months away. Alas, the day finally arrived and my mother and I, along with Matt (he's so good. lol) fought the horrible rainy weather to get to the BJCC. However, once we arrived at the show, we found that this was not all it was cracked up to be. It seemed like most of the booths there were overpriced photographers, tacky decor, obscene party ideas, and bad videography. There were thousands of people there and a great deal of them were bridezillas. My mom and I found ourselves laughing b/c of the competitiveness of some of the moms there. I know a wedding is an important day, but come on ladies. No need to get all worked up! haha. One of the craziest things we noticed were how many "Bride-to-be's" were pushing baby strollers. Even though we were disappointed in the booths, we were still excited about the fashion show at the end. Unfortunately, we were no more impressed with that than we were any other part of the day. Most of the dresses seemed to just look like white prom dresses. Nothing special... As we left, the statement we agreed upon that basically described everything we had seen was simultaneously stated by my mom and me.:-) "I feel like we were planning a Walmart Wedding!"

Due to our disappointment in the Bridal Show, we left and used the rest of our afternoon to look for dresses (Matt had to head back to the church to get ready for the youth service). So we went to one shop and I tried on three dresses, none of which I was ready to commit to. However, this was the first time I had ever put on a veil. This moment made up for the disappointment we had experienced the rest of the day. For that one special moment, with just my mom and I in the dressing room, I finally had a reality check. This is real. I am truly getting prepared for the most important day of my life... I'm going to be a bride.