A Bride All Lit Up Like A Christmas Tree?

There's no use in thinking "I thought I'd seen it all", because there will always be something out there that will either dumbfound you, make you dream, or have those three little special initials pop into your head....WTF!
These dresses come from a web store called Enlighted. And they don't just have wedding dresses. They have vests, capes, jackets, bras, hats, shoes, belts....you name it!
So what do you ladies think of this dress?

Here's a youtube video of the light show in action:

I'm Not Keeping Much From My Wedding.....

(image by erinchris Photography)


I know that it's customary to keep your wedding dress. To pay extra money to have it preserved in a box. To keep the top layer of the cake for your 1st anniversary (ewww), and to pay yet even more cash to preserve the gosh darned bouquet.
Well, I'm not saving any of those. I will sell my dress on Craigslist or Ebay, eat all I can of my wedding cake, and throw my actual bouquet at the bouquet toss. I consider myself to be a sentimental kind of gal, but I really don't feel the need to take up a bunch of extra space with stuff that's just going to sit there. Will my daughters or granddaughters ever wear the dress that I wore? I seriously doubt it.
Pictures, scrapbooks, videos, our rings and each other are all I will need. These are all easily handed down to the next generation without imposing. Yes, even each other can be handed down as long as we're cremated or made into diamonds. Have you ever heard of that? Being made into diamonds when you die? Well, if you haven't, check this out: LifeGem Cool stuff!

Well, I think I've gone off track.....I do that from time to time......ok....often!

Wedding Dress From Ebay?

(This picture is not me, but it's the dress I ended up with from David's Bridal.)
OK......So we had finally decided to set the date and get hitched after 8 years of loving each other. I was so excited and immediately started looking around for a dress. Because of the economy and seeing that I had just gotten laid off in December, I knew it would have to be a great bargain dress. As I began to scour the internet, I saw that dresses were not very cheap. Then I had a light bulb go off in my head. Ebay! The place I had gotten so many bargains from in the past....why not a wedding dress?
I found a beautiful ballerina-style dress from a store in China. I breezed through the feedback of this seller, and everything seemed to be ok. So for $68, free shipping and a beautiful custom made dress (replica, of course), I thought, what the heck? After all, through Paypal I had full purchase price protection. Definitely worth the gamble at such a bargain price. Besides, I had heard that many bridal dresses come from China anyway, so it seemed plausible that this offer wasn't THAT good to be true. It made sense to me. So I did it!
3 weeks later, I wrote the seller asking if my dress would be shipping out by May 31st, which was the timeline he had given for making and shipping the dress. I never received a response. I went back to his feedback....which I had been doing in between time anyway, and saw a recent negative feedback for him. Hmmmmm...I thought. I watched daily as the negative feedbacks rolled in. One after another. I wrote him again, telling him my concerns because of his non-response and negative feedbacks. Still no email.
I finally filed a claim through Paypal and am currently waiting to see where that goes. Lesson learned. I actually learned a lot about the whole feedback thing. Did you know that with some sort of program, they can actually put up FAKE feedback? I always do a lot of researching on the internet, and learned SO much on this subject. There are ways to tell that's it's fake, but that's a whole other blog!
After all this chaos I decided to look for a dress the conventional way. I got in my car and drove my butt to David's Bridal where the staff was more than helpful. After trying on eight dresses, number nine was "the one". I absolutely LOVE it! I have a little over a year to lose a few pounds so that the dress can look like it should on me. lol
Thus far, for my wedding attire, I've purchased my dress(David's), my veil(ebay), my petticoat(ebay), my tiara(ebay) and my shoes. I still need jewelry and I'm still contemplating on gloves(but probably not) and putting some straps or sheer 3/4 sleeves on dress.
UPDATE: I did finally end up getting my money back through Paypal. Lesson learned.