Alterations

We're getting all the girls' dresses hemmed by a lady who owns a little design shop near here.  I'd heard good things about her from several friends of mine and we've even voted for her shop in a local contest run by a news station, but I've never had the occasion to go visit her before.  That changed this week when most of us got together to go pay her a visit.

It would've been fun to go all together, but I had a little scheduling difficulty getting all the girls there at the same time, so a subset of them got together around dinner time last night to take turns trying on their dresses and standing on the little wooden box so Miss Jules could pin their hemlines to the right height and discuss whether we should alter anything else.  I'd already forgotten how pretty all the girls looked in their dresses and it was fun to see them again.  One thing that was really nice to note is that it's unlikely anyone's really going to need any alteration beyond the basic hemming we were planning on - one of my sisters lost weight this month due to being sick for a few weeks (well, okay, she was technically only sick for a day or two, but it made her stomach have so much trouble she didn't eat hardly anything for weeks.  Not a good way to diet, folks.  You feel rotten.) and we might have to take her dress in, but we're waiting two more weeks to see if we really need to.  

I thought I'd left the alterations until kind of later than really is a good idea, considering the dresses came in two weeks ago, but Miss Jules says because it's an off-season she has plenty of time.  A bridal party came in this week who needed some serious work done by Saturday and that, she says, is definitely last minute.  I felt slightly more organized hearing that.

The procedure was kind of interesting too, because we all sat around and chatted and inspected the dresses while the girls were getting pinned up.  Anna was signed up for Driver's Ed yesterday, so we told stories about learning to drive and teaching other people to drive.  It's funny, but those little spaces in time often end up being among the most interesting memories of planning an event like this.  It's not the time you set out to make memorable that often ends up being the real thing: which is why I'm often much more interested in the seemingly commonplace little things that happen all the time every day than the big things we pretty much set out to make memorable.  For instance, it's very possible that in a year I'll remember the little while sitting around in the dress shop laughing about putting on air-brakes when your brother's learning to drive more than I'll even remember details about the wedding ceremony itself.

We also learned that a bottle of Static Cling is going to be indispensable.  The dresses seem to be super-comfortable, but because they're made of a knit materiel sheath covered by chiffon, they pick up static.  Anna was going around zapping people by accident and you could arrange her skirt in all kinds of neat rosettes that would just cling to themselves.  Something to add to our Support The Bridesmaids list.  Benjamin's sister Rebekah is on official Support the Bridesmaids duty on the day of the wedding and part of what we need to do is make a list of things that she is actually in charge of.  I think de-staticking is going to be high on the list.

Originally the plan was for Elizabeth to hem all the girls' dresses, but after looking at the work she had to do it seemed like a much better plan to get it done once I found out that the cost was going to be very reasonable.  Katherine's dress is going to need a little more finicky work done to it, since the shoulder seams need to be adjusted, and I could see Elizabeth looking at it the day we got it and thinking, "Hm.  Wonder when I'll be able to work on that?"

All in all, I was very happy to be able to have the chance to relieve Lizzy of the responsibility.  I find it kind of exciting to be able to do that, actually.  It's like when you find out you can give someone a vitamin supplement or something that will make them feel much better than they have been.  Normally, doing the work would be a breeze for Elizabeth; but one of the side effects of Leah and I both being gone much of the time is that Elizabeth has taken on a whole new career in the Tuckfield house.  She's a busy girl - and she's being a trooper about it.  I'm so pleased with how my siblings have all stepped into taking on different responsibilities than they had before and how wonderful they've turned out to be at doing those things.  I expected it of them; but it's one thing expecting and another seeing that faith become proven.

In other news, today is the one-year anniversary of the day Grandpa Wilfred Richards died.  Ben and I spent much of the day with Grandma Lila.  She didn't refer to Grandpa's death, but she was unusually sleepy today and really did not want us to go, so we spent much of the day just keeping her company.  We sat on the couch and talked and she would wake up once in a while, check to see if we were still there, smile at us, and go back to sleep.  She has sleepy days, but today was a little more extreme than most; still, what always seems to make her happiest is just to know her family is around nearby somewhere.  

It's an interesting thing to me that the thing that people seem to need and want the most is not physical care - though that's very necessary - but to not be alone.  There are loners out there, of course, who seem to prefer having no company: but in the beginning God said "It's not good for the Man to be alone" and when he made Eve, he made it so people would no longer be alone.  It's not just about marriage.  It's about parents and siblings and grandparents and cousins and aunts and uncles and friends and...people around you.  It's not good for people to be alone.

It's also amazing how fast you can come to love someone you didn't even know existed a year ago.  People have a tremendous capacity to love and love easily and quickly.  The movie ideas of love at first sight are kind of goofy, but it is true that you can come to love (and not in the "romantic" movie fluff way that can be explained away by excitement and infatuation with a handsome face) people very quickly.  Grandma Lila usually says, "Goodbye - I love you!" and I'm not just saying it when I say, "Bye Grandma!  Love you too!"