My recycling project---The Tale of Two Dresses

A few years back our church had a ladies luncheon that included a fashion show of wedding dresses through the years.  I brought my wedding dress out to see if it would be suitable to be used for this event---worn by someone else, of course. (I think I maybe weighed about 120 pounds when we got married---what a return Bob got on his investment!!) Anyway, after looking at the dress, I decided that it probably wasn't fashion-show-worthy---there were a couple of stains on the front, and also all of the trim had really yellowed over the years.

I got to thinking that maybe I could take the dress apart and save the fabric and maybe it could be used someday for something else, like maybe a baby's baptism dress.  So I took it all apart and threw away all the yellowed trim. (That probably was not a smart move--it probably could have been bleached white again.) And then I put the fabric away in a closet.

Fast forward a few years to 2014, and we found out that Rachel and Adam were expecting a baby girl!  So that got the wheels turning again, and I started looking for someone who could make this all become a reality. I found a seamstress here in Brookfield and she was very excited about this project.  I did have some nervous moments, because this all took much longer than I expected---I first talked to her last July or August, and I picked up the finished dress 4 days before Hope's baptism.  I was also worried that I wasn't going to like the finished project, partly because whenever she sent me pictures of it, she had it on a rather creepy-looking doll. It was hard for me to then picture it on adorable little Hope. But in the end, it turned out very nicely, and Hope looked absolutely adorable in it.

So here I am in my wedding dress on July 6, 1974:

 My 70's look--long hair??

 And here is Hope Caroline on Feb. 1, 2015:

The seamstress made the head band, too, from the dress fabric.

Hope is lying on a very special blanket,

made by her great-great-grandma Wiers!

It was such a blessing to witness Hope's baptism, and it was very special to see her wearing this dress.  The seamstress even managed to find some trim that was very similar to what was originally on the dress.  So all my worrying about it was for nothing--it turned out very well.  And my only real regret is that I didn't think of doing this about 6 years ago, so that Josie could have worn it as well. It is now stored away until.......who knows?