The wedding dress came out lovely. My apologies-- I don't have a picture of the whole finished thing, let alone of the bride in it, but here is a random process picture:
One of the nicest compliments I've ever gotten on my sewing happened when the bride's mother, who has more experience than I do, sewed right over my basting stitches on the shoulders which I had modified. (I'd left the basting in rather than doing the final sewing myself just in case she wanted to fix anything I had done.) After that, she told me that the front of the hem looked just right, and since I had pinned-then-basted it three different times at that point, I felt both gratified and justified. I told her I will be eating those compliments for a year, which is true.
I told my friend, the bride, that I had thought about trying to finish up a blue dress I had been working on in time to wear it to the wedding, but because her colors were blue and white, I had decided not to. She told me that to the contrary, she would be thrilled if she looked out at the congregation and saw a sea of blue.
So, I spent the next day doing my own sewing-over-basting, and I wore the dress to the wedding on Friday night, and then again to church the following Sunday. I felt SO pretty. I'm pretty sure that at this was at least partly due to the "growing your own vegetables" effect-- kids (and grownups) who are involved in gardening often love to gulp down produce they've had a hand in growing. But I don't think it was all that. It's a good color on me, anyway, and it doesn't look home made, which is a win.
At the wedding itself, the most curious thing happened. As the couple met at the front of the room and the ceremony started, I found myself unable to stop grinning. This also happened at the last wedding I went to, a year ago March, and it surprised me then, too.
Because, true confession time, I wasn't this happy at any of my siblings' weddings, nor at my friends' weddings, even a decade ago. This is new for me, and it's lovely, and I wish I had found it earlier, but better late than never, no? I'm so grateful that "years ago" (to quote my father) I was paying attention in a church meeting where a leader encouraged us to learn to be happy for others. At the time I thought this was slightly odd advice, but I've tried to take it, and maybe it hadn't sunk in ten years ago, but maybe it has now.
I remember years ago (there's that phrase again!) a friend quoting her religion professor saying that after you are married, there are only team points. I fully believed that then, and I fully believe it now. But the thing that I've been realizing, as I've pondered how delighted I am to have found my "happiness for others" mojo, is that I'm pretty sure that all points are team points. We're humans; we're children of God. That's the team I'm on, and that I want to be on.
(But, me being a mortal, fallible human, it sure does help to feel like I have some wins, too, even if they are smallish and have to do with sewing and professional life-- more on that later.)
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