For today’s post I wanted to put on a fashion show. After all, my sister isn’t the only one in the family with good fashion sense!

Growing up some of the best gifts that I ever received were the dresses that my mom would make for me. At the time I didn’t realize that she was making me dresses because we didn’t have a lot of money and it was much cheaper this way. All that I knew was that my mommy made me dresses with lots of ruffles and lace and I LOVED them!

 

I *think* this is one that she made me. If not, it was this style that she modeled a lot of the dresses after.

Lace – check

Ruffles – check

Puffy princess sleeves – check

 

 

 

Here we are at a church program in another homemade dress. Let’s go through the check list again…

Lace – check

Ruffles – check

Puffy Princess sleeves – check

 

 

Jelly shoes!! Okay, so my mom didn’t make those, but she did make the dress that I’m wearing…

I won’t go through the checklist, but I think that you can tell they are all there.

Oh, and Jay please note that in this picture I seem to have a bruise. See, nothing has changed!

 

 

As I got older I still loved to wear long dresses. I did give up the princess sleeves and the lace, but this one is kind of ruffle.

Yes, this is actually how I dressed in high school.

No wonder kids tripped me in the hall!

 

 

 

Look! This time I’m actually wearing pants. Except, they have the Puffy Princess leg thing going on. Actually, I loved this jumper and was upset when I outgrew it.

Wow. Jay is one LUCKY man!

 

 

 

When it came time to attend the prom we couldn’t afford to go out and buy a dress at the store. This was 10th grade and my mom had been given a black dress that fit me. It came just below my knees. We went out and bought dark blue and black lace, plus the elastic sequined belt. My mom made a skirt out of the lace and attached it to the dress using the sequined belt.

 

 

 

My Junior year of school I had a date to the prom, but only because the tickets were cheaper that way. It was definitely not a romantic thing.

As you can see, I really like blue. Again, we couldn’t afford to buy a dress at the store so we used what we had. My mom had been given a VERY long polyester black skirt. We went out and purchased this blue sequined material and my mom made a top for the skirt. We used the sequined belt from the previous year’s dress and used that to hide the seam.

My mom swore she would never make anything using that sequined material again! And she hasn’t.

 

This is actually a few years after my Senior prom, but this was the dress that I wore to it.

I told my mom that I wanted a store bought dress just once. We got this one for a really good deal. She just had to change the sleeves (they were gaudy with way too much material) and then she had to take it in to fit me better.

 

 

 

I don’t know if this counts, but my mom also made the skirt that I was wearing in this picture. In fact, my mom has made a LOT of my skirts. Mainly because I’m very picky and I like them long, but since I’m so tall I have a hard time finding them long enough. She uses the same pattern and makes me different skirts with it.

 

 

 

 

When I was in college the movie Ever After with Drew Barrymore had recently come out. I LOVED that movie and wanted a dress made for the formal at college in the same style as what Drew Barrymore wore.

This was dark purple velvet and I loved it. Yes, I looked like a dork. No, I didn’t care. At least I wasn’t walking around all night constantly pulling my top up!

 

 

 

After college I was asked to be the maid of honor in a friend’s wedding. She decided that the bridesmaids would make their own dresses. Not me. I handed the stuff over to my mom and asked pretty please.

 

The other two bridesmaids were the soon-to-be sisters-in-law of the bride. Their mother made their dresses. I felt bad because she did her best, but you could tell that they were homemade. One lady came up and asked how I managed to find a dress to match theirs off the rack? I told her that I didn’t, that my mom had made mine.

 

 

This is just a tiny sampling of the various dresses that my mom has made for me or my sisters. As you can tell, she really is good with the sewing machine! I hope to someday be as good as she is. Until then all I have to do is smile prettily and ask, “Please?”