When I was a little girl, I knew only two things about my future wedding: I would get married where my parents said their vows, and I was going to wear my mother's dress.
My father, mother, and I unpacked my mother's dress with just a little under a year until my wedding.
My mother's dress started out in a box. Preserved for 27 years, wrinkled, and old.
It was yellowed a little bit throughout, but it still kept the beauty it gave my mother all those years ago.
The box was hard to open as someone had sealed it shut, keeping the dress in hibernation.
We broke those seals and lifted the dress out of the its prison, my mother holding it up before her.
She began to cry, all those memories flooding back to her. I smiled at this emotion: for some reason my heart soars when my mother cries good tears.
My mother looked to me and said it was my turn to try it on. She held it up to help me step into it.
I thought it wasn't going to fit. My mother is smaller than I am, much more petite. I was pessimistic this dress would ever become mine, but as the zipper ran up my spine, I knew I would be wearing this dress on my wedding day.
It was the best experience of my life. What began as my mother's dress became the dress that I will cherish forever.
My mother and I took her beloved dress to a nearby seamstress. It took 8 months to transform my mother's dress into the one I would wear as I walked down the aisle.
The poofy sleeves were the first to go and the big bow on my lower back was the second.
It was cut in two and new material was added to ensure the dress touched the floor.
Next, came the details: the lace from my mothers dress was placed around the train and finished off the material around my shoulders. Bows, buttons, and lace - just a few of my favorite things.
After 8 months, the old, wrinkled dress had turned into the most beautiful thing I had ever seen.
But, the most important thing, after 8 months of work, was being able to share the experience with my mother. Our relationship had strengthened watching her dress become my dress become our dress.
When it was all said and done, I still called it her dress, but she insisted it was mine.
After looking at the journey we had shared, I walked down the aisle on my wedding day wearing my mother and I's little white dress.
