Say Yes to...

We have now completed the initial wedding dress shopping with our younger daughter. The bride --to-be arranged the weekend for her older sibling and her parental units to be together for "the" shopping event. She had a plan. She had a style and color she wanted. Yes indeed, we were set.

Our first son-in-law and granddaughter stayed with the groom-to-be and watched football. They were happy campers. They ordered in pizza and had beverages and were set. The grandgirl watched videos and played on the Ipad and had pizza too. They were just fine letting us go on our merry way.

The four of us were off with reckless abandon. Now, the girls may not think that was the case, but for me that was as reckless as I am going to get these day. I don't get many opportunities when it is just the four of us since our family has added our boys and a grandbaby now.

The first dress store the bride-to-be selected was an independent shop. They were set up with multiple fitting rooms and multiple mirrored staging areas. Upon entering we had to take off our shoes. That was a first for me. When I thought about the amount of money those gowns cost, shoes would track in and get the floors dirty. That in turn would get the long gowns dirty as well. It is preventive I suppose. While I grumbled and the FOB (father-of-the-bride) grumbled initially, we did as we were instructed.

Older Sister was a big help. She helped her sibling get in and out of the gowns and picked out different dresses for her to try on.

Now, the trick to this was to attempt to judge the expression as the younger one walked out to model the gowns. Was the dress she was going to model to be 'the winner' or a runner-up?

Now I have watched enough of the wedding dress shows on cable TV to know, I just didn't want to be one of those moms who hijack the experience for their daughter. Okay, I know some of my family and friends are going to laugh at that because I tend to be... well... vocal.

We were getting to the end of the choices at the first store, when the Older Sister wanted her to try on just one more. She had been looking at it the entire time and thought her sibling should try that on.

Let's just say, when the bride-to-be walked out, the expression and the walk was different. It was 'the dress'. Yes, her matron-of-honor had done her duty well. She had guided her sister to 'the look.'

Now, if you remember, there was a plan earlier. Let's just say, the plan was revised. The style and the color were not what she had envisioned herself finding. And just for the record, the MOB (mother-of-the-bride) was spot on for the color. I don't win many of the fashion discussions ever, so I am going to shout about this one for a long time. I also did that with the elder daughter's color choice as well but, heck, who is counting.

It was time for lunch and then on to the next store. While she had found 'the dress', we decided since we were all together, there was no sense in stopping at one store. We did go to a second store, which was a chain store. While there were similar dresses, there wasn't anything that wowed her like at the first store. The only new detail from the second store was a choice of veil. The second store opened all our eyes to a different length of veil.

While I would love to be more descriptive, those details have to be saved for the time being.

Now, all day long, the FOB had been in a fairly good humor. He put his two cents worth in and he definitely had his opinions. He didn't have a Husker game to listen to on the radio. He was definitely the only dad in either of the shops that we saw that day. He wasn't totally outnumbered because our nephew came with us for the second part of the day. He was able to give his uncle some moral support and it was okay also that Aunt B bought a meal. Nephew #1 is a college student and food is a big plus. He also likes to give his cousins advice and he is usual spot on with it. It was nice to have us all together to share the afternoon.

When everything was said and done, I knew how the bride-to-be felt about the day, I asked the FOB. His reply was "I feel a little bit like Steve Martin."

For those of you who don't know, the comment was a reference to the 1991 movie "Father of the Bride" movie with comedian, Steve Martin. Martin's character, George Banks, has these moments where thinks about his "little" girl and how she should not be old enough to get married and should still be home shooting hoops in the driveway.

It turned out to be a pretty groovy dress shopping day. Younger daughter was able to say yes to her dress. We were able to have some good family time. Days don't get much better than that.