story of a little black dress

This is the story of a dress.
A little black dress.

We all have one (well, we ladies.)
Some of us have multiple.

But there is always one that is our "go to."  To feel gorgeous.  That shows off what we want to show off and hides what we like to hide.

Here is the story of my little black dress.

In December of 2001 (yes, twelve years ago) my hubby, then boyfriend, who I was madly in love with, bought it for me.  The company he was doing an co-op position for was having their annual Christmas party, so as one of my Christmas gifts he decided we'd go pick out a cocktail dress for me to wear.  (Can I just say that even at 20-years-old he was clearly the perfect man for me???)

We picked this one out.  We both loved it.  This picture doesn't really show it at all, and sorry for the poor photo quality, as it is scanned from a paper newspaper-type clipping...

whoa...were were babies!  and I was blonde!

Since this is the only picture I have from that night, an apt description of the frock would be: a mid-calf length simple black strapless, fitted in silhouette, made of soft, cotton material, with a pretty overlay of black lace-like design.  It also has a slightly racy slit up one side...but none of my pics seem to show that.

After this event I wore the dress many times during the years between this - our first formal date - and our actual marriage.  During those six years we dated on and off...but I always had this dress to remind me of my 'first love' - that ended up as my one true love!

Even my sister Heidi even wore it several times!  She and I referred to it 'the signature dress' because it was pretty flattering on both of us and could be worn to any number of events.

For some reason after Hubby and I got married the dress went into hiding.  I put it and several other dresses (like my wedding dress) in a portable garment closet down in our basement, wrapped in plastic and then forgotten about.

Until now.

So why did I go digging for dress options in our dark and dungeonous basement?  Typically when we have a wedding or other formal event to go to I will use it as the perfect excuse to buy a new dress.  I love clothes shopping and dress shopping is particularly fun.  However, recently my husband was inspired to be even more frugal in our spending.  Long story short: he dreams of retiring really early and found a blogger who did just that and writes all about it.  Therefore, even though we were already pretty fiscally conservative (got debt-free through Dave Ramsey's guidelines) now we are furthering our efforts to save in order to perhaps enjoy a fairly early retirement.  Basically, we cancelled cable and eliminated a bunch of other little 'unnecessary' things (such as a new outfit for every event), along with aggressive saving.

Therefore, instead of heading to the mall I headed to the basement, and unearthed several viable dress options, including...the 'signature' black dress.

In my head I thought, There is no way this dress will still fit me!  I am ten pounds heavier than I was when I first wore that dress.  I have more curves.  Also, I had two babies, one less than five months ago.

Luckily the dress is made of very forgiving stretchy material.  It even ruches in the center to somewhat cover that last bit of baby belly.  Oh, and I 'sucked it in' all night.  All in the name of fashion!  :)

in our hotel room - between wedding festivities

Since this was my first night away from Finola in nearly five months (I waited much longer with Cormac!) we decided to only get away for one night, so I wouldn't be too traumatized.   We got up and drove to Chicago early Saturday morning, arrived in plenty of time to check in, take a nap (!!!) and get ready.

The wedding was lovely, and the reception was a blast.  Weddings always remind me why I love my husband so much.  Not only does the ceremony get us all teary and reminiscent of our own vows, but the reception reminds how much fun we have together.  This one was no exception.  We drank, we enjoyed an excellent dinner, we danced, we took goofy photos in the photo booth, and drank and danced some more.  

Hubby and I at the wedding 

So, the signature little black dress enjoyed the exact same type of fun night twelve years later on this mama-of-two, curvy brunette that it did on a twenty-year-old skinny blonde.

Somehow, I'm kind of proud of that.

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So, how many little black dresses do you own?
What kind of stories could they tell?
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