So, the dress. Well, the girls each have school pageants coming up really soon. I have known they were coming all year, as they do every year, but didn't really think about it until the first registration form came home from school. Allie got her form a couple of weeks ago, and the pageant is in a week and a half. So the hunt for a dress was on. I went to the "big city" and talked my husband into going to three or four dress shops. (He waited in the car after the first one, but he was very nice and patient about it.) My intention was to rent a dress to save a little money. The first shop used to rent (back in the dark ages when I was in school), they no longer do that, but the lady said she would be willing to rent me a dress (only had one choice) for $150. I thought that was a little steep seeing as how we wouldn't get to keep it, so I continued on to the other stores. The second store had nothing under $300 (not happening for a Kindergarten school pageant). The third store was a second hand shop that had only dressy stuff. They did not have anything in my girl's size, but had a website that I could look at and they would order from for me. Those dresses were a little more reasonable, but still more than I wanted to spend ($150). I thought, if they can order from a website and add their fee to the price, surely there is a website that would sell straight to me.
I found the website! I was so excited. The dresses were beautiful and cheap! I found Allison the perfect dress for $95 (pictured above), and Brianna picked one out that was $69 (even better). Allison's dress said it would ship out in 2 days and be at my house within 8 days, perfect! A day or two passed and I checked the sight to see if it had shipped. There was a tracking number, yay... and a note from the seller that China was on holiday for the New Year and the workers would not be back for 20 days. It stated that they would begin working on the dress when the workers returned. I messaged the shipping company and the tracking number belonged to a package that was destined for Australia... what????? I was freaking out! I messaged the company that was the go between (it is like an ebay for china) and they said they could not do anything. That after four days I could begin the process of asking for a refund. Then the seller had to agree to the refund and it would take a few months. This was not what I wanted to hear, the pageant was pending. I contacted the seller and after several rounds of "no workers, I am so sorry dear friend." I finally asked if they had any other dresses in stock that were the same size. She quickly got back to me and gave me three pictures to choose from. We found one that was an acceptable replacement and then she promised to have the dress shipped out asap. My friend joked that we should pray it was not a Barbie dress, lol (not funny at the time, but I was a little worried.) Biting nails, pulling hair, the lady finally sent me a UPS tracking code and when I looked it up, it said it was headed to my town. God is good! (We had been praying all week that this would work out!) So, the dress arrived, and I learned an important lesson... you can get just about anything cheaper from China... but you better make sure they are not on holiday before you order! (Come to find out, my sister-in-law has ordered a dress for her wedding from China also... I told her that she better find something else, because it probably won't get there until after they are hitched.
The Replacement Dress
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