A tale of two dresses

Most of the stories I write are about my boys. The cute or unbelievable things they do. Each one is a small bubble of amazement at the small wonders of every day life. This note is about another of such small wonders, but it is not about my children, or my amazing husband, or even my faith. It's about a dress. Or rather two dresses.

My style of dressing is slightly different from main stream. I own one pair of pants. I love dresses and skirts and things that are just slightly.. different. Last year on a shopping trip to goodwill I was amazed and excited to find a dress in the racks that was not just handmade, but hand embroidered. Someone had spent hours embroidering magnificent pink flowers on a dress, and add bands of crochet and lace on there. I fell in love with it, bought it and have worn it till it is well.. almost worn. It was one of those one of a kind 'I can not believe I found this' items. Here you can see me wear it on our vacation last year.




Fast forward a year later. I have gone to goodwill a few times throughout the rest of the year, having found something pretty here and there and today, I decided to go back for a 'prepare for summer' shopping. I was a bit dissapointed at not finding any shoes. Some bridal store must have made a big donation, because there were dozens of pairs of beautiful painted satin shoes in whites, pearls and colours. Still, I was more than pleased to find one or two new blouses and a skirt or two. Then I went, without much hope, to the rack with the dresses.

Pretty dresses are hard to find at Goodwill, I am afraid. Most of them are of the 'polyester shoulder pad' type. Then there is a nice section of denim jumpers. And several dresses of the polyester 'who would want a grown woman to wear that type of print' variety", usually with a peter pan collar and fabric covered buttons" variety...
Okay, I admit I am rather difficult when it comes to dresses. Still, I faithfully go through the rack every time I am there. And all of a sudden I stopped. I am pretty sure that if a novel writer had been documenting this, she would have said that my eyes widened. Because what did I find? A hand embroidered dress. Clearly from the same hand as the one I had bought there last year. Same fabric, same dress pattern with a small difference in the shoulder straps, and a whole new level of embroidery on the dress.





I do not know who made these dresses. I do not know how they ended up at goodwill almost exactly a year apart for me to find them. I wish I could call the one who made them and invite her over, so we can sit together and compare projects. I wish I could tell her how she has delighted me. I wish she knew that, however those dresses ended up at goodwill, they are valued and treasured by someone who appreciates both their beauty and the work that went in them. She will most likely never know. But she made me so happy!