I Made My Own DIY Wedding Dress | Key Wedding Moments on Camera

Who is dumb enough to try to make their own wedding dress when they don’t know how to sew??? Me. And it was another key wedding moment I missed on wedding video.

I had expensive wedding dress dreams and a teeny tiny budget. That’s when my friend lied to me. She knew how to sew and assured me that it would take no more than 10 hours to make my own DIY wedding dress. LIES. She knew I would never try if she had told me it would take over 100 hours. Probably longer.

So I took my $500 budget, flew to New York and went to the wholesale fabric stores. Yep, I spent my whole dress budget on fabric. My entire knowledge of sewing consisted of making a pillow in home economics in 8th grade.

Learning to sew was an adventure unto itself. First I made a practice dress for Christmas, just to prove to myself that I could follow a pattern. I spent about 20 hours on that dress alone, so I kind of knew that my friend had lied to me at that point.

The night before Christmas, I had my gorgeous practice dress laying out in the living room and was applying my makeup when my fiancé knocked on the bathroom door. “Um, how do you get wax out of silk?”

“Why?” I asked.

“Well, remember how you’re always telling me to use the candle snuffer rather than blowing out candles? I kind of ignored that advice. And apparently candle wax can blow pretty far. Like all over your new dress.”

Somehow I maintained my composure, although I would have some loved some good ole’ fashioned reality tv shots of that conversation on either side of the bathroom door! FYI, ironing with a brown paper bag will get out candle wax.

But creating the wedding dress was so much more than that. There was the day I laid out 19 yards of tulle to cut it for the skirt. Or making the hem. Do you have any idea how complicated it is to sew a hem on a wedding dress? First of all, you have to measure it. Wish I had video of that. Then you have to hang the dress high in the air and sit inside of it to sew the hem so that it lays properly. I literally had my head shoved up my wedding gown for a couple of days. And I have no video of that!

There’s also the hours of time I spent with my friend while learning to sew. She was so generous with her time and I will be eternally grateful. I wish I could say that I will forever remember all the stories we shared on those afternoons. But I don’t have a minute of video of it.

If I had it all to do over again, here’s what I wish I had filmed:

• Picking out a pattern and why I liked/disliked some of the gowns
• Picking out the fabric and learning about the different silks
• Cutting the pattern
• Talking to my mom about her own wedding dress
• Talking to my grandma about her wedding dress
• Attaching the bodice to the skirt – that was momentous and hilarious
• Sewing the hem – with my head stuck up the skirt
• Doing the spin my very first time in the gown
• Filming the look on my parents’ faces the very first time they saw me in the gown and veil

What special projects are you working on for your wedding? Do you need any help in how to capture them on video?