In Lieu of Paper Sacks

I want my girls to look good. Like "I feel like a rockstar" good. Seriously! I'm not the kind of bride that is secretly plotting to make my ladies look a mess so that I'll look better by proxy. Hive, that is tacky. Also, no one wants to $100-$300 on a dress that they hate. I don't even like spending that much on dresses I like.

But when I originally asked my bridesmaids what kind of dresses they were thinking about for the wedding, they were totally wonderful....but also very vague. They assured me that "they'd wear a paper sack if I wanted them to". Well, hive, I'm here to announce the official cure for well-intentioned "I'll wear whatever you want" bridesmaids! Spoiler alert: Terrorize them with pictures like this.

Img via RackedNY

I had had some ideas before, mostly Pinterest inspired, but I was torn between matching and mismatching dresses. To add even more indecision, 'mismatched' also has about 10 different ways TO mismatch.

Our only confirmed wedding colors are blue and gray. It just so happened that my favorite inspirations were usually one or the other of these colors. I also knew I would really life them in soft, light fabrics like chiffon. I wasn't sure if I preferred that they be long or short, just that they all chose long or all chose short. I loved 'matching' options like these...

Image via Style Me Pretty

Img via Em for Marvelous

But then the mismatching options were cute too....

Img via Style Me Pretty Photography by Jen Fariello

Img via Princess Wedding Styles

I loved that the mismatched options also worked really well with my ombre theme!

In case your head is spinning with options like mine was, I found this awesome blog post with examples of each mismatched 'style'. I posted this link to my "Bridesmaids!" Facebook group (which I would highly recommend!) to clear things up so they could choose their favorite!

I polled my bridesmaids, and they actually unanimously picked long dresses over short. They also liked the same color, different dress idea! Now just to decide on blues or grays!

Next we'll try some on!