Nick and Kalea Derry (my daughter in my wedding dress as Pocohontas)
Most wedding dresses are very special treasures, cherished by the bride, and saved for future generations. My very unique wedding dress has not served either of my daughters as their bridal attire, but has served one of my them well on several occasions as her personal Pocahontas costume. It is actually quite humorous to realize the irony of a Halloween costume once being a wedding dress.
When my friend, Kelli Ward, began planning her wedding 40 years ago, her mother-in-law to be, Katherine Ward, a gifted seamstress, had already made many friends’ wedding gowns within their tight Corryton community. So, for Kelli, there was no question who she wanted to design and make her dress; they spent precious hours together choosing the lustrous satin, the ornate lace and the tiny pearls Katherine would hand stitch on to this one of kind masterpiece.
Kelli has kept the beautiful dress thinking someone would want to wear it. She laughs, ‘Brides these days have other ideas. It now has a new life in ‘dress up’.” What a life this fairytale treasure has in the world of Kelli’s granddaughter, Elouise Katherine, named for two of her great grandmothers, one being Katherine, the dress designer. Kelli loves to tell her lone granddaughter (she has 6 grandsons) how her namesake made this dress for her Grammy to marry her Gramps.
Elouise Katherine in her Grammy’s wedding dress
“My mother-in-law passed away in 2020 and how she would have loved to see her great granddaughter enjoying the dress,” reflects Kelli.
The dress is a true legacy of love and Elouise Katherine will no doubt carry the legacy on as long as the dress stands up to the test of time. I can just visualize generations of tea parties and fairy balls in the living rooms of little girls enjoying “Grammy Kelli’s” beautiful dress.
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