A Cautionary Tale

from the closet of Emily Current via The Covetuer

I know I'm not alone in my love of white lacy dresses, even if I don't actually wear them very often. What is it about those pieces that tug at our heartstrings? Anytime I try to wear one, I end up feeling a bit too precious and afraid that I'm going to spill something all over myself. Unfortunately my luck in the lacy white dress department has been running a bit thin lately. A cautionary tale...

When we took our trip to LA, we were trying to avoid checking bags so I shipped a box of clothes (including a couple of my favorite white dresses) to our friend's house where we would be staying. All was well, I wore a couple of the dresses while we were there (photos to come) and when it was time to come home, I packed them into their box to ship them back. I was confident that we would beat the boxes home by a day so I would be there to accept them when they were delivered but the post office used some sort of super sonic coast to coast delivery system because the box ended up beating us home by a day.

Rather than leave a notice on the door or try redelivering the next day the postman just tossed the box over our gate and left it on the sidewalk. In the pouring rain. Ugh! By the time I discovered the box, it was soaked through. Rainwater poured out of the corners when I picked it up. My heart sank! I knew what I would find when I opened the box but I was hoping against hope that everything would be OK. What I found was a pile of sopping wet dresses, the dyes all running onto one another. After a good old-fashioned foot-stomping hissy fit I calmed down to assess the damage; three white vintage dresses (including a 30s chiffon one I bought in LA and hadn't even taken off the tags) that looked like they'd been badly tie-dyed. Double ugh!

No amount of soaking has lifted the dyes so I think I'll be investing some time in a Rit bath for them soon. I just have to decide what color to go with. Who knows, maybe I'll wear them more once they're not so pristine looking. I knew I should have wrapped the clothes in a plastic bag before shipping them and have no real reason why I didn't. Lesson learned! The hard way.