The question of shoes

I'll admit, I kind of forgot about shoes. With all the things to decide, from flowers to dresses to food choices and whatnot, the question of what shoes my girls and I would be wearing kind of got put on the back burner. It wasn't until my sister emailed me about it that I realized that they'd probably appreciate some direction so they can go ahead and buy, borrow, or know that they can use what they already have.

I'm not going to be dictating that they all need to have matching shoes - or even shoe styles. I don't care if one girl wears a strappy sandal, one a flat, one a peep-toe pump. All I ask is that they be silver, not flipflops, and not clunky platforms. (I doubt any of my girls would choose clunky platforms, but I had to say it just in case.) I'm determined that they will be able to wear the shoes again, which is why I told them no dyables, since matching the shoes to the pink in their dress would mean that they'd probably never wear the shoes again. Plus I hate dyables. And if they already had silver shoes that would work, I see no problem with them using those instead of going out to buy something new. At first I was wishy-washy about the color, since I thought a champagne-colored shoe would look fabulous. But in looking at shoe stores, there aren't many shoes in a nice pale gold or champagne color - they're mostly blazing bright gold or dark bronze and I didn't think that would look right. And I didn't want the girls to have to struggle to find the right shade of shoe, so I went with a color that's readily available and would still look lovely with the dresses - silver.

So I emailed my girls with some suggestions:

which launched a bit of a back and forth with my bridesmaids firing shoe suggestions to each other. It was fun! I love looking at shoes (although actually shopping for and trying on shoes usually ends with me getting fed up and/or bored or tired of it).

And thinking about bridesmaids shoes got me thinking about my shoes. I want to wear flats since they'd be much more comfortable for all-day wearing, and because James and I are the same height. I love some of the shoes that the girls and I found yesterday, but with a three-inch heel I'd be towering over him. Which would make me feel awkward and I don't want to be awkward on my wedding day. Plus I never wear heels so I'd probably be a bit wobbly in them. So flats it is.

But nice dressy flats are hard to find. I was hoping to have pink shoes, but that seems to be impossible. I think I'll be going with silver, too.

I just got an unpleasant shock - I sent my parents a bunch of links to silver flats on zappos.com, but when I went to look at them to post the pictures here, every link said "We're sorry, that product is no longer available." WTF?! Boo. So I found some others, which are above. I've never purchased shoes online, but I may have to - I've been having a hard time finding any silver flats in stores - at least, any flats that would be nice enough to wear with a wedding gown. But I still have plenty of time, so I'll keep looking in stores for the time being. Buying shoes online seems risky to me - just because the shoe says it's your size doesn't mean it'll fit right.