Last night was SO FUN! There's always a chance of something going wrong when driving to Chicago during rush hour, but the whole night went swimmingly, even though we were only down there for about an hour.
First, we'll get this out of the way. Here's what I wore:
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| Dress: Target; Belt: from an H&M dress; Bracelet: Forever 21 belt; Watch: Michael Kors; Shoes: ModCloth |
I picked up Lindsey and Sabreen at Southridge Mall, and then we headed down to Chicago. As it began pouring, we were a little worried about the rest of the night, but the downpour didn’t last long. Shortly after the rain ended, we hit the dreaded rush-hour traffic. Not only that, but I realized that the antenna on my car had been removed during my recent oil change and never replaced, so the only station that came in clearly was the Spanish station. But, I had my ipod, so that was quickly remedied.
We got into the city at about quarter to 7 and wanted to find a restroom before continuing on to the event. I knew there was a McDonald’s on Ohio, so we tried there first. They wanted to charge us $10 to park! Um no. We drove on, found a Subway on our route, and were back on our way.
As we drove down Oak St., our jaws dropped at all the high-end shopping surrounding us--Hermes, Chanel, Barney’s, Jimmy Choo, etc. etc. We joked that they weren’t going to let us into the event at Bebe because we were too poor. By some miracle, we easily found street parking right across from Bebe and nervously headed inside.
An employee in a fabulously large floppy hat and gift bags greeted us at the door. Sabreen commented on how she wanted to shop, and the lady was like, “Please do! We feel lonely; everyone is going up to bridal.” Sabreen zeroed in on a top she wanted to try on, but first, we decided to scale the steps to the third floor for the bridal event.
Tuxedo-clad men with champagne welcomed us as we reached the top floor. The room was pretty crowded with people and the beautiful gowns on mannequins along the center of the room and on hangers lining the walls, but there was still room to move around comfortably.
We spotted Rami from afar on the other side of the room talking to people and taking pictures, but then he disappeared behind a curtain. A few of the employees came up and asked who the bride was, which we immediately designated Sabreen for as the unmarried one of the trio, and she pointed out a couple gowns that she was admiring. One of the employees asked if we wanted to meet the designer, and we giddily replied that we did and proceeded to geek out as she went to retrieve him.
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| There he is! |
When Rami came back, he immediately looked at me and said, “I know you!”
A look of terror, disbelief, and amusement crossed my face. “What? How?” I had tweeted him a couple times and left a message on his Facebook fan page, but surely he couldn’t recognize me from a tiny thumbnail, could he?
“You try clothes on and take pictures for your blog.”
Then, I was even more bewildered. “How do you know about my blog??”
“You tried on my blue dress from HSN.”
Phew! Not me. I corrected him, and we had a good chuckle about it, and I said I should’ve lied and pretended it was me. I told him that I do, in fact, have a blog, which is why I was so confused at first. He explained that this girl and I have the same hair and kind of the same face, and I had to wonder who this girl was and how I can find her blog. Maybe I’ll have to do some sleuthing.
I almost forgot, Rami also pointed to my dress and said, "That's a great color." Score one for the Pantone color of the year tangerine tango dress! Rami shook my hand, and I officially introduced myself, and a lady nearby offered to take our picture with my camera. Then, I stepped to the side to let the other two girls get pictures.
Sabreen complimented Rami on his talent and told him how she’s been a big fan since he was on Project Runway the first time. He asked her how she liked the line, and she pointed out her favorite gowns. I think at one point, Lindsey and I said we were already married, and he was like, “vow renewal,” but maybe that was another conversation.
After Sabreen and Lindsey got pictures with Rami, I jumped back in to ask a favor. “Our friend is nine months pregnant at home on bed rest, but she was the one who got me into Project Runway, and she always wanted to wear a wedding dress of yours, but she got married two years ago, “I babbled.
“Of course,” he said. I’m sure he’s heard that part from a lot of people. Heck, I totally would’ve bought one of his dresses had they been out four years ago when I was dress shopping.
I continued with my babbling and said something about this favor being silly, but I asked if he could call her and say hi. By the way, I texted our friend earlier and asked if she wanted a call from Rami since she was such a huge fan but couldn’t join us. She said no, but I didn’t think she really meant it. Luckily, the call went to voicemail, and Rami left a nice message...I can’t remember exactly what he said, but it was short and sweet. A minute later, we got a text from our friend, saying, “I said no phone calls.” Haha, oh pregnant ladies. She thanked us a couple minutes later, so hopefully she wasn’t too mad.
At that point, we had accomplished everything we wanted to accomplish, and Rami had moved on to talk to some more fans, so we headed downstairs to shop. I was still on my shopping ban, but Sabreen tried on and ended up purchasing the top she spotted when we walked in. Since it was still early, we decided to walk down the street and see what other purchases we could convince her to make.
We walked down the street a little and all ogled the Kate Spade window. Unfortunately, the store was closed. Probably for the best, in my case, but still a bummer. We figured Barney’s would still be open and wandered in there. I don’t know if I’ve ever been in a Barney’s, but I was in awe of all the luxury brands that were displayed around the store. The first floor was handbags and accessories, and we spied a purple leather Fendi wrap watch that would be perfect for Sabreen for the low low price of $2800. Yikes.
We debated going upstairs, but we had nothing else to do, so we went for it. Somehow, we stumbled upon another event with dressed-up waiters handing out hors d’oeuvres (spelled that right on the first try, booya) and champagne. The second floor housed shoes and some clothing, and that was even more fun, admiring the Manolo Blahniks, Miu Mius, Pradas, Christian Louboutins, and many many more. At one point, Sabreen asked a waiter what the event was for, but he didn’t speak much English.
While we walked around, we saw some books on display for whomever the event was for, so I went in for a closer look. I saw the name on the books, looked up, and who did I see but creative director for Barney’s,
Simon Doonan! He has appeared on TV shows such as America’s Next Top Model; The Fashion Show; and VH1’s I Love the ‘70s, ‘80s, and ‘90s; among others. He was there promoting and signing copies of his new book,
Gay Men Don’t Get Fat. None of us bought the book because we couldn’t decide what to talk to him about other than asking what Tyra Banks is like, but it was still so cool and random stumbling on an event like that.
Since the store was closing and everything else around was closed, we decided to call it a night and head back home to check out our goody bags and geek out about our luck. Our goody bags from Bebe included a leather luggage tag, perfume sample, mints, bridal coupon, signed card from Rami, and Brides magazine. Fun!
On our drive home, we jokingly decided that we’d have to return every Thursday and find events to go to and mingle with celebrities. If only! Haha.
