Ella - The World According To A Disney Doll

Chapter 14 - "Dressed For Success" - 13th September 2012.

The girls and I tackle the BIG challange of choosing an outfit for my upcoming first date.  There were certainly some INTERESTING options, but will I EVER find the perfect one ? ...

You can find the FULL story on my facebook blog here ... https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.151076088380433.35149.150797015075007&type=3

You can check out the music slideshow to this chapter on Youtube here ... http://youtu.be/gkUUnXdCfII

Chapter 14 - "Dressed For Success".

Only 24 hours left, just one day until the “Big Event” as my doll friends had started calling it, not that I am counting or anything, ok you got me, its rather obvious that I am in fact counting. It started with days, now I’m onto hours and I am sure when the time comes, and as panic starts to set in that I will be down to minutes and seconds.

After our little chat yesterday, Jem had gathered together the girls for what she named the emergency ‘What on earth is Ella going to wear for her date?’ meeting. We congregated in the wardrobe, as apart from the fact that that its where we keep the clothes, it was probably one of the only rooms in the entire house that the guys hardly ever entered. Well apart from Jackson when he’s on one of his spying on Rochelle whilst pining after Stella visits, but he would never have attempted such a thing with a gaggle of us girl dolls occupying the room. So for the moment we were safe.

“So whoat ya got ta shows us theyn Ella ?” asked Calamity, I think she was keen to get things going as clothes really weren’t her thing but as she was one of my friends she did want to try and help out in any way that she could.

I explained that I had the dresses that they had already seen me in, the blue ballgown, the pink one, my spotty picnic dress, well and what I am wearing now.

“Sthat it ?” Calam questioned. I felt a little confused ?

“I think what Calamity is trying to say” chimed in Jem, seeing that Calam had not got enough tact perhaps for this situation “you don’t want to wear something that Rocky has seen you in before, you want to look different, stand out, make him sit up and notice you … you’ll feel more special and not so every day if you are wearing something out of the ordinary”

“Aynd theyn he’ll knows you gune t’ll thayt effort fer hiym, an’ll mayke him feels spyshil too” joined in Calamity, somehow I wasn’t at all surprised that in some ways she could see things more from a guys point of view.

“OK, so where do I start then ?” I asked them hoping they could point me in the right direction.

“Well to start with, where is he taking you? What will you be doing ?” replied Jem “You need to try and pick something that is suitable for the task ahead”

It was then that I realised that I had not got a clue where Rocky would be taking me ? for all I knew it could be the moon! Or what if we ended up climbing a tree like at our picnic ? Oh no, what was I going to do?

Upon seeing my rather blank reaction to their questions my friends just simply stated that as we had no idea exactly what was needed, it was probably best to try and find something all-round suitable and hope that Rocky had got enough sense to not take me pond wading. Urgh pond wading, that did not sound like my sort of thing, I really hoped that is not what Rocky has planned for us !?

The girls hunted around and gathered together every possible outfit that they thought might fit me, and I ventured behind my makeshift changing screen, that was in fact a nice tall hardback Disney Dolls book, but somehow seemed an appropriate choice at the time.

I could hear them chatting amongst themselves while they waited for me to come out, somehow under all the added pressure of them waiting I found I was all fingers and thumbs when it came to putting on a dress, but in the end managed to finally get it together.

The first dress I came out in was actually one of mine, one that my big sister had given me when we briefly met, I had forgotten about it as I had been saving it for a special occasion and I wondered if this might be the perfect time to wear it ?

“It’s a lovely dress Ella, really” started Jem, but I could feel the ‘but’ coming “… but I wonder if it maybe, might be, a bit, how can I put it … too much?”

When I thought about it I could see her point, maybe it would be best if I continued to save this one for a special occasion where I actually new it would be appropriate. So I headed back behind my changing screen to try again.

The next dress I appeared in was white Mattel Disney dress that came on a Cinderella doll that Holly had not been so keen on. As soon as I appeared the girls started to giggle.

“Errrm, I think that one would be getting a little bit ahead of yourself there Ella” said Jem trying ever so hard not to laugh “ …It’s a Wedding gown Ella”.

Oh, oh nooo now I looked like a complete idiot. So I decided not to hang around in it too long and hastily retreated to the changing screen again.

On my way back I noticed Calam lean across to Jem and tried to whisper

“If thiyngs goes weyll tomorru, she miyght be needin theyt in a while”

Jem sniggered and nodded in agreement, and I felt even more convinced that I had to get out of the dress as quick as I possibly could.

The following dress was hideous, It was creased, too big, and so did not really fit me very well. Millie simply squeaked “Yucky” while Calam and Jem chimed in with a rather decisive “NEXT!!”.

Now I was onto one of Jem’s dresses, this was her Rock and Curl dress that she said she saves as her party dress. I hadn’t ever really worn anything this short before and so felt a little exposed, and for some reason it made my legs look like little matchsticks. It wasn’t really to my taste but I did not want to upset my good friend by not even giving it a go.

They all seemed to agree that it wasn’t really what we were looking for, and so on we went to the next one.

I was really REALLY not sure about this next one, I peered around the edge of the changing screen and told the girls as much.

“Come own Ella, how bayd cans it bey ?” said Calamity trying to boost my confidence, but I already knew that there was no way they were going to convince me about this one.

I was met with stares and Calams rather abrupt “Gosh amighty Ella, wheyres t’rest owff it ?”.

The jacket was too tight and so I was unable to do up the top pop-stud and the skirt, well, as Calamity pointed out, where’s the rest of it? I thought Jem’s dress that I had tried on was short until I tried this one on !!

I felt uncomfortable and kept fidget-ingly trying to pull the skirt down lower, the only thing that was good about the whole thing was the ankle boots, they were actually kinda cute.

Millie seemed to like it though “Ooooh I love it” she squeaked with excitement, but I was no way THIS adventurous when it came to my clothes.

Jem simply said “I am not sure that, quite, sends the right message here”.

Thank god, now I could go and change again !

I was down to the very last dress, but luckily when I tried it on I instantly felt comfortable, but also sort of special too. When I came out from behind the screen for my final viewing, my friends all instantly smiled and clapped, saying ...

“That’s it, that’s the one, its perfect !”.

I was so relieved, as I went back behind the screen for one last time to change back into my usual day dress, I could hear my friends still clapping and commenting on it from behind and I knew that this must really be ‘the one’.

If you were hoping to see the dress now, I am sorry to disappoint, but you will have to wait until tomorrow to get a proper look as you will see it the same time that Rocky does.

After I was back in my normal attire and I started to feel a bit more like myself again, I sat with the girls for a bit of a chat. They were all very curious about how my nerves were doing ? Was I looking forward to it ? and what I REALLY thought of Rocky ?

I felt a little bombarded but tried to answer them as best I could.

“I am nervous, but in an excited way” I answered to Jem. I told Millie that “Yes, I am looking forward to it”. But it was Calam’s question that was the hardest to answer, what do I really think of Rocky ?

“I like him an awful lot, he’s a very sweet guy” but, I could feel the but building in my head as I continued “but, I am not sure if I am quite what he is looking for”.

“What do you mean ?” asked Jem in a bemused tone

I tried to gather my thoughts properly so that I could explain myself better “He is going to be expecting to go on a date with Cinderella, the ultimate fairy tale Princess, and I think that when he realises that he is stuck with just me, and that I am not anything like my Royal namesake, then he’s going to come to the conclusion that he has made a horrible mistake” my eyes started to well a little as I poured out my, real, inner-most worries that had been playing on my mind since Monday. “Its just going to be hard, that’s all, as I don’t want to feel like I am not good enough, but how could I possibly compete with a Princess ?”.

The girls looked at me with such sympathy, they seemed quite glad that they had finally got it out of me what had been worrying me THAT much. Jem looked at the others briefly, almost giving them the opportunity to go first if they wished but they left the floor open for her to respond on their behalf.

“Ella that’s silly” she said, the way she was starting did not really fill me with confidence but then she continued “Rocky’s not looking for a Princess, if he was then there are quite a number of various Disney specimens that have joined our household that he could have chosen from” yeah I thought, my snooty twin sister is a wonderful example there. Jem finished with “If anything Rocky likes you in spite of the fact that you are a Princess doll, you just wait, he will like you just the way you are. Have a little faith, in not only yourself, but in him !”.

She was of course right, I wasn’t being fair to Rocky really. Maybe he did like clumsy dolls, who dithered, and blurted, and was too stupidly naive to realise when she had been set up on a double date. Oh yeah, I am sure that’s ‘just’ his type.

OK, I am being far too pessimistic here, and probably a little too snarky aswell. So I gave myself a mental dressing down and decided that, yes in truth, Jem was right, I needed to give Rocky the respect that he deserved and the chance to prove himself without pre-judgement or expectation. The cards had been dealt, I just had to wait until tomorrow to find out what hand I had been given, after all, if I give it a fair chance, I could just come away with everything I had ever dreamt of ?!? …. Now that was food for thought !!!