WHEN TWO FRIENDS SAY YES TO EACH OTHER

Nothing beats hearing two people you have been wishing could just see they can make it together as a couple tell you they are getting married. I was so ecstatic when I heard me and my hubby's mutual friend tell us he is marrying our mutual friend and his teenhood friend. Ironically hubby and I were talking about them just a few nights before. I even looked forward to hearing the announcement of their wedding at church and anticipating the reception of the congregation. I believe 99.999% of them felt just like I did.

I was honoured to make the garments for Edwin Tshabalala and his groomsmen. Since I am not yet a wedding gown designer, my friend Tebello's dress was designed by a designer called Brenda. I can give her number if you want to contact her. She also made Tebello's bridesmaids' dresses as they had the same theme design as her gown.

The bride was so beautiful. I loved how they incorporated their personality together with her groom by wearing white converse sneakers. The groom wore a ForeverFaith Couture Irish Linen waistcoat and matching pants and two of his groomsmen wore ForeverFaith Couture Irish Linen pants with white shirts, stirrups and and mint bowties. The ladies  wore peach dresses by Brenda.

Bride and Groom in white Converse All Stars Sneakers

The Wedding Entorouge

My hubby and I had to take a few pics with our newly-wed friends

This is me with Reggie who was one of the groomsmen in ForeverFaith Couture

Thanks to our friends wedding we got to take this beautiful pic with our Bishop Mosa Sono and his wife Pastor Gege Sono

A picture with another powerful couple, The Ngidis

THREE WEDDINGS AND A BLESSING

In March this year (2015) I had the blessing of designing garments for three weddings which were all on the same day. Three of the people who were getting married go to the same church as me and my husband of which two of the three, a couple, are our friends. One of the other people getting married is my former colleague although in reality we did not really work together but worked for the same company at different times.

This post is 9 months too late and it actually feels like 12 months later already because, 1. I did not know if I should write about all the weddings in one post or 3 different ones. 2. I did not have time to write anything yet because of juggling business, work-at-home mummyhood (I babysit while I work) and housekeeping. 3. I was waiting for pictures from one of the weddings which I could not attend. 4. My husband took pictures of the other wedding but I had not had time to send the pictures to the bride before I could use them.

As I write now I am busy debating in my mind if I should continue in one post for all three or write individual posts. On that thought, because a wedding is special and is about individual clients, I decided to separate them and then I will post the links here. I will just post introductory pictures of the couples here.

The first couple, Mr. Edwin Tshabalala and Mrs. Tebello Tshabalala

These two are our friends and they are best friends to each other. Their marriage to each other is not just a blessing to them but to a large number of bazalwane (christians) who for a long time hoped and probably prayed for this fairytale to come into real life. Read more about them here and see more pictures.

Couple No. Two: Mr. Bongani Zondi and Mrs. Temogo Zondi

Well here I know the bride as we go (actually went)( to the same church. Their love story is the kind you only thought you see on TV. Just like the first couple such stories (how the couple met or decided to get married) are not believed to happen in real life but in the lives of Christians they do and have a real happily ever after through Christ. Temogo is a very talented writer read about my work for them and get a link to her blog on my post.

Couple Three: Mr. Eleazer and Mrs. Wendy

I do not know how, when and where these two lovely people met but I know when, how and where I met Wendy. I knew Wendy before we met through our colleagues at my former employer, Old Mutual. When I left Old Mutual she joined the company again as she worked there before I did. I know, sounds confusing. Anyway find the story and see their beautiful pictures here: (still in process)

COUTUREGEOUS COUPLE

My husband and I were invited to a wedding of our two friends, Ruth and Lesego Shogoe at The Midrand Conference Centre in November 2014. Ruth is the songstress who blessed us on our own wedding day on the 23rd of March 2013 by singing for us and our guests. I walked down the isle to her beautiful voice singing "Golden" by Christel Mitchel . Ruth and Lesego's love story is a beautiful one which deserves a blog of it's own. The bride looked beautiful in mermaid/ trumpet cut dress, the husband was handsome in his navy suit and the bridesmaids looked gorgeous in yellow long dresses with the groomsmen  dressed in in grey suits.

A Match For Life

I got to make an outfit for myself and my husband as well. I made a turquise dresss for myself and my hubby looked handsome in a grey ForeverFaith Couture waistcoat and matcing pants. This was eight months post our son's birth so unlike the famous international celebrities I did not shrink back to my pre-pregnancy body. Without saying too much here are the pictures.

Grey Suit Pants and Matching Waistcoat by ForeverFaith Couture and Turquise Dress by ForeverFaith Couture

Getting a Kodak Moment With The Newly Weds

Ladies in Turquise: Faith, Mam Catherine and Awongiwe

My Friend Karabo and her friend Zandile

WHEN A DRESS FITS....Wear It!

Mr. and Mrs. Nthoba

2013 was an interesting year in regards to my business and clients I had. I had two different extremes of clients. I had easy clients and difficult ones. The highlight of ending my year was a 17 year old who had no understanding that fabric shops in South Africa do not have the same fabric as overseas fabric shops and the different fabrics will never make the dress flow the same way as the one in the picture. I went to 4 different fabric places (Oriental Plaza, Chamdor, Lenasia and Jozi CBD) to find the closest fabric to hers. She did not even believe me that shops don't stock all colours anyone dreams of.


She came for her first fitting and did not like the dress fabric so I went on a journey to find another one and by God's grace I found it. I asked her sister who was paying for the dress to accompany her but she could not come. To cut a long story short she came alone, fitted the dress, said nothing to me but sent her older sister a text. She said nothing on the way I went to drop her off by her taxis stop. Istead her sister called me. After spending all the money I did, doing all I could to make a teenage girl happy, I cancelled the order and refunded her sister the money. I figured my health is much important in this instance and here I was taking my family time to make a dress which at the end costing more than I quoted the clients. Her sister understood very well I did not do this out of anger or bad service she understood her baby sister was impossible to please.


Well thanks to the young girl I had a dress for a friend's wedding since I am the same size as her (client) and I never found time to make an outfit for myself for that wedding . I have never liked royal blue colour ever but wow I loved how it looked on me. As the word of God goes: "All things work together for good for those that love God", despite the time and money I spent to put this dress together it was not a loss after all and I really looked good on that day with my red bag and matching red shoes. I even received over a 100 likes on Facebook and got an order for the same dress. My beloved hubby even bought a royal blue and white shirt and navy blue suit to match my couturegeous royal blue dress.

In My Husband's Loving Arms

The Newly Weds, Mr. and Mrs. Jiyana

MAKING YOUNG GIRLS HAPPY....MATRIC BALLING

I had an opportunity to serve two teenage girls again for a matric ball at the same time. The two girls are nieces (one is actually a cousin) of an aquintance of mine from church, Mr Nhlanhla Mabaso who brought his other young cousin Lerato last year for a white grecian-inspired dress. The two young ladies names are Tshepo and Mabose.

Both girls knew what they wanted and were not willing to change their minds. Mabose wanted a royal blue and white princess cut ballgown while Tshepo wanted a red mermaid cut dress. I went looking for the fabrics before I even got the deposit in order to know where to go when I go buy. Mabose's colour (royal blue) was not in stock and I had to wait for two weeks for the shop to order it.

Tshepo Fitting Her Dress

Tshepo Fitting Her Dress

Mabose Fitting Her Dress

The stress came for me when I only found out last minute that I had only two weeks to make the two dresses on top of another order from 3 clients for 2 Sepedi dresses, one Seshoeshoe and a man's linen traditional dress. Amazing through my dependence on prayer and God's interventioned I managed to complete all the orders in time. But because the girls also had exams to write the final fittings were done on the day before the ball and the dress fitted perfectly. I only had to change Tshepo's dress as per her mom's request to put in straps. Her mom felt that it was to provacative for her age as it showed cleavage when it was strapless.

From Strapless Dress To a Dress With Straps

The girls were happy, cousin/uncle Nhlanhla was happy, the moms and aunts were happy and I was happy too and I give all thanks and glory to God who helped me in making these dresses. One of the girls' cousin (another girl) wanted a navy and white suit to go as plus one with Mabose to the ball. Her suit was made by someone else. Thanks to God they had a taylor for that as it would have been too much work if it was added to those dresses. What made me even happy about the outcome of the dresses is that they made up for the dress I cancelled with the hard-to-please teenager who nearly made me cancel making matric ball dresses to avoid dealing with hard-to-please and spoiled teenagers.

Mabose And Her Cousin As Her Plus 1

Tshepo At The Ball With Her Date

Both Girls Looking Beautiful

Suit Made By Someone Else

THERE'S A ZULU ON MY STOEP

I had an opportunity to make a Zulu outfit for men. There's a correct term for it. I will share it after I find out. My job here is to design and make garments not necessarily share my intelligence or knowledge of culture and traditions. Just like the Sepedi women's outfit, this is another time-consuming garment to make. It is simple to make as it was just a pair of pants and a sleeveless jacket but the patch-work is where the work is. I need to see people who are used to making these and see how they work on the patches and braiding because I was abused, scratched and mutilated by the pins I used to attach the patches before sewing them on. However I must say, I was quite impressed by the final product. I asked my husband to model it for me and he had fun doing Zulu dances in it.

FOREVERFAITH COUTURE SPEAKS SEPEDI

I never knew making a Sepedi outfit is such a lot of work. The pleating and sewing the beadings in is the most time-consuming things that is why I need to hire people who will do the nitty gritty work. I had to design two Sepedi outfits for two different ages and size women. I decided to pleat the outfits myself so that I can save time and save the clients' money. If I had to outsource the pleating I would have had to make two trips which amounts to time consumed and petrol consumed. The clients also preferred beading sewn in instead of embroidery as that too required outsourcing because it is not my speciality. Once again, time and money saved.