Our stake youth leaders decided to throw a Harvest Ball for the youth, ages 14-18. I'm sure the idea behind this was to give the girls another opportunity to wear their formal dresses that otherwise, might have only had one wearing for an expensive dress. Since boys normally rent a tux, they could wear their regular Sunday dress clothes or other formal shirt-and-tie looks for this dance.
It would have been really neat to see all the girls at the dance in long formal gowns, but once again, I'm sure, in deference to those who might not have had a formal dress, they adjusted the dress suggestion to include, "Sunday Best." No one was asking girls to go out and purchase a special dress just for that evening.
Alyssa has only had one formal dance; but a few months back, a friend who was getting married, decided she would no longer need a yellow Belle-style formal dress, and GAVE it to Alyssa. So this was the dress she decided to wear for this Harvest Ball.
For Darcie, this was actually her first dance as a 14-year-old. Since she hasn't ever been to a formal dance, one of Alyssa's friends (from a family of girls) generously offered to loan Darcie one of their dresses.
There was all the typical flurry of preparations that afternoon, and when Emma saw the girls getting their dresses on, SHE wanted to wear a "pitty dress," too! (SO cute!!) Good thing that Todd does the DJing for the stake youth dances, and we were planning on going anyway. She would have been all dressed up with nowhere to go!!
Here are my girls!!!
One of the best things about this dress on Alyssa, was that it is LONG enough! She wore heels with it!! Her new haircut looks so pretty; she pulled the top back in a barrette and let all the curls do their thing.
The maroon and gold metallics in this dress really played up Darcie's red hair beautifully. During the summer, her hair bleaches out from the sunshine, but in the fall and winter, it darkens up and the red really shows. (Side note: ask Darcie about the season of Walter. Maybe she can answer before the giggles take over!) Normally her hair's straight, but for this dance, we did the headfull of curls look. I LOVE it, and I think it made her look more special.
Todd even broke out the SUIT for the occasion. I defy any young man to hurt his girls or break their hearts -- Todd will be most unforgiving!
And at the dance -- Emma LOVES to dance. Twirling and jumping to the music is a lot of fun for her:
For myself, I'm glad that they went to the efforts to put on this dance. I think sometimes that people have gotten lazy about how much time and effort is put into activities of any kind. No matter what the activity is, isn't it nicer when some thought and creativity and effort is put into the decorations, the food, and other details? I think that too many times, people seem to think, "why bother?" -- and so they don't. For once -- somebody BOTHERED to make it nice -- and it showed! Good for them! And good for my girls and all the other kids that benefited from it.
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