The Final Formal

Eight dresses.  Eight sets of pictures.  We recently marked a significant Last: the Last Winter Formal.  With this Last came the realization that not only is Delia done with these events, WE are done with these events.  I no longer have an annual January date to dress shop, sit on the side of the tub while makeup and hair is being done, or be the mom behind the camera.  But, what a fun six Formals it's been, they are some of the things that have made me love the high school years.  I guess I'll just have to settle for the Formal pictures they text me from college from here on out! ;)

Here are a whole bunch of pictures of Delia's favorite part of Formal-- the getting ready and the golden hour photo posing before the dinner/dance! 

    

Ella doing the fancy Formal makeup the night before she headed back to school.  Thank goodness for big sisters!

At friend's house number 1-- Natalie's to do the hair.

At friend's house number 2 for the pictures with Senior girlfriends.

Aren't they fun?

These girls were so darling thinking up all the creative and silly poses!  They all wanted a little individual photo shoot too.  

Sweet Seniors walking off into the sunset.  They are a lovely bunch of girls with many different gifts and strengths, each finding their own way to lead our school-- dramatically, athletically, artistically, or academically.  Delia was in Top 8 voted by classmates for Homecoming Court, but she was actually relieved to not make it to the Final 4.  Best friend Kate did, though, and we were thrilled to root for her!    

Murder at the Roller Rink

One of Delia's Christmas presents this year was a new Murder/Mystery party kit.  It's getting to be a Christmas Break tradition to host one of these parties for our dramatic performer friends!  This year's theme was 80's with the crime being "Murder at the Roller Rink."  Delia is SO into this, she created a google doc for all her friends to list their top 3 choices of characters to play.  She then published a cast list.  The 80's costumes had us shrieking as each guest walked in the door and the parts were played to perfection.

Ella was goth girl "Lash Black". She nailed the look and the "I'm just here" aloof indifference in all her answers.  Delia was possibly the funniest character, "Brock Mussles", the intellectually-challenged jock.  She was pretty pumped about chopping up her old PE shirt and pairing it with short shorts and tall socks for her 80's dumb jock costume.  I was the host, a former cop who does security for the roller rink.

The suspects brought their A Game with their costumes, accents, adlibs...and appetizers!  It was a fun feast!  We didn't buy any decorations, just dug deep in the old tubs to bring out things like VHS and cassette tapes, scrunchies, mesh gloves, Mall Madness, and Nintendo controllers. 

Someone in this crazy crew strangled Kevin with a leg warmer in the Lost and Found closet at the Roller Rink!  Was it the jock who knew Keven knew he was throwing games?  Was it the vice principal who was caught on video tape dancing and was being blackmailed?  Was it the bad-girl rocker who gave antagonistic and elusive answers to all the questions?  Was it the goody-two-shoes sticking up for and kissing up to the blackmailed vice principal? Was it the cheerleader whose story didn't quite add up?  Or was it the roller derby girl who was threatened by Kevin's roller skating skills???

The 3 popular girls.  Natalie is wearing her mom's old cheerleading costume!  Tessa was cracking us up with her huge ego and bragging about her one perfect shoulder.  Raina perfected her valley girl giggle.

The bros.  Kate as Gnarl, the surfer dude, was excellent!  Her curly mullet wig and abs shirt under her Hawaiian shirt won her "Best Costume".

Examining the evidence.

Mug shots of the suspects.

The murderer was, like, totally, the roller derby girl!!

Here is something that delights me about Delia's friend group-- all these gals come from 3 families!  It's the suspicious sisters pic!  So fun to have Ella, Anika, and Laura home from college and joining in the fun! (Sophia, someone we all met just last night, is a brand new Korean exchange student living with Tessa and Anika.  She did awesome at acting her band geek part.)

And the post murder dance party.  Of course.  The case closed around 8:30, leaving hours for karaoke and dancing!  It's been said before, but how wonderful that Delia's group likes to have fun the exact same way she does-- with elaborate, thematic planning, dressing up, improv comedy, and performing!  To just go for it and act so completely goofy and ALL IN, shows such security and comfort with one another, I just love these girls.

In Between the Holidays

A few random pictures and memories that happened between Thanksgiving, Christmas and New Years:

Delia and her beloved cast of Shrek went to Sacramento to see the musical Anastasia.  She has the best time with this bunch and is especially soaking up every moment this senior year with bestie, Kate.

Delia and I went to see our good friend Megan as Jo March in her community theater production of Little Women.  Megan was awesome and it was a fun date night with Delia.

The Swing Dance Club Ella leads had lots of fun events-- like a dance at the fancy ballroom and a Christmas Party.  Actually, tonight Ella is bringing her skills to her high school friend group and leading some dancing for a big crowd in Ruth's barn!

Ella and her friends have an annual tradition to take a break from studying to go see the lights on the super-ritzy Naples Island.

The week before exams, our high school had a fun dress up week.  The always favorite "Anything But a Backpack" Day had Delia raiding the prop closet for options.  She found the child catcher's net from Chitty Chitty Bang Bang.  She had access to the closet because she's been spending several days a week working with the middle schoolers on their upcoming production of Annie.  She's choreographing 2 dances and one day even led practice on her own!  She feels excited and honored to be given so much responsibility and is delighting in getting to know and encourage the enthusiastic middle school bunch.  

Delia spent a Saturday taking her ACT, something she was quite nervous about.  Scores have already been received and while they are not outstanding enough to earn her any new scholarships, she did do better than she thought she would-- and better than I did on mine! ;)  After her morning of grueling brain calisthenics, we went out for lunch and then Formal dress shopping.  Purple is the winner this year!  Stay tuned for Formal pics next weekend!

We had some spectacular skies.  Credit to late-40s hormones that have me awake at 5am each morning and able to see pretty sunrises.  

We celebrated Dave's post-Christmas birthday with a special dinner out, courtesy once again of generous gift cards!

And I completed my "Book a Week" (with a little grace built in) reading goal for 2024.  I did find myself picking shorter books to stay on track, so 2025's reading goal will 20,250 pages, making it less about the number of books completed.  Top 5 books for me this year: The Labors of Hercules Beal, Project Hail Mary, The Women, Last Summer on State Street, and The Small and the Mighty.

The Gift of Togetherness

Two holidays with Ella home.  My heart is happy!  November/December are becoming my favorites because it means the whole family under one roof twice in two months!

Ella has been having an awesome, but extremely tiring, first semester.  She intentionally packed it with some of her hardest classes to get them done with so the future, when she is doing things like preparing for the MCAT or applying to med school, will be a little lighter.  She comes home for rest and respite and we are happy to feed her allllll the homecooked meals and put nothing on the agenda except cuddling by the fire and reading for fun all day.

Our cozy Thanksgiving at home had church plus all our favorite foods plus several rounds of Ransom Notes, a new favorite game, plus Wicked plus a night of her Mount Hermon summer staff friends coming over for dinner and games.

(One of the things Delia learned in her Home Ec class this semester was how to properly set a formal table, so she was assigned that task.)

Our November temporary tattoos reminded us that indeed "the Lord is good, his love endures forever, his faithfulness continues to all generations."

Over Thanksgiving break we set up the Christmas decorations.

(Find FOMO Llama, peeping the stable action from just outside of it-- the Nativity tradition that continues when the teenagers set up this piece of décor!)

Sinterklaas visits a little early too. 

Just a few weeks later, after we've endured exams, and sickness, and teaching wild preschoolers during Christmas, and the Advent preaching schedule, Ella returns!  This year, we kicked off her 3 week stay at home with a nostalgic outing to the Christmas-y Bass Pro Shop.

On Christmas Eve, I cook the evening's dinner and bake the treats for Christmas Day church all day and then we open our presents.  Homemade gifts were especially appreciated this year!  Ella made a painting of the bridge where Dave proposed.  Delia made me a hilarious video.  Delia also made Ella this apron in her Home Ec class (along with the trademark funny Delia card to go along with it) and I wrote out 60 favorite family recipes for Ella so that she can have a taste of home in her apartment next year... and wherever her future kitchen may be. After seeing an original Audubon Birds of America plate at The Huntington, Dave gave me the whole book of every bird plate Audubon made and Ella painted my favorite birds to use as bookmarks in the book.

Grandma and Grandpa sent something cuddly for Delia's dorm bed next year (she won't have Ivy ;).

The girls each got Polaroid cameras too, as well as tons of dorm necessities and luxuries (like towels, an alarm clock, and storage shelves as well as fancy tea holders, a blender, rollerblades and cute iced coffee drinkware.)  Thank you to our generous gift-sending family! Karen even had a box of Portos (our favorite restaurant by campus) sent for us to make at home!  So our Christmas Eve dinner included our favorite potato balls.  Yum!

After a season of discernment, prayer, and conversations with our financial advisor, we were ready to give Delia our blessing to commit to her dream school.  We did this at Christmas with the gift of a school sweatshirt I had ordered from the bookshop.  Everyone was crying over this weighty and happy news. 

Christmas Day included church, our annual staff serving of treats after the service, some yummy homemade butternut squash soup and focaccia bread for lunch, and a nighttime trip the court with all the lights.

We girls have had coffee shop dates, watched a movie every night, read several books, and taken a group nap every day.  Time to rest: check!  Our family has shared countless laughs while playing games, and Ella has also gone climbing, gotten together with her Robotics team, and had a Christmas party with her high school friends.  Delia's been busy planning the annual Murder/Mystery party she'll host this break: Murder at the Roller Rink (80s themed!).  Time to have fun and connect with dear ones: check!  

And we still have a week (two for Ella) of Christmas Break left!