After-Prom Party

Good Monday morning!

Come on! You had to know what today's party was going to be. That's right... The infamous After-Prom Party. The particulars will be discussed below, but I will say I hope I have the opportunity to do this again for Josh and Roxie if the occasion arises.

I call the Showcase Pic "Austin in a Tux." Or "My Baby's All Grown-Up." Or "Quick! Someone Get Me a Kleenex!" Isn't he exquisite? (Good word... but not necessarily masculine.)

The Gallery Pics are more prom pictures... a couple taken before and a couple taken during by Austin. I used my good camera (three rolls of film) a good bit, so there won't be quite as many on the ol' blog this week. (Isn't Melia beautiful, too? They made a very handsome couple.)

To make up for having only four or five prom shots, I decided to do the "before and after" shots of my deck. You will see "Deck After Destruction," and hopefully, hopefully, hopefully by the end of the week you will see "NEW DECK."

I've also added some pictures from my cooking class Sunday night. It went well. I have a little tweaking to do, but that's to be expected. The boys were great. The food was edible. I learned a lot, and I hope they learned something, too.

I've known some of these guys since they were three years old, and now they are young men about to start new lives. (Quick! Someone get me a Kleenex!) And it will truly be amazing to see what God has in store for their lives... what their journey will become. (Okay! Forget the one Kleenex! Get me the box!)

How much water can a person lose through sobbing before they become dehydrated? Anyone? Anyone? I think I may need to carry a case of Gatorade with me wherever I go to replenish my body's loss of water. That's what you'll see me sipping during Graduation.

No TV Reviews today. There was absolutely no time this weekend to catch up on Amazing Race and Celebrity Apprentice. We'll just have a lot more to talk about Friday.

New topic... quick! Is it just me or does this happen to a lot of people? Remember when you used to wake up in the morning and sometimes you would have "sheet marks" on your face where you had slept on a wrinkle? Remember by the time you were ready for school or work the "sheet marks" were gone? I still have "sheet marks" on my face from my nap Saturday afternoon from the After-Prom Party... and it's Monday. What's up with that? Mikie's going to have to get another job to start paying for my Botox or collagen injections or whatever it is that gets rid of those!

I guess that sets the stage for this weeks' topic. Yes, we're going to be talking about Pet Peeves. I'm just going to name one or two a day because I don't have very many. (HA! My Pet Peeves BOOK makes my 100 Things To Do Before 90 List look like a short, tiny memo. But because I don't want to sound like a whiner or complainer, I'm going to pretend I only have five or six this week.) How many do you have? Feel free to share. I'm almost positive whatever's on your list is somewhere in the 4,000 or 5,000 I have written down... in alphabetical order.

So, to make it official... PET PEEVE #1 - I hate when "sheet marks" on your face last for over 48 hours. That's 47 hours and 45 minutes TOO long as far as I'm concerned.

Oh, and just so you know, I'm not making a Pet Peeves Scrapbook. I think that might be "too much," even for me.

After-Prom Party

Austin's prom lasted from 8:00 until 11:00. There are several different options out there (from bowling to movies, etc.), but I asked Austin if he wanted me to fix breakfast so everyone he was hanging around with could come to our house to eat and watch a movie. He approved the suggestion, changed the breakfast menu to Mexican (taco cups, taco soup, cookies and snacks) and sent me a text during their dinner saying everyone had voted on a specific movie (from a pre-approved list we had talked about earlier). Mikie left at 9:30 to pick it up at the Movie Gallery.

The theme of their party was "A Black Tie Affair," so I simply decorated the table with a black (throw-away) tablecloth, white plates and bowls, pink napkins and pink and white candles. It was very elegant. (I took pictures with my good non-digital camera since Austin had the digital with him. Please use your imagination, and make it even more spectacular in your mind.) I used long stemware for the glasses.

Melia called me as they were leaving the prom, so I had time to pop the taco cups into the oven. They were ready as the guys walked in. Everyone quickly changed clothes and removed THEIR SHOES! The guys were dying of thirst, so after I made sure everyone had seen how pretty the table looked, I went to my stash and got the giant red plastic cups to replace the guys' tiny, delicate stemware. (They were very appreciative.)

It was very low-key, very simple. They sat around the table and talked about 45 minutes, and then headed to the den to watch the movie. Their curfew was 3:00 a.m., so Mike and I knew we had a long night ahead of us. We kept our bedroom door open, lights on and dozed and watched TV. We could easily hear them talking, laughing and cutting up. When the movie was over, they decided to play X-Box for a little while.

I took this opportunity to clean up the kitchen and fix take-home plates for the girls. At 2:40, everyone packed up and went to their respective homes.

There are a lot of different things you can do. We have a pool table and air hockey in the basement. There are games they could play (Pictionary, Catch Phrase, etc.). But these guys were happy with the movie, talking and talking about the prom, and just hanging out after an exciting evening. It may be totally different if I ever get to do it again with a different set of kids.

The evening was so warm and pretty, if our deck hadn't been in "destruction mode" it would have been nice to set up chairs and the TV outside and let them watch the
movie under the stars with twinkly lights all over the deck. (That idea is in the back of my mind for the next After-Prom Party.)

Would the party have worked with more than six kids? Yes, but over eight people would have been the perfect "deck" party, and it would probably have worked better with a buffet rather than a sit-down dinner/breakfast. This is going to be another time when flexibility is key.

Was it worth staying up until 3:30? Yes. I would do it again and again. I wanted them to have a good time, but after midnight, I wanted to know they weren't on the road... and they were somewhere having a good, SAFE time.

When it's Josh and Roxie's turn, I'll make the same offer. We'll see how many kids may be coming and we'll plan from there. (NOTE: I did ask Melia when she called how many people were with them. I had told Austin he could ask anyone he wanted, even though the six of them had dinner together, so the number could have grown. I had plenty of food for ten, and if all else had failed there was always pizza and Krispy Kreme doughnuts. (We were not going for a healthy, balanced meal at this point!)

It was a very nice, laid-back party, and I highly recommend trying it at least once during your prom years. Be inventive. Use what you have for entertainment (board games, X-Box, movies, ping-pong, karaoke, etc.). Have plenty of food and drinks. Oh, and do NOT plan anything the next morning. You're going to want to sleep in!

My Favorite Kid Party Ever

Since the above is not a very "specific" party, I thought I would share my favorite kid party. I didn't give this party. I attended. Austin was about eight or nine, and he was invited to a "water" party. They had to bring their giant water guns. They had an inflatable set up. They had sprinklers all over the yard pointing toward the inflatable. The mom had set up plastic pools and large buckets of water for quick and easy water gun refills. The boys were having a ball, and the parents were enjoying a birds' eye view high and dry on the second floor deck.

Then the mom went into the kitchen and came out with not one, but two, large plastic garbage cans filled to the brim with water balloons. "They are going to love this," I said.

"Oh, these aren't for the boys. I didn't spend two hours filling up garbage cans with water balloons to give to the boys," she responded.

"Well, what are you going to do with them?" another parent asked.

She picked up two water balloons and found her target. Then she started chunking! The boys looked up, shocked and thrilled at the same time, and the war was on! All the parents had a blast. The only thing that could have made that party better was THREE garbage cans full of water balloons!

And that, my friends, was the best kids' party I ever attended. What a great, fun mom. What a lucky eight year-old boy to have such a mom! (I only wish I had thought of it first!)

Tomorrow I have a very good crock pot recipe. Check in for something quick, easy and very low calorie.

Have a wonderful Monday. (I'm planning on taking a little nap today. I have found I don't snap back as quickly as I used to... and I'm more than a little tired! And since I still have the "sheet marks" from Saturday's nap, what can it hurt?)

Take care, and I'll talk to you tomorrow.