A little Cinderella at the Ball

 The Marine Corps Birthday is this week, and in honor of that, we attended the Marine Corps Ball Friday night. It was a great Ball!  Due to a lack of venues able to accommodate such an event, it was held at the gym, and I was impressed!  They did an amazing job of making it look elegant and beautiful and nice.  They even offered shuttle bus services to the gym, since there was definitely not sufficient parking.  It was a little weird to walk to the bus stop all dressed up, but at least it wasn't a pumpkin!

I'm all dressed and ready to go!

I'm starting to think it is time to make Dan pay money for photos.  It is time we had some good ones.  Although Callie did her best and this one isn't awful, it would be nice to see the details of my lovely dress though.  And something from an appropriate angle would be good.

Here we are on the bus.  Whoo-hoo! I'm off to the Ball!

Since Dan is all special now, we were invited to the big-wigs cocktail area.  We'd planned skip that hour, but with a special invite, we had to go.  It wasn't bad.  I was disappointed that the "light refreshments" was mostly full-on sushi, but with my dress and confining undergarment, there was no room to put it anyway.  I am really sad I didn't take pictures, but that seemed a little ..... uncouth with all the important people standing around.  No one else busted out the camera, so I was afraid they'd point and gasp is I did, so I have no proof of the delightful aesthetics we enjoyed. It was less awkward than I had anticipated it would be. There were enough ladies I knew that I had people to chat with and didn't feel totally alone, and we shmoozed away the time.   We headed to the Ballroom at 6:45 and found our table.

 I assume this was a appetizer?  It was on the table when we came in.  I was surprised that Dan declined to eat mine, since he likes shrimp.  I declined because I very much do not!

They kicked off the program at 7pm.  I love the Marine Corps, and its pomp and circumstance.  The music is so motivating too!  There was the usual ceremonial stuff, which I enjoyed.  The keynote speaker went a little overtime, which is fairly traditional as well.  But dinner was served not too long after 8pm.  The salad was good, and the main course was passable.  

The cake looked unimpressive, but was amazingly delicious!

This was too funny.  Once the music got going, folks loosened up a lot.  These 2 ladies from Dan's work are serenading Sylvie with their carnations.  It was unexpected and awesome!

We tried to get some photos, but it really was just too dark in there.  This is Dan and some of the guys he works with though.

This was what they transformed the entry of the gym into.  Pretty fantastic, isn't it?!  I love how men are the same.  As we exited on out way home, a cute couple was out here and I offered to take their photo.  The girl was a gorgeous Japanese lady in full kimono.  (Now I wish I had gotten a photo of her!)  I got their picture taken here- a close up and one that showed the full facade.  The Marine offered to take our picture and snapped this.  Then he walked over to hand back the camera as his date was saying, oh no, one more picture!  It was too late, Dan was already walking away as well.  Sigh.  But that is why there are so very few pictures of us!

Oh, an after- pic of my fancy-shmancy hair.