day 83: the ball

Military Photo Challenge Day 7: Post a pic of the most recent military event you attended and explain what it was and why you were there.

Can you call yourself a Marine wife if you don't attend the Marine Corps Birthday Ball?

I think not.

Aaron and I have attended the ball together every year since 1999 (and we actually went to two that year), minus the one in 2002 when I had just had K and he was at some school or training or something and went to a ball there....minus me.

This year, I honestly didn't want to go....minus him.

But K had persistently asked, every November, when it would be her turn to go. At the age of three, as we left her at home with Grandma, dressed up in her most fancy Cinderella gown (K, not Grandma), I knew that this princess needed to go to a ball.

2010 was her year.

I was in a dress that I'd already worn a few years ago, and she was in a gown borrowed from a friend. We helped each other with our hair, and she let me use some of her body glitter :) The rain couldn't sink her spirits that night, as we headed downtown....and parked in the absolutely wrong parking garage, which meant we had to walk two blocks, outside, no umbrella, to get to our destination. We arrived, me a little wet but no worse for the wear, just in time for the Gordon Pipers to lead the way into the ballroom. A yellow rose sat at my place at the table, one of the myriad of reminders that I was minus him. We dined on a fancy feast....almost. K ordered a special kids plate of chicken nuggets and fries. Of course she did. And then dinner was followed by the obligatory tooth falling out. Of all places to lose a tooth! I had to ask a waiter to bring us a ziploc bag for safe tooth keeping, and K managed to weasel $5.00 from Grandpa Mac-O for that lone tooth. But that wasn't the only way he'd do her a favor that night.

I had prepped K to let her know that I would be obligated to dance the traditional first dance at the ball, with one of the senior Marines, since Daddy was gone. Can a princess go to a ball without dancing herself? Mine sure couldn't. I put in a simple request, that my princess needed to also dance....and it was done. The poor girl was so nervous that she was shaking, even at the guide of Grandpa Mac-O. But oh, was that night was magical in her memory.