St. Barb's Ball 2008

In the middle of all the craziness of December, we had a ball to prepare for. I was fairly excited, but the thought of staying home and kicking my feet up appealed to me at that time as well. I had started having issues with my legs swelling. Too much going up and down the stairs led to swollen knees that I could barely walk on. The thought of going dancing well, ....let's just say wasn't on my top 10 things to accomplish that day.

I had searched high and low early in the fall for a dress and finally had found THE RED DRESS! I have never had any luck searching for the red dress (artillery colors). The red dresses were either built for beanpoles without any body shape or looked like tents that could cover my dining room table. They just never seemed to have a "regular" ball dress in the color red. If I did find one that might work then it had something hooker-ish going on about it....side slit clear up to my armpits or the back cut out and hanging so low that you'd know I wore socks underneath my dress instead of hose. Well, I guess lucky for me that I am pregnant because I finally found a dress. The only real problem with it is that during St. Barbs it is proper to wear full-length and not cocktail which was what this dress was. I figured I get a pass though since I would be pretty big at this point. Well, wouldn't you know it, December arrives like an artic blast. It started snowing the week before Thanksgiving and either snowed some more or just stayed put. I finally decided to go look up in my ball gown dressing closet (at the encouragement of Jeff not wanting me to freeze my swollen legs off) and looked through the gowns that I had kept from my "bigger" days. I ended up finding the perfect one up there- a stretch burgundy velvet job with beautiful beading and guess what....floor length! It fit perfectly over my big baby belly and I was thrilled and comfortable all at the same time.

The ball was one of the nicest that we had been to or let me rephrase that- it was one of the most funnier ones that we have attended. I'll get to that later. For starters, the food was okay, but not terribly great. I had -stupidly because I am pregnant and have to eat fully cooked meat- chosen steak and when I cut into it....well, it moo'd back at me. I ended up having to trade with Jeff who had chosen the pork medallions. The poor guy took the bullet for me and sat there and tried sawing through the cow as it tried to run off his plate. Mine (or rather ours at this point) had not been the only steak full of life. Pretty much everyone's at the table was full of the same life. The rest of the meal was okay, but what can you expect for ball food, right?

After we were done trying to kill our food, the program had started. They all start the same way. Greetings, blessings, this has been a great year of hardly seeing your spouse, blah, blah, blah. Since our guest speaker bowed out at the last moment, our team commander was left holding the bag or slides should I say? He got up and had a ton of slides to show of the past 6 months. They were quite funny at the beginning with him showing slides of when his oldest daughter- also in attendance- was a baby. I think there was a makeup scene or something in there. I think we all have those photos of our kiddos. Bethany had better watch out when her dad takes command one day! Isaac too! I'll be sure to hide any photos of me as well. Jeff is one of those tricky guys that could dig something like that up on us as well. After all the great family photos, he went on to talk about and show what they had been up to for the past 6 months.

The next thing that happened is it was time to do the St. Barb's (for the soldiers who exceeded in excellence over the past year) and Molly Pitcher (for the spouses who really did all the work) awards. Usually, when presenting these awards they are very official and very extremely formal. Nothing funny about them. You have to stand and let the orders be read, etc. etc. etc. Well, this year, they decided to do skits representing each of the ladies that these awards are named after. They were quite simply the funniest things I had seen in awhile. I think I nearly peed my pants watching these skits and laughing so hard. I will NEVER get over the image of St. Barb- a man dressed in a mop wig with 3 cornrows talking like Tracy Morgan doing his female immitation off of SNL. Ah....it was just too funny for words. Something that you definitely would have needed to be there for.

The ball ended of course with the dancing and I am proud to say that I DID indeed get up and dance to one song. We moved very slowly though. I never realized how tough it is to dance with a huge belly, but sacrifices were made none the less. Jeff was so sweet dancing at one point with his hand on Baby Isaac. The night ended great and I even got photos of me with two of my preggie friends (one not preggie now who delivered a beatiful baby boy- Isaac's future playmate).