The Hoedown

Things at the Party

Arwen made these cupcakes- every bit of them! Don't they look delicious?! My favorite was chocolate with chocolate icing. We had so many left over, which was both a good thing and a bad thing. : )

In only a few hours, that space would be filled with dancers.... It was so exciting!

Isn't this cute?! At first I was like, "Flowers in a shoe? Uh...." But then I saw it and thought it looked adorable.

What was just going to be a short lesson on a banjo for Dad turned out to be a Jam Session with about 10 people!

Friends!

One of my best friends came down a little early (about 6 hours) to help set up. We called it the pre-party party. Love you, girl!!!

My little cowboy

"Random picture, everyone! SMILE!!"

Arwen, my aunt, and my brother. Another random picture!

Arwen and another friend were greeters. I soon lost track of how many people had arrived!

The end of the pre-party.... Waiting for the party to start!

So many friends came!

A collision of worlds... in a good way!

Mom and a lot of her friends

An awesome family- we love you guys!

My half cousin... sort of : D

Dad's Suprise Party

A suprise party and a half-suprise guest

Even though he was standing right there, it took a minute for Dad to see the suprise guest. Ha!

My dad, my uncle, and their good friend, the suprise guest. (Dad, you're supposed to look at the camera!)

Everyone catching up with the suprise guest. (My friend kept on wanting to get into the picture... just kidding!)

The REAL surprise- a canoe!

(Last but CERTAINLY not least...)
Dancing

About two-thirds of the dancers. The rest joined a minute later on the grass.

Hello!

The caller trying to teach us to do something...

He had our attention- we wanted to do it right!

The Allemande

Then came the rain.... : ( The true dancers tried to dance a little in the rain, but it was hard, especially when the drops would gather on the tree leaves and come crashing down right into your eyes. Not cool. After about 15 minutes, we gave up and went inside to eat as the rain started coming down in buckets. (It reminded me of the campout we always had at our old church where it ALWAYS rained!) We ate and had Dad's party, but the rain persisted. What to do?!
Never fear, we had planned for that. Sort of. : ) We all went into the basement to dance, where we had cleared out the middle room and most of the garage area. It was really funny to see people decide that our bikes needed to be moved right in the middle of a dance move. People made themselves at home with moving our stuff around, which was great! Two young men picked up our riding lawn mower and moved it over, which made me laugh really hard.
(A huge thanks to a really good friend who took most, if not all, of the inside pictures for me!)

Standing around and trying to learn The Alabama Jubilee

Isn't he cute?!

It took a minute to get situated with the dance steps and we were all very confused in that time!

Don't know what they're trying to say!

A demonstration of a step... I forget it's name

Confused again, yet having a blast!!

Someone knows what they're doing! That step was probably my favorite part of The Alabama Jubilee, besides the Ladies' Change

Man's Right Hand Star (A few girls had to 'be the guy' for a few dances. It was a little confusing, but it worked!)

Two steps going on- the Swing and the Do-Si-Do

Smile!

My group in the middle of the Swing step. What fun!!!

Promenade!!!


Last picture of the day. Tired, yet happy. The party ended, but the post-party party had started. : )

This was certainly a party to remember. A few things I didn't get pictures of were eating in the rain, the huge Animal Game we did, more of the pre- and post-party parties, and probably my favorite dance, the Salty Dog Rag. I hope everyone who came had just as fun a time as I KNOW I did!!! The work really paid off and the party was a huge success because of all the work that happened before the big day. A huge thanks to a certain family who helped immensely- you know who you are. : )

That's it for now. What's next? Maybe some Camp GH pictures or a random post about an article that really annoyed me. : )
Eowyn

PS: Happy 4th, everyone!!