Flashback Friday: Prom!

It was about this time, three years ago, that I began fantasizing about my graduation and prom. It was also around this time that I found my prom dress in Prince George, B.C. while there for a hockey tournament.

I didn’t think I wanted a poufy, princessy dress but I really didn’t have much of a vision in mind. As soon as I tried on my dress, I LOVED it and had to have it. So, my dad coughed up the money and I had a beautiful dress by the end of January 2006 even though Prom wasn’t until May 27, 2006!

There was one problem. It didn’t fit properly. The dress was a size 12, and it fit well everywhere but in my chest area. You see, I am very much a pear shape with a big booty and very tiny boobs. Apparently the dress makers assumed if you’re a size 12 then your boobs MUST be at least a D cup or bigger, so the dress kind of fell off me in that area. Thank god for my grandma and great-aunt. They must have put 12 + hours of work into making that dress fit me. The top of it was covered in tiny little beads so in order to take it in and make it fit tighter they had to take ALL the little beads off and then hand-sew them back on! However, in the process they managed to figure out a way to make my boobs look way bigger than they are in the dress, so that was nice!

From the beginning of April until the end of May, ALL my girlfriends and me could talk about was prom. Oh, maybe I should explain something quickly here. In Fort St. John, where I grew up and graduated, prom and grad are completely separate things. Prom takes place on the last Saturday in May and it is a big dance/dinner at the curling rink. Our grad takes place at the end of June and is a totally separate thing. The after-prom party is our ‘wet grad’, usually one of the graduating class volunteers there house (and they usually live out-of-town) and they have a huge after-party. There were parents there chaperoning and making sure nobody drinks and drives, they hired a DJ, and they had a HUGE field out behind their house so lots of people tented! I partied there from about midnight to 8 a.m. the following morning. It was such a fun night! That’s me and my BFF Michele at the after-party.

Since prom isn’t squeezed in on the same day as grad and the grand march and everything then it kind of becomes a much bigger deal because your whole day is devoted to it. I started my day off bright and early at 9 a.m. when I headed to the gym for my last work-out with my personal trainer, that’s right, I hired a personal trainer to help me get ready for prom. Prom was actually the last time I weighed what I do now, I started gaining weight right after prom. Then at about 12:30 p.m. I went and got my hair done and then a few of my girlfriends came over to my house and we had snacks, did our makeup, and got dressed, then we took pictures in the backyard! Eric was my prom date even though we technically weren’t together at that time; we dated for 11-months, broke up for five and then got back together and have been together since (another story for another time). Anyhow, there was no one else I wanted to take me so I asked Eric and he said yes! He was such a gentleman, he opened doors for me ALL night and stood for hours of pictures without complaining and he even danced TWO slow dances with me, and Eric is not the dancing type at all. He was the best prom date a girl could ask for. This is the picture we got taken by the professional photographer, isn’t Eric handsome!!

I’m sure we put so much thought and discussion into prom that we were all letdown when it wasn’t the ‘perfect’ experience but really we’d placed the night on a pedestal and I don’t think anything could have lived up to our expectations! Overall, my prom was great and I have happy memories when I look back on it! I cannot believe it was almost three years ago. Feels like yesterday sometimes.