Port Townsend Victorian Festival: Saturday Evening, The Ball

Day 2.5:  The Ball

For the Ball on Saturday of the Victorian Festival, Mom and I decided that we needed to attend as Royalty.  It was super fun to dress Mom up in the bling we had been collecting over the past few months.  I wore my Rogelio Egusquiza Barrena Painting dress with my Royal Family Orders, jewelry, and tiara.  Since Mom's 1896 ball gown was in dark shades of black and deep red, I thought it would be nice for her to wear the star tiara I made a few months back, and all the star jewelry I have been collecting (Hello, my name is Gina and I'm addicted to Star Jewelry).  I thought she looked exceedingly regal!

Ready to head to the ball!

We had the fun chance to find a fabulous antique, white feather fan at the local Antique Mall.  Mom bought it and let me borrow it for the evening.

Ok...can I just say that this dress is now one of my favorite dresses!  I felt totally like a princess wearing it!

It was crazy how the silk wicked up the rain that was still on the grass.  I had to run back inside our room and iron the pleats (while still wearing the dress) so that they wouldn't collect any dirt and create mud!

New Royal Family Orders.

Mom's Family Orders.  My fabulous friend Kat of Madame Modiste made a Queen Alexandra family order and sent me a cabochon and ribbon so that I could make one like hers (Thank you thank you thank you Kat!!!).  I let Mom borrow it for the evening.  Up from that is a Monogram order that resembled the Russian Lady-In-Waiting orders.  I found the brooch on Etsy and instantly fell in love with it!  We are going with the "M" standing for "Maxine", Mom's Mother's middle name.  Above that is my Daddy (the King Raymond family order).  He is wearing his Boise Fire Department Battalion Chief uniform.  Then above that is the Empress Elizabeth I of Russia order. That is the only one that we had in common.  

  

I am so irritated at the pictures that I took of Mom.  ALL of them were super overexposed.  I have a feeling that it had something to do with the over cloudiness of the late afternoon and Mom's dark dress.  I had to seriously manipulate the images to get a semblance of what her dress looked like.  She looked more that fabulous in her Royal Attire!

Mom borrowed my black feather fan for the evening.  Hahahahaha!!  I think it's fun that we borrowed each others fans!

Mom looks so stunning in the silhouette of the 1890s!

These next few pictures are from the fashion show that we were in earlier in the day.  She doesn't have on her royal jewelry, but you can see her in her lovely dress!

My beautiful Mama!!!

Fun with Picasa.

I always like to manipulate some of the photos taken in recreations to try and capture a bit of what we would have looked like "back then".  I think I need to invest in a true "antiquing" photo shop program.

  

You can really see the difference between our dresses in this picture.

Affecting an Empress Alexandra look again.

At the Ball!

Mom dancing with a charming gentleman.  We helped him pick out his outfit on Friday.  From the looks of things, he had taken more than a few dance lessons.

I got to dance a dance too!  This charming gentleman, Jerry Cheetham, husband to Julie Ann Cheetham.  OHMYGOSH!  What a true master of dance!  He told me as he was literally spinning me around the dance floor that he had taught dancing for over 15 years.  There were times that I had to just focus on his bow tie to get from getting seriously dizzy!

Too much fun!  Mom said it was fun watching my train swirl around as we were spinning.  It reminded me of the dancing scenes in "The Age of Innocence".

We were joined at the ball by Rebecca Maiten and Vanessa Wood.  Both of these ladies looked so grand in their gorgeous ball gowns!

Rebecca and her boyfriend, Sean.  They are such a lovely and fun couple!

Vanessa and her boyfriend, Caleb...another lovely and fun couple!

We left the ball at 9:00 as we were starting to turn into pumpkins.  We were both hungry so stopped at the best Thai restaurant I have ever been to.  I ordered Yellow Curry and chicken Satay for us to share.  We went back "home", disrobed, ate our dinner on the floor and fell into bed!

I hope your weekend has ended on a most lovely note my friends!!

Be Blessed!

g