Misawa's First Spouse's Dining In

Active duty members often attend "dining ins". Spouses aren't included; though they can attend dining outs. Probably easiest to include this definition from wikipedia which seems to be fairly accurate, "Dining in is a formal military ceremony for members of a company or other unit, which includes a dinner, drinking, and other events to foster camaraderie andesprit de corps."


This year Misawa celebrated the first ever Spouse's Dining In.  It began with all the various "groups" (military division) choosing a storybook. Our tables were to be decorated according to the storybook theme and our costumes for the night were to be characters from the book.  Each group brought ingredients for the grog bowl....alcoholic, non-alcoholic and water. 


The Wing Staff Agencies (of which the chapel is part along with Public Affairs, JAG etc) chose "Alice in Wonderland" as our theme. I wasn't able to participate much in the organizing but Susie and Jen did a great job. Muna and Tiffany and their crew did an amazing job with the decorations. We all met early on Saturday, got to pick our table based on lottery, and then had an hour to decorate!  Then we went home, got ready, and met back in the evening. 


The decorations were great.....Percy Jackson, Willie Wonka, South Pacific, Princess and the Pea, Beauty and the Beast, Hansel and Gretel, God this is me Margaret and more. 


My favorite tables were How to Train a Dragon (and their customs were fantastic too!).....

And Willie Wonka in the Chocolate Factory

The generals chose the winning table. I'm not sure how they chose...but was pleasantly surprised when Team Alice went home with the prize basket of goodies! Here are some shots of our tables.  One was the Queen of Hearts and her court; the other was Alice's tea party. Check out the flowers on the back of the chairs. Everything was made by hand and the attention to detail was simply amazing. 

Note the cakes are made from paper as we weren't to use food

Queen's Table chairs were covered with playing cards

Note all the little trays of food were made from clay! 

Stephanie makes a great Alice!

Tweedle Dee and Tweedle Dum - I love these gals! 

Alice and the Hatter

Chesire cat - member of queen's court

Do remember members of the Queen of Heart's court had to have a abnormally large body part....note the ears above. Michael and I spent a date night searching high and low for "enhanced body parts" - imagine pantomiming THAT in a foreign country...and finally....settled for some batting and dive caps.... It was amazing how many gave me a squeeze. 

Chaplain Spouses all - me as a lady of the court, Jen as the Queen of Hearts and Coralia as the sweet bunny! 

Our group 

Here are a few more random shots of the night.....

Nice to have Terri here in Misawa 

Bimbo of the court? Reminds me of a photo of Gpa Earl

Choosing Joy!

©2012 D.R.G.
~Coram Deo~
Living all of life before the face of God...