What a night!!

Saturday evening was the big final pageant that 9 boys and 13 girls have been working on since the first of the year---earlier for some (like Eliza and her co-head coordinator)... These high school seniors were hand picked by fellow students and their teachers to participate in the big pageant---spending all their spare time organizing 10 different major fundraising events and multiple smaller fundraisers, ranging from a fashion show, rock concert, dances for middle school students, all day car-wash to doing yard work for businesses and private homes---one Saturday they were hired to move 45 yards of "nasty, disgusting, gross dirt" up a long driveway---in the pouring rain!! 15-17 of them worked from 9-3, and still had to go back the next day to finish---45 yards of dirt is about 15 regular-sized pick-up truck loads... The money raised was going to go to the neo-natal unit at our local hospital and the Mario Pastega house---a home for people to stay at that have loved ones in the hospital.

Besides those events, the boys had to learn a choreographed dance, create a skit or talent to perform at the pageant plus create a clever video shown on an earlier night. Each boy had a girl paired up with them helping to keep them on task, working with them on their productions etc. Overseeing everything were the head coordinators---they went to most dance practices, filling in when boys were absent, wrote the script for the MC's on pageant night, picked out the MC's, created agendas for meetings twice a week, organized schedules for events, procured the choreographer, the photographer, the costumes, tuxes, etc... Eliza was asked by one of the fellas to participate in his skit, which meant she had to memorize some lines and perform on the stage with him---basically wearing 2 hats that night---one as a cop, the other as coordinator! Below is a shot I took of her doing the skit...



One segment of the program had each boy paired up with a little kid---both in costume---this little fella was a favorite of Eliza's...



This shows Eliza introducing the girls during the pageant.



Here she is with her head-coordinator pal & the boys doing an unscheduled group sing-along---"My Girl".





Last year they raised about $32,000 so this year they were hoping to beat that number, and also their rival high school which brought in $35,000 at their pageant. Most were guessing they might have raised a total of $36,000---so you can probably imagine their surprise and shock when the check was revealed with a total showing over $47,000!!! Also, if they made their goal of $30,000 they were to receive an extra $15,000 from Mario Pastega!

It was a great group of kids, great cause, fabulous entertaining evening, and truly an amazing experience for everyone involved (Brad and I even!)