An Evening in Excellence Tea Party

Our 16 and 17 year old girls were in charge of Young Women in Excellence this year, so picked an Alice in Wonderland theme.  I went on an exploring expedition for ways to tie it into Personal Progress. I found this perfectly fitting quote by President Monson:

Let us not find ourselves as indecisive as Alice. You will remember that she comes to a crossroads with two paths before her, each stretching onward but in opposite directions. She is confronted by the Cheshire cat, of whom Alice asks, "Which path shall I follow"
The cat answers, “That depends where you want to go. If you do not know where you want to go, it doesn’t matter which path you take.”⁷Unlike Alice, we all know where we want to go, and it does matter which way we go, for by choosing our path, we choose our destination.

So we had our tie in! Personal progress helps us choose the right path. One of our speakers used it as her topic. Our second speaker used a quote from the Doorknob character (see further down) as his.

I suppose you can't have an Alice in Wonderland meeting without transforming it into a tea party. Squeal! Of course THAT idea was a hit with the girls. A week before the event they cut out the decorations. Then on the night of the meeting one of them came early to help set and decorate the tables, another brought floral arrangements she had made herself. Also one of them dressed up like Alice! It pleases me so much to help the girls find unique ways to participate, contribute and enjoy themselves.

I didn't get a good picture because let's face it, I was setting up and decorating right up until the meeting started….so I illustrated it instead.
We hung decorations to make them look like they were "falling down the rabbit hole." And I was excited to use my snack set collection! (I almost had enough…I borrowed some from my mother-in-law.)

Other decorations included signs pointing in all directions on the walls. And I put this quote on the programs:

I enjoy doing this for the girls—especially when one of them says "I thought it was going to be boring like all the other ones, but this was WAAAAY better than I thought it was going to be. This was my favorite one!" Hah hah. I can always count on her to speak her mind. Plus she was very involved this time, and that makes a huge difference in attitude.

But every year I am glad when it's over. Its takes preparation (for all of us adults, not just me, there's no way I could do it on my own) and I tend to worry and think a lot about it, so much that I loose sleep over it. Ugh. So check mark for the year 2015! (Now how are we going to top it next year….?)

Click here for the pinable post with a downloadable link for the cutouts