I had the idea that I wanted to canopy or tent the gym in the church for the RS dinner. I just wanted it to feel more intimate and less like a gym. After some careful planning, lots of shopping and some preparation, it was time to sew the fabric! I got it on big bolts and Greg helped me cut it into 15 yard sections. Then I had to sew pockets at the ends of each piece. Look at this huge pile of fabric!!
This is what it looked like as I was sewing the organza. Yep, it's literally piled as high as the window sill!!
The poplin is on the left...
Piled higher than the table! It took me 7 hours to sew the fabric, but I finally got it all done.
When we got everything to the church, we had to lay the fabric out with the pockets facing the center.
Then we slid the metal frame through the pocket.
Connected it to the chains and attached it to a pulley system that goes to the center of the ceiling.
Then I took a bunch of oversized ornaments and hung them from the center of the ring. The fabric was so heavy that the pulley system couldn't lift it. I had to climb on the ladder and lift is as people pulled the pulley. I was just happy that it held!!!
Recognize these boxes? They have the presents inside! We used them as part of the centerpieces for the tables.
Decorating the stage...
And getting the tables ready!
Here's what it looked like when we were done. I was so, so excited!!
When everyone came, we served dinner and then a few minutes later, the Choraliers came and sang for about 25 minutes. They did such a beautiful job!
After they were done, we did about a 15 minute presentation. We turned off all of the lights in the gym and took the lanterns from the tables. We brought out a table to the center of the stage that had a picture of Christ in the center. One by one, we came out with our lanterns and read one of the visiting teaching messages from this year about Christ. When we finished, we would place the lantern around the picture. It slowly got brighter and brighter. It was the only thing you could see in a completely dark room. You could have heard a pin drop. It turned out just how we hoped. After we finished, we served dessert and then closed. People stayed for about another hour visiting...always the sign of a good event!
It was a long day (9am to 10:30 pm) and there was a lot of prep time that came before that day, but it was worth every minute. It was a wonderful night spent with wonderful women and a great way to kick off the Christmas holiday.
