I called my mother to complain about my house...

...which has water in the crawlspace, and it turns out my niece was staying the night, so we talked about "Eldest" and "Brisingr" (she loves that series with the passion that a girl always brings to her first dragon books) and about "The Lightning Thief" movie, to which I am going to take her and her brother on Saturday.

Anyway, it also turns out that she's going to a Valentine's dance this weekend. And I, being her fashionable Aunt Min, asked if it was a real dance for which you get dressed up, and she said yes and told me all about her dancing dress...a strapless teal dress with a bubble hem. Personally, I think strapless is a little too old for an almost 13-year-old, but she also said that she has a little black cardigan to wear over it, which I suspect is Grandmother's tempering influence. She is soooo excited about her dress and has planned to show it to me when I go home this weekend.

I remember my first dance ensemble. I wore a lush green velvet skirt that my mother made for me, a white satin blouse, a green velvet flower over my ear, and my very first pair of strappy sandals with heels. My mother was beside herself with excitement when I picked out those shoes, because I was already 16 years old, and she had despaired of me ever giving up my Keds and hurachi sandals. :-)