Unfortunately, my curls did not hold nearly as well as they had when I had tested my hair style the evening before. I think the end product was o.k., though. I did my eyes in champagne and purple eye shadow, with plum eyeliner and mascara. For my lips, I used my favorite lipstick in "Saffron Silk." The night before, I had painted my nails with clear polish. I won't describe all my accessories, but I did take pictures of them, which you can see in the night's album. My makeup complete, I took down the setting curls and brushed and pinned them into a side swept half-up style. Clayton came back as I was moving on to makeup, and at this point we both got dressed, helping each other with our respective hardware when necessary.
Once we were all ready, we double checked that everything we needed was in my clutch, and then we walked over to the convention center. We located our table, and it wasn't long before we found some friends. There was a large (but expensive) bar, and a few tables of veggie trays. The tables and chairs were done up beautifully, but our red table cloth made everyone's faces red in the pictures. Oh well!
From there, the night was very regulated. We ate our salads, and then the ceremonies began. Several things were read, the cake was cut (the youngest Marine present was scarcely 19 and from Clayton's shop. When I asked if I had met this one before, Clayton replied "Of course not! How could you? He was only born five minutes ago."), and we watched the 2012 Marine Corps Birthday Message. Our guest speaker was very good. He was equal parts salty and funny, and he got a very loud standing ovation at the end. Then we were released to get a delicious dinner at the buffet, and dancing began as soon as people finished eating. We actually did dance quite a bit, as this D.J. was pretty good about taking requests and picking dance-able songs. A and bit after 10 PM, we said our good-byes and walked back to our hotel, where we watched anime on Clayton's computer and slept on a nice soft bed.
This morning, we packed up everything we'd brought with us (which went surprisingly fast, considering how my makeup bags had exploded in the room while I was getting ready) and checked out. We went back into New Bern for a delicious breakfast at another favorite restaurant. After breakfast we took a turn around the block in the crisp, autumn air. As soon as we returned home, we got into pajamas (we've got nothing else going on today) and started chilling on the couch with more anime. I was excited to post our pictures, since I know a lot of you were looking forward to ball pictures. Hope you like them!
Click here to see the Marine Corps Birthday Ball 2012 Pictures.