Golden Gala

I normally don't do this on this blog.  This blog is reserved for my kids and their doings but the other day I was telling someone about all the cool places I went and the awesome adventures I had in my 13 years as a pharmaceutical rep and I realized something.  Most of those pictures are scattered somewhere and I may find them one day so the girls can see all my travels around the country all those years but on the off chance I never do I want my girls to see all those things that maybe kept me from home or had me stressed out at the time...the reasons for which I work and you know what I want them to be proud of the accomplishments that Mitch and I have been so lucky to be a part of over the years.  So for that reason I have chosen to add on occasion some of those things to this blog.  This is a celebration gala that I did for our 50th anniversary of the college.  We held this event at the McLarty home and had a great time with over 300 guests in attendance that evening.  We did an event were I hired 4 different chefs from around Arkansas and asked them to create some of there favorites.  We assigned each chef his own tent and guests were able to mingle and try a little bit of it all..and we had some crazy dishes like duck, alligator and things I have never even heard of!  WE had a wine sommelier and a craft beer expert on hand to educate guests on pairing and we had a program on an outdoor screen to end the evening.  It was such a special night and I am so proud of the end result after many months of planning.  I have added a few photos I found..none of which really show  how gorgeous the backdrop and the lights were at sunset as we dined in the middle of this field but hopefully it shows some of the creative work of all those that helped make it possible.

Here is a picture of some of our nursing students who doubled as servers for the evening.

The daylight really does this event no justice but I have to share some of the pictures I got as we were still setting up that afternoon.

The lanterns were hung from this beautiful huge tree in the backyard and at dark it was just gorgeous.

The honorees that evening along with the family.  Dr. Bobbitt , UA system president, Dr. Sugg former UA system President, John Goodson UA Trustee, Freddie Smith, Bonnie Routon, Larry Dowd, Ned Ray Purtle, and Jerry Pruden, UAHT Board of Trustees am Venita Allen Turk Power Plant CEO. Unfortunately, we lost Mrs. Bonnie shortly after this program.  I really adored that woman she will be greatly missed!

A few pictures of the decorations from that evening.  Most of them were from before it was all finalized but at least it shows part of the vision for the evening.  However without a full picture of the backdrop in the middle of this field once it got dark and the lights were hung it is hard to see just how beautiful it all was.  There were hundreds of painted pumpkins scattered around and each tent was a certain color theme, we had the white, the gold, the silver and the copper.

The only picture I found of myself...I was on the run the entire evening!

The Mclarty family were very gracious hosts.

Jeff, Mitch and Trevor seemed to have a good time.

some of the helpers from our student ambassador group.

The sculpture that will be dedicated to the honorees that evening.