Call of the Champions

The After Sneak Dinner - a +50 year tradition at Dalat! Our junior class chose the Olympics as their theme to decorate with and specifically "Call of the Champions". Many, many man hours went into making the set. Tim built the bleachers last year and they have been used over and over for whatever need arises. We painted them white with a blue stripe. The top part is actually 4x8 sheets of foam painted to look like a screaming crowd of fans. It took Tim over six hours to screw all of this together!! Then we attached the foam lettering on the bottom. We added the masking tape track which we used for the games after eating dinner. And of course, the Olympic rings were also of foam as was the 6' flame that was lit by a runner with a handheld 'torch' (modified plant pot with a flashlight inside!)
The decoration committee put together table centres according to sports like beach volleyball above and track and field below. We also put flags on the tables and made paper plate awards for every senior.
The Olympic cake - it took a while to ice and decorate. Notice the orange ring - it should be blue but we couldn't find blue candies!! So orange had to suffice at the last minute . None of the students even noticed!

We began the evening with the offical Olympic welcome in several languages - Spanish, Bahasa, Japanese, Mandarin, Korean, Khmer and English.

Kaleb and Riley with their paper plate awards. Riley's says "Next Mr Canada" and Kaleb's reads "Most Likely to Conquer the World".
During the photo op time, the senior class sponsors (Brian, Val, Kerry and Robin) took advantage of the rings.

Our three Chandler Dorm seniors on the podium.
Kaleb receiving the Canadian flag as a handoff from Riley in a fake relay.
Three Canadians kids - Riley, Kaleb and Sheena.
Our outstanding junior class executive put a lot of time and energy into the dinner. Thanks so much to Nadia, Bill, James, Hannah, Linnea, Joycelyn and Josh.

Tim and I with our 'champion'!

The seniors were placed on three teams in a relay situation with eight different games like pencil javelin, one legged race, jelly bean toss along the track. Kaleb was in the last part, the sack race, and managed to grab the baton and cross the finish line first to win the prize for his team!!
To end, we held a medal ceremony for all our champions (see the Olympic flame in the background?) and every senior plus the four sponsors were awarded medals as the Olympic theme music played and everyone applauded.The juniors had to eat in the home ec on the run. We had a high carb menu of pasta and garlic bread plus cake and ice cream sundaes.
The whole group - senior and junior classes - together. Over 80 students who love and appreciate one another!

It was a great evening of affirming and honoring our senior class as not only the champions on our campus but champions in God's eye as they continue to grow in His likeness. The real bonus for us was that the senior class president got up to thank us and then their whole class gave the juniors a standing ovation and many, many hugs! Once the evening was officially over, all of this had to come down and be cleaned up and put away. Thankfully many hands made for light work and it only took one hour to do dishes, vacuum, take down sets, decor and tables and put the chapel back in order. I came home completely energized by the evening but Tim, who had spent 13 hours in the chapel yesterday, was tired. He was able to sleep this morning and after a few cups of coffee, he's good to go!