I wanted to share with you all a blog post that my roommate, Jenn, wrote about the quinceañera that we planned a few weeks ago. If you want to read more about life from Jenn's perspective, you can check out her blog at: http://www.jennholden.com.
"It started with a Chinese buffet. She had never tried Chinese food before and the endless supply of egg rolls and ice cream was a lot for her and her young teenage friends to take in. At the end of the dinner, we concluded that they actually didn’t like Chinese food, but they sure knew how to eat bowl after bowl of ice cream and they absolutely loved being out and about, window-shopping and walking around the mall arm-in-arm. Something about the whole experience just seemed so normal, and everyday, and that mixed with their giggles, teenage girl chatter and massive ice cream consumption made it beautiful. We vowed to make a habit of it, these spontaneous girls’ nights on Fridays when our schedules aligned and the girls had behaved well all week.
Fast forward to the moment when we first sat down to talk about her 15th birthday party, as described in my past blog post, when I asked her to share her dreams for the day and she shyly replied “well, I don’t know. I have never been to a quinceañera before.”
It didn’t take long to realize that this day was going to reach far beyond a party or even a rite of passage for Wendy- it was going to be a celebration that connected her deeply to her culture, to her dreams and to the love of her heavenly father. That which is often theoretical became tangible in the process of a party planned just for her.
Previous window shopping experiences turned into hours poring over the shoe selection to choose just the right pair for the day of her party.
Mentors, sponsors, visitors, family, Back2Back staff and caregivers were recruited to make her dreams become a reality, decorating the auditorium, cooking the dinner, capturing the day on film, and presenting the symbolic gifts.
A traditional quinceañera dance was rehearsed day after day for weeks leading up to the ceremony, teaching Wendy and her friends in the children’s home new ways of worshipping the Lord and carrying themselves in front of crowds of people.
Thirty three children who live with Wendy at Casa Hogar del Norte anxiously and excitedly awaited the big celebration, when they would all put on their new, fancy clothes to attend the most formal party that has ever been hosted in their home.
And on that day in mid-October, a timid, teenage girl transformed into a stunning, confident young woman as she stood on the stage, concluding the ceremony with her words of thanks to the children’s home that raised her and the pastor who shared words of wisdom for her future.
It was in these moments that a distant dream became a reality, which was sealed both by her words “Thank you, thank you. You made my dream come true” and our prayers that she would never stop dreaming."
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