High school senior hosts an at-home prom for her family after school cancels dance due to the coronavirus
When high school senior Amelia Schantz found out her prom was canceled due to the coronavirus pandemic she was disappointed. “I expected it to be canceled and it was definitely for the best,” she tells Yahoo Lifestyle. “But when they announced it, you couldn’t help but be a little sad.”
But Schantz, who is in isolation with her family at home in Louisville, Colo., had an idea: a prom at home with her family. The teen has been out of school since March 12, and social distancing at home with her mom, dad, younger sister and dog since March 15.
“I walked downstairs and told my family I had an announcement,” she says of how the prom plan went into play. “They were all very excited and supportive of having prom at home.”
The family got creative to make the event work.
“My mom pulled out the Christmas lights and made a dance floor,” Schantz says. “My dad called our local florist and got corsages for us and a boutonniere for himself. I made a photo wall with my school colors, almost everything a normal prom would have had.”
Schantz already had her dress at home, and her younger sister had conveniently purchased a thrift store prom dress a few weeks earlier. “When actual ‘prom night’ came around we ordered in from a local restaurant, danced and FaceTimed our friends and family so they could be a part of it too,” the teen says.
As for the highlight of at-home prom night? “Probably the dancing TikTok we did,” she says. “It seems silly but we got our dad to dance, which he never does, and it was a really fun way of including the whole family in one video.”
Of course, there is some disappointment to having prom at home. “It was another missed opportunity to make memories with all the people I had spent my high school career with,” Schantz admits. “We didn’t know we had already danced together for the last time at our Winter Ball a few months ago.”
But her idea for a prom at home inspired some of her classmates. “When I told my best friend, we decided to do it on the same night,” she says. “Other people I told did similar things or at least put on the dress they were going to wear and had a nice dinner.”
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