Pretty In Pink: 'Mom Prom' High School Fashions Extravaganza Benefits Charity

March 10, 2011 — -- Forget fashion week. The coolest catwalk may not be in Paris or Milan. In Canton, Mich., women were strutting their stuff from the best of Mom Prom 2011, sashaying down aisle in their prom best.

The women are wearing outlandish, gawdy, ruffled concoctions that were questionable even back in the day, but it's all for a good cause.

I went to Michigan to meet up with Betsey Crapps, a charming mother of three, who's the main mom of the Mom Prom.

She proudly pulls out her puffy pink prom dress circa 1988 and rallies her friends for the ultimate retro girls' night out.

"We spend our lives taking care of our families and this is the one night we don't have responsibilities and we can have fun," she said. "It's not very often that we wear pony tails on the side of our heads and macaroni necklaces.

I quickly realized that it brings out the inner girl in you because every girl likes to play dress up.

I have to admit: Looking at the rack of taffeta splendor, I quickly caught their girly fever.

These tacky, wacky, sometimes startling gowns are also curators of special memories.

"This was my mom's dress," Ellie Wallace said. "She wore it to my wedding 20 years ago, so I wear it in her honor."

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But there is an even greater driving force behind the tackiness and tiaras.

The Mom Prom has benefited various charities along the way, and that adds meaning to what Mom Prom does.

"It would be great to have a girls' night out and be fun and go dancing but it just puts more emphasis on helping people and that's what we do," said Crapps. "We are moms. We try to help as many people as we can. We take [care] of our families and it's nice to take care of others."

This year the Mom Prom raised $3,000 for the HHT Foundation, a charity that fights for a cure for the rare and life-threatening genetic blood disorder. It's a disease that Mom Prommer Jody Nissan knows all too well. Two of her children and her husband suffer from it.

"It means so much to know that people who have their own lives and their own challenges will pull together to help us find a cure," Nissan said.