The girls were dressed in their finest heels, the weather was cooperating, and the 10 couples who gathered in a friend’s backyard for pictures before Newton South High School’s junior semiformal were ready for a great night of fun and memory making.

Except the merriment hit a snag when the limousine didn’t show up at the appointed time on May 16 to drive the teenage friends to the Boston Park Plaza hotel.

“Some parents were getting ready to carpool, but the kids were having so much fun they didn’t want to split up,” said David Rosenblatt, whose son Sam was among the group.