Lifesize Tebow cutout accompanies Iowan to her senior prom - DesMoinesRegister.com

Tim Tebow did his best Flat Stanley impression at the Kingsley-Pierson High School prom Saturday night.

A homemade cardboard visage of the former Heisman Trophy winner and NFL quarterback appeared on the arm of senior Rachel Bird, a basketball player and cheerleader bound for Northwestern College in Orange City come fall.

Bird was dateless for the spring rite of passage. She sent Tebow a message via Twitter, a social media network that allows people to share 140-character posts. She invited Tebow to prom as her date. A devout Lutheran, Bird likes Tebow’s faith-on-his-sleeve approach to life and his football skills, and “he’s not bad looking, either,” she said.

“A lot of my friends are guys, and they were involved with girls,” she said. “I didn’t want to go with just anybody just to have a date. So I thought I would give it a shot.

“I didn’t expect anything. He must get 100 requests a minute.”

Bird never heard from Tebow, whose ability to rally the Denver Broncos to fourth-quarter victories last season sparked a nationwide “Tebowmania” phenomenon.

She shrugged off mild disappointment and put Tebow out of her mind. She decided to attend prom with a group of friends. But as the days grew closer, Bird started to feel like a third wheel. Her friends had dates, and she didn’t want to be the only girl at the table alone.

Rachel is the youngest of Bob and Carol Bird’s three children. Life is changing fast. Bob Bird sold his share in a Kingsley insurance business and got a new job in Plymouth, Minn. They are selling the house they’ve lived in for 12 years and moving. Father and daughter figured they’d have dinner before prom â€" a final, tender moment together before he dropped her off at the dance.

Rachel Bird floated an idea: What if she took a Tim Tebow standee â€" a cardboard cutout of the popular quarterback?

Friends laughed and encouraged her. Everybody thought it would be funny. Her mom blanched a bit, though.

“We didn’t want her to be embarrassed,” Carol Bird said.

Rachel Bird abandoned the plan. Then prom Saturday arrived. She decided Tebow was going to be her date â€" even if he was only a quarter-inch thick.

“We wanted her to have fun with her friends and have a nice memory â€" and it’s definitely something people will remember for years,” Carol Bird said. “She’s not usually outgoing like this. She really came out of her shell for this one.”

An office supply store in Sioux City had a sale on poster printing. Rachel Bird already had picked up a photo of a dressed-up Tebow. She paid $20 to get it life-sized.

Bird called her dad. She needed some help getting her date ready. Bob Bird came home. The pair went to the local hardware store and fished out a large piece of cardboard. Together, father and daughter cut the cardboard and the poster. Bob Bird assembled a stand for the Flat Tebow and helped Rachel glue the poster in place.

Bob Bird even loaned Flat Tebow some cologne.

“The piece of cardboard we found smelled strongly of wood glue,” Rachel Bird said. “We sprayed a little on him to kind of hide that.”

Flat Tebow might have been made of paper and cardboard, but he was anything but a stiff at the prom. Girls wanted to dance with him. Boys got their picture taken with him.

“I think more people took their picture with Tim than they did with me,” Bird said.

Most of all, though, everybody laughed.

“It was so much fun,” Bird said. “I don’t regret it at all.”

Bird’s mom got her wish: A lasting memory was made.

The wild courtship of Flat Tebow and Rachel Bird might not be over. She plans to move him into her college dorm this fall.

How will her father feel about his little girl living with her prom date?

“I think,” Bird said, “as long as he’s made of cardboard, it’ll be OK.”