Monday, May 26, 2014

Graduation 2014

I'm so glad we have today off.  What a weekend.  Friday was the final day of school for our seniors so that meant handing out my senior letters to my College Comp 2 students from this year, the senior video, and then, of course, graduation.

I wasn't able to attend, though, since my nephew, Austin, graduated from EGF.  So right after school, I dashed over to EGF to celebrate.

However, I was kept in the loop thanks to social media.  I saw this on Twitter - as two of our senior speakers took time out from their speech to take a selfie with the class of 2014.


I even had a former student Tweeting me live updates.  I wish I could've been there to hear the jokes.




Then - because of our family being here for Austin's graduation - we had a houseful.  We had Kristie's sister Karla with her husband, Gary, and their two children, Kayla and AJ.  We also had Kristie's younger brother, Eddie, and his daughter Addison and his step-daughter, Taylor.  Gail had been staying with Eddie, so she came up with them from SD.  We also had KoKo and Casey home too.  Quite the houseful.

We all woke up early Saturday to start cleaning and get the yard and house ready for all of the family over for the day.

But I also had a number of graduation parties to attempt to attend.  Sadly, every year I get around 35-45 invites (my how things have changed in 16 years.  I received zero invites my first year at LHS and just two after my second year!).  I admire Mr. Zutz because he is able to hit them all, spending 5-10 minutes at each one and then moving on.  Maybe when my kids are a bit bigger, I'll be able to do that too.

But for now I make a mad dash to get to as many as I possibly can.  So I spent Saturday hitting 13 graduation parties, including my niece's in RLF, before returning home to see my family.  It was exhausting, but it was so worth it.  I wish I could just spend 5 minutes at each one. Inevitably, though, I have too much of my father in me, for I'll see an older sibling and talk for 15 minutes, or I'll see a former student or a parent and spend 20 minutes catching up.

Unfortunately, I was not able to hit any on Sunday.  I had at least five to attend, but it's hard to spend the better part of two and a half days away from home when I have family up, especially my step-son Casey.

This is one reason I write all of my seniors who have taken College Comp 2 senior letters where I congratulate them and tell them two things: advice I have for them and what I will always remember about them.

What I would really love to do - in addition to still attending as many grad parties as I can - is have a College Comp 2 reunion BBQ this summer.  The only thing former students would have to bring would be a reunion essay (probably about how College Comp 2 prepared (or failed to prepare them) for college or advice on what I can do to tweak the class)!  I'd provide the rest . . . pop, hotdogs, hamburgers, and chips.  How much fun would that be?

I'm sure going to miss this crew, my second semester College Comp 2 class.




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