Parents of the Class of 2019

Graduation is over, and it was quite an adventure... The mass was lovely, then just as the commencement part of the ceremony was about to start, cell phones all over the church started going off with an emergency tone. A tornado warning was issued for our area! So we headed to the gym, which is the school/parish shelter, and they finished the graduation there. My daughter was so disappointed. Our church is beautiful, 120 years old with gorgeous stained glass and ornate architecture, and they ended up walking in the gym instead. But it'll be a funny story to tell later, and by the time the service was over, the alert had been lifted (tornado was spotted about 12 miles from here but didn't touch down) and we were able to get some pictures with friends in the church. I'm just glad I did the outdoor pictures I wanted before the mass, because when we left it was raining buckets. My husband was soaked to the bone just from pulling the car up for us! But by the time the all-night party started, the severe weather was long gone so they should get to enjoy the fun part of the night without any interruptions.
 
Congratulations, Colleen. I'm sorry that the graduation had to be moved to the gym, but I'm glad they could finish it anyway and she still got to walk!

Ours was yesterday, too. It went smoothly although we had the threat of bad weather too (no tornado warnings during our ceremony though.) After each student's name was called, they received their diploma and shook hands with various administrators. Then each student got to pick a district employee to shake their hand and greet them as they returned to the floor. DS chose his cross country coach (who was also his track coach and his 8th grade history teacher). As far as I could tell, EVERY senior boy from the cross country team (20+ of them) picked the XC coach. And several of the girls' XC runners picked him too (he coaches both boys and girls distance for track, but the girls have a different XC coach.) He is an amazing guy, an amazing teacher, and an amazing coach and I think it's pretty cool that SO many of the kids chose him. He, by far, had more than any other person.

I didn't get as many pictures as I wanted, and I'm sure I won't get him back into his cap and gown for a photoshoot! The family came over to the house afterward and we had a nice dinner. Unfortunately, most of DS's invited-at-the-last-minute friends couldn't come because they were busy with their own families (DS didn't seem too disappointed but I felt kind of bad for him... but it was a terrible time for a "friend" party. I have WAY too much food so I'm kind of hoping some of his friends can come tonight to play video games and eat leftovers.)

2019_graduation_zpsljauhbbx.jpg
2019_graduation.jpg
 
Graduation is over, and it was quite an adventure... The mass was lovely, then just as the commencement part of the ceremony was about to start, cell phones all over the church started going off with an emergency tone. A tornado warning was issued for our area! So we headed to the gym, which is the school/parish shelter, and they finished the graduation there. My daughter was so disappointed. Our church is beautiful, 120 years old with gorgeous stained glass and ornate architecture, and they ended up walking in the gym instead. But it'll be a funny story to tell later, and by the time the service was over, the alert had been lifted (tornado was spotted about 12 miles from here but didn't touch down) and we were able to get some pictures with friends in the church. I'm just glad I did the outdoor pictures I wanted before the mass, because when we left it was raining buckets. My husband was soaked to the bone just from pulling the car up for us! But by the time the all-night party started, the severe weather was long gone so they should get to enjoy the fun part of the night without any interruptions.
Ugh! The weather this time of year sure is a wild card. Sorry she didn't get to graduate in the beautiful old church.

Our graduation is Saturday and they are predicting strong storms in that day. Biting my nails. No idea how I'll get pictures if it's raining.

Congrats to the grad, regardless of where it took place!
 


We had our final scholarship meal (breakfast at a local country club). Dd had scheduled a wig/makeup appointment for a younger Irish dancer at 8, so we were late and showed up right when the awards started. Ironically afterwards she had to dd22’s wig/makeup for her new gig as an Elsa for birthday parties.

Dd and her sister broke the school record for the 4 x 4 at their track meet last week (4:01.00) which was her goal this season. Two more meets to go. She still has the track, choir, and athletic dinner, I think the last choir concert is tomorrow night.
 
Congratulations, Colleen. I'm sorry that the graduation had to be moved to the gym, but I'm glad they could finish it anyway and she still got to walk!

Ours was yesterday, too. It went smoothly although we had the threat of bad weather too (no tornado warnings during our ceremony though.) After each student's name was called, they received their diploma and shook hands with various administrators. Then each student got to pick a district employee to shake their hand and greet them as they returned to the floor. DS chose his cross country coach (who was also his track coach and his 8th grade history teacher). As far as I could tell, EVERY senior boy from the cross country team (20+ of them) picked the XC coach. And several of the girls' XC runners picked him too (he coaches both boys and girls distance for track, but the girls have a different XC coach.) He is an amazing guy, an amazing teacher, and an amazing coach and I think it's pretty cool that SO many of the kids chose him. He, by far, had more than any other person.

I didn't get as many pictures as I wanted, and I'm sure I won't get him back into his cap and gown for a photoshoot! The family came over to the house afterward and we had a nice dinner. Unfortunately, most of DS's invited-at-the-last-minute friends couldn't come because they were busy with their own families (DS didn't seem too disappointed but I felt kind of bad for him... but it was a terrible time for a "friend" party. I have WAY too much food so I'm kind of hoping some of his friends can come tonight to play video games and eat leftovers.)

2019_graduation_zpsljauhbbx.jpg
View attachment 401792
What a great looking group! That's great they get to pick someone to shake hands with. I vote you tell him you want a belated Mother's Day gift of putting the robe back on for more photos. :) Congrats to your grad!
 
Took it out to steam it this weekend...so close (10 days!)!! DS passed the phone interview with the math tutoring place and will be having a face-to-face interview this week. He also said where he worked last summer can take him back, so he may do both places. Wed. is his last day and half of that day is the senior picnic. He was describing Project Graduation and when he got to "laser tag," DS16's eyes got wide. So DS offered to take him as his guest. DS 16 hasn't decided if he's going to go yet but I thought that was really sweet.

cap and gown.jpg
 


It's a whirlwind week for us here. DD's honors banquet is tonight, they'll give out the cords and announce any scholarships. I don't expect DD to get any but she should get her AP Scholar With Distinction award for passing 5 or more AP tests with a 4 or a 5. Then DD has her Senior banquet on Wednesday, and the in-laws come into town. DD has graduation rehearsal (only 1 for about 600 seniors) and DS has his Swim and Dive team banquet on Thursday, and graduation is Friday, with the weather in Colorado this week, I'm really glad we're too big a school to have it at Red Rocks! Then we have DD's graduation party with on Saturday. Thank goodness it's a 3 day weekend so I'll have time to recover!
 
So, who's starting to stock up on things for college? To those of you that have kids away at college already, what are some helpful things to bring that perhaps you didn't remember the first time?
DS's school is literally down the street from an Ikea. He is pretty no-frills, so we'll see what he wants to do. We don't know yet if he's got a double, triple or quad (please think good thoughts for a double). He said he wasn't planning on getting a fridge and I think we convinced him to think again about that. But once he knows about his roommate, then they can coordinate. I already bought towels on Black Friday but how many sets would you send? I got a set of four everything and don't think he'll need that many or have room.
 
Graduation is over, and it was quite an adventure... The mass was lovely, then just as the commencement part of the ceremony was about to start, cell phones all over the church started going off with an emergency tone. A tornado warning was issued for our area! So we headed to the gym, which is the school/parish shelter, and they finished the graduation there. My daughter was so disappointed. Our church is beautiful, 120 years old with gorgeous stained glass and ornate architecture, and they ended up walking in the gym instead. But it'll be a funny story to tell later, and by the time the service was over, the alert had been lifted (tornado was spotted about 12 miles from here but didn't touch down) and we were able to get some pictures with friends in the church. I'm just glad I did the outdoor pictures I wanted before the mass, because when we left it was raining buckets. My husband was soaked to the bone just from pulling the car up for us! But by the time the all-night party started, the severe weather was long gone so they should get to enjoy the fun part of the night without any interruptions.
Sorry that happened, but it will be a story you all will not forget! It rained early on my HS graduation day and when we were coming out afterward, there was a rainbow.
 
DS's school is literally down the street from an Ikea. He is pretty no-frills, so we'll see what he wants to do. We don't know yet if he's got a double, triple or quad (please think good thoughts for a double). He said he wasn't planning on getting a fridge and I think we convinced him to think again about that. But once he knows about his roommate, then they can coordinate. I already bought towels on Black Friday but how many sets would you send? I got a set of four everything and don't think he'll need that many or have room.
Dd22 went to college with one bath towel and one elastic top towel, ds21 went with 2.
 
Dd and her sister broke the school record for the 4 x 4 at their track meet last week (4:01.00) which was her goal this season.

Awesome! That is an amazing time. And cool for sisters to do it together.

Our graduation was this weekend too. I was happy to have had our reception done last weekend and just enjoy this weekend. We went to a total of 9 receptions, DD did more. Ceremony was nice, DD's speech was entertaining. She had fun going to receptions afterward with her BF, but drove home listening to old Taylor Swift and crying. Pretty sentimental, this one.
 
Preparing for college is going to be so different with a girl this time. DS didn't want to plan or shop at ALL. I finally just had to use my best judgment and buy him some stuff. I have the feeling we'll be shopping all summer with DD. At least she's had a chance to get to know her roommate the last few weeks. I'm sure they'll coordinate something.
 
So, who's starting to stock up on things for college? To those of you that have kids away at college already, what are some helpful things to bring that perhaps you didn't remember the first time?

We're just starting now that the senior all-night party is over, because most of the party door prizes are dorm basics. DD won a pop-up laundry basket full of cleaning supplies, a bunch of Mod Pizza gift cards, and a set of new water bottles with a gift certificate for her and 3 friends to do a local high ropes/adventure course. My mother also got her a dorm-friendly coffee pot (a Hamilton Beach single-cup brewer with a reusable filter - DD *hates* the waste of K-cups!) and a milk frother so she can make her own lattes. Since DD lives on coffee, both were on her "must have" list for school.

The next step is purging her bedroom, a project she wants to begin tomorrow. She has way more clothes than she needs to pack, and she's looking forward to checking out the thrift/vintage shopping in San Fran so I'm sure there will be some new purchases after she gets to school. So we're going through what she already has and sorting it between donations, consignment or keep, and she wants to start packing the stuff she won't need so we can get a feel for how much room we're going to have in the van for the journey. Her bedroom looks like Pinterest exploded, so I'm sure there are going to be a lot of weird little things she'll want to take or buy, like her cookie sheets and magnetic Scrabble letters and the string of fairy lights with mini clothespins for hanging Polaroids. Fortunately, there's a Target 3 blocks from campus, so whatever we don't have room for or forget to pack won't be hard to pick up on the other end!

DS does too, but his school makes a big deal of how environmentally responsible they are, so I'm expecting it to be pretty convenient for students to use refillable bottles.

Most of the campuses we toured have installed drinking fountains with water bottle filling spouts, which makes the reusable bottle much easier than going out of the way to buy or recycle single-use bottles.

Dd and her sister broke the school record for the 4 x 4 at their track meet last week (4:01.00) which was her goal this season.

That is really cool that they were able to do that together!
 
Awesome! That is an amazing time. And cool for sisters to do it together.

Our graduation was this weekend too. I was happy to have had our reception done last weekend and just enjoy this weekend. We went to a total of 9 receptions, DD did more. Ceremony was nice, DD's speech was entertaining. She had fun going to receptions afterward with her BF, but drove home listening to old Taylor Swift and crying. Pretty sentimental, this one.
Dd18 was the fastest female sprinter at the HS before her sister got there (and the fastest female xc runner). At the beginning of last year’s track season, I asked her how she felt having her sister take her spot in track (dd16 plays varsity soccer in the fall), and she said she was thrilled because she made the team better (dd18 was 60.3 and dd16 was 59.3). They have always been SO close and I think next year will be hard (especially separating their clothes since they’ve always been the same size).
 
DS has his cap and gown, but our ceremony isn't until the 31st - so I'm hoping for tips from those of you who have already done it for getting the darn hat to look right! He tried it on, and it was so awkward.

It's this type:

grad cap - inside.jpg grad cap - outside.jpg

He thinks the cardboard circle is supposed to come out, and I think not. And I don't remember my own years ago having that much elastic? - I thought we used bobby pins somehow??
 
What's so awkward about the hat? (I mean, they *are* awkward. My son hated his. He didn't like how it looked, and said it wasn't very comfortable either, but I don't think it was more awkward than they just are.)

His hat had the same sort of elastic. I think it's supposed to help lessen the need for bobby pins -- so DS did not need any pins -- but some people still bobby pinned theirs on. I think a lot of girls did. One of DS's (male) friends has a big mop of curly hair. He needed pins to keep his on. I tried the hat on, and I think I would have needed pins. I have a big head and "one size fits most" would not fit around the widest part of my head. It started out OK, but then the elastic started contracting and slowly lifting the hat off my head!

I think we left the cardboard piece in his.
 
DS has his cap and gown, but our ceremony isn't until the 31st - so I'm hoping for tips from those of you who have already done it for getting the darn hat to look right! He tried it on, and it was so awkward.

It's this type:

View attachment 402023 View attachment 402024

He thinks the cardboard circle is supposed to come out, and I think not. And I don't remember my own years ago having that much elastic? - I thought we used bobby pins somehow??

A tip that I saw that was really for girls may apply here. Fold the front "v" section back a bit, and use bobby pins to hold the cap in place. That way it's not hanging over their forehead giving them an unnatural widow's peak, and the cap will still stay secure.

We had the Honor's night for DD's school last night. It was 3 1/2 hours long! They have a graduating class of 530, which is smaller than I thought, and around 125 kids in NHS, over 75 kids who graduated with a 4.0 or better, another 100 or so who graduated with a 3.75 or better, and a whole lot who graduated with a 3.5 or better. We had 12 kids, 12, who are National AP Scholars with Honors (I think that's what it's called). Who have taken 8 or more AP classes through their Junior year and received a 4 or better on all of them. Our valedictorians each took 19 AP courses, and got 5s on all of the tests. One is going to Stanford, the other is going to MIT. DD was an AP Scholar with Distinction, meaning she's passed 5 or more AP courses up through her Junior year with a 4 or better on all of them.

I had always wondered how DD wasn't in the top 50 in her class, and then we had last night. Holy cow! The Valedictorians had 4.6949 GPAs (they had to take it out that far because they tied, they planned it that way, they're best friends).

It was interesting to see. Of course it was also distracting because we could see the snow coming down outside as the ceremony is going on. Snow, on May 20th. Crazy! Makes me glad that we don't have graduation scheduled for Red Rocks Amphitheater, as beautiful as it is, it would be cold, drizzly, and miserable! 2 smaller schools did have to reschedule their graduations because of the weather yesterday.

DD's Senior banquet is tomorrow, but she didn't get tickets so probably isn't going, graduation is on Friday, and her party is on Saturday, then it's all over!!!!!

(I'm going to need a LOT of kleenex on Friday, I'm a total sap!)
 

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