graduation woes

I remember when I graduated a few years back, it was filled with lots of fun memories. One of those included marching into the football stadium and looking up to see all the people sweating in the bleachers, but still there to support you on this momentuous occasion. Then afterwards I spent the next little while hugging friends and laughing about the end of all our fun times on campus. Finally comes the family time where you get to hug each other and share in the happy celebration and then take the infamous graduation pictures.

For my little brother, Ben, who graduated on Thursday night, he will definitely not have the same memories as me. His graduation was filled with anticipation as to how the ceremony would unfold with a water drenched football stadium, marching into the auditorium with ONLY students sitting there, and finally his older sister and her family ditching out before he could even head over to Hawk Hall and begin the long search of finding family in order to take the must have graudation photos. Thursday was one of those once in a million happenings when Arizona somehow managed to receive buckets of rain not only in May, but on graduation night of all days! We ended up sitting in a random classroom and watched a televised graduation ceremony and then spent the next few hours watching Maddie run up and down the stairs without tiring. Finally we heard Ben's name and watched him walk across the stand to receive his diploma. We cheered and then happily headed to the car to head back home. Probably the saddest part about this whole affair is that we don't have ONE picture of the family on graduation. The only ones I could manage to scrounge up were from Baccalaureate (sp?) on Sunday afternoon. So happy graduation Ben...we are so proud and excited for you to move on to a new stage of your life (even if we are wimps and couldn't deal with our kids long enough to find you after graduation ended :)My dad and brother, BEN
Maddie giving the sweetest ever hug to her Uncle. Of course she added a "Happy Birthday Uncle Ben" to go along with her hug....she always thinks that every celebration must be someone's birthday!!