If 3+ folks are coming for breakfast at 6:30, the people preparing it need to be up and moving considerably earlier than that. I was showered, coifed, and dressed for graduation by 5:40 am.
Folks came, B’s eggs and sausage were good in addition to the other food. We all left the house (in N’s car and my van) by 7:07 for the hour drive. The school has 3 graduations scheduled for May 10th and I am thrilled N’s was the first. The one scheduled for 12 had to have been late starting and imagine the parking. We had no trouble w/ places to park, but at 11:30 as we were leaving --others were coming in and they were struggling to find a place.. I can imagine that the 3pm folks had similar difficulty as well. That is why I say Hooray for the College of Education having the first graduation time.
There were approx. 700-750 graduates and that takes time. Each name was called and each person walked across the stage. To be able to be seen in a group of that size, some graduates (about 15 in all) “decorated” their mortar boards. Some had initials on the top of the hat, while others were “BEDAZZLED” with designs, initials, greetings (Hi, Mom and Dad) One in particular covered the entire top of the mortarboard with sequined fabric. This may have been gong on for years, but I had never seen it before. I’m sure the decorators were very proud of themselves, but to me (a generation thing, I suppose) it was really TACKY. There were many more graduates whose names were in the program, but who chose not to be there for the ceremony. Nki even considered not “walking” but that didn’t last long. In the clip following, she had a little trouble with her hat.
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Other than N’s graduation-- another real high point of the celebration was the group of 10 Ph.D./Ed.D candidates who were “hooded”. That was quite impressive
After the ceremony, gathering the group who came w/ us was a bit of a challenge in the crush of people pouring out of the arena (Consider- 700+ graduates who each had 5 tickets for guests plus the TWU officials and staff--the place was PACKED)
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We finally found everyone, loaded up and headed for the Reata in downtown Ft. Worth where we had reservations for lunch.
I’ve talked about the Reata before in my trip to Alpine in Dec, 07. The original restaurant is in Alpine, Tx (where I grew up) and is named for the ranch in the movie Giant, which was filmed in that vicinity. ANYWAY We got our table and had a wonderful meal and super desserts and also really good conversation. N’s friends are very special to her (and to us as well), one being a fellow teacher and student at TWU, another being a mentor and really fun friend and the third being a college friend who may be more like the sister that N never had rather than just college buddy. Everyone came back to N and B’s house for a short time and then they all went their way. We changed clothes, got comfy and relaxed.
We did have one last “chore” for the day and that was to make a run to Sam’s --we had a LONG, LONG list of items that we usually get there. After the Sam’s excursion, Sara’s back area was FULL.
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