Mary's Graduation

It's taken me a couple of days but finally I have some pictures from Mary's graduation to share.  I'm also working to upload ALL of the photos I have from the weekend onto Facebook.

Early in the ceremony, Mary was surprised to be awarded one of a handful of Board of Education awards.  Her award was for History/Social Studies.

Next to receiving her diploma, the highlight of the ceremony for us was Mary's valedictory speech.  (Did I say that right?  I feel that as the mother of the valedictorian I should make sure my grammar is correct.)  At the bottom of this blog post, you can watch the speech.  (Or not.)

There was a part in Mary's speech where she took a photo of the crowd.  This is it.  (I got this picture from our local newspaper's website.)

This is Mary enjoying a lighthearted moment on stage.  As you can maybe tell from the pictures, the weather was great.  It was overcast and in the high 60s/low 70s for most of the ceremony.  Toward the end, the sun peeked out a little, and by the time we were leaving, it was full sun.  The ceremony took place in front of the school, so we were thankful for the cloud cover.  We couldn't have asked for better conditions.  Even though we were worried about whether it would rain right up until the morning of the ceremony, the weather turned out to be simply perfect.

Happy graduate in the processional.  She's got a diploma, so now it's official!  

Mary and her grandparents.  Brad's parents are on the left and they came here from Oregon.  My parents are on the right and they came here from California.  What a lucky girl she is.

  The best three kids in the whole world.

While we were taking these pictures, one of Mary's friends was waiting to have her join him for a photo.  When she finally walked over, he asked if her family always takes so many pictures.  (Silly question.)

Not only was it a treat to have our parents here with us, but it was also terrific to have Peter and John here for the weekend too.  We are blessed in so many ways.

For the full experience, here is Mary's five-minute speech. We had a few technical difficulties getting it started, so you will miss the introductory remarks. It's also a little jumpy. But the sound is good and I suppose that's the most important thing. If you get this blog post by email, in order to watch the speech you'll have to go to the actual blog to do so. Click here to get to the blog so you can watch the video.