Graduation!

Wow - I cannot believe that it is FINALLY over! The graduation ceremony was this last Saturday, and what a great day! What a great weekend!

Heather flew in from Portland on Friday, I took the day off and we spent the day shopping. Pretty much all day. Watched Cam skate for a while at camp, came home for happy hour and cocktails on the patio ...

... then we headed out for pedicures. It was a fantastic way to spend the day!




Saturday morning was hectic. I had to be at the University of Phoenix Stadium around 9:45 or so for lineup, the ceremony started at 10:30. Bryan had to work, so the initial plan was he would meet us out there as soon as he could. (The stadium is a good hour and 15 minutes or so away. I was hoping he would make it. (Come to find out the little you-know-what knew all along he would be there in time. Whatever. He LOVES to do that to me. Just add some more stress why don't ya?) Needless to say, the plan changed from him meeting us there, to Heather, Cam and I meeting him at the freeway by his work, and then to him making it home so we could all go together.

But .. to backtrack a little, he stopped by the house early Saturday morning with flowers and a present from him and Cam (beautiful diamond earrings!) which was a GREAT way to start my day! So of course, I forgave him for giving me a series of slight anxiety attacks. Here's Hayden standing next to my flowers. :)

So we all headed out Saturday morning for the ceremony. Mom and dad drove in that morning and met us there, along with Bryan's parents. I had quite the cheering section! The ceremony was incredibly long, but pretty cool. My new supervisor was the individual handing out diplomas on "my side" of the stage, which was very cool. And very similar to my Bachelor's ceremony, the announcer is also a co-worker and said my name with a tad bit more pizazz then the rest of the graduates. I know, talk about receiving the princess treatment! It really made the experience that much more special to have these individuals personally hand me my diploma!

Bryan and Cam waiting patiently for my turn. :)
"Do you see her dad? Does she have it yet? Can we go now? Is the snack bar open?"

Mom, Cam and I after the ceremony




Cam, Bryan and I after the ceremony

(Note: You can actually watch a replay of the ceremony by clicking on this link. It wasn't working over the weekend, but I checked it earlier today and it seemed to be good. The ceremony was webcasted live on Saturday. Aunt Cathy and Uncle John saw me graduate from Port Orchard! How cool is that? Anyway, the link takes you to the site, where you can choose the ceremony. The one to choose is University of Phoenix, Saturday, July 19th, at 1030 am. I've made it easy for you and can tell you EXACTLY where to fast forward to: my name is announced at 59:30 and there is another little side shot of me after the ceremony at about 2:15:30. By the way, that is my supervisor that is giving me a hug after handing me my diploma! :)

After the ceremony we headed home for some brief downtime (i.e. corona) and got ready for the big celebration. Somehow or another, Heather had a brilliant idea to design a custom skateboard for Cam. Cam took a shop board that he had, Bryan sanded it down, and Heather went to work designing the board. It is absolutely incredible. She worked all weekend on this thing - in between beverages of course - and did an amazing job. She may have found a new calling, or at least a pretty cool hobby! He was SO excited to take it to camp on Monday to use. Here are some pics of the board:

Cam using his new board in the backyard

Cam using his new customized hH board at skate camp, on the mega ramp. He was so excited Monday morning, that he could hardly eat his breakfast:

I had such a great time with everyone that came to the graduation party and am SOOOOO thankful for all of my friends and family that were there to help celebrate. Heather flew in from Portland, Mom and dad drove in from Vegas, and I think the next furthest out was Kerry and Chris from Chandler hee hee! :) Always a good time!

Kerry and Reagan



To the beer cooler please!

My girlfriend Lori and I - she also graduated on Saturday with her Bachelors

Some of the kids sitting by the fire and eating dinner - they worked up quite the appetite swimming: Cameron, Connor, Josh, Caitlin & Chas



Theresa eatin' some chow!

Cam giving me a BIG graduation kiss!

Dad and Chris



Mom and Kailee



Loving my hubby!




Lori's son Connor, and Cameron ... fast forward ten years. AAAACK!



Pushing the product ... gotta love my husband's buns! :) Go Holsum!



Sunday night's dinner: Steak, crab, and a two year old bottle of wine. The wine was "Alicia Peterson - 10 years in the making" wine that Aunt Cathy had given me for my Bachelors graduation in '06. We drank one bottle the weekend of my graduation and Heather and I felt it was appropriate to celebrate this graduation with the 2nd bottle. Of course, we wish Aunt Fluffy could've been here to help us, but she was home being a new Grandma! Yay! (Note: Heather was my photographer for the weekend - so thanks to her I have all of these great pics!)

The million dollar question has been asked numerous times, and here's the million dollar answer: Yes, I'd love to use my degree(s), eventually. I'm very fortunate to be telecommuting and in such a stable position with the company. The area that I would like to go into with criminal justice is an administrative position with a city or state agency, more specifically entitled: criminal records specialist. (At least from what I've found in the job postings). This is generally a budgeted position, and with the way our economy is out here (as I'm sure in many other cities) these are the first positions to be cut or downsized. Apparently many agencies feel the police officers have all the time in the world to be sitting at their desk handling these responsibilities ... at any rate, now is not the time for me to give up my benefits and privileges with UOP, so I'm holding off for now. :)

I'm back!

Yes, I know. It's been a LONG time since I last blogged. Sorry about that - but even bloggers have to take a vacation, right? So Cam and I headed up to the Pacific NW and had a great time. There are four different posts below with pictures from each "leg" of our trip. I got sick at the end of the trip and was down for the count for a few days after that. Between that and work, which is really busy right now, and getting ready for graduation, well let's just say it's been hectic. So let's see, not much else is going on. Cam is still going to skate camp. Friday wrapped up his 4th or 5th week of it, I can't even keep track anymore. He loves it, obviously. The last week at camp he won an award - a new skateboard! His coach nominated him and it was for his attitude (really?) and always willing to try new things and not giving up. Very proud and he was pretty excited. Been working in the yard a lot, and doing some things around the house. I guess the sort of things that I didn't have time for when I was in school? :) And yes, graduation is next weekend. Cannot believe it is here, and I honestly don't feel like I'm done yet. But I am. There is no way I am going to further my education any ... further. Looking forward to the party Saturday night with family and friends. I'll be sure to post pictures. From the ceremony? For sure. From the party? We'll see ...

Seattle

I finally met Henry! Kim, one of my girlfriends from high school, moved back to the NW from Connecticut with her husband and son a while ago - I was so excited to see them! This was the first time I had seen Henry since he was born so it was great. Pete was in LA for business when we arrived, so it was the boys and moms! Cam wasn't there more than a half hour and already made a friend. He lives in the neighborhood and Kim is friends with the family, so ... they hug out for a while, started out by playing basketball, then come in the house to get his skateboard. I swear, he can sniff them out ... Kim put Henry down and it was time for wine! We BBQ'd steak and crab and had such a great dinner. The wine went down WAY too easy! The next day we headed into Seattle for some sightseeing ... we started out with the Space Needle and Seattle Center. I cannot remember the last time I was here, probably when Grandpa Kenny took us kids on the train to see Aunt Cathy - YEARS ago! After much thought, Cam decided he wanted Kim to go on the log ride with him. :) It was cute. We left there, headed down to Pike Street Market and did some shopping. Had a great lunch after we were done and it was already time to go! It was not long enough, but we had such a great time. In fact, Cam had a few tears when we left ... he was going to miss Henry, and "Kim is so fun, mom. I really like her." I know kid - me too! :)

Port Orchard

We spent the next few days or so with Aunt Cathy and Uncle John! Cam gave Aunt Cathy a lesson on playing his Nintendo DS, and Uncle John gave Cam a lesson in wrestling. :) Cam was actually wearing his skatepads and helmet for a while. That is some serious wrassling! Friday we headed down to the waterfront in Tacoma. Cam was able to skate along, and we had a fantastic lunch at Duke's Chowder House.

This was just the beginning of our day! We headed over to Maple Valley to see Becky and Slider and went from there to meet up with Jim at work. Unfortunately, Jim couldn't make it to dinner with us because of work, but we were able to meet up with afterwards. He gave Cameron the grand tour of the police car! Honestly? I think Cameron was a bit nervous and was very adamant about NOT wanting to see a holding cell and to make sure there weren't any "bad guys" at the substation when we were there. :)

That was enough excitement for me, but certainly not the end of our day! Jim mentioned a skate park close by and asked if Cameron had his gear with him. Of course he did, and it was in the trunk. So we made a stop at Crossroads Park before taking Becky back to her house. We stopped at Starbucks before heading over, and Jim met up with us for a bit. Cam had a pretty confident demeanor about him, perhaps because he was walking into the skate park with a policeman. :) Jim headed off to tell some people to turn their music down and another guy on a BMX bike that he wasn't supposed to be there, but it was okay if no one else complained about it. Just doin' his job. There were a few other kids Cam's age, but not skating inside the bowl. The other kids were about 16? 17? and up. After watching for a while, we got the hang of the park etiquette and Cam was all over it. The skaters there were very polite to him and even looked out for him, telling him to go ahead and giving him the head nod of approval on his tricks. :) The other kids watching were calling him a "beast" because of the trick he was trying - a handplant - and that they wouldn't try that even with all the pads on. :) It was a huge boost for his ego to say the least. We left there, to drop Aunt Cathy off with Jennifer, and they were going to meet us back at their house. Unfortunately, this was the onset of a stomach bug Cam picked up. Got to Target and he puked. Dropped Becky off at home and he puked. Headed home and puked in the car, because we were on the highway and couldn't find a spot to pull over. :( My poor baby! We finally pull over and get things cleaned up, and Cameron is standing off to the side of the road crying "I hate this trip!" It was sad. Finally get home, give him a bath and put him to bed. A corona never tasted so good. Spent the next day hanging out with Aunt Cathy and debating on whether Cam was good enough to ride down to Seaside. He wasn't, so around 6:00 we hit the coronas, again and had a GREAT day catching up with Aunt Cathy! All in all - even with the little stomach bug - our visit in Port Orchard was great. The only thing that would have made it a bit better would have been if Uncle John had some cream of tartar ... :)

Seaside

The third leg of our trip was to Seaside! Because Cam was sick, our arrival was pushed back by a day. But we still had a great time with Grandma! Grandma and I enjoyed our whiskey and beer until 4:00 a.m. Yes, 4:00. Unbelievable! It was so much fun and something I will never forget!





Of course, it would not have been a trip to Seaside without hitting the bumper cars - the traditional and the air/innertube ones ...



and miniature golf. Despite Cameron's TWO hole in ones, Grandma still won!






And on top of that, she was introduced to air hockey - which she also kicked Cam's butt at! Woohoo! The Seaside skate park is conveniently located down the street from grandma's house, so of course, we hit this one too. :) We had a great time with Ichi on the beach, playing frisbee, and a nice visit from Connor and the kids. Cam was excited to see his cousins!



I'm thinking when the weather is cooler here, Grandma will have to head down this way so we can repay her hospitatlity! (I'll be sure my liquor cabinet is stocked!) :)