Apple Hill Family: The Epic Graduating Class of 2010

(the individual and group portraits are traditionally, always, taken outside, in front of the school, with the rock wall and the camellia bushes in the background - but with the weather like it was ...

a few of us parents and staff started talking about if we could photoshop it in behind the kids because it was just so ... WRONG to have to worry about freezing pounding rain the last week of school - and how terrible for the girls - their first time to get all fancy, have their hair done, etc.

but these kids did awesome - as always!)

warning

a bunch of very blurry pictures
to follow

Due to POURING rain that week (and we woke up to snow again a few days before) the ceremony was planned for indoors - so it was a good thing this has been the smallest graduating class in decades or we never would have fit. Our wonderful custodian put a fresh coat of paint on some old wooden risers he found and Sawyer's mom and a crew of parents made the gym look absolutely beautiful and the sweet 7th grade parents served cake from tables smashed up against the back wall.

It has been tradition, since way before I graduated from the same elementary school, for the boys to line up by height and the girls to line up by height and pair them off for the processional as they enter the ceremony. Guess who just happened to pair up?

I asked Nathan later,"So, who stood on tiptoe or slouched a bit to make sure you two got to walk together?" he said no one, that's just the way it worked out. (Kind of sends a shiver up your back, huh? Aren't they absolutely adorable? But they are still WAY too young. no paired off dating until they're both 16 - he's 11 1/2 months older than her - just group stuff 'til then. no driver's licence until he gets his Eagle AND can pay for his own insurance, so a parent will be driving them around for awhile anyway. but aren't they adorable?!)

Julie was the class Valedictorian, and Caileigh the Salutatorian, and Nathan and Sydney tied for 3rd and were the class Historians. Nathan also wrote the class theme

Some end in tears,

Others with a smile,

Whereas we end in style.

Nathan and Andrew earned the Citizenship award and were 2 of the 7 who received the Outstanding Student award and Nathan also earned the CJSF seal on his diploma. (over half of this class made the honor roll! and a quarter of them made CJSF!)

Nathan's grade, this group of kids he has gone through elementary school with, is a very small group and the boys have always outnumbered the girls. With so few of them, they have always been really close and everyone is friends with everyone. Plus the kids in this group have such BIG and sweet hearts, they can be extremely goofy, but they don't get into major trouble - they are smart enough, love their families and themselves enough, and truly care about their friends enough to WANT to stay out of major trouble (they're really good at getting into minor trouble though). As a parent volunteer and as school staff, especially as a yard duty, I've been able to get to know these kids and think of them as my own, especially Nathan's best buds. And 4 of them, Andrew, Hailee, Bella, and Maria, have been my amazing TAs with the Kindergarteners this year. So for the 2010 graduation, I saw my own wonderful son be honored for his accomplishments and completing K-8th grades and ready to move on to high school, AND I also saw my 30 "adopted" sons and daughters graduate. When they started naming them individually as they came up to receive their diplomas, I started bawling! to the point where I couldn't even look up at them or I'd start gushing all over again (good thing I figured I might tear up and only put mascara on my upper lashes)

(Mom had to take over taking the pictures because I'd blubber all over again when I looked at the kids - besides they don't want their yard duty telling them to pose, or stalking them for candids - here's Nathan with just a few of his buds)