A Fabulous Graduation Weekend

I spent Thursday, Friday, Saturday and part of today in Virginia celebrating graduation 2008!

Friday night was Matthew's University Graduation from Virginia Tech. I am proud to say he graduated cum laude with a major in history . We attended the reception for honors students and then walked in the somewhat cool but at least not rainy air over to Lane Stadium. It was great being in Lane stadium with the family and friends of the over 3700 undergrad and 1200 grad students who completed their studies. ( I figure I won't be there for a football game since they sell out every game in the 67,000+ stadium.)It took 20 minutes for all the graduates to march into the stadium. Since Matt graduated with honors he walked into the stadium first with all the other honors students. The keynote speaker was Hoda Kotb a 1986 tech grad who is co-anchor of NBC's "Today " Show and a "Dateline NBC" correspondent and a breast cancer survivor. She gave a fantastic speech which had everyone laughing, applauding and the students jumping up and down to the music she played from her I-pod. She said that after you survive a tragedy you get four words "You can't scare me". That applies to what VT has been through as well as a cancer diagnosis. She certainly gave a memorable speech.If you would like to listen to the mp3 of the 12 minute speech click here.

The History Department Graduation Ceremony was Saturday afternoon in the War Memorial Gym. We ended up sitting next to the parents of another student who studied in Riva with Matt last spring. This ceremony included12 master degree awards and about 130 undergrads. It was awesome hearing his name announced! This ceremony and the reception after gave us a chance to meet a number of his friends and professors. I am so happy that he will be staying at Tech to get his masters degree.

After the ceremony we went back to the car and Theresa put on her master's gown. ( The photo is of Matt and Theresa in front of Burruss Hall on the Tech campus.) She missed her graduate school ceremony at the University of South Carolina ( 4 hours from Blacksburg in Columbia , SC). She was awarded a masters in applied mathematics. I am just so proud of my children- what a great gift on Mother's Day weekend for me!

It was certainly a beautiful weekend and I thank God for the opportunity to share it with my family and all the Hokies.

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Dee