Eric's Graduation Party

The party is over! Well, almost over. There's still some kids here watching a movie. But everything is cleaned up and put away, and my fridge is full of delicious leftovers! I always worry that there won't be enough food and usually end up wondering what I was thinking.

The party invitation asked guests to come and share some of Eric's favorite snacks. Last weekend after a hard day's work in the yard, someone asked me what I was serving. I said I might just line up a bunch of cereal boxes on the counter and call it good. Later I asked Eric what he thought of that idea. He seemed a bit surprised, but with his usual easy going manner he said, "Well, if that's what you want to do...it's a little unusual but..." I assured him I was only kidding, but he said he really likes rice krispy treats made with other cereals. So we did cocoa puff treats and fruity pebbles treats in addition to rice krispies. We also had Seven Layer Dip, cheese and crackers, various salads, fresh strawberries with dip, Cheetos Puffs, no bake cookes, Jelly Bellies, and everone's favorite, Mocha Punch. (I can just imagine the emotional torture Craig will go through when he reads this, as many of these are his favorites also! Sorry Craig! But I'm sending you some leftover Jelly Bellies!)

In addition to lots of food, we had the scrapbooks available for viewing, and Nick put together a slide show of Eric with background music recorded by Eric over the years, from the original tunes from his first "I Like Cheese", to Eric Wagner and the Pilgrims to Funkle Ted.

The weather was not the sunny day I hoped for, but Will had some plans for getting people outside. Early afternoon, he decided to build a firepit to use for his dutch oven.

He claims he and Nick built in it 35 minutes. He cooked up a delicious peach cobbler during the party. The people remaining at the end of the open house ended up outside, gathered around the firepit where Will kept adding a few charcoals to keep some warmth. After the adult left and only kids remained, Will got a great idea to use some wood scraps. Nick cut them up and we sat outside enjoying a fire for awhile. Looks like a captured one of the more fun, lively moments. Notice our new covered bench are in the background. Can you see the ham radio antenna pole securely anchored to the bench?

Will also set up a table and had Nick hook up the cable to a TV outside so people would have to go outside to watch the Beaver's baseball game.

For some reason, I couldn't get Galen and Eric to get serious about posing for a picture. It's too bad the cutest person (Jenna) has her head turned!

Now all the graduation hoopla is over. All that remains is my bulletin board full of graduation pictures, food and drinks, the scrapbooks and slide show, and more pictures to scrapbook! Oh, and a very special graduation gift. My friend Judy Davies makes graduation gift quilts out of tshirts. Check out how she put together this gorgeous quilt from some of Eric's old tshirts.