Congrats To The Grad - Part One

It's been quite a week in my family, with two of my cousins graduating from high school.  As I mentioned in an earlier post, my cousin Andrew was feted last Sunday and was the motivation for my graduation cupcakes.
Here's the guest of honor himself, posing for an endless series of cake cutting pictures.
 

I must add that he's newly shorn due to his senior prom (take a look at the before hairstyle in the Memorial Day weekend posth here).

I must apologize for the dirty lens on my camera - it's causing the hazy glow around our faces! Look past it to see a lovely picture of Amy, my lovely cousin Andrea and myself:

One of the best things about family graduation parties is quite simply, family! All of the young'ens at the party (of which, I'm the oldest and almost 30 to boot, yikes) gathered for a group shot. It made the "grown-ups" sentimental as they recalled a similar picture from a family vacation in Maine that happened roughly seventeen years ago, since my cousin Andrew was in diapers in that picture! Time flies. I also had to laugh at how bright and perky my clothing seemed in comparison to my hipster cousins and sibling!

In fact, I have to give a shout out to my cousin Jaimi for her outfit - as a recent (college) graduate herself, I felt her outfit embodied that whole spirit of being young and hip and she rocked it!

Finally, the camera was turned on some of the grown-ups and parents in attendance - looking pretty good themselves.

Yay for summer and celebrating good things with family.

Congratulations Andrew!

Andrew, my cousin, that is.  My youngest cousin has officially graduated high school as of this weekend. And my first selfish thought is "Geez, I'm old if Andrew's gradutating high school." But I'm incredibly proud and excited at what the future holds for him as he heads to college this fall. More to come on his graduation party and what I baked (natch) for it.

Amy's and Andrea's Graduation Bash

Finally, it was the day of the party that was the culmination of months of planning by my uncle Rich, my aunt Rena and myself.

I have to say that I was pleased overall by our choice of the Braintree VFW Hall for the graduation party - it was cheap; the space itself was big with a kitchen, a huge dance floor and room for 90 people; and everyone that worked there was very pleasant. Ditto for Fasano's catering - everyone kept raving about the food, so it's worth getting it catered and I recommend the stuffed chicken/sirloin combo that Rena picked.

This is what the centerpieces ended up looking like:

Each table had a bucket of a different type of candy, surrounded by small Chinese food takeout boxes with ribbons in Andrea's and Amy's school colors, 2009 buttermint packages and special graduation fortune cookies. The sand buckets and the pinwheels were purchased at a dollar store, the candy (including Starbursts, Ghiradelli chocolates, Swedish Fish and Hershey's Miniatures) from BJ's and everything else from Oriental Trading. If I had to do it again, I wouldn't do the takeout boxes because no one used them - guests just ended up munching on the candy at their table, rather than visiting each table to fill their boxes as the notes urged them to do.

First to arrive at the party were obviously family members - this is a shot of my cousin Janel, co-guest of honor Andrea, Rena, me and my cousin Andrew:

This party was also important because it was the first time that Andrew's parents met my Mom - here's a shot of me with Andrew's mom Charlotte and my mom Koom.

Here's co-guest of honor Amy, my Dad and me:


Amy and Andrea take a break from chatting with their guest to pose for a picture:

This what I call the BC shot - Andrew's sister Amanda, me and Jen - all members of '02:


I can't remember what was so funny but obviously Jen, Pete, Andrew, Phu and Joe are having a good time:

Shot of me and Andrew, one of my biggest helpers for the event:

Andrea enjoys some of Fasano's great food:

Both sets of parents get up to give a toast to the new grads:


Finally, it was time for cake!


Andrea and Amy shared cake-cutting duties, with my mom hovering to the right with advice:


Perhaps due to the open bar, there was also a lot of dancing (that would be Betty and my Uncle Rich on the dance floor):

Andrew taking his sister Andrea for a spin:

Did I mention that there was A LOT of dancing? Andrea pulls her dad Rich onto the dance floor and Amy and my Dad join after to demonstrate that our family's collective lack of rhythm.

The money shot at the end of the night - a rare shot of me, Amy and my parents - we're usually only in the same place once a year:


The party was considered a rousing success by everyone who attended and most importantly, Amy and Andrea had a blast. Congrats to them both!

Graduation Party Invites in the Mail!

The invites for Amy and Andrea's big graduation bash are out!

In case you haven't received them in the mail yet or if you were curious to see what the other version looked like (Amy and Andrea each had their own design), here they are:


I wish I could take credit for the witty phrase on this one, but it came from someecards.com.

Andrea's was inspired by her current love for Lady GaGa:





The photo editing is a little rough since I don't have Photoshop and I had to rely on a coworker to do it, but overall, I thought they came out well. I love the eye-popping colors of each one as I was hoping it would help to get them noticed in the mail stack.



I'm just hoping people RSVP within the deadline I set (hint, hint).

Graduation Party Venue - Booked!

As some of you might know, May will be an exciting month because:

• My cousin Andrea is graduating from Bristol Community College
• Amy will be graduating from Suffolk Law School
• My parents will be visiting from Japan for two weeks

With the two graduations happening in the same month, Rich, my parents and I decided to hold a joint family part on the weekend between their graduations.

After talking to most of the VFW halls, Elks lodges, Sons of Columbus (halls? lodges?) and Sons of Italy venues in the South Shore area, we have made our selection:

The VFW Hall in Braintree

This is a shot of the front door:

And the side door:

The only thing that alarmed Andrew and I when we arrived at the hall this week to sign a contract was the serious lack of parking - it looked like at most, you could fit 15 people, which would be a problem when we're expecting around 80 guests.

This is why the next picture is important - it shows the bank's front parking lot next door which will hold all our overflow parking. Apparently, the VFW has an arrangement with the bank, and with our party falling on a Saturday afternoon/evening, we'll have no problems using their lot (both front and back).

Front lot (I think the customers thought I was casing the bank):

Dopey me forgot to take a picture of the actual party room inside the hall - oh well!

Now onto the fun part of planning - decorations, food and invitations!