Sunday was Mom's birthday. So it was family day. Much silliness on the parts of my ninja nephews:
Miss Aubrey mostly slept, it's what she does best, but I did manage to get a shot of the whites of her eyes.
Ellie had to work that night but she supplied the superb, non-WW approved cake.
Mom's gonna be so mad I featured her on the blog - but she's in Jersey and can't hurt me at the moment. Anyway, when you're the birthday girl, you have to get at least one solo shot. The nephews continued in their particular brand on "good photo ops while eating cake" - I think we might have to trademark that for the two of them, wonder if Aubrey will join in the fun when she's old enough...
Having picked strawberries the day before, we had some with the fruit salad, and I introduced my nephews to them. Funny to me that they had never tried them before, but my SIL doesn't like them (craziness). Elliott isn't too big on trying new things, so we'll try again next year. But Mason... wow, I think he ate 2 bowlfuls (is that a word?). 
He couldn't get enough. So I guess he's got a bit of the Colton blood in him. And speaking of strawberries, here's the shortcake that I made that Monday:
It was fantastic, if I do say so myself. Mmmm, want some now.
Onto last weekend. Saturday I was up for WW, then met Bridget and Kaylee at the mall for some shopping. Then home to pack, then onto the Indians game with Dad (they lost sadly) then drove down to Columbus. I started a sock on the car ride down, plain vanilla, just to have something to work on that I didn't need to think about. Got through the leg and started the heel flap before bed that night- felt like I had finally gotten my knitting mojo back.
Sunday, was the big day. Commencement at Ohio State for Ellie. I'm sure that if she hasn't done a big post about it yet, she will soon, with more stuff that I wasn't around for. So here goes.
Outside the Shoe before the ceremony.
The sock as it was before I started knitting it in the Shoe.
Mom photo-ing me knitting the sock before the ceremony started.
All 8,165 graduates finally seated. Too bad we hadn't gotten to the faculty yet...
The nursing graduates had the balloons - which made for easy finding. If you click to embiggen the photo, and go 3 three people to the left of the orange banner, you'll find Ellie. One good thing about being at the start of the alphabet.
Filing out to get the actual diplomas, once again use the orange banner as your reference mark.
The balloon launch to mark the announcing of the School of Nursing.
The President of the University has a part-time job as an auctioneer. This is the actual conferring of the degrees on all 8K undergraduates.
The sock after the ceremony was over. More on it's progression at a later time.
Congratulations Ellie!
All together now: OH-IO!!!
Alright, so I've got 2 weeks of work at the hospital under my belt. Not loving it - like I knew I wouldn't, but it's not horrible. And it is going quickly, only 3 weeks left until vacation! Hard to believe that at the end of Wednesday, I'll be able to say I'm halfway done. The change in schedule has left me exhausted most nights, but I'm finally getting used to it. Which means that I'm finally getting more knitting done. I also joined the Y and went faithfully Monday through Thursday after work this week. The exercise has done me good, because yesterday at weigh-in, I was down 2 lbs, which put me at (drumroll please)... a total of 40 lbs lost!!! Insert Happy Dance here! And I think that's it for now. This has gotten long enough. I'll try not to go so long next time.
