photo credit Kyler Gray, Jan. 2009

Remembering the 40th anniversary of the biggest snowstorm of my lifetime...the Blizzard of '78.

It's been a weekend full of smiles and congratulations...graduation weekend!

                                                                                                             photo by Dave Bell, director of MpM

This is one of those mornings when I sit down to write my blog post and I got nothin' to write about.

I haven't taken any photos for a couple of days...(what is wrong with me?!)...so instead of looking at a lot of nothingness, I borrowed this adorable photo my friend Dave took of some of the babies at their Mahali pa Maisha infant rescue center.

Krew invited us to join him for an evening in Bloomington.

We don't decline invitations from Krew.

As many soon-to-be college freshmen pack up their things and head to college, I am reminded of my own experience in the fall of 1975, 39 years ago.  Times have changed, but those feelings of first-time freedom and fear are universal and timeless....

originally posted August 21, 2008

From the time I first started thinking about college, I knew I wanted to go to Indiana University.  I don't know why I chose IU.  I didn't really know anyone who had gone there, and my parents certainly didn't push me in that direction.  Somehow, I just knew early on that Indiana was the place for me.

(Originally posted 5 years ago in May 2009 after attending my son Kamaron's graduation from IU.  With all the college graduations happening this time of year, I recall my own very special day now 35 years ago....)

Me ready to graduate from IU! May 1979

Has it really been 30 [now 35!] years ago?  Celebrating my son's graduation from IU took me on a stroll down memory lane to my own graduation from Indiana University in May of 1979.

Many things were the same.  Assembly Hall. Thousands of excited, ambitious young people ready to start their lives and change the world.  Proud parents and grandparents jockeying for the perfect seat to watch their child.

I am always amazed at how every grad has an intense need to find their cheering section in the stands and wave at them, while every parent searches every face from her distant seat to spot her baby in his graduation garb.  It is as if neither can rest until they find the other across the sea of people, and then once spotted, both can sit down and enjoy the ceremony.  At my kids' graduations, people were using their cell phones and texting their locations to their loved ones.  Back "in the day," it took a lot more effort to find each other, but somehow we always did.

photo by Linda Hull via Facebook

See that tiny little girl way, way, WAY up there on the diving tower?

That's our very own dear, sweet Kate Hillman, who is finishing up her senior year at Indiana University where she has been on the women's diving team for the past 4 years.

me working at Wright Quad cafeteria, 1976

Heading off to Indiana University in the fall of 1975, I knew I needed to get a job.  The most obvious and convenient place to work on campus was in the cafeteria in the dorm where I lived, Wright Quad.

My own children have all worked at the Wright Quad food service, but things have changed a lot.  Back in my days at IU, each dorm had its own cafeteria where the residents of that dorm ate.  Wright Quad was one of the larger dorms, preparing 3 meals every day for over 900 students.  They needed lots of workers, so I got a job.  It paid the $2.30 minimum wage and they worked around my class schedule.  It was the perfect job for me!

I couldn't resist a photo of all the little Hoosiers at Kaden's party! 

And IU even gave Kaden a birthday gift, beating highly-ranked Michigan soundly in college basketball on Sunday afternoon.

Hoo-Hoo-HOOSIERS!!!

I have to say, their parents are raising them right...many years down the road these litle ones will hopefully be IU alumni.  But for now they are a....

...covey of cute cream and crimson cousins.

Sweet Kaden turned 4 on Saturday!  And being the basketball fanatic that he is, it was only fitting that we celebrate with a Slam Dunk Hoosier Hoops birthday party!!!