After 6 long years and lots of work and more than a couple late nights, Ben Graduated!!! I’m so proud of all his hard work!!!

We had fun celebrating with lots of family in May! My Mom & Craig got into MD late Monday, May 18. Tuesday, I had lunch w them at work and showed them around the Fed and then we went to dinner at my favorite restaurant – Rasika – amazing Indian food! Wednesday my dad flew in and went up to my G&Gs and Ben flew in Wednesday evening and mom&Craig and Ben&I went and got dinner (Indian food again lol at our other favorite, Spice 6). Thursday was graduation! …. And of course it rained… like crazy… all day long. So instead of our backyard BBQ we squished all of us into our basement for a late lunch, went to graduation, and then came back for cake and a light dinner :). It was great to have Ben’s parents and 6 of his siblings, his Uncle&Aunt from Richmond, my G&G from MD, my dad, and mom&Craig!

He got lots of fun gifts – shirts, mugs, socks, and a clock from his great-grandpa Munyan. The pics below are from a UMD Business School PhD dinner. Danmo is the other PhD student Ben started out with 6 years ago – we will miss you!

Thursday night my dad spent the night and Friday we went for a hike at Great Falls and then we drove up with Ben to my Grandparents where we had another BBQ at my grandparents on Saturday. Ben’s family was good to drive all the way out there and lots of my Schollian relatives came and my mom&Craig!

Then Sunday-Wednesday, Ben&I went up to a condo with my mom&Craig in Shenandoah Virginia. It was nice and relaxing, hiked, played mini-golf, played lots of board games, and saw lots of deer!

Then Ben&I went to work Th/F while my mom&Craig stayed at their condo. By this time our tenants (we’ve been renting our main floor out to 3 female students for the last 5 yrs) had all moved out and we were starting to work on cleaning up our house and starting to think about packing lol. My mom&Craig had dinner w us Saturday and spent the night at our now big empty house and went home to AZ Sunday!

Thanks for all the family people who celebrated and thanks for all the family & friends who made it a great 6 years!