Ryan's Surprise Graduation Party

Yes, this post is a little behind. But I have a valid excuse - the pics have been saved on Ryan's computer which he takes with him every day so I couldn't post them. I finally took the time today to download them for all to see.

For those of you that don't know, I had a surprise party for Ryan a couple weeks back for his Law School graduation. He wasn't able to walk with his graduating class due to a Bar Review course he had to take up here, so I felt kinda bad that he missed out. He of course was downplaying the whole graduation saying it wasn't a big deal, which it is!! Man, if I could have walked in his place I think I would have 'cause I felt like I'd been through as much as he had these past 3 years.....okay, maybe not quite as bad.

Anyway, I got him out of the house by having my brother-in-law tell him he had a free certificate to play golf that was about to expire, which I knew Ryan wouldn't turn down free golf! The thing that almost blew it for me though was the dang weather. We woke up that morning to rain, and I thought for sure he wasn't going to be able to golf and that I wasn't going to be able to set up for this. And worse, if the weather stayed bad, everyone would have to be inside my small house, which wouldn't have been fun. But it cleared up enough in the end!

Once gone, my mom and sister came over to set everything up with me. I've never been more stressed out in my life. I was certain that he'd figured me out and knew what I was up to because when I came home after he'd left for golf, something that I'd hid in my closet for the party was showing, which meant Ryan had seen it. Lucky for me, he was looking for his golf shoes and was in such a hurry that he didn't have time to analyze his findings. So when he pulled up from golfing he of course saw all of the cars in the street/driveway and I think he muttered something to Shane about how he was going to kill me!

But all in all, I think it turned out alright. He couldn't be too mad in the end because I made him a cake out of his favorite doughnuts, Dunford's chocolate chocolate doughnuts - yum! We had fruit kabobs, salads, and chicken/vegetable kabobs to eat. And the icing on the cake was that Ryan's friend JD created a "handout" for everyone with Ryan's favorite candy on it (the giant Laffy Taffy bars). It had pictures of Ryan when he was a kid and then a photo-shopped picture of Ryan in a cap and gown with the following quote: "A man who never graduated from school might steal from a freight car. But a man who attends college and graduates as a lawyer might steal the whole railroad." ~ Theodore Roosevelt. It was pretty funny. I also had people bring gag gifts for lawyers, and he got some really good ones: The movie "Legally Blond", a plumbing tool called a snake because lawyers are snakes, a t-shirt with money all over it to add to his collection of "Benjamins" (wish we had some Benjamins!), a BYU t-shirt saying class of '08, but in small writing above it it said "wanna be". I know there are others, I just can't think of them right now...sorry!

I think Ryan is still ticked at me for doing this to him, but it was fun to see a lot of family and friends. I'm just really proud of him for accomplishing this goal and wanted to do something nice! So good work Ryan!