Kelly's Graduation and a great Hughes Visit!

I'm super behind in this post, our visitors have come and gone and even Kelly has now left Brussels to start her next adventure.  We were sad but excited for her to start the next chapter-Go Navy!

The Hughes clan arrived a few days before graduation and we got to do a few local trips..I was happy to finally see the reading room at the Leuven Library with them..what a place!

 Quite the staircase banisters!

This is what happens when you have too many Belgian beers with lunch!

 Greg, Joanne, Mark, Joe and Julie headed for Bastogne one day..

 Representing Massachusetts of course!

 We did a quick tour of the Embassy... I love the photos of all the former Ambassadors to Brussels.

Mark tries his first Westvleteren, the famously hard to get beer here in Belgium!

Mike brought his amazing camera & talent to the graduation to save the day and was kind enough to share his gorgeous photos.  The ceremony was held in the gym with theater type lighting so it made pictures tricky for most of us...unless you are Mike!

The only one I got was the day before when Charlie and I went to the practice, he had just gotten back from his trip to the Belgian Coast and was excited to give her a hug!

Note the wrinkled gown, she wore it like the first day, then handed it to me about 20 minutes before we were supposed to leave before the ceremony and asked for ironing help.  When I told the story to another father later (who happened to be former Marine) he told me to remember that from here on out she will be taking care of all the ironing herself!

A new graduate!

Love Charlie's smile!

Sisters!

Dad gets a hug!

Just missing our photographer, Mike!

Last family photo til parent's weekend in August!

We had a nice dinner on Sunday night before everyone flew back, we were happy the Baratas also made the trip over to join us. Dave even stepped in to help Katie finish up her cake decorating duties...

Barb was highly entertained by the cake frosting efforts as she was unsure if she has ever seen Dave frost a cake before!

With the masterpiece..specloos frosting-the best!

The two catchers finally got to spend a little quality time in the backyard after dinner!

So glad that the Hughes family made the trek to share such a happy occasion!