Veterans Day

Last week we spent Veterans day at the cemetery. This was our third year at the annual Valley Center Cemetery Veterans day ceremony. You can see the post from the last two years here (2007) and here (2008). Gunnar is on the board and gets to line up the speaker every year. Plus he is the obvious choice for invocation and benediction, so he gets to do those too.The speaker was a retired Marine from our church, who also happens to be an Escondido police officer and SWAT team member. He also happens to be the owner of the blueberry bushes that we visited this spring. Oh, and it was his wedding that Grace was the flower girl in. All that to say, he was the speaker, he did a great job, and aren't you impressed with my linking to previous blogs skills?
As I have mentioned in the previous post, I enjoy walking around the cemetery and reading the head stones. This year, Grace was able to participate a bit more so
that was fun. She was able to recognize her name on a headstone and everything. Oh, and she wondered if there was a horse buried under this one, because there was a picture of a horse on it.
I love this one.
And here is our traditional picture with Grandpa Dick:
And a family picture. Even though our outfits were perfectly appropriate and matching for the occasion, apparently, once you have more than three people in your family, it is impossible for everyone to look good at the same time.

Veterans Day

Yesterday we spent the morning at the Valley Center Cemetery Veterans day ceremony. We went last year as well, as Gunnar is a member of the Valley Center Cemetery board.

I would have to say this year was way more fun than last year. For a couple reasons. First of all, unlike last year, Grace didn't have a cast on her arm. Although a surprising number of people remembered and asked how her arm was doing. (It is doing great, by the way)

Also this year was much better than last year in that the featured Veteran speaker was a good friend of the families. His son and wife are good friends of Grace and I so we were all excited to see our friends. They, along with Gunnar's dad, came over for lunch, which was a treat. Living out here in the boon docks, I have come to greatly appreciate when people make the drive all the way out here.

Here are a couple pictures from the ceremony yesterday.

Reverend Hanson's invocation

Grace loves her buddy WillHanson generations

Have you hugged a veteran today?

Happy Veterans day!

As a Cemetery board member, Gunnar had the privilege of being part of the Valley Center Cemetery ceremony honoring the veterans this morning. His dad drove up from Alpine to join us at the ceremony.

After the ceremony Grace and I spent a long time walking around the cemetery looking at the tombstones. Something about cemeteries is fascinating to me. Valley Center actually has 6 civil war veterans burried here. There are so many stories, it makes you wonder who they were and how they lived their lives. I took a bunch of pictures, but here were two of my favorite tombstones.