Ups and Downs

As I have mentioned before, this is one of my favorite times of the year with a new academic year!  Seeing all the new freshmen around campus moving into their dorms, going to all the fun opening events and attending University Convocation!! 

Grace had fun at the carnival on Saturday night.  It is always fun to go see everyone and welcome the students back to campus.

Grace on the Surfer Dude ride

On the Sunday before classes begin MTSU always hold convocation.  It is a formal start to the academic year where students are welcomed, faculty and staff are present and the summer reading author comes to speak.  This year we had a great speaker and the tone of the whole convocation was great.

My view at convocation.  No I did not wear my regalia, but many of the faculty and staff do.

One of the things that was new this year is the True Blue Pledge.  In the past year there have been some unfortunate events on our campus and a taskforce of students, faculty and staff got together and created this unifying pledge.

At the end of convocation after the faculty and staff recess, the students are asked to stand and do the MTSU Fight Song.  I always sneak back in to see this.  I love the school spirit!!

One big downer to all this fun this year is seeing our first MTSU home being torn down.  We took some photos on Saturday and then Troy got some more Monday after they started to take part of the building down.

A full shot of the building before the tear down began. 

The entrance to our old apartment up close.  They have gutted everything and it is that Grace will never get to come back as an adult and see where she first lived when she was born.

Monday afternoon after they took off the stairwell on the end of the building.  Troy was able to get a few bricks for us to keep thanks to the construction crew!

Yes it is sad to see this, but it will really be sad when the building is completely gone.  The plus side is that MTSU students will soon see a new state of the art science building going up in this space.

In completely unrelated news, Grace LOVES helping me with the laundry and I got some video of her this weekend helping me fold towels.  She is really good at it and cries when I don't save her some towels to fold!  I am sure this will be different when she is a teenager.