Mandy's Boot Camp Graduation!

On Friday, June 10th my sister-in-law, Mandy graduated from US Coast Guard training! She is now a sea(wo)man! USCG training is only done in Cape May, NJ - so she has spent the past two months up there. She played clarinet in the band and was also a squad leader. She did great and we are very proud of her!

Before the graduation ceremony the family was able to go have breakfast on base and then we watched a video about the recruit process, to get a little bit of insight into what she had been doing!

The view on the water from breakfast

Some of the boats on base

After watching the video we headed over to the field for graduation. It was at 11am and VERY warm! Luckily it wasn't as hot as it had been over the last few days and it was a beautiful day. At first the graduating recruits marched by the bleachers and we couldn't find Mandy! We knew she would be hard to recognize with the hat and everything on but not that hard! Turns out she was over with the band. They played at the beginning of the ceremony and then joined the rest of the recruits for the actual graduation.

Recruit drill team

Mandy walking by with the band!

Waiting in line to graduate

Standing incredibly still

After graduation she was allowed to gather her belongings and leave. When they are in uniform they aren't allowed to carry anything on their backs, so we had to help her carry everything out! Then we all headed out to lunch together to enjoy our time with Mandy!

With seaman Winoski!

Her "dorm" for boot camp

We went shopping after the ceremony

She was able to come home for a week and at the end of this week she will be heading to duty in Grand Haven, Michigan.