Jon Graduates and a Pig is Roasted!

So this is a post that I have been meaning to get to, but have been super busy and haven't gotten a chance to completely do it justice.  So, I've been putting it off.

However, this was quite the epic weekend and it all came together so nicely.  However, it NEVER would have been possible without the tremendous help and generosity of so many of our friends in Albany.  To you, we thank you so much.

Months back, our friend Casey had mentioned that him and some friends were having an end of the summer pig roast in Denver.  We were around the weekend before in transit from Portland to New York, so we weren't able see how the shindig turned out, but we heard great stories. 

Fortunately, Jon got his very own chance to roast his very own pig on the day of his graduation from Rockafeller College with a Masters in Public Policy (congrats!).

The weekend was pretty awesome.  We had friends come in from Boston that took on the brunt of the stuffing and greasing and injecting of flavorful goodness (thanks Ali and Dom. Ya'll rock!) So many others helped contribute.  We wouldn't have been able to even fire up our little, pink friend had it not been for the copious amounts of wood that were plundered from the Sloane family garage.  Not to mention my sanity would have been out the window without the help of Leah and others with all of the small sides and set-up details.  All-in-all, it was a huge group effort.

The pig, however, chose to be the most difficult of the group.  Unfortunately, the cooking process took a little bit longer than could have been foreseen.  And by a little bit longer, I mean it needed another 6 hours of cook time.  Luckily, we are all way too competitive for our own good and we made due with playing yard games in the park until we were able to tear (read: literall rip a part with our hands) the pig much later in the evening.   Either way, the weekend was a success and it just made it all the more clear how lucky we are to have a great group of friends here.