As graduation approaches, senioritis comes with bittersweet feelings for leaving behind the past four years of your life. To savor these feelings, seniors participate in celebrating traditions.

This year, seniors decided to carry a kids backpack to remind them how far they’ve come in the past thirteen years. Kezban Mamakhova chose her backpack based on her favorite childhood cartoon. 

“It’s Lilo and Stitch because I loved it growing up,” Mamakhova said. 

Chole Kraus and Emerson Bradley chose to celebrate this tradition with a group of friends. 

“My friend group decided we would do everything together. We didn’t have a theme [for our backpacks] but I chose Frozen because it’s my favorite,” Kraus said. 

Bradley’s friend group had a theme of princesses. 

“We kind of just did princesses. My favorite princess is Princess Tiana so I picked her. I think that it’s a fun tradition that our class brought back since I don’t remember the seniors last year doing it,” Bradley said. 

For countless years, seniors have been decorating their parking spots with chalk. This year, many students asked their parents to decorate theirs. Willow Powell said she decorated her’s with a friend. “I did my parking spot with Junior Moriah Hayibor. She put a big bow on it,” Powell said.

Many students included music in their spots to show how it has helped them through the years. Lucas Cobb decided on a spotify theme. 

“My mom, sister, and aunt did mine for me. They did a spotify playlist of four of my favorite songs. One of them was ‘Red Leather’ by J.Cole,” Cobb said. 

In comparison, Maggie King did a Taylor Swift theme. 

“My mom did mine for me, and she really wanted to surprise me. She knows I love Taylor swift so she was just pinteresting things I love. She did ‘mirrorball’ which is off of Taylor’s folklore album,” King said. 

To get in the graduation spirit, Kenzie McClanahan’s parents and neighbor sketched McClanahan’s possible future college logos. 

“They did potential colleges such as, The University of Kentucky and The University of Mississippi. They also did a lacrosse stick and swim,” McClanahan said. 

Similarly, Lola Veliz’s parents designed hers. 

“My mom put a quote on mine that said ‘Almost there!’” Veliz said.

Along with the parking spot tradition, the “Senior Women” tradition is celebrated by senior girls wearing matching tank tops. Madi Koke was the organizer of the tanks. 

“It’s a part of my role [creating the tanks] in Student Council. I’m the public relations chair so I host meetings and run the social media pages. I also did powderpuff tanks.” 

Olivia Mantz said this tradition brings the senior girls together. 

“On the first day of school, there’s a lot of girls you haven’t really talked to but you’re wearing the same shirt as them so it gives you a reason to talk to them,” Mantz said. 

McClanahan said she appreciates the coming together of this class’s seniors. 

“It’s just supporting one another. I think senior year is the time to connect with one another because we’re all going separate ways so everybody should try to do as much as we can together,” McClanahan said. 

Numerous seniors have taken their senior pictures already, while others prepare to take theirs. Many seniors admired the diversity of Forest Park, and decided to take their photos there, one of them being Addy Horn. 

“I had four different outfit changes. I had them all laid out in my moms car, and that started three months in [to planning]. I wanted a bright and colorful summer theme,” Horn said. 

Avery Hoffman also decided on Forest park. 

“I knew that I wanted my photos to be very playful and I knew once I found my first outfit that I was going to base everything around it; super flowy, cute and fun,” Hoffman said. 

Though she hasn’t taken her photos yet, Aliya Keller also plans to take them in Forest Park. 

“I’ve chosen Forest Park, because there are a lot of different locations there. I picked out three different outfits because I know I wanted a water, country, and floral scene,” Keller said. 

Kraus took her photos at her family farm in Pacific, MO. 

“I did a top with jeans for this setting because there are white pines there so it fits the scenery. I did my own makeup and hair, and my older sister was my photographer,” Kraus said. 

Mantz is planning on taking her photos at the Botanical Gardens.

”I just want a colorful aspect because my dresses are colorful. It’s a spring theme because I plan to take some pictures at the beginning and end of the year,  ” Mantz said.