I remember my tonsuring as a monk back in the bad old days of Tito's Yugoslavia. The holy monastery of Zica, a cold and snowy winter's night, Saint Sava's eve, 26 January.
The tonsuring was at the end of a long Vigil....it seemed to go on forever.... and afterwards everyone in the church came up to congratulate us (there were two of us new monks) and to kiss the Crosses we had been given. And so many people, mainly the grannies, laid socks across our arms as presents.... and many of them said: "From your mother who cannot be here." It was quite an emotional time of gift-giving.
Enjoy it, Trevor, and may God richly bless your new life!