<p>Omg! I get to see my boy tomorrow!!! Hopefully he is done w his final paper.</p>
<p>Have fun switters!</p>
<p>I know Switters! I have not admitted to anyone how excited I am about having S home for a few months. It is partly having another driver to help with over scheduled teen D but mainly it is just having us complete as the family-of-four again if just for a little while! But I have the jitters, excitement as if it were Xmas when I was a kid. I am surprised to have such a reaction because I feel like he should have some fixed plan (work, intern, etc) but I guess it is just a relief that he made it through this year… Next year I hope he gets an internship like Little Drae…but I am happy to have him back for one last summer. </p>
<p>I am also hoping to have the patience of G-mom (who has shown tremendous resiliency in dealing with tough-typical-teen behavior) when he slips into late nights/late wake ups, piles of stuff, to do lists that only get longer, art projects that never are finalized…yup, been there and will be there again very soon…hopefully, the initial glow of having him back will last a few days/weeks rather than hours…</p>
<p>my D will get back the day after tomorrow!
I got all the hotel thing done last night. Feel big accomplishment to get this done before she got home.
switters: have fun in nyc.
greenwich: have fun in Iceland.</p>
<p>Hope all of us have a good summer. I will have my D home the whole summer. Good news is Chinese Association of Iowa will hire her to do an art project.
Theme:Iowa Chinese
Purpose: Celebrition of the association’s 25 years birthday
she got paid to do this, but don’t know what she will do …</p>
<p>love
I will do some parody of this sort with chinese flavor to honor Iowa
^ no don’t, she won’t get paid!!!
<a href=“http://www.google.com/search?q=american+gothic&hl=en&client=safari&rls=en-us&prmd=ivns&tbm=isch&tbo=u&source=univ&sa=X&ei=Ue7JTbeaE4G_gQeO1uX6BQ&ved=0CD8QsAQ[/url]”>http://www.google.com/search?q=american+gothic&hl=en&client=safari&rls=en-us&prmd=ivns&tbm=isch&tbo=u&source=univ&sa=X&ei=Ue7JTbeaE4G_gQeO1uX6BQ&ved=0CD8QsAQ</a></p>
<p>lol
genius</p>
<p>follow bears’s idea, it is hard to get paid. lol
right, bears is genius :—)</p>
<p>Bears you are priceless!</p>
<p>(take a bow)
thing is, love’s D could easily do it just as good as original.
the painting is tiny! details are immaculate. I can’t paint like that, ever.
I didn’t realize how small it is but oh how big-o deal in the museum. the main attraction!! photo opps!!
if only Iowa Chinese folks in the organization got sense of (self deprecating) humor of say, White people-ed NYer?</p>
<p>Can I just say…</p>
<p>D1 comes home, unpacks rather quickly, and aside from not putting her foam mattress topper away (where would it go?), has left order in her wake.</p>
<p>D2 comes home, and several days later we can still barely get in the door and walk down the hall! I’m still catching up with laundry, and also found 4 push pins and an open safety pin in the basket of clothes that came out of the dryer. Another metallic something or other fell onto the floor and we haven’t found it yet. Our feet will find it eventually!</p>
<p>She became sick at first (typical for her after a long period of stress) and couldn’t do much of anything useful. At least she finally started picking up her tissues off the floor. She had forgotten how much the dog likes to eat them and leave little shreddings all around. Now she and her sister are in some kind of free and cheap furniture acquisition contest. We are graced with an extra sofa in the living room and have several chairs in the van waiting to be unloaded tomorrow morning when it’s light. And where will they go?</p>
<p>Poor D3 is very much still in school and finding it hard to get her homework done with all the fun activity in the house and the late night socializing. I hope D2 at least gets to work on creatively stacking all her stuff so we can move around more easily. I can’t wait for summer to really start!</p>
<p>launch saved! (dance)
we never asked if they are identical and fraternal?
according to Judith Harris, there are secret identical/fraternal that could only known by serious DNA testing. people couldn’t tell them apart but they were actually fraternal, or vice versa.
I’ve forgotten details, but if you got two placenta, always fraternal. but one does not always mean identical.
I used to take care of baby twins and kept in touch, now all grown. their baby personalities stayed with them. parents believe they are fraternal but never tested. looks alike but I can always tell.
so much fun and rewarding but it is a hard work. to carry, to raise, to afford, even just to babysit. bless you all.</p>
<p>Mine are definitely fraternal. When they were younger, people would think they were 1 year apart, since there was a dramatic height difference. They have different blood types too. </p>
<p>Even identical twins can have two placentas, it just depends on when they split from one to two. Split early - two placentas, two amniotic sacs, split a little later - two placentas, one amniotic sac, split even later - one placenta, one amniotic sac, split too late - conjoined twins. I probably know too much about twins. </p>
<p>Did you see that story a year or so ago about the twins who found each other at college in NYC? Was it NYU or Pace? Each girl had mutual friends who would tell her, “oh, you have to meet this other girl, you are so much alike”. They finally met and one said it was like looking in the mirror. They untangled their histories and found that one had been adopted and raised in South America, I think, and the other was from somewhere closer by. Twins are usually adopted together but it didn’t happen that way for them and I think even their parents didn’t know about the other twin.</p>
<p>Found it! It was Hofstra, and they were both born in Mexico and raised in different parts of New York.</p>
<p>[Separated</a> at Birth in Mexico, Reunited at Campuses on L.I. - New York Times](<a href=“Separated at Birth in Mexico, Reunited at Campuses on L.I. - The New York Times”>Separated at Birth in Mexico, Reunited at Campuses on L.I. - The New York Times)</p>
<p>Hi All-</p>
<p>My launched one came home. We went to get him Tuesday night, on Wednesday after his last class helped him and his now roommate - who will be his next year roommate also move a couple of carloads of stuff to their apartment. Apartment is so/so, but cheapish, in a neighborhood in Brooklyn that appears to be gentrifying at warp speed. Baby Switters has the nicest room, not sure why, because other roommate who is clearly brains behind all the practical stuff got first pick. I think he is just a really nice kid and baby Switters oohed and aahed over exposed brick in one of the rooms, so roommate picked second nicest room. Other roommate has much less nice room, but is also paying much less. </p>
<p>I was very impressed with the community of friends my S has gathered. Art students are generally cupcakes, but these kids were ridiculously adorable. I had a long talk with brains roommate, and pretty much came out and asked “ok you lived with baby Switters all year, why do you still want to live with him?” (Baby Switters is darling, but a cornucopia of habits that are incredibly annoying to mothers.) Brains Roommate said that they really complemented each other. Baby Switters is a doer, is social, funny etc. Brains is well brains, mellow, more organized then the average 19 year old. They have the same friends. I think Brains Roommate appreciates that stuff, and is resilient enough not to mind the other stuff. But Brains Roommate was worn out by the end of moving out days. Because moving out days involved not just moving out and in, but also the vast and complicated social scene of the combined friends in the new apartment. Brains roommate is spending the summer there, as is other roommate that I don’t know that well. Brains and Baby Switters seem to have fit much moving, painting over of yucky places on dorm walls, dinner with Switters Parents and all night party with cupcake friends into two days. </p>
<p>My observation about the dorm rooms: I cleaned their bathroom three times. And this was after they had already cleaned it. Me and Brains cleaned common area after I went and got more appropriate cleaning supplies, and while baby switters was in last class. But having said that, I spent a bunch of the day cruising the dorms, looking for cool throw aways, and I have to say, that Baby Switters and Brains left the cleanest looking dorm. Of course they had a mother around to point things out. BUT THE GIRLS DORMS WERE AT LEAST AS DISGUSTING AS THE BOYS. About the throw out stuff. We scored sets of dishes, pots pans, unopened paper plates, lots of toilet paper, cleaning supplies, mop bucket and a really nice little apartment sized vacuum cleaner. </p>
<p>A story that elucidates how annoying/dreamy/disorganized baby Switters can be. After Baby Switters came back from class, he still had more packing to do. It needed to be organized by what was going into apartment, what was coming home etc…I watched him spend what seemed like hours going through stuff on and in desk, looking at every piece of paper, etc. It drove me crazy, so after showing Brains how a real person mops a floor, I went cruising the dorms looking for throw aways, visited baby switters gf on another floor (baby switters gf is my new favorite person in the universe. we like her way more than we like him) Came back after a while, desk seemed cleaned up. The next day when they were officially signing out, where the RA comes and does the checklist thingy, baby switters opened the desk and the drawers were still full. Hahahahahahaha…He was too tired and cross to laugh at (remember all night party in new apartment from the previous paragraph.)</p>
<p>Anyway, after the check out we took one more trip to Brooklyn. Roommate crawled into bed, and Switters family met baby Switters best friend (from middle school who now lives in Brooklyn) and went looking for good pastrami sandwich. Ended up at Gottlieb’s deli in Williamsburg (got to love the smart phone) I was very uncomfortable as the only woman in pants, every one else in the deli was Hassidic men, all with the same faces. Then had italian ice, Baby switters BF is a foodie, so he is always fun to take out to lunch. Then very quick furniture acquisition. Left baby switters in Brooklyn to wait for furniture delivery, and hang out with his super fabulous gf for one more night before she went home for the summer, and we came home. Baby switters took the bus home yesterday morning, which was my birthday. We had ribs for dinner and family movie night. I fell asleep on the couch, missing the whole movie.</p>
<p>Wow switters, you must have needed that nap! Happy Birthday!</p>
<p>Mica is very strict about room cleanliness. My theory is that they don’t want to clean the dorms after the regular students move out, because then they use the Commons for the summer program kids. THEN, they finally clean and repaint.</p>
<p>I arrived and found D and her roommates scrubbing the walls and the floor! The bathroom was sparkling and D wouldn’t let anyone use it, even to wash their hands. Apparently, they even get charged for marks on the wall and floor. Marks! The homosote pin up walls can be left all painted and messed up though. </p>
<p>I heard from a friend that she went to pick up her sophomore son, and he was supposed to have his things packed and organized into the “going home” pile and the “storage” pile. She found him and he had done nothing and was still asleep! Oooooooh.</p>
<p>D2 ended up putting her storage stuff in someone’s house. There are 6 students renting an old, gorgeous townhouse in a borderline sketchy neighborhood, and they were raising money by offering people space in their basement for summer storage. I had misgivings. Especially when we pulled up and saw all the steps to the front door, the long walk to the back of the house, and then the steep and narrow flight of stairs to the basement. No furniture made it down the stairs, but it was OK, and two of them helped us carry everything. Many hands make light work! Or at least help ease the pain. Their house has original molded designs in the plaster, crystal chandeliers and ceilings so high that they’ll be frosty this winter. Haven’t seen inside D2’s apartment but if it has decent space and a place out of the rain for her bicycle, I’ll be happy.</p>
<p>silly old bear… you’ve had no time to come for honey.
As I am following switters’ tale, visual turned into Arthur the aardvark and friends.
[Arthur</a> . Friends | PBS Kids](<a href=“http://pbskids.org/arthur/friends/index.html]Arthur”>http://pbskids.org/arthur/friends/index.html)
lil swits have to be Arthur but only child, there is Brain, the other kid seems like Buster bunny.
what?
OK OK I quit.
happy summer to you all</p>
<p>ooh ooh…all this excitement. What a year it has been. These kids (and we) have had a big year. New friends, independence, injuries, challenges, romance. This thread has been a lifeline through it all for me. I may not post a lot but I think of you all often. Having you share so openly has made the launching less jarring. It has been like a good bedtime story and a kiss goodnight or a hug just when you needed one.</p>
<p>Launchee returns…so I get there early and surprisingly a lot has been packed! CMU offers 5 large boxes free storage so supposedly all the winter clothes were there (and clean) and art supplies. However, there are rolls and rolls of paper still in my car and a big box of supplies he says he needs for summer. Nevertheless, it was just me and him for the trip home so we could use the whole back of the highlander. Just tossed the stuff in. Roomate is moving to a huge group/suite on campus…S decided too many people. A bunch of art students rented a place off campus including his latest girl interest (gf is too strong a term, apparently) but S wisely thought that he spent enough time with art students during the days and most nights and did not want the drama and chaos of living with them too. </p>
<p>I have to say that he unpacked the car pretty quickly. He had help from our houscleaner/ex-nanny who got him organized washing clothes and bedding and packing it all up to put in large attic. I came home Friday after she had had him under her control all day and most was done and she called at 7pm to remind him to fold the towels in the dryer and put the jeans in to finish!! Love her, lover her!!! </p>
<p>BTW…the racoon incident had other collateral deaths…clearly something was trapped in our attic/roof (squirrels? baby racoons?) because the unfinished storage area really smells like something died…we decided to seal it off and put in lots of odor absorbing stuff and hope for the best. </p>
<p>S looked ghastly thin. He said I just had forgotten but he got home and had a very short haircut (#2 razor over the head) so I figure he can work as an extra in a war movie if they need prisoner of war extras… He went to see a friend who called me to say that his cheeks are sunken. Old GF coming over tonight so interested to see what she thinks. </p>
<p>For next semester, S was “pulled in” to a upperclassman dorm which is very, very hard to get into. It is center campus, airconditioned --3 bedroom suites. 2 doubles and a single and they share a bathroom which is cleaned once a week!? They have a shared lounge with couches, etc. and a full kitchen down the hall. He is going to try living with very small meal plan and I will just give him 1/2 the money for the food service of this year and see if he can manage. He can’t get any thinner than this year and he feels bad that the room is more than this year. I am thinking of a big run once a semester to stock freezer with Ecuadorean soups and meals…</p>
<p>So he is now taking sister to school each day and took her to the mall today because she needs shorts…he promised to keep her from getting anything to risque…good luck!</p>
<p>He registered for a summer history class at CC which is 1/6 less than the CMU course! I was surprised that CMU would let him transfer a CC online course, but I think that if it is just one or two so he can do the minor in robotics CMU still will get 8 semesters of tuition out of us so they don’t really care. He starts community theatre on Wednesday and performance in late june (Twelth Night). My mother in law comes in mid july and we all have a wedding to attend and then launchee goes to Ecuador for 2 weeks to recover his spanish and touch base with cousins and friends. He said it is going to be a good summer…will apply to starbucks and hopes to get some hours but he figures he will work during the school year again so earning this summer is not so critical. I agree. If he can just eat/sleep/cc course/theatre…it will be enough. Next summer…he needs to do a little drae and try for some type of internship…or like love blue jr who will paint chinese Iowans for posterity…Ecuadorean contributions to Virginia…why not?..</p>
<p>Glad everyone is home ok… best wishes for a lovely summer!</p>
<p>I saw Twilight movie finally, the third one was in the library.
so my visual aide of the ghastly escort driving beauty around would be that.
it was very entertaining, I can see why kids go coo-coo.
I must say I am jealous. CMU would let kids stay over holiday, give them 5 boxes free allowances, you know which is gas or brake, get on off interstate, did I hear house cleaner? Shakespeare?
I wanna go to mall with Edward!!!</p>
<p>Okay so had to go to NYC on an emergency (everything is ok), I’m sitting on the number 6 train heading towards NYU and Cooper (about 34th Street) and about 20 kids get on. One is carrying a boom box and two video cameras. Suddenly they turn on the boom box and “Love Train” starts playing and all the kids break up into couples and start kissing while the budding videographers are filming. And this folks is why I luv (and miss) NY!</p>