<p>The letter. Hands down. Including something to the effect that, in addition to all the material gifts you have received, you are especially grateful to have the lessons and examples about living a good and honorable life and that you will endeavor to live in a way that will make them proud. (Unless those sentiments will not sound like they are your own.)</p>
<p>Oh, and leave your room in order when you head out in the fall. When we got back from taking DS to school, it took me a few days before I was ready to go into his room (you’ll understand when you are a parent.) When I saw that his room was neat and the bed made, in spite of the ruckus that was getting him off to school, I was deeply touched (this is not a neat kid).</p>
<p>I love my coffee mugs that have my kids photos printed on them. How about take a picture of yourself holding a sign saying “I love you,I miss you” & then get it printed on a mug. Your parents will see you & smile when they have every morning w/ their coffee…</p>
<p>Thanks for all of the suggestions and compliments, everyone! They’re greatly appreciated.</p>
<p>I think I’m going to go with the heartfelt letter since graduation is in under a week and I want to have something there for them during graduation. Plus, I’m a little low on money and getting a job in the summer, so I’ll have more money to buy them something special to go along with the note once the job starts. I also think I would do the idea of spending a day with them doing the things that they most enjoy.</p>
<p>At our school, since there are only 24 of us in the graduating senior class, there’s a slideshow at the class night awards and it highlights our time at the school and with our family through pictures and a song that we each pick. Each senior gets a copy of the slideshow on a CD.</p>
<p>Sorry I wasn’t clear on this, but I’ll actually be going to Harvard next year. I was thinking Princeton for a while, but once I visited Cambridge overnight, it just felt like the place for me.</p>
<p>Thanks again everyone for the suggestions and I’d be glad to hear more!</p>
<p>If you are culinarily inclined, you could surprise them by cooking a nice dinner while they are at work for the three of you to share. Then you could pop the note on them or, if you made a photo album, grab a Polaroid or digital camera and get another picture of the three of you eating together.
Along the lines of the letter on the pillow, if there is a particular chore or something you always do for the family, you can leave a fun little note for your parents to find while you’re gone. Like if you always mow the lawn, leave a post it on the lawn mower that says “Do you even remember how to use this?” They’ll find it that first weekend after you’re gone.</p>
<p>After our college graduations (four years apart), my sister and I gave my father our Phi Beta Kappa induction certificates, and he had them framed together into one display and hung it in his office. Those physical objects meant a lot to him.</p>
<p>My son, a man of very few words, wrote us a note that said: Thank you for making me who I am. Coming from him it meant the world since he never says much. I still have it on the fridge five years later and still tear up when I talk about it. </p>
<p>My parents got me the best gift ever: my college education and a copy of Dr. Seuss’s Oh, The Places You’ll Go<a href=“quite%20appropriate,%20considering%20I’ll%20be%20attending%20Dartmouth,%20which%20is%20Dr.%20Seuss’s%20alma%20matter.”>/u</a></p>
<p>I gave my parents a scrapbook with pictures of us throughout my life before high school graduation. They loved it and my mom even cried. I earned some serious brownie points.</p>
<p>Hands down - Handwritten, heartfelt note of genuine thanks will be the most memorable and appreciated tangible gift. I also second Mafool’s comment about leaving your room picked up (as in try to be thoughtful of your parents when you leave). One other suggestion - spend some quality time with your parents this summer. I’d suggest making a “date” to spend a day or evening doing something nice with your parents (together or separately) sometime in the week before you leave for college.</p>
<p>What wonderful ideas! I can’t imagine my kids thinking about giving us gifts when they graduate and go off to college. . .How can I plant the idea?</p>
<p>About planting the idea… Tell them to write their teachers thank you notes/ gifts after each year. Hopefully they will remember who their first and most important teachers are.</p>
<p>If you’re graduating from high school and are going to college, I too think a letter is great. Also, you can buy them each something with the college you’re going to. My sister bought my Dad one of those shirts that say “–Name of School-- Dad” they sell a lot of stickers and mugs and such that allow parents to proudly display how smart their kid is in a non-verbal way. So maybe that?</p>