<p>Good idea re: the laptop carrier. Son doesn’t have one yet. We are leaving home on Sat (2 days) & are just now starting packing (full-time work gets in the way of that stuff…). </p>
<p>The sadness at son leaving (going on family vacay, first, for one week) is somewhat muted by the need to remind/nag him about every, single thing and his desire to do nothing but spend time w/friends 24/7. </p>
<p>Walking into the kitechen ater a long day at work to find it trashed with food wrappers and crumbs, w/the new puppy having peed on the floor – while son is in the basement playing video games w/a crowd of friends — tends to undercut the sentimental aspect of these last few days. </p>
<p><end vent=“”></end></p>
<p>It’s still sad, though. We’ll miss those trashed kitchens, eventually…</p>
<p>I remember my hot pot and boiling it dry many a time, but I don’t remember any red ones. Maybe I am a wee bit older than the rest of you …? Maybe we didn’t have fun colors yet?</p>
<p>Rachacha - thanks for the backpack link - another thing I hadn’t thought of. Thankfully D comes home next week so we can start shopping in earnest. I did go to BB&B yesterday and started her pack and hold order - just the generic stuff like mattress pad and featherbed. Definitely don’t need to buy a Chi - I think we have more Chis than Ds!</p>
<p>NM - D2 is a potato/garlic/cheese junkie. I will definitely be making that recipe when she comes home from camp next week. Thanks!</p>
<p>missypie - So funny you should mention Woodstock - I was just looking at it on Netflix this morning after someone sent me a cute video link with “subtitles” to Joe Cocker’s unintelligible lyrics. [Joe</a> Cocker](<a href=“http://www.elwp.com/Joe%20Cocker.html]Joe”>http://www.elwp.com/Joe%20Cocker.html) My kids are also big fans of Across the Universe.</p>
<p>
lindz126 - I am having more and more of those moments. Yesterday it was at the local drugstore when I saw little kids and Moms picking out school supplies…wasn’t I just doing that with D yesterday? Sniff.</p>
<p>Jolynne - I know I’m weepy now, but when D comes home next week and trashes her room and sleeps til noon and doesn’t finish her thank-you notes, it will be my turn to rant!</p>
<p>My son and I looked carefully at ebags a few weeks ago and got a Jansport Firewire – perfect for his stuff (very big) and laptop – he wanted a bag with a laptop protector. It also has terrific shoulder straps and no waist strap (his old Jansport was a good bag, large with a modest internal frame, but he did not like the waist strap and it didn’t have a laptop protector and had managed to make it through 4 years of HS and wasn’t the least odorous backpack of all time).</p>
<p>I used froogle to find it at a lower price and then ebags matched the lower price.</p>
<p>We drove to his post-surgery sleep study and on the way back, he was telling me that he should write an essay this summer so he is in practice for the school year. Also, he’s planning one serious book over the next couple of weeks to get his mind ready.</p>
<p>He didn’t think he needed pants as he has at least one pair of jeans and might have a pair of cargo pants. I suggested that an extra might be good. I also thought that waterproof hiking boots might actually be good, though I don’t know if he’d actually wear them when he was walking from dorm to class to dining hall to library to class etc. all day in the rain.</p>
<p>Took S to an Eastern Mountain Sports (EMS) store so that he could check out the Northface backpacks in person. He actually ended up selecting an EMS brand bag that he liked even better. FYI… the kids can get 15% off at EMS if they show their college ID.</p>
<p>Jolynne - I read your post about your son’s attitude and behavior, and I felt as if I had written it myself! I’m sure I’ll miss my son like crazy, but at this point, I am counting down the days until he leaves! Hope he comes back at Thanksgiving with a more mature and respectful outlook.</p>
<p>Sheets and other bedding stuff? Check.
Fleece jacket? Check.
Heavier jacket? Check. (Gotta love off-season sales!)
Luggage? Check.
Airplane tickets home for Thanksgiving? Check.</p>
<p>Empty nest puppy with submissive urination issues? Check.</p>
<p>Current debate in house - which kid’s Parent Weekend to attend.</p>
<p>Sending Son three hours south with no coat - only hoodies. He’s been wearing his letter jacket as a winter coat for a few years, so we’ll have to buy something…he’ll be home before it gets cold, so we’ll be fine.</p>
<p>Envious of the puppies - although I’d prefer a cat. We have lots of anoles and geckos and other assorted lizardy things here in Texas and they find their way into the house on a regular basis. Son is the only one who will pick them up and take them out. After the last gecko removal, he asked what we were going to do when a gecko got in when he wasn’t around. Suggestions ranged from moving to burning down the house. A cat would be easier (at least on us, not the geckos.)</p>
<p>I am starting to worry about D’s cat, he has big time separation anxiety when “mom” is gone for more than a day. He sits vigil on the kitchen windowsill waiting for her to come home most nights. I will have to smuggle him on campus for a visit sometime I guess…</p>
<p>She’s packing!!! Came home from picking up the NorthFace back pack…boyfriend in tow…and she is packing while he looks at her scrapbooks. We normally have a boy free zone upstairs but I am just thrilled she is packing! Down to the wire but at least there is movement in the right direction.</p>
<p>This happened quite a few years ago, and I didn’t think much of it because my own kids were years away from college. But now that I reflect upon it, it seems odd:</p>
<p>We live in Texas and my neighbor’s D went to school in Wisconsin. The dad drove the D up to Wisconsin; the mom stayed home. Before the D and dad even reached the school, the D’s room had been turned into a guest room…room painted, bed and bedding replaced, closet and drawers totally cleaned out…no hint that it was ever the Ds room. I was sort of amused at the time, but now that Son is two weeks away from leaving I cannot imagine doing that!</p>
<p>Besides generally cleaning-up/weeding out, are any of you doing something totally different with your child’s room?</p>
<p>LOL missypie! No, I haven’t been nagging because I had the tiniest bit of fear that she would say she wasn’t going! She has to do things in her own way and her own time. Remember…slow to warm! She was supposed to leave tomorrow as practices start on Saturday. However they have moved practice time to late Saturday so the OOS kids can get there. She of course is delaying departure until VERY early Saturday morning so she arrives right on time…hopefully! She has to do the two stage packing…one for the next week and then we follow next Friday with the remainder of her things when she moves in to her own place. Amazing how different my girls are. D1 was packed and ready ahead of time. All supplies were organized and labeled. So very different!!!</p>
<p>Missypie - I did come across some crude “architectural” drawings that D2 put together recently, which I think would involve taking a sledgehammer to the wall separating the two bedrooms (wishful thinking on her part!). D1’s room will probably become a “sporting goods storage room”, you would be surprised how much room hockey equipment takes up, plus hiking/camping/ski & snowboard gear!</p>
<p>Was D1 an athlete? Is D2 maybe just focussing so much on her sport to the exclusion of all else?</p>
<p>In two years, when the first D is going to college, I’m sure she’ll use it as an excuse to get not only dorm stuff, but as many new clothes as she can squeeze out of me. I’m having to go to extraordinary means to get Son to tell me his underwear size so that I can pick up some extra boxers.</p>
<p>Yes, D1 also a recruited athlete, just wired differently. Had to laugh about the clothes for your D. D2 is a fashion diva! She wants a very expensive pair of designer jeans and I am resisting. H said she could have them if she has a top time doing some timed race during preseason. sigh…</p>
<p>When I took my Ds to New York early this month, both came away with way too many cute tops and dresses. The other day D1 and I were talking about how all she really needs to buy for school is some jeans. She very casually said that she thinks we need to start buying her jeans at Buckle (price rance $70-$150) instead of American Eagle (price range $30-$50). </p>
<p>I really really need to start just giving that one a set clothing budget and letting her be on her own. Here’s $150 - you can get one pair of jeans at Buckle or five at AE - take your pick.</p>
<p>missypie - I did exactly that this year for both Ds. It’s amazing how many more cute bathing suits they could buy at Target instead of Nordstrom! And D2 suddenly doesn’t “need” to shop at Anthropolgie anymore (or at least she no longer turns her nose up at the sale rack there)</p>
<p>And NMN: I am very impressed with your restraint. I learn a great deal here.</p>
<p>Packing Lists: Thankfully, I do know son’s boxer size and he has never been too picky about clothes, but he did recently say how he wanted some “good” clothes to take. Meanwhile, I am thinking how long until they are balled up in the corner of his closet? Apparently they do have to travel in suitcoat and tie for away games, but how much “new” stuff is he supposed to get? We always have waited a little after school starts before school shopping because whatever they buy beforehand is never what they really want when the time comes. </p>
<p>OK…that NF backpack is huge! Son thinks he wont be carrying all his books and basically wants this little backpack big enough for just his laptop and a few notebooks, but not so big it fits everything he owns. He had a northface backpack for school the last two years and he honestly did carry every single book and paper in it refusing to use his locker. I think he needs something inbetween. But he’s going to a small school and I don’t think he’ll be living out of his backpack during the day. We still don’t know roommate or dorm info (although he thinks he knows dorm), so I am not sure what he should be bringing in terms of hotpots, fridges, microwaves but cannot see him cooking for himself unless we’re talking flatbread peanut butter and jellys. And that aint cooking. :-)</p>
<p>Now I am thinking that maybe we’ll take what we know he will absolutely need the first month and then take out another bag when we see him over parents weekend the first of october. He isn’t a clutter bug, but I also know he is the type of kid that if you get it for him BEFORE he knows it’s what he wants , he will be mortified if it’s “wrong” (aka underbed boxes etc).</p>
<p>No tears shedding around here. He’s still driving me nuts and pushing the envelope further and further each day!</p>
<p>PS… I am unsure if I’d rather have a daughter that I had to curtail the shopping or the son who refuses to go and then rejects half of what I buy him so I have to return it.</p>
(or at least she no longer turns her nose up at the sale rack there)</p>