<p>Well, we’re doing a 2 for 1 deal. In a week, load up the car for both D and S. Drive 5.5 hours west, move D in dorm for ~ a day and a half. Next morning convocation, hug goodbye, cry, drive 5.5 hours north. Move the rest of S’s stuff into apt, take him and roommate out for dinner. Next morning breakfast, hug goodbye, smile, drive 5.5 hours southeast, start another chapter in our lives!</p>
<p>Ohhh… NMn. what did you say? I would be completely torn! On the one hand it would be good for her to get her bearings in her own space with friends she is learning to trust, etc. On the other hand, her Grandfather just passed away. I am, of course, assuming she looked at him like a Grandfather instead of a step anything. So… not sure what I’d say either. But I MIGHT encourage her to stick with your regular plan… seems she might go back more “exhausted” than if she just hung out for the weekend. I think it’s a nice time to bond while she’s now on her own turf.</p>
<p>NM–if you can afford the cost, I would suggest you drive there and take her to a nice hotel and dinner for one night. She might just need the contact and to get out of her new experience for a little while. If is this is a long drive and not very long at home then maybe just a visit from you and some parent care (and shopping, etc) would be the ticket. Sweet that she obviously needs a hometouch.</p>
<p>Well, D is not ready, but today is her last day of work: we leave on Tuesday & move her in on Wednesday AM. I will have to catch up with her & get another list together of what she still needs. Seems as she is never home anymore, always at a friend’s house.
It will be a new beginning, a new chapter in her life. But as she is the 3rd child of 4 to go off for Freshman Year, I don’t seem to be getting very emotional about it! I suppose every parent reacts in different ways to a child leaving home for Freshman Year!</p>
<p>We leave one week from tomorrow. Haven’t hit panic mode yet - that will probably come this weekend. It’s going to be very hard to return to a house with no children (but lots of dogs). S is the one who can always make me laugh.</p>
<p>Northminn, if the Greyhound goes between her and you, you can always compromise and ask that she come home on the bus and you’ll bring her back or vice versa. We had son do that for short weekend visits. Of course he hated it but it still worked out pretty well.</p>
<p>Been busy the past few weeks, so I haven’t had much of a chance to read/post. Dropped off my son Sunday morning at his dorm. Everything went very well. We had just 30 minutes to drop off things – we did it in 20. We’re very good at packing/unloading things. Then, I parked in my designated area and returned to the dorm to help my son put things up. His kid brother was a huge help putting things in the bathroom, kitchen, etc. We went over to the package delivery center and picked up some boxes that I had sent earlier – again, it went great. We left the campus within three hours of our arrival and headed home (it’s a 13-hour drive). </p>
<p>My son has called every night to say he’s fine, he’s making friends, he’s sleeping well. He also asked that I send a few things that he forgot. They are already in the mail!</p>
<p>May all of your move-ins go well. Oh, and when you get home, clean your child’s room good. I have been doing just that. It’s amazing what is under the bed, in the closet, etc.</p>
<p>^^Wow–that does seem to be the best start to a college career ever!</p>
<p>We leave on Friday…at 9:30 last night we started getting clothes together. Son has this hamper where he keeps underwear and swim suits. I think every swimsuit and pair of underwear he’s had since 4th grade was in there (tiny tighty-whities with space ships on them!) But a true tragedy did happen. He was trying to transfer his itunes account to his laptop and synced and lost everything. He checked the recyling bin on the desktop and nothing is there. The songs are allegedly on the laptop but they won’t play. His zillion songs on his ipod are gone. The first available appointment at the apple store is after we leave. There’s got to be tech support available by phone or at Best Buy or something. I feel so sorry for him.</p>
<p>That would practically destroy my son. We are hoping his computer will arrive today. We ordered through the school (still an apple) but they had free shipping, no taxes, a free printer plus the ipod touch rebate thing. Since he has an iphone, I’m hoping he’ll give his sister his ipod touch. She got a new computer yesterday having saved up for over half of it in the last year. She transferred her Itunes by moving the entire library over to the external hard drive and moving it that way. Not sure that’s the best way to go about it, but hopefully when he syncs his iphone, it will all just transfer. I feel like I should make him an appointment at the apple store now just in case! Fortunately there are about five stores he can try for appointments. Plus we don’t leave until the 30th.</p>
<p>Great suggestion for Northminn, Oregon 101. Missypie, maybe stop by the Apple store and explain the urgency? I would think they’d squeeze you in. That IS a tragedy, from a kid’s standpoint.</p>
<p>Oh, missypie, that really is a blow. I know his music isn’t the same as his books, but he sure will be wanting it. I hope tech support can help.</p>
<p>This made me smile, though:
</p>
<p>Hooray for all the positive stories. NM, I’d be torn too. I lean towards finding a way to see her that doesn’t wear her down, though.</p>
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<p>The note I left for him was to go to the Apple Store and beg. The tech geniuses at the apple store (their term no ours) are so arrogant and unwilling to help without an appointment that we hate them. Last time we had a quick question and the tech genius was standing there complaining that her next appointment was 20 minutes late but she refused to talk to us while she waited.</p>
<p>missypie, were many of the songs downloaded from iTunes?</p>
<p>If so, send iTunes an e-mail. I have gotten very prompt response from them, and they are able to restore them remotely.</p>
<p>call Apple’s tech support, or set up a time for them to call you online. it’s easy and they’re very knowledgeable.</p>
<p>Agree - call Apple’s tech support and have them help your son over the phone. Something like this happened with my oldest daughter when she got a new laptop about a year ago and Apple was able to help her retrieve her music.</p>
<p>When my daughters mac crashed, she couldn’t get an appointment for a week, or more. I suggested she just go to the store and hang out by the “genius bar” with her computer and look sad. People make those appointments, and i told her that at least one person wouldn’t show up, and if she was there, then they would probably put her in that time slot. It took about an hourl, but they got her in.</p>
<p>try phone first but if you can’t resolve just head to the apple store with a good book</p>
<p>Thanks, everyone! Just have to get Son out of bed to pass on all your good ideas.</p>
<p>We spent the first month of the summer thinking if Son was ever to going to take advantage of having a job and actually working as much as he could. Now I am wondering when he will give me a day (that doesn’t have “this is the only day off I have to spend with my friends before they leave” attached to it) that we can actually get things on the list. Plus… visa and Amex bill came and I can already guarantee buying even more stuff for school is going to be a hard sell. Thankfully, his school has office word so he won’t have to buy that!</p>
<p>I am not even kidding that when I needed to buy younger daughter a phone I did it while older daughter was in town. She is very cute and manages to use it to her advantage (and mine) where I got a “free” three month trial for the media plan (or whatever allows you to check facebook via phone.). Believe me, that power left me about a decade ago.</p>
<p>I just did the itunes transfer yesterday (nonApple). You have to back up the songs from the old computer onto a backup device and then install itunes on the new computer. Version 8 of Itunes lets you do this from the file menu (I don’t think earlier versions did so make sure you’re on version 8 first).</p>
<p>For any song that was purchased from the apple store, you have to authorize the new computer (you get 5 computers which are authorized for a purchased song). </p>
<p>After that you just insert the DVD or CD you copied the songs onto and it will be on the new computer. And finally you do the sync. If he still has the songs left on the old computer, redo the process like this and see if it works.</p>