<p>4tran4 - I’d pick the individual tour and interview.</p>
<p>Random thought-</p>
<p>its the second day of school–
whats for dinner???</p>
<p>Dining out.</p>
<p>Did any of your kids or their older siblings register on any of the ‘free’ financial aid sites such as finaid or fastweb? If so, were you bombarded with spam? Did the older sibs actually get any $$ or is it a waste of time?</p>
<p>D1 did not. Mainly because we decided that going with Institutional merit aid rather than outside scholarships made more sense for us. We wouldn’t qualify for any scholarships based on need and we needed at least half tuition for 4 years. With limited time and energy, she applied to schools offering substantial merit aid and a few outside scholarships that looked “more likely”, such as NMS and the Byrd scholarship.</p>
<p>The financial aid websites have seemed to be a waste of time so far. We don’t want loans, we don’t qualify for need-based aid, and some of the other scholarships seem essentially to be lotteries. For example, there is one that says Grades Aren’t Everything–but for that award, really, Grades Aren’t Anything. I think we’re better off using our time to pursue scholarships that will reward my daughter’s hard work and achievement in earning a 4.0 than one that seems to be a random draw out of a hat. </p>
<p>If someone has had a good experience with such websites, I would be happy to hear of it!</p>
<p>Hi Everyone!</p>
<p>Just wanted to say hello and let you all know I have found this thread very interesting yet very long. I went back to page 225 and started reading, maybe one day at work when I am bored to tears, I will start at the beginning! I have a D17 who is starting the application process and I hope if I have any questions in the future I don’t ask something already answered. Do some of you have kids that are all over the place with what they want? My daughter really wants UT-Austin, Plan II, and she will apply early (her goal is a completed application by Oct 11)…(Just FYI, plan II website says they start reviewing Mid October and apps turned in Sept 15 or Oct 15 are no different but if you wait till Nov 15, you have placed yourself at a disadvantage). Anyway, she is hoping for a quick decision and will then decide what to do from there but will prep her Common Application during that time.</p>
<p>On a fun note…we just got her Senior pictures back they turned out beautiful!</p>
<p>My D isn’t all over the place with what she wants, but her apps will be all over the place because she has to have a range of schools both in auditioned theater BAs and BFAs and non-auditioned “regular” BAs. So her list is very multilinear and it’s going to be a long year figuring out what will work. She does have some quick rolling safeties so we won’t be complete wrecks for the next 6 months, though. But she’ll be auditioning through February, at least, so all the balls will stay in the air until the bitter end.</p>
<p>You will be very happy, I’m sure, to have the UT situation in hand soon, and then take the rest of the year to explore other ideas without having to panic. That’s great.</p>
<p>We registered our Japanese student today - got her a great schedule, based on her goal of learning English and enjoying herself, no need to push the toughest academics (not her thing, anyway). I think she’ll have a great year.</p>
<p>And my D seems to be starting to relish the “senior” mantle, really looking very “senior-like.” We fixed her schedule to have Econ 1st semester instead of 2nd, making 5 academics (others are APLit, APCalc, APGov and Honors Chem), with Choir and also a yearlong independent class working with the Choir teacher both as a TA and doing special projects like arranging, music organization, learning the recording studio, etc. Second semester she’ll be done with Econ and can take an Advanced Art class. We’re feeling good, very settled with this plan.</p>
<p>It’s nice seeing my D coming to terms so comfortably with being on the last lap. And she promised me - and herself - today that she will have the basic Common App done Labor Day weekend, and chart out as many of her other essays as possible. She does want it done. This weekend are the performances of her final summer play, a very intense experience for her, and life will be very different when it’s done.</p>
<p>EmmyBet, thanks for your wonderful perspective on these years in the life of a young musician, athlete, actor, etc. I think you are spot-on. Glad to hear your D is settling in nicely as a newly minted senior. Mine is too. As she walked into her piano lesson this afternoon, her teacher said, “You know, you even WALK like a senior!” D smiled.</p>
<p>Fogfog, since you asked what’s for dinner, I will tell you: some of the most fantastic stuffed tomatoes the world has ever known.</p>
<p>Here’s what happened: the day before school started (Mon), I decided to “cook ahead,” as I often do in the school year so we will have good leftovers on busy nights. I had some extra time and decided to make my Grandmother’s stuffed tomatoes. The farmstand tomatoes in our area are plentiful, affordable, and out of this world right now.</p>
<p>My grandmother died a few months ago at the age of 103. For all the decades of my life we would garden together, cook together, and enjoy wonderful meals together. She was an outstanding cook, and I learned so much from her. Anyway, the whole time I was shopping and then washing and chopping vegetables on Monday, I had this feeling that she was there with me or watching over me somehow. My recipe is actually the one I wrote down when I was 13 or 14, and we were making these tomatoes together. I just wrote down exactly what she said, almost word for word…and so it “reads” exactly the way she would talk. So comforting, and what comfort food! I’m proud to tell you that this batch was 95% as good as hers, and that’s saying something.
For a few hours on Monday afternoon, I had my Grandma back and we were happily cooking something wonderful together again.
And THAT’s what’s for dinner tonight (and for the rest of the week as well).</p>
<p>MoSB- what a nice story. Sounds like you had a nice time prepping and eating dinner. Wished I lived closer! I have a big spaghetti pot my Grandmother gave me 20 years ago, about 4 years before she died. I often think about her when using that pot.</p>
<p>I love your story! I wish I had the recipe! H brought home a hundred gift tomatoes, and since he’s leaving tonight to take D1 to school, I have to think of something to do with them. Maybe I’ll make sauce; at the very least I’ll try to get them frozen.</p>
<p>I love “walk like a senior.” I can SO see that.</p>
<p>In our family, my grandmother was forced to take piano lessons with an awful teacher for years and years. She vowed she’d never do that to her kids. She said, “You can always take lessons; if you want to stop, you can stop, AND if you want to start again, you can always do so, without any questions asked.” </p>
<p>While it sounds like a recipe for flakiness, it really was a great philosophy that we all have followed. People often have to flow in and out of things, and we at least don’t seem to be the types who do well on narrow pathways. Her two sons, my brothers and I, and both of my kids so far have followed our hearts with music and kept it in our lives. </p>
<p>I never got any recipes from this grandmother -she wasn’t much of a cook - and she was not one to make forceful statements of any kind. But this was one thing she felt strongly about, so it’s the “recipe” from her that I’ve followed all of my life.</p>
<p>Great story about the grandmother’s tomatoes. I have no idea whether my grandmothers would have been good cooks…they lived their lives in poverty and did everything they could to stretch the food. My dad’s mom did make terrific green tomato relish, but sadly, the recipe died with her. (Not for want of asking…by the time anyone asked her to write it down, she couldn’t remember it.)</p>
<p>I also SO wish we could grow tomatoes…simply not worth the heartache. Ours get eaten by critters with big teeth…I’m hoping squirrels but more realistically, probably rats. I’ve just stopped trying.</p>
<p>Emmy…our D is a pretty gifted musician but I am a bit happy that she has chosen not to pursue music performance because many people in our family have and the audition process is so involved. She loves her music, but her passion for medicine is stronger. With that said, she is craving to play on the college level and one reason UT is appealing to her is that they have many “non music major” opportunities to enjoy her instrument. One of her private lesson teachers is the studio director in her instrument and she is bummed that D is not pursuing music as a major, but one thing this process has taught me is that it is about my D, not me or anyone associated with her.</p>
<p>About “walking like a senior”, the one thing that really got me about her Senior Pictures is that she has gone from high school kid to a lady. Crazy transition.</p>
<p>Yes - my D1 also loves music and considered a combined conservatory degree (that’s how she found Tufts). But she’s very happily double-majoring in science AND extracurricularly singing in their choirs. This semester she’s going to take advantage of the free voice lessons she qualifies for, too. I know she’ll never stop singing.</p>
<p>D2 evolved from wanting a music degree to a theater degree, much better for her and a big relief for me. Even though there is this very difficult audition process, the degree will make much more sense for the “renaissance woman” she’s always been.</p>
<p>MomofS, that was a beautiful story. And now you need to share your recipe! Those treasured family recipes are the best.</p>
<p>Momofsongbird, I too loved your stuffed tomatoes story. Neither of my Grandmothers were very good cooks so no passed down recipes from them. 
My Mom is pretty good though and I still make her mac and cheese and a few other things.</p>
<p>We are still winding up summer. School starts on the 7th. Son got contacts on Monday and is having a hard time getting the hang of putting them in. He’s also finishing up on-the-road driving with the HS driver’s ed instructor. He’s doing night driving tonight and then will be able take the test with him. Yay! I’m hoping he can get a parking spot at the school for this semester even though he doesn’t have his own car. I’m thinking he can drive once in awhile when needed. He also started a class at PSU, so far, so good.</p>
<p>Would you guys mind if I shared D’s list with you? I think she has too many reaches, but I’m trying to keep the duct tape firmly in place over my mouth :/</p>
<p>She scored 33 on her ACT and has an unweighted GPA of 4.0. She expects to be Val, and will find out next month if she is National Merit Semifinalist (she’s right at the cutoff from the last few years). She wants to major in Psychology for undergrad and intends to go to medical school.</p>
<p>In rough order of selectivity:
Harvard
Yale
Brown
Swarthmore
Amherst
Williams
Middlebury
Haverford
Macalester
Whitman
Chapman
Southern Oregon University</p>
<p>We’re visiting Macalester, Haverford and Swarthmore next month; and she’s going to revisit Whitman again in a couple of weeks, so these might change. She’s visited Chapman several times and likes it a lot. We have not visited any of the NE area schools yet, and we won’t be able to get there until April. SOU is an ultra-safety that she has no intention of attending, but I’m having her apply there “just in case.”</p>
<p>Thoughts?</p>
<p>OM…I am not the best at really knowing the college, especially the LAC’s, but of course HYPB…etc will always be reaches for everyone. I would make sure she has a solid matches and make sure she has a safety she loves.</p>
<p>About Receipes…I made the coolest Christmas gifts last year for my Grandmother’s great-granddaughters, granddaughters and daugheters. I still have many receipes that she had written by hand and they have weathered over time. I LOVE their vintage appeal. I took three or four receipes per person and scanned them in the computer then re-printed them on printable fabric (Hobby Lobby) I then attached them to some wonderful canvas aprons and satin-stiched around them in a thread color close to the carmelized look of the worn paper. (I made one to look like it was “peeking” out of the apron pocket) They were a hit at Christmas and the person wearing the apron always has the receipe at hand.</p>