<p>H and I just did a mega-shopping trip and basically are done, except for each other. But I know now what he wants and can hop out and finish easily.</p>
<p>I crack up whenever I read about that “bluegrass class.” Have fun at the concert!</p>
<p>I’m starting to get really excited about flying out Friday to see D’s play, and also D1. My best wishes to all of you with older kids graduating college. This has been a very intense year for my older D, finding her way as a young adult, in a new life. It’s wonderful, and also one of her most difficult adjustments. No more safety net of the structure school provides! Even the idea of grad school feels so much more “on her” to make happen.</p>
<p>I’m going to put some decorations up this afternoon - if H and I won’t have a tree for 3 more weeks, we might as well have something to make it feel more festive around here.</p>
<p>D1 wanted to help pick ouyt a tree. She initially planned to be home for some time next weekend, but found out that she has a concert on Saturday night and they need pretty much all of Saturday for rehearsal, since it is with other colleges in the city. </p>
<p>I had a grand plan to pick her up at this morning at school, and to go to a place half way between home and school to cut our own tree. I figured that if it was a fresh tree, it would last through Christmas week and beyond. We went to the place, and the trees were all so small and not very full at all. We trudged up and down the hills and didn’t find one that any of us liked. We were all very disappointed. </p>
<p>I offered that D1 could come home with us to the place we usually get the trees, but she had to be back to do some school work and for a sorority meeting. We ended up getting a precut tree that they sold on the lot, but it was not as nice as trees we have gotten in the past. Since we have 2 4 month old kittens, I am not sure that having a nice tree is going to matter.</p>
<p>Just finished packing up the cookies to send to DS for reading week/exams (I don’t think they’ll last all that long…). Thanks to everyone who recommended the flat rate mailers - awesome. Only thing we’ve heard from this week is one email - he forwarded us his tuition bill!!! He’ll be calling tonight as “required” - can’t wait to have him back at home and won’t be long now.<br>
Hope all the kids hang in through this final push to the holidays and then time for r & r!</p>
<p>Morning Everyone.
Coffee is on and bisquits just came out of the oven.</p>
<p>Kiddo1 is firmly into reading week.
Kiddo2 is counting the days til break…2 more weeks.</p>
<p>Am debating whether to start planning a college tour/roadtrip for kiddo2. Did 3 of those with kiddo1 and all of the schools were a flight away from our homestate. Unclear which direction kiddo2 will take academically (HS GPA) and major/interests…May do a urban/suburban/rural/large/small etc type of tour…in the safety range for now.
Thoughts anyone?</p>
<p>I think a tour of a variety of safety schools is a good idea for any kid. I am trying to get my sister to let her D (9th grade) to go with me when I see my D sometime, just to give her a feel of what a college campus looks like. What grade is your kiddo2?</p>
<p>Hey folks…
I was talking with another CCer yesterday about social media.
I have a FB acct, yet don’t actively use Link’d and do not have a Twitter acct.</p>
<p>I do know other adults who have FB, Twitter, Link’d etc …</p>
<p>I wonder about the use of social media and how much adults or teens use it all…</p>
<p>Thoughts?</p>
<p>Bama–kiddo2 is a soph. I did the first tour with kiddo1 over spring break soph yr. Did a second one jr yr spring break and a short 2 school trip in Aug before Sr yr…</p>
<p>Fogfog - I have a D13 and we have done the urban/suburban/rural/large/small etc type of tour…in the safety range. Funny, she started off liking rural but is changing her mind towards urban. Her biggest item on the list - global study opportunities beyond basic study abroad.</p>
<p>Fog - in grades 8 to 10, we ‘looked’ at a few colleges while on vacation, but didn’t do any tours or info sessions. I’m not really sure how much value this had. By Xmas Junior year we had a solid list of 8 schools DS wanted to visit. We visited five in Massachusetts and California during Spring Break and two of the others (Atlanta and Houston) on 3 day school weekends. State flagship wasn’t visited. It was an expensive choice (DH, DS and I went) but it definitely determined which schools and what type of school was preferred. We didn’t rush the trips and had a great time. If it is financially possible, I recommend this approach.</p>
<p>Fog - I think social media is just the latest in the progression of communication, and might seem just noise at first while early adopters run around like it’s nirvana. My first job, we used telex to communicate with the overseas office, then it became email, next job they were handing out blackberries so we could get email walking through the halls (not attached to a desk)…fast forward 20 yrs and email is too slow - we have im’s and then twitter becomes a way to broadcast yourself. Dinosaurs like state govt getting on the twitter bandwagon is kind of funny, because they are bound to misstep…but if you look at Twitter to be the bastion of information, you have to wade through the noise of swearing, sluttiness and grime, everyone can have a voice and frankly, I don’t want to hear all those people talking - there are no rules and no real reprecussions from tweeting crap except maybe celebrity divorces, losing followers, heck you probably gain followers if you are outlandish enough. Twitter is great for celebrities - fits right in. The best tweets I have read come from my local govt emergency mgt office - they gave us info about the power outages/road closures much faster than waiting for the local news or traffic reports. </p>
<p>My kids are on FB and even dd1 has an APUSH assignment to put out 30 tweets on a reading. Teacher wanted to be “hip” I guess. I have linkedin, twitter and fb - and watch the banter too much. I also have a college buddy that I write old fashioned letters with, which I adore. Don’t you miss getting handwritten letters from people? Try to find a box of stationary that is not designed for printers - it is impossible. Remember when you used to get scented stationary? See, I am old!!!</p>
<p>I have FB and Twitter. I am kind of addicted to FB because of the games! Now that I have my iPhone (addicted to it) I am on it a lot more than I should be. Twitter I use to follow some writers I like-mostly sports.</p>
<p>2ed sorry about your old lady…it’s so hard to know when it’s time to let them go-but I believe in Rainbow Bridge. It’s just the worst thing though-they are such a part of our lives.</p>
<p>Don’t give me too much credit on the windows. I only cleaned the inside of the very worst ones! My daughter gets major kudos-the tree is really beautiful and she and her Dad put all the outside lights up yesterday! They even managed to do it without episode-they usually have issues with everything.</p>
<p>fogfog so much of the search depends on the student. We didn’t start looking until the summer of Senior year with my son. He also had no idea what to major in, and like MOB he started out not wanting any part of large city schools-and ended up at NEU! I still sometimes shake my head about that…</p>
<p>I doubt the search with her will resemble the one her brother had-or the application season!</p>
<p>Fog, I think we may do a couple of nearby places with our DS’14 – same idea the small/large/urban/rural. He went with us to most of DS’11/15’s visits so at least has an idea. I’d also love for him to do some kind of summer program on a college campus in August but there isn’t much available that late (guess they are preparing for incoming freshmen etc. by then). We’ll probably do RIT’s Colleges and Careers at least. If anyone knows of anything else relevant for someone with a strong engineering bent that starts either very late July or early August, LMK!</p>
<p>Mathmomvt - my son went to an engineering survey program at Stevens. I believe it was in Aug. I have a list if others I will try to dig up for you.</p>
<p>No Twitter or Linked for me. FB and cc keep me busy along with email.</p>
<p>Thanks FlMathMom! The Stevens one is a touch early this summer. Technically he could make it, but he’d be a basket case as he will be just getting done with overnight camp the day before, and he needs a few days sleep to recover from camp. This is his last year at that camp, so he’ll have lots more opportunities next summer for such programs, but I’d love to find him something for this summer. He’s a little nervous about going off to college in a couple of years, and I think a summer taste of college would make him much more comfortable.</p>
<p>I use FB more than any of my kids. DS 11/15 uses it a little, and DS 14/19 rarely touches it. My youngest is under 13 so I haven’t allowed him to get an account. I like FB quite a bit for myself though. I keep in touch with a wide range of friends from various past parts of my life of whom I otherwise would have lost contact.</p>
<p>fogfog - With our D14 we will take her to several local colleges just to provide a background for what is to come during the road tours over spring break and in the summer. By exposing her to schools she most likely has no interest in (she wants to be “away” from home), she can get a feel for a LAC, a couple of larger state schools, an urban, a small town and a rural campus.</p>
<p>We started DS at schools that were on the application list radar and the first two ended up off his list as he had nothing to compare to and he felt they weren’t “right”. Also, he then refused to look at anything but the mid-sized schools. It was almost like the first visits were “throw-away” visits. I don’t know if this makes any sense but I think this process will work with our D14.</p>
<p>My dd14, 15 next week went on many of the college tours with her sister. So far she has one college from that group that she is very interested in. We may send her to a summer program there since they have a special one for girls interested in engineering or physics. The really wonderful thing about college searching for her is that she is much more likely than her sister to be decided on a few schools or mainly one school and a back-up. That would be a welcome change.</p>
<p>In terms of FB, twitter, etc… my kids are all on FB as is H and me. None of us are heavy FB users. I may use it about 15 minutes a week or so. Seems like most of my friends barely use it too. I don’t twitter and neither do my kids.</p>
<p>D is unsure when she is coming home. It basically all depends when she feels ready to do her math final. Apparently she is feeling it may be sooner. It won’t be before Thursday since she does have a music test on that day. But it could be Thursday or Friday or sometime next week. She has her first grade for the semester which is an A+ and worth 4.33. The school lets her have those and but if she ends up having more than a 4.00 total GPA, it will be reported as a 4.0 anyway. But every little bit counts so now she can relax a but more about the math since even if she gets an A- on that, the average wil work out to 4.0 between those two classes.</p>
<p>I’ve also been thinking about college visits for D2. This is a kid who’s still a work in progress and taking her on visits earlier rather than later isn’t going to fit the young woman she’s going to be, if that makes any sense. For instance, her summer plans suddenly changed from a long-anticipated CIT summer at camp to doing a educational travel program. When she explained her reasoning to us, D1’s reaction was “when did you turn 30?” which was pretty much the silent reaction of us the parents. </p>
<p>I started D1’s visits with safeties and matches, and want to use the same strategy for D2. Just waiting to see what her PSAT score is like (I know it won’t be strong) so that I’ve got a clue where to look, safety-wise. She’ll want either a small U or a LAC with a lot of majors, a nurturing feel, at least some experiential offerings and a real campus. A visit a few weeks ago to a pre-professional local program (2 years, either right out of high school or after college) confirmed she wants a four-year school.</p>
<p>Fogfog: My DD came with us on her brother’s college tours when he was a soph.(HS class of 2009) so she had kind of an idea. And we started the local tours when she was a soph as well. That solidified what she was looking for so that gave us the guidelines for colleges to look at.</p>
<p>This Santa Clara program looks like it would be a perfect fit for my DS’14, it fits his schedule and as a bonus, it’s FREE! [Santa</a> Clara University - School of Engineering -Summer Engineering Seminar (SES)](<a href=“http://scu.edu/engineering/about/ses.cfm]Santa”>About - School of Engineering - Santa Clara University) But of course because it’s free, it’s probably very hard to get into, especially for a white male sophomore (it looks like they give preference to females, URMs and rising seniors). Also it wants kids with minimal exposure to engineering – his dad has an engineering degree but doesn’t work as an engineer, and I don’t have an engineering degree (mine is CS) but my business card says I am an engineer (though I consider myself a computer scientist). So I don’t know if he’d have any chance. He definitely already thinks he wants to be an engineer of some sort, though he doesn’t really know what that entails or what kind he’d like to be.</p>
<p>Anyone have experience with this program? From other CC threads it sounds like they accept about 35 students per year, but I have no idea how many apply.</p>
<p>He just got back PSAT scores and has a very strong math score. He has both a math teacher and a CAD elective teacher who would probably be willing to write him a strong recommendation.</p>
and taking her on visits earlier rather than later isn’t going to fit the young woman she’s going to be, if that makes any sense. For instance, her summer plans suddenly changed from a long-anticipated CIT summer at camp to doing a educational travel program. When she explained her reasoning to us, D1’s reaction was “when did you turn 30?” 
</p>