Gah! Little rant at the universe coming. D has her regional championship in three days and leaves for Sicily in 12… and as of tonight she has two wisdom teeth coming in, which explains the recent headaches and dizziness she’s had, but is definitely a life complication we could all have done without!
@HeartofDixie awesome! Congrats on the scholarships! Sounds like you’ve got everything covered which is amazing. I remember some of your posts on finding an affordable fit and I’m happy it worked out.
@milgymfam sorry about the teeth. Mine advance and retreat, I’ve just left them in…hopefully they don’t ruin any of her plans!
DD had a good first day of work at the Chamber of Commerce. I’m so happy she’s getting this experience. Her dream is to work in a National Park. She loves them, but she’s no outdoor survivalist either. She has also been interested in Chamber/Parks & Rec departments and those are located in most towns and cities across the country so I’d been hoping she would be open to that type of career too for more options. Honestly I think it fits so well with her talents and interests. So far this week and next she will be updating the website, creating flyers, posting on social media, doing a walking tour with officials to think about landscape improvements, serving food to a tour group, helping with the 4th of July plans and who knows what else. She’s pumped 
Congratulation to all the graduates (or soon to be)!!
DD finished her incredible journey of 4 years last Friday night! We enjoyed having relatives the whole weekend. Tuesday, drove to overnight in Dallas. The following morning, DD attended a breakfast honoring the State Farm National Merit corporate scholarship winners. Then a short drive to visit with registration and study abroad folks at UT Dallas. In the car ride home, she registered for her classes. Gotta love technology!
She’ll be here working as a tutor most of the summer. So happy to have her unstressed and ready for the next adventure!
Just brought D19 to the airport - she is headed up to NYC to go to Gov Ball music festival and meet her new roommate! She is a little nervous - she went up alone and is staying with the roommate for 2 nights. I told her it is perfect timing, next week is when they have to pick if they want a certain roommate or if they want to go random, if they don’t like each other at least they have time to back out! 
From texting and face timing it seems like they will get along very well. In the car on the way to the airport I realized I hadn’t talked to or texted the parents - this was all planned yesterday so it went fast. They must think I am crazy letting my daughter fly up to stay with people I have never even spoken to. 
@momtogkc My D19 is also going to Gov Ball. Heading down on the train from Boston tomorrow morning, with a friend. First time traveling with no grownups, checking into a hotel, etc. should be interesting. Makes me nervous, but I use Find My Friends regularly, we have friends living in NYC, and we’re only a 4 hour drive away. I’m sure they’ll be fine.
Sorry about your D, @milgymfam, I hope that she’s OK for her championship and trip!
Once more, congratulations to all kids who graduated, are starting jobs and other great summer activities - there are simply too many to mentions specifically.
Graduation is coming up on Sunday, and my D’s last showcases at her dance school are the days before, so another crazy weekend coming up.
It seems that another high school in Chicagoland (one which is better known than ours) has had the same issue which brought our HS unwanted national media attention. I sincerely hope that our HS won’t do something to make sure that they aren’t upstaged…
Ah. Booked D19’s ticket for arrival day at college. Also, southwest opened more booking dates - we were waiting for that as they are the only nonstop from here to our thanksgiving meetup with D19. Then booked her ticket separately to meet us. It’s all becoming real.
School theatre awards last night - kiddo won Best Actor, Best PR campaign, Best Dramaturge and Best Monologue. Ended the evening with a chest full of medals. They did the Senior Farewell, many tears were shed.
@SJ2727 waiting on southwest to open Thanksgiving travel dates as well! Just booked flights for my husband and I and D21 to fly out for family weekend in mid Oct. I think S19 will stay at Bowdoin for fall break which is the 3 day break that’s just the week before family weekend. We’ve gone back and forth about it but he asked some kids he met at Bowdoin admitted student days and they said about half the kids stay so he won’t be alone. Seems silly for him to come home for that break and then we come out ten days later.
@MWolf Had to google to find the Chicago HS controversies (which are not limited to Chicago). I understand now why some schools are eliminating the senior quotes from the yearbook.
D made it up to NY and is hanging out with the future roommate. So far it is going well, I haven’t heard too much but she did say they were looking at dorms (even though they don’t get to pick, just want to see whats out there I guess) and laughing over their mutual One Direction phases. I found some funny old pictures of D at out many, many 1D concerts I will text her this morning.
@momzilla2D I went with D to Gov Ball a few years ago and it was fun. Well, a friend and I took our girls, we all went over to Randall Island together then we never saw them again until we got home, so I kind of went with D.
@ninakatarina That is amazing - congratulations!!
@MWolf Ugh, such a pain with the kid smelling up the yearbooks. Last year a senior put an inappropriate quote in D’s yearbook. It was sexual, but not in your face so the administrators didn’t notice it until after some yearbooks had gone out. They tried to recall the ones that had been given to kids then made everyone else wait while they reprinted.
@homerdog Not sure when Bowdoin’s fall break is, but it is probably around Head of the Charles regatta in Boston. Tons of college kids go down to the city for that so maybe he will head to the city! I just realized D has a fall break as well, not sure what she will do but pretty sure she will stay at school.
@momtogkc That would be so fun for him to head to Boston and so easy on the train! He has three good friends going to BC and they have the same fall break so I was already thinking he could visit them or they could visit him. Regardless, I think he’ll survive if he doesn’t head back to Chicago for that break.
Divide and conquer continues. Move in dates are the same for Mac and Amherst. One of us will be driving to MN and the other to MA. Need a minivan or SUV rental as well since our Prius wouldn’t fit either one’s stuff they want to take. At least its not WA and ME, which was a theoritical possibility at one point.
Lots of interesting logistics questions. I should start a thread for parents of twins of Cof2019
@EganAg If I remember correctly, you are kind of in the middle between MN and MA so maybe driving isn’t too too hard. Would you not consider flying at all? That’s our plan for move in and we know a lot of people have to do it that way. I’m actually thinking it will be WAY easier than buying everything here and schlepping it out to school (although we never considered it since Maine is just way too far to drive). We will ship some things in advance and pre-order some things from Target and pick up in Maine. The personal stuff - clothes, computer, etc - will just travel with us on the plane.
I’m so grateful we can drive her to her dorm- there is no way we could affordably source everything quickly upon arrival. She just got a fridge the other day for $5 and spent the morning bleaching it out. Her linens and such were all found used and laundered. A big round of target/BBB would sink us. Also quite luckily, my parents have offered to come pick up and store her stuff for the summer breaks (they live locally to the school) so we only have to do this one time anyway.
We are doing the same @homerdog Our neighbors whose daughter is a Bowdoin grad, probably around 2013, drove her to and from school all 4 years…17 hour drive, best case. No way for us, we will be flying, shipping some stuff and buying there too!
@homerdog flying and shipping remain an option too. We heard that Bed Bath and Beyond has something where we can register and have stuff picked up at the local store. We have to lug two expensive music instruments, hence the preference to drive. They can’t be checked or gate checked and won’t fit in the overhead bins of the small commuter jets out of here. So, need to get a bigger jet going to St Paul and Hartford through somewhere and still rent a car there…so, lots to think about.
@homerdog That would be fun - and a free place to stay on the floor of the BC dorm.
We are doing the fly/ship some stuff/ pre order some stuff method as well. I thought about renting a van, drive one way 11.5 hours) with everything then fly home but DH talked me out of it. We love a road trip but don’t want to feel like we are in a rush. We are allowed to send a few boxes the week before and they will be waiting in the dorm room when we get there. DH is a Mosaic member on Jet Blue so when he is with us we are allowed two free bags - I’m hoping we don’t need too many but nice to have the option.
@milgymfam That is a nice option to store stuff at your parent’s house! I have already started to look into storage facilities near school since we don’t know anybody in New Orleans.
Flying and shipping and ship-to-store is a necessity for us, and having done it with our D17, I can attest to it actually being possibly simpler than just driving everything to the dorm—and, as a bonus, it makes you consider what your kid really needs, cutting down to some extent on wasted effort.
@homerdog Southwest already opened Thanksgiving dates probably a month ago.
December dates are open, but the January dates for return trip are not yet open.
Just booked S19’s Thanksgiving trip for Sunday and Friday return. The low fares are already sold out.
Very glad to have SWA direct flights between home and school.