<p>Hi:</p>
<p>We just got back from dropping off our S at college on Sunday. Today his room is rearranged and I am able to use it again as an office.</p>
<p>We have one more child in the house, so we aren't empty nesters yet. I am definitely feeling sad at not having my S around, but thrilled at having the spare bedroom again.</p>
<p>Am I the only one that was secretly (OK, maybe not to secretly) looking forward to having some extra space in the house when he left?</p>
<p>I hope you discussed this with your son before he left. I clearly remember how devastated I was when I came home to find my room had been completely redecorated and turned into a guest room. My mom never said anything about it, so I was completely taken by surprise when I got home. I would have been ok with the change, had I had known it was coming.</p>
<p>My (only child) DS asked me what I was going to do with his bedroom and I was rather shocked. We have a 3 bedroom house and don’t really need his room. So I have finished hanging up his Eagle Scout awards and cleaned up the room some. </p>
<p>My single mom died before I left for college so there was no room to come home to. So that’s kind of stuck in my head and would have a difficult time converting his room.</p>
<p>If I needed the space, it might be a different story though.</p>
<p>I told dh it was still “D’s room,” mostly because a guest room means every.single.stinking.time he has somebody from the church in town to do anything they’re staying at my house. And I really don’t want regular house guests. </p>
<p>I plan to redo the room this summer with D1’s input, but I still don’t want to call it a guest room. More like “room where I can escape from H’s snoring”.</p>
<p>I am finally re-doing my kids’ rooms but the youngest graduated college a year ago. I just can’t figure what to do with the stuff!</p>
<p>We told him that we would be moving things around when he left. We kept a bookshelf with his odds and ends on it, and he will have a place to sleep in the room when he comes home. </p>
<p>Other than taking down some of his posters, he had already taken everything that was important to him, so he said we could do what we wanted with the rest.</p>
<p>When he comes home, I will just move my laptop out of the room, so it will be his again.</p>
<p>My D would be so hurt if we reappropriated her room.</p>
<p>Years ago (before any of mine were in college), my neighbor’s oldest D went to college far OOS. Before the dad and D even arrived at the school, the mom had removed every single trace of her D from every closet and drawer of her room, and totally turned her room into a guest room. Now that I have college aged kids, I find that so odd!</p>
<p>I also never had a place to call “home” once I left for college. I just couldn’t do that to my kids. I left their rooms as is…until they said it was ok to rearrange (we have plenty of space without using their rooms or I might have thought differently of this). DS’s room is now decorated as the “Comfort Inn” of our home. He likes it too. DD’s room is untouched because when she left, she asked us to leave it. The only thing I might do is replace her bed with a double bed (why???).</p>
<p>I think if we didn’t have an extra bedroom and a finished lower level walk out, I might have been more eager to “change” my kids’ rooms. But since it wasn’t necessary, I didn’t.</p>
<p>We live in a small 3 bedroom house and have 3 kids. When D1 left, we moved S2 into her room. Last year when S2 left, I converted it into a guest room. I put all of their extra stuff in totes in the closet. WHoever is home sleeps in the room. I put some pictures of them up on the walls but all of the trophies, plaques etc… are gone.</p>
<p>I am waiting until/if he comes home this summer. He wants to move downstairs to the bedroom in the basement and his old room will become the guest room. I worry about my parents/in-laws going down the stairs to that room when they visit so this will alleviate that fret. </p>
<p>The third bedroom on the main floor is being turned into an office. It was originally used as our den before we put on an addition and since then just became a catch-all space for things we didn’t know where to put or were too lazy to throw out.</p>
<p>One of my clearest memories of the first time I came home after going away to college, was walking into my room - and it wasn’t my room anymore. My mother had turned it into a pretty guest room, and she thought I’d be so happy. I hated hurting her feelings, but I wanted to come HOME. I wanted to see the water-ring stain on the bedside table where I left my soda when I did my homework, the same worn place on the bedspread that felt so homey, and the same color on the walls that I saw growing up. It was very upsetting.</p>
<p>When our kids went away to school, I left everything exactly as they left it, until they graduated and got jobs (in case they had to come home again). Then I got 2 nice guest rooms.</p>
<p>We are desperate for space but I’m not taking over her room. My parents swapped my room with my little brother the minute I left and the room I had to come “home” to was just a guest room. It wasn’t my room anymore. Then they moved into a different house and I really didn’t have home to come back to anymore. It was my parent’s house but it wasn’t my home.</p>
<p>I won’t do that. She might find a few off season things migrating to her closet…lol…but it’s still going to be her room until she is officially and permanently out. ~and we might move to another house but I will set her room up just as it is now.</p>
<p>(however, I <em>did</em> give the room a proper cleaning when I got home from dropping her off…which I warned her if she didn’t leave it clean enough, I would do. You wouldn’t believe the piles of “so THIS is where that went!” that I ended up with. 
)</p>
<p>Son just left the nest–his room is being deep (deep) cleaned (so looks happily updated already!) but otherwise untouched.
D1 is graduated with job and everyone agrees I should do whatever I want but for some reason I can’t. I updated it to “adult” standards, incorporated some D statements and am very happy with the results. Good guest room.
Their closets however have been invaded by my current needs and I have no apology there! (My current motto: go get your own closet space!)</p>
<p>We cleaned her room and changed her sheets but that’s about it. I know she will be happy to come home to her comfy room when she visits next week.</p>
<p>Thanks for all the replies! I haven’t turned it into a foo-foo guest room, so he will probably only notice that the posters are down from the wall, and the room is rearranged. </p>
<p>When I left for college myself, my two sisters were finally able to each have their own room, so when I came home I shared with one of them. One summer I even moved into the garage for awhile, just to have some space! I didn’t mind what they did, and really liked having my own space in the garage.</p>
<p>When one of my sons came home he moved into my daughter’s room because it was designed with lovely built-ins and desk space both in the closet and out. I don’t really go in the room because as much as I love my son he is in my daughter’s room and all of her things are gone. I have them boxed up, and when he moves out my daughter’s things will go back in her room, including her linens and window treatments.</p>
<p>When my sister left for college I moved into what was her room. It was bigger and had it’s own bathroom. She just slept in my old room when she came home on break. After I left for college my mother turned it into the main guest room. I rarely came home from college after freshman year, I went to my grandparents in Florida over Xmas break and spring break went to Mexico with friends. After my sophomore year, summers were spent in Boulder since the rent was being paid year round on the house I was living in. Most of the OOS students stayed in Boulder over the summer. </p>
<p>My parents never had to worry about keeping our bedrooms like they were when we lived at home because back in the 70’s kids didn’t move home after graduating. ;)</p>
<p>My parents kept my sister’s and mine’s room the same FOREVER. It wasn’t necessary but it was nice knowing we were always welcome. (but as an adult do you still want your childhood room?)
My Dad FINALLY turned the bedroom into his office (much to Mom’s dismay) and made GREAT use of it. He should have done it years earlier and would have if not for Mom’s protests. We are not traumatized by it in the least. We knew we were welcome no matter what.</p>
<p>Maybe I’m just mean, but I think rooms in your home are there to redeploy or repurpose as you see fit. I have no intention of making my D’s room a shrine to her youth or anything like that. She knows she’ll always be welcome in our home even if I change the paint and the curtains.</p>
<p>You’re a very chipper bunch and I hope it doesn’t happen to you, but there are kids - actually lots of them - who come home after one semester or one year at college and stay home for some time to come.</p>