Parents of the HS Class of 2011 - We're awesome!

Parents Forum Class of 20xx Community
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<p>Hi all - nice to see people here, lovely to meet some new folks!</p>

<p>I’ll quickly introduce myself, too: I live in Wisconsin, and I have 2 Ds: the older one just graduated from Tufts and is working in the rainforest on a tree census this summer. D2 is HS Class of '11 and plans to go to Adelphi University on Long Island to combine a BFA in Theatre with their Honors College. </p>

<p>Big update on D is she cut her hair, very short and cute. She’s had it short before, particularly during summer marching band, and she’s thrilled. BF isn’t so sure … but he’s never seen her like this before.</p>

<p>That’s about as profound as things are around here right now. She and I are enjoying our peaceful week; H gets home tomorrow night from his fishing trip. We have some theatre tickets but otherwise are pretty chill, except for the weather which is supposed to hit 96 this afternoon.</p>

<p>We’re going to wait for the mail on AP scores - she only took 2 and they won’t do much for her in her programs. They’re irrelevant for the BFA and the Honors College doesn’t take them, except for lab science which she did not do well in. </p>

<p>Not much shopping, either. She has her poster, book and DVD collections pretty well set (i.e. her priorities), and she’s happy to use hand-me-down stuff from her sister like storage units, etc. She definitely will wait on clothes, etc. - she has plenty, and I imagine she’ll enjoy hitting the discount and vintage spots near NYC rather than buy things here!</p>

<p>D1 in Puerto Rico is doing fine … now. She did hurt her wrist, also spilled juice on her laptop and ruined the keyboard, in a separate computer glitch lost reams of data and had to redo, etc. All in perspective because her BF here at home was in a very scary and fortunately ultimately OK car accident the other day. A semi clipped his bumper and sent him spinning into the median; the car is totaled, but BF is all right, except that so far people seem to be believing the semi driver that it was BF’s fault. Poor kid!</p>

<p>I haven’t counted days yet, but she goes to Orientation next week and has about 6 weeks after that until we leave to move her in. So it’s still feeling long to me. </p>

<p>Happy 4th, and hooray for our new thread!</p>

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<p>Thanks, kathiep, for getting us off to a fresh start! I’m looking forward to sharing the adventures of freshman year with all of you.</p>

<p>Someone mentioned black sheets. I’ll just share our experience with dark sheets. S1 decided that he would like to have navy blue sheets when choosing sheets for his dorm freshman year. I thought, great – maybe no one will even realize that he hasn’t washed his sheets for weeks if they are a dark color. So, I bought navy sheets. His first trip home, he asked if we could buy new sheets. I launched into – you have brand new sheets la la la la. Come to find out that S1 is what he called a “drooler”. Never noticed it with our light colored patterned sheets at home. Seems that drool shows up as white splotches on the navy sheets. Who’d have guessed it? Anyway, we quickly did away with the dark sheets and replaced them with less embarrassing pastels. For S2, I went directly to the lighter colored sheets. No idea if the drooling thing runs in the family or not, but decided not to find out. Now wouldn’t my sons be mortified to find out that I’d been discussing drooling online???</p>

<p>Haven’t decided yet whether or not to call about the AP scores. S2 can only use 2 AP scores for credit next year and we’re encouraging him not to use them to place out of subjects relating to his major, so I’m not sure if I’ll check early or not. </p>

<p>As for roommates, S2 found out that he will be rooming with an international student from Taiwan. He’s all excited. I’ll admit that I thought…wow, I guess HE won’t be bringing the fridge. </p>

<p>AmandaK, I’ll check out “The Happiest Kid on Campus”. Sounds good!</p>

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<p>Like, totally awesome, dudes!</p>

<p>Glad to hear all of the happy AP news. I’m handing out virtual packs of 5 brand gum to all and sundry. :)</p>

<p>D1 got her roommate assignment, so they’ll start making plans for coordinating buying stuff soon. Another Californian! </p>

<p>Summer rolls on. D1 started her internship, and is just loving it: she’s working at a local nonprofit which has its fingers in many pies. This week is learning about all of the pies so that next week she can choose which area she’ll be working in. If nothing else, she’s learned a great deal about corporate culture and structure. D2’s been babysitting, and goes off to camp next week. </p>

<p>It’s heating up here, too. The pool is looking very, very inviting…</p>

<p>Emmybet, hugs to D1’s BF after having that very scary accident experience. Very glad that everyone is OK.</p>

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<p>congrats to mnmomof2’s D. Nice to get validation.</p>

<p>Well, the shawbridge household is in the midst of its normal peripatetic life. ShawD got a call from our Canada bank asking for her Canadian address so that she can send a bank card for a Canadian account. At the time, ShawD was on her way up to an ashram in Quebec to start her yoga teacher training. ShawWife is in Tuscany teaching painting and I’m going to join her, hopeful in time to see the Palio. ShawSon will be staying at home, though he may go visit a friend on the Cape for friend’s birthday. </p>

<p>MM, good luck. proudmom, great opportunities can come out of the next emptying. I don’t think it will be easy for ShawWife, but I think she is already engaged in creating new efforts and activities that will be fulfilling for her.</p>

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<p>^ Thanks for the heads up on the dark sheets ohiomom. Here I thought I was being smart…perhaps I should have Bluejr check out his navy blue pillow cases before he heads to school. I would think this has to do with allergies and sinus problems. </p>

<p>After a bit of stop n start I was able to load some pictures to the Shutterfly site. I gave up trying to get the pictures to appear in order w/i the album. I’m slowly putting faces to names. So much fun!! :)</p>

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<p>Bragging ahead: so DS just called for his APs and got 5s on all 3 he took this year (English and Physics C). He already has a bunch from previous years, so he is in good shape.</p>

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<p>rodney - congrats on the great housing assingment. I am still amazed at the b*tching about housing some kids are doing on the school FB page for class of 2015, get over it already. </p>

<p>OWM - good luck with the speech. I am tops at procrastinating things like that. Hope your S has a great day. </p>

<p>kathie- bb muffins? yum. I may make some this weekend. </p>

<p>kinder - nice, I wish my H would do some cleaning in the garage. He is a huge packrat. </p>

<p>pamom- welcome. My S got the all male dorm and was not happy. I was surprised he quickly adjusted and is now looking forward to living there, with the man cave and bball court. </p>

<p>missy- I use amazon prime all the time, but am looking forward to using S’s account for free prime. Regarding using your S’s stuff, I think it is great that your D gets to take a little bit of her brother with her to school. Both your kids will end up in good places some of us just take a little longer. </p>

<p>Welcome Bamamom - I have a rising 6th grader too who is very much going to miss her big brother. I expect some big tears those first few days. Thank goodness for skype. </p>

<p>

LOL. S’s assigned room mate lives a couple hours ride from the school but is desparately trying to get out of the all male dorm. He won’t make plans with S regarding lofts, micros and fridges. H keeps pestering S to make his room mate plan (right that is going to work). So I think we will rent the loft bed thing and plan on getting the fridge/micro at move in time if S needs it. </p>

<p>Emmybet- pictures of D please! Sounds like lots of excitement regarding D1. Glad BF is OK. </p>

<p>mathmomvt- thanks for AP info. I plan on calling customer service just to be sure, but will wait til next week and they are less busy. Wow, all 3 boys are at overnight camp? I think I would be suffering empty nest syndrome big time. well, for a few days anyway. </p>

<p>calreader - I figure if the stores run out of xl twin sheets before we make it there, a flat sheet always works. I just paid for summer camp for D, I am not in a spending mode yet. </p>

<p>AK - The problem with having a kindle is I never browse book stores or the library like I used to. Thanks for the book rec. </p>

<p>stillwater - welcome. H recently bought a Dell laptop for S, no idea anything beyond that. I imagine that STEM students like your D need something fast with big storage. </p>

<p>Gibson - congrats to your D!!! </p>

<p>eastcoastcrazy - welcome!</p>

<p>whew, leave for an hour or so and I fall way behind./</p>

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<p>AK–I read HKOC and it was good. Just kept asking myself how to broach subjects in book without DS knowing it was coming straight out of book. Bought DS the Naked Roommate book and he’s flipping through it.</p>

<p>Ohiomom–LOL on the drool. Convinced me to buy lighter sheets, but I still draw the line at white! I think DS is thinking togas or something!</p>

<p>Great new thread, thanks Kathie for starting it. I was a bit amazed to come see there were already three pages I had to read through. It was nice to see the links to the sheets, JCP coupon and such. As always you are all a wonderful resource!</p>

<p>DS’s school wanted AP results turned in on 6/30 for paperwork due that day. Since DS couldn’t do that, he just put “pending” Since that’s been submitted, DS isn’t interested in getting scores and having to pay for them (even though I’d be paying). So we will wait for the mail. </p>

<p>I haven’t started the dorm shopping. Trying to figure out how to ease my DS into a shopping trip, even if it is online. Not his cup of tea. Not sure how or if he finds out who roommate is, but won’t know dorm until late this month. Luckily he doesn’t start school until Sep, since he just graduated less than 2 weeks ago.</p>

<p>Good news, he’s starting his job today. Thank goodness for proactive friends. It’s a self directed job–he’s knocking on doors and taking a survey for a state representative. Luckily friend wanted to get started, or my procrastinating son would have waited forever. They go out in teams, but knock on doors separately in the neighborhood. It will be educational!</p>

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<p>aria - congrats on the scores</p>

<p>slithy -nice to hear D1 likes the internship</p>

<p>Shaw- I feel like such a slacker when I ready about what is going on in your household!</p>

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<p>On sheets, we ordered these: [Horizons</a> 300 Thread Count Printed Sheet Set | Overstock.com](<a href=“Overstock.com: Online Shopping - Bedding, Furniture, Electronics, Jewelry, Clothing & more”>Overstock.com: Online Shopping - Bedding, Furniture, Electronics, Jewelry, Clothing & more) from overstock.com and they are very soft and seem to be good quality, for a pretty reasonable price. (I did wait for S to choose the color, fwiw)</p>

<p>S is very pleased with his AP results, four 5’s and a 4 in physics (C mech) which he thought he had totally bombed. Cornell Engineering generally requires 5s for credit/placement, but they’ll take a 4 on the physics. He’ll get to place out of a lot of intro classes, which will give him more wiggle room to take stuff he’s really interested in down the road.</p>

<p>We already have Amazon prime that we pay for. I think I read that we can convert over to an Amazon student account and get a pro-rated refund. Do we just add S’s email address to our existing account to do that? So far H and I just share the account but I wasn’t necessarily planning on sharing the same account with my S in terms of payment options etc. How do folks manage this?</p>

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<p>Regarding computers…I know a lot of kids from my son’s IT high school going into engineering are going with one of the new Lenovo thinkpads. Great reviews and good specs. My son went with the T420s. Kids looking for a tablet went with the x220 which is miles away from the old Toshiba tablets which had terrible reputations for being broken all the time and horrible battery life. I’ve never been a fan of tablets because you always seem to have to sacrifice power…it never balances out. The Lenovo comes much closer to giving you a decent computer and being a tablet.</p>

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<p>Hi All
Coffee is great in our new digs!!!
OUr scholar is gone all summer and will be home about 15 days (yes I counted) til we board the plane for the U.
Got the roommate info–etc though kiddo has a major event in the week and has not spent much time with email/facebook to converse with the roommate. From what we gather, the roommate has similar interest…and even the “fro-co” ie freshman counselor is in a related field of study. Seems the U did a nice job without making the rooming assignment a grand social experiment. </p>

<p>Since kiddo isn’t even thinking about AP scores–I figure I will wait for the mail. When are they supposed to arrived? Took 4 last year and six this year…and I guess we will be paying 2 fees to foward them to the U…I need to check my receipts to see if we sent the SAT2s…since all we did was leave them self reported (kiddo submitted ACT scores)…the U also uses SAT2s in conjunction with APs for placement…ie math, chem, physics etc etc</p>

<p>Thanks Blue for your thoughts on laptops…kiddo needs a nice machine as an engineering major.</p>

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<p>Hi, all. I rarely posted on the other thread but tried to keep up with it as I found it enormously helpful (and horizon- expanding - I found myself looking up Korean music vidoes, thanks to AK’s D). So I’m determined to contribute more this time around though I’m afraid I’m not bringing any wealth of experience to the table. We are international and S is my first to go to the US for college (he’ll be at Sarah Lawrence). His older sibling went to uni here in the UK – a very different kettle of fish. I hope to come into my own when this group starts researching junior years abroad –not to alarm anybody but the way the time’s flying, that’s just around the corner…</p>

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<p>Hello all! It’s nice to start here with a clean slate and a fresh cup of coffee.
We haven’t started any shopping, although when we do…I have about 20 BB&b coupons to use.
S hasn’t received any housing info yet from Columbia…hopefully soon.
We’re not calling in for AP scores either…College Board has gotten enough of our money!</p>

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<p>Hello All…I am another former lurker who has been waiting for this new thread to begin posting. I was very late to the CC party…did not find this site until March of this year. However, I have gotten so much information since then and wish I had found you sooner…it would have made the past years much more bearable (I can’t say easier…I don’t think anything would have been able to do that!). Anyway, my D2 will be attending George Washington University in the fall. I also have a D1 who has already graduated from college. And, I can honestly say, the second time around was/is as overwhelming as the first with the added bonus of this being my baby. I am hoping being a part of this group may help make the coming years just a bit easier. Thank you all for welcoming newbies!</p>

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<p>Wow - This thread is sure off to a fast start! </p>

<p>Since D won’t be back home until August, we won’t know AP scores until we get them in the mail; no point in calling if I can’t share them with her. Her school only recognizes 5’s (except for stats, for which they’ll accept a 4 - go figure). She has a couple of previous 5’s in history, so hopefully she’ll get a couple of more to free up some space in her schedule; she’s already said she is not going to have time to take all the courses she wants to take.</p>

<p>Our family tradition is to get our hs grads a laundry basket filled with college paraphenalia (mugs, hangers, desk fans, reading lamps, fun snacks, etc.) so D is pretty set for that. But we won’t shop for sheets and comforter until she gets back. I’m thinking that stores probably have some back-to-school sales later in the summer, or at least I hope we’re not going to be in trouble for shopping relatively late. She doesn’t have to be at school for freshman orientation until September 3rd. Not sure when she finds out about her roommate; she filled out a pretty detailed roommate match form so this will be interesting.</p>

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<p>Thanks Kathie for starting the new thread. I love that you added “awesome!”</p>

<p>Boychild leaves 9 weeks from yesterday but that’s just for the outdoor adventure program. Having graduated 7 weeks ago tomorrow it’s a very, very,very long summer at my house.</p>

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<p>MATHMOMVT</p>

<p>I think you can add additional shipping addresses to the Amazon without having to change anything…and I have heard that college students can get Amazon Prime at a reduced rate or free? So either way would work.
Have Prime and have shipped things to several addresses and sent gifts with Prime just adding the address to the profile.
Have wondered about getting book shipments in a timely manner at college when courses start and assignments are already piling up…</p>

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<p>stillwater, my kids use Macbooks. ShawD will keep her black one. ShawSon’s is three+ years old and is showing extreme signs of age. I’ll replace it with an aluminum Macbook Pro (heavier but more durable). </p>

<p>Earlier in time, ShawSon used a Fujitsu tablet, but never really used the tablet feature – I thought he might take notes with it. </p>

<p>This past year, I got both of them special recording pens (that make an audio recording that is cued to what they are writing in their notes). That gets used sometimes and is very useful for things like math proofs and teachers who talk really fast. The output can be uploaded to the computer.</p>

<p>I’ve found that the Macs require much less time from me as family IT consultant and many other kids have Macs as well. Just simpler, especially if they have ipods and iphones (my kids don’t have iphones, though my wife does).</p>

<p>One thing I did was to set up gmail as the mail client for my kids’ school email addresses. They then don’t have to deal with the clunky webmail the school provides. And, it is easy to get on Android, iphone and Blackberry. My family has one of each.</p>

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<p>So, what is Amazon Prime? And is there a deal with a .edu address?</p>

<p>I am on my third cup of coffee this AM and it is tasting great on this side. D1 received her housing assignment and is pleased. However, as I mentioned in the previous thread, she is realizing what leaving the nest really means and has displayed a wide range of emotions from giddiness to crying…it is so unlike our confident, happy go lucky, fun loving kid.</p>

<p>D1 is going to orientation next week and I am hoping that will tame her nerves and help her move to the “I can’t wait” stage. She is meeting up with some friends and their roomates that are all going to attend the same school the night before orientation for dinner…at least their will be some friendly faces on Day 1.</p>

<p>D2 (HS Class of 2013) is also leaving next week for a service trip - this summer she is going to save the turtles, last summer she saved the rain forest. Next summer she wants to save the orphans in Africa…in the meantime she is saving the hungry people at the soup kitchen. It keeps her busy.</p>

<p>I hope everyone has a wonderful holiday weekend! I think I amy host an impromptu BBQ…</p>