Alabama is definitely on the radar for Thing 1!!!
I’m intrigued about Macalester now…We’ll start looking into it!
One small extra bonus with Macalester, at least if they haven’t changed their recruitment style since my D17 was getting stuff from them: Mailings that are often amusing, and consistently can best be described with the adjective ‘quirky’.
@Momof3B - I sure like reading your posts. I appreciate your positivity 
my D23 has absolutely no idea where she would want to go to college; but she’ll be merit looking. she took the ACT in September; slightly underwhelmed at the results. do your boys know what they want to do or study?
do you guys have a hard time getting your kids to be involved with virtual activities? I am . … any thoughts?
The kid is doing mock trial auditions tomorrow. His first experience with it, and I have no insights to help him. They sent him all the info - I guess like a full court brief, etc, just last night. He’s cramming like it’s finals week, haha.
Yes, no way would he be doing virtual activities, @bgbg4us … my sympathies…He did a virtual theater camp this summer and was meh about the whole thing.
Funny story: The instructor decided to have his theater campers practice and perform (via Zoom) “We Got the Beat” by the Go-Gos.
He sent the sheet music to them, and a recording sans voice for them to practice to.
S23 set about perfecting this piece. His part came in at the 57-bar mark. So he counted off for 57 bars… and was confused because it was in the wrong key and it was the middle of a verse, which seemed odd.
He tried this two more times, then asked D19 for help. (She actually was assistant stage manager for this very musical last spring - tragically canceled - so she knows the score by heart).
She looked at the sheet music and realized that he’d been sent the music for the title song, “Head Over Heels,” and had been trying to sing “We Got the Beat” to the tune of “Head Over Heels.”
The best part? My son was the only person who noticed. The other seven in his camp actually sent in videos of them singing TO THE WRONG SONG.
@Gatormama haha, My lips are sealed. ?
I don’t know, it kind of reads pretty coherently (or at least as well as any song involving Tears for Fears could be expected to).
@dfbdfb and @Gatormama I just had a flashback to my older sister, with her Cyndi-Lauper-esque haircut (short on one side) getting ready to leave the house mid-80s for a Go-Gos concert
Just had to come here to say that S21 shocked me with an all A first quarter report card!! It’s still a work in progress letting him drive through his study habits and organization. He’s enjoying most of his classes, English included which shocked the hell out of me too lol. The only thing he needs to figure out is ramping up extracurriculars. We had originally told him that he needed to find a part time job but I am hesitant to push for this when he is doing well with school (so far). With school and extracurriculars (covid permitting), we are also looking into SAT/ACT prep starting in Spring. With his rank already in jeopardy (hes at the bottom of top 25%), he will need to prove himself through tests and extracurriculars, right? With regards to job, I suggested that he just keep his life guard job during the summers (he will also be doing DC courses in summers). We will see.
3 Likes
It’s been quite a day so far. …Thing 2 got his braces off this morning! (Nice to see the end result of my $5800 investment lol) and S21 woke up to an email with his second college acceptance! (first one came on Saturday)
Thanksgiving Month is off to a good start 
I got married. Covid wedding was crazy but a beautiful day. S23 ended football undefeated. Marching band has 2 potential performances left. School did a neat video for the fall choir concert with each choir group singing their songs standing in the audience of our performancing arts center. I’m glad they were able to do something for the seniors… Now he’s torn between winter activities. Grades are taking a bit of a hit. He doesn’t love precalc and hates the teacher so hoping he can pull off at least a B- for semester. Working on drivers ed behind the wheel hours. Hea doing solo for state choir in a couple weeks as well.
2 Likes
I meant S23. :neutral:
@2plustrio CONGRATULATIONS!!
Congratulations!!!
He and I have been together for 10 years. He views my kids as his own (he has no bio kids). We’ve been through a lot so it was a bit laughable and poetic that we got married during a pandemic.
@Momof3B that’s great - it feels good to have some options! (S21 just has one right now, so I don’t know that we can call it an option as he has nothing else to choose from yet, but it’s still a relief and also exciting).
@2plustrio Congratulations!
@JaceyK that’s a great shock to have. 
D23 surprised me a few weeks ago by choosing to enter the selection process for a high level leadership group at school. At first, I didn’t think it was a match for her - I thought she’d more likely to lead in a group/club specific to an interest of hers (which she’s been working to do but the clubs just aren’t mostly getting off the ground this year due to COVID…at least so far, and school’s been in for 3 months already here), whereas this other opportunity is a county/district level leadership group (literally, it’s purpose is to develop leaders and have them go back to their schools and engage the students in what they’re learning at these leadership summits in order to have an effect on their school communities).
She is shy and incredibly quiet. And she is usually ultra focused on her particular interests to the exclusion of other things. It turns out that the hook for her was that each member of the group gets to develop an initiative that they want to lead at the school, and she had an idea and also got really excited at the prospect of being involved in these change/improvement initiatives for the next 3 years since she LOVES being at a fairly new school (just had their first graduating class last year) and feeling as if that means the school culture/community is still being shaped. That’s been empowering for her. It also didn’t hurt that a teacher nominated her for it - this girl thrives on being recognized by teachers for her contributions, and it gave her some confidence to go for it. She’s made it through the first 2 rounds of the selection process and has the final one on Friday - a group interview. Yikes - for someone as shy as her, this will be a heavy lift, but it’s a good growth experience no matter what happens. They choose 3 sophomores (her class is a little over 300) each year.
Meanwhile, we had the tropical storm come through here last week (Zeta). It resulted in no PSAT (pushed back from this past Thursday to late January) and power/internet/cell service all out for 48 hours. Some of our neighbors fared much worse with trees through their upstairs bedrooms, so we were glad to have only a fence and gutter ruined - husband spent all weekend on repairs. I was definitely glad that S21 had no Nov 1 college application deadlines for which he hadn’t already submitted applications - would have been hard to do without power/internet. I think I saw that Georgia Tech extended their deadline as a result (not a school on S21’s list, but I’m sure there were many kids in that situation here).
I like how this was just mentioned as the start of a list of stuff—bonus points for style.
(And congratulations to you and your family.)
1 Like
We may not know who is going to be president in 2021 but this election has solidified one thing for certain: Thing 2 will be a PoliSci/Gov’t major lol. This kid is fascinated with politics. His AP World teacher just emailed me that he spent all of class talking about the election with her. A couple of weeks ago he texted me in the middle of the school day to ask if I was watching the SCOTUS hearings because he was on his phone.
Lord this child is going to be living with me until he’s 40 lol…he better go straight into a masters degree and find some good internships that lead to jobs because I already have plans for his bedroom once 2023 rolls around!!!
1 Like
S23 just got his pre ACT results. He took it last year as well but fell asleep. A 27 this time which is at least a step in the right direction.
1 Like
@2plustrio That’s a good upward trend (I don’t know what his first score is) - are you going to use any prep programs? I wonder if s21 will take the preACT - I know they took the PSAT last month and we won’t know those scores until December (possibly January after the break). Right now, I am mulling over doing SAT prep - it’s very $$ but because of his ADD and EF issues, I think S21 could benefit from the review and prep. And I’m trying to figure out when to do it - should he do this Spring or Summer? Or should we wait and see how he does on the SAT for a baseline? And isn’t the SAT best for STEM minded individuals? I know he could take the subject tests too This is heavy on mind because of his rank, and I know he wants to do aerospace engineering.
Congratulations!
@Momof3B The majority of my law school classmates were Poli Sci majors so don’t lose hope. 
S23 is also fascinated by politics and has been closely watching the election. There certainly have been some spirited discussions in our house!