<p>What are you all doing with your student's space in the parental nest, now that they've vacated?</p>
<p>D's bedroom is the best room in the house and I've been planning to convert it into my office. Now that I'm back from the launch, I'm not sure I have the heart to do it. I haven't touched the room yet, not even to make the bed. She's given me her blessing to clean, purge belongings, re-arrange, even move her stuff into another room. But I can't, not just yet. She's still so "there" in that room, unmade bed and all.</p>
<p>We didn’t do anything with S’s room. He’s not gone forever, heck he will be home at fall break. And where would he stay over Christmas and summer break? It is still his room, as is, as long as he needs it.</p>
<p>I didn’t change my son’s at all. As many changes as he was going through otherwise, I felt it was important that he have the comfort of knowing home was still the same. OTOH, we know a girl who started taking things out of her sister’s room and rearranging furniture while her sister was still enroute to campus!</p>
<p>There is a whole other thread about this…I think in the Cafe. Maybe these could be merged and this OP could read some great posts (some very funny!!).</p>
<p>We have almost a year before son leaves but my plan is to clear out all the extra clutter, paint, change out some furniture, re-do the bath and just generally make the room look nicer. It will still be ‘his’ room when he is home for holidays and summers but I want it looking decent while he’s not here - more like a guest room and less like a dorm room.</p>
<p>There’s the “totally change it” choice,
there’s the “spiff it up a bit” choice,
there’s the “let the younger sib have a chance at it” choice,
there’s the “make it a shrine” choice.</p>
<p>I didn’t realize which my mother had chosen until my DH and I spent our first night there as newly-weds, and he rolled over in my (lavender and white comforter, eyelet canopy) bed and saw my 24x18 baby picture pinned up on my wall. Along with dried flowers from our wedding table centerpieces… Mom had a lot of pin-hole territory to fill. Let me explain - in HS I made myself a huge floor to ceiling (covered in bright purple burlap) bulletin board that covered the space between door and closet (maybe 8 feet…) The walls were painted Granny Smith apple green and there should have been a huge boston fern in the corner but it died when I left…
This is <em>not</em> what you want your guest room to be. At least clean it up a bit if you will be housing guests there.<br>
D2’s room is still a shambles - crisis comes next week, we are getting new carpet so all the “stuff” will have to be organized…</p>
<p>The plan all along has been to paint and buy a new bed. What has amazed me is my daughter’s attitude toward what the room looks like when she returns for the winter break.</p>
<p>“Mom, do whatever you want. I know its going to be a guest room when I finish college, so go ahead and decorate it that way. Just no flowers, and please put a full-size mattress in there.”</p>
<p>She’s actually quite excited to see the transformation, and wants it to be a surprise. I think she’s actually hoping for a more ‘mature’ look to the room to match her freshly minted ‘adult’ status in the world.</p>
<p>I’m leaving my son’s room alone for now. He just left for his sophomore year. We didn’t do anything to his room last year and don’t plan to do anything with it this year either. In a couple of years we are planning to move. At that time, I will paint and clean it out. Until then I’ll think it’ll stay as is (except I will wash his sheets and make his bed…!).</p>
<p>We left DS’s room alone for the first term – kinda wanted him to feel welcome at Christmas. Since then we’ve decluttered a bit so a guest could be there but it’s still familiar to DS. </p>
<p>My mother rapidly changed my room to her sewing room when I left for college. It was a bit painful to see my teen life erased so quickly. Maybe she was sending a signal that I needed to move on – but I think it might be wise to leave a room for a bit if logistics allow. Next spring your kid will be in a totally different place mentally and it may be a lot easier on both of you to make the makeover then.</p>
<p>My Ds liked it when I decluttered. WHen they come home, their rooms are calm, pretty, easy to relax in. One Ds room has some craft and sewing space for me, but converts easily to “her space” when she comes home, which is about 6 weeks a year. All spread out. I put in flowers, have her favorite tacky magazines ready, her bathrobe, and slippers. She feels right at home, and I try to make it feel a bit resort like for her at the same time- fresh towels, new jammies, candles. IRght now I am looking for fabrics to make her a new quilt for her room at home. </p>
<p>For my other D who just left, I am working with her colors but making it fresh. When she comes home, it will feel like a young lady’s room, respectful of her new status as a college woman. </p>
<p>Painting the old furniture as well. We plan on doing house swaps starting in the next few years, so all we do is geared toward that. Our Ds are cool with the changes, so long as they can come stay with us in Italy, or Chicago, or Spain!!!</p>
<p>D did a massive clean out and declutter over the summer, so it’s staying as is. I will do a deep clean when I get around to it.</p>
<p>Our fourth bedroom upstairs was used by D as a study/computer room until a few months ago when she got her laptop. I plan to get a reasonably priced daybed (if anyone knows any sources, let me know) and put it in there in case she brings a friend home.</p>
<p>I had big plans, finally, to clean his closet, right after he left for college. The transition to college was difficult, in different ways, for both of us. So, for a long time I couldn’t get myself in there to do the task.</p>
<p>I think maybe I should have accomplished it by now. He just started his junior year…sigh!!</p>
<p>I did think perhaps S2 should be offered the room (it was much bigger than his). H thought it should stay as S1’s room. The thought of the furniture moving and painting is daunting, and S2 and D1 don’t seem to mind. However, this is the room with the double bed and DirecTV. Their solution is that they just take over the room whenever S1 isn’t home. Seems to be working. I hope to have the closet cleaned by graduation!</p>
<p>I had big plans to move one of his brothers in there last year, but sending him to school was a lot more painful process than I had anticipated. I couldn’t even contemplate it then.</p>
<p>A year later and it was much easier the second time around, so I’m back to entertaining ideas for that space. I will say that he was here for a month at Christmas, and with the other vacations and the almost four months of summer it’s clear that he’s still going to need some living space for a few years.</p>
<p>I don’t intend to change anything until it’s time to move (about the time DD2 graduates from college). I figure there’s a real chance they might come home after graduation…</p>
<p>Changed it after freshman yr. to be better for guests. Really just rearranged some furniture, threw away some junk (S1 assisted so nothing precious was lost) and bought new bed linens.</p>
<p>S2, a soph, moved off campus this yr. and took his bed and an old recliner fr. his room with him. So his room is really empty. The dog even refuses to sleep in there.</p>
<p>Washed all the linens and blankets and remade the bed. Put up new energy efficient drapes – the room gets a lot of afternoon sun, and it’s hot in the south. Hung up any clothing left out. Plan to dust before he comes home or better yet, the youngest uses his brother’s TV with an Xbox. Maybe he can do the dusting.</p>
<p>We put on an addition to our house last year. S1 got the new bedroom, which is the nicest one of the three for the kids. So the understanding is that S2 will get it when S1 leaves, and then D will get it when both her brothers are gone. I guess the departed kids will get the two smaller bedrooms when they return.</p>
<p>Son’s “room” in our very small house was a loft in the living room. When he went away to college, it went away, too. When he visits, he sleeps on the couch. Daughter’s room was my room before the children came to live with us. Before she leaves for college next fall, she’ll have to pack up everything to go into storage or get sold/given away, because it’ll be my room again. In our household, college is a one way trip out of the house, except for brief holiday visits. No living here over the summer or anything like that. </p>
<p>Daughter and I are <em>both</em> counting down the days until she goes to college. :-)</p>
<p>Why would you change anything in the new freshman’s room? At that point, the kid is still home for four months of long stretches (three in the summer, one in the winter) each year, as well as for shorter breaks.</p>
<p>Perhaps, if a younger sibling has been occupying a less desirable room, a room switch might be in order. But displacing the college student completely seems impractical.</p>