College Bound

First Child Off to College

My oldest daughter turned our favorite show on today, Gilmore Girls. We’ve watched it ten times through I’m sure, and sometimes it’s comforting to put it on in the background. Ironically, it was the episode where Rory goes to Yale and depicts her move in day. It almost brought me to tears because my daughter, too, will be moving into college this fall.

The only difference is, she won’t be a couple hours away as Rory was from her mom. She’ll be approximately 16 hours away. Almost two days’ travel time if we were to drive and a hefty penny if we were to fly. I know there are other families whose kids go off, way off, to college, but it makes me wonder how well the mommas fare. I’m only a little bit nervous about how well I will take it… So far my mantra is, “If she’s happy, I’ll be happy.”

Best Advice

A good friend of mine who has had two kids go to college and is now on her third moving out this fall, gave me some good advice. She told me that to prepare for her first child’s college debut, she was told to picture her home without him there. Walking through what the day to day would be like without him home.

Subconsciously, I have already started to do that. I’ve pictured what her room will look like when she moves out. (One of our other kiddos will move in because we have two that share a room.) I’ve pictured what our driveway will look like when her car is no longer there, where I’ll store her things that she doesn’t take to college, and our game room with a daybed replacing the lego table under the little picture window. Hopefully it will be inviting enough that she’ll like it when she comes back home.

Now we are preparing for her move-in day, gathering dorm decor and supplies. This process helps me to get used to the idea of my daughter moving away. I’m excited that she’s excited about the coffee maker, comforter and sheet set, space saving hangers, and mini vacuum. Like I said before, “If she’s happy, then I’m happy.”