Nan in Mass Posted November 25, 2010 Share Posted November 25, 2010 And I hope everyone whose children have come home are having a happy time with them. If they are anything like mine, they are tired and stressed out and looking at having to finish up the semester and take finals in three weeks, and may have mixed feelings about being home. Being home reminds them of how much they missed home. Holiday house guests and extended family and inlaws don't help. I have found that a little acknowledgement that this is indeed a stressful situation helps calm mine down. By now (third Thanksgiving with children in college) I have it figured out but it was a bit puzzling at first. -Nan Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JennW in SoCal Posted November 26, 2010 Share Posted November 26, 2010 Kittens and a St. Bernard -- sounds very entertaining!! It was such an odd Thanksgiving for us. My niece who used to come with a friend or two while she was in college has graduated and moved home, so that feels weird. My oldest is working for Disney and has to work the holidays, so it was just 3 of us. So, we went out to eat and enjoyed the Southern California sunshine. Disney took care of all their employees with turkey, ham and all the fixings in the break rooms. He said the crowds were really nice, so it wasn't such a bad thing to be working today. I am especially thankful that he is in such a happy and safe place for the holidays. Moms of active duty military were especially in my thoughts today. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nan in Mass Posted November 27, 2010 Author Share Posted November 27, 2010 Kittens are good. So are St. Bernards. One of my sons isn't here for Thanksgiving. His best friend joined the airforce this summer and can't come home, so my son went down to visit him. They were both very excited about it. It has been over a year since they got together. The last time was when my son finished up his mug month and was finally allowed off campus. -Nan Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nan in Mass Posted November 27, 2010 Author Share Posted November 27, 2010 It's fishers, here. We have coyotes, and they do bother cats, and other things (like my children - sigh), but the main danger to our cats is the fishers. They may eat porcupines and snowshoe hares in the wild, but in the suburbs here, they live on cats and chickens. My oldest's best friend's father got a newfie puppy this fall. My son's dog (a rescued Am. eskimo) wasn't exactly fond of the puppy because the newfies on our street used to pin her down and wash her when she was a puppy, but this vacation when my son went to stay with his friend, she was positively alarmed at how large the puppy now is. Add in the cats and a lot of relatives and I'm sure the pie stage of their Thanksgiving (when my son showed up) was rather interesting. Nothing like yours, though! You do have a houseful, don't you! Goodness! I'll have to tell my youngest about your sheep dogs. He saw some in Europe and was intrigued and wants one. I've been trying to tell him that I think they are a bit to intelligent to make happy house pets, but I don't really know anything about them. Would yours be happy to lead a lazy life? -Nan Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Halftime Hope Posted November 27, 2010 Share Posted November 27, 2010 And I hope everyone whose children have come home are having a happy time with them. If they are anything like mine, they are tired and stressed out and looking at having to finish up the semester and take finals in three weeks, and may have mixed feelings about being home. Being home reminds them of how much they missed home. Holiday house guests and extended family and inlaws don't help. I have found that a little acknowledgement that this is indeed a stressful situation helps calm mine down. By now (third Thanksgiving with children in college) I have it figured out but it was a bit puzzling at first. -Nan You hit the nail on the head. Dd is stressed about having work to do while she is here, sad about her high school friends growing away from each other and "it not being the same" when she is with them, and sad that she misses her college friends and misses the ease of walking out into the hall and being able to find fun. She is also melancholy about the uneasy tension of knowing the *no place* is perfect. Until she actually went to college, it was the utopia she was dreaming of. I reminded her that it is OK to feel conflicted and to love parts of a place qwhile acknowledging the parts that are less than perfect. For her and me, the key is to choose to focus on the good parts with a heart of thanksgiving. Growing up has its sorrowful "reality check" moments, doesn't it? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TravelingChris Posted November 27, 2010 Share Posted November 27, 2010 The situation we had and will have again with number two is that the kids come to a new place for holidays where they hadn't lived before and know no one. With my son, the first year, he was back in Belgium but for the second and third year, we had been moved to FLorida and he never felt at home there. With my next child, we will be moving sometime this summer and probably she will live in our new home for at least a few weeks but that isn't certain at all since we don't know when we will move, when her school will start or what she will do this coming summer. At least this time, we may well be moving back to city she lived in before if to a new home. At Christmas time, she could also visit with a friend she had a long time ago who would also be home from college. So if we move there, she won't feel so lost. But I know my youngest isn't looking forward to it since she has a very negative attitude about that city (she had never really made friends there when we lived there). Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nan in Mass Posted November 27, 2010 Author Share Posted November 27, 2010 That is hard. I went home with a friend one Thanksgiving, the first after his parents had split up. Not being able to find any of the light switches was sort of the last straw. Hugs Nan Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Merry Posted November 28, 2010 Share Posted November 28, 2010 Our fourth ds went away to college this fall. We had planned on meeting him at his oldest brother's house six hours away for Thanksgiving but due to a $400 plumbing emergency, we had to cancel our trip. I had already bought bus tickets for him to go there so he went there anyway even though he was not happy about missing us and we felt the same. But I'm glad that he had the chance to bond with his oldest brother without so much family in the way. And he didn't have to deal with the unease of being back home for only a few days and with the finals hanging over him and trying to deal with his old friends and so forth that Nan mentioned. Nan, you described so well this awkwardness. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gwen in VA Posted November 28, 2010 Share Posted November 28, 2010 My son is spending his junior year at a university in England. His college hosted a Thanksgiving dinner for the American students, complete with turkey and all the trimmings! :001_smile: Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nan in Mass Posted November 28, 2010 Author Share Posted November 28, 2010 Thank you, Margaret. I will go fix my box now. It just has had low priority recently. : ) -Nan Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LuvingLife Posted November 28, 2010 Share Posted November 28, 2010 I hope I don't end up feeling this way when I come home from college. I am already going to miss home even though I haven't even left yet! I hope everyone had a great Thanksgiving, God Bless! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nan in Mass Posted November 29, 2010 Author Share Posted November 29, 2010 Sometimes things are worse in anticipation than in reality. Homesickness especially often seems to work like this. -Nan Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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