Our girl’s moved in

We’re back from Nashville and our girl is officially a college student and all settled in the dorm. I can’t begin to tell you how strange it is to know she won’t be coming home later. I think it will take a little while to get used to our new normal.

I’ll just warn you now that this is going to be a long one, so find a comfy place to sit, grab a snack and come along for the weekend in photos.

So when you move a child to college by plane this is what the baggage situation looks like.

#thankheavensforsouthwest

And this is how you make the most of every inch of suitcase space. I used a lot of these vacuum bags to compact bulky items. There’s a pillow and a bunch of jackets and sweatshirts in this one.

We had three tickets for the outbound flight and two for the return. 

#allthesadfaceemojis

The first two nights we were in a hotel and here we are in the elevator Saturday morning, fresh and ready to start the dorm shopping.

I think our credit card almost melted from over use Saturday.
 #poorkent

This was only one of our stops that day.

The domino’s may seem odd in the cart…they were for our friends we were staying with the rest of the trip. We love us some games!!!

Sunday we went to early church, grabbed some lunch and headed to the dorm to begin the move in.

Welcome to your new home Katie.

 Here’s our blank canvas. The first item on the agenda was to get carpet. There’s a pretty cool deal where some carpet store has left over rolls of carpet that builders order and end up not using all of it. They bring the rolls over and then cut off sections to fit your room. We got a 12 X 14 piece of carpet for $60…pretty good deal if you ask me.

Here’s Kent and our friend Paul carrying it up to the dorm. I should have taken a picture of Kent working on it. He did an AWESOME job of trimming it to fit the room and work around the sink, etc…

If you’ve been reading my blog for any length of time you probably already know that Elam Hall is the same dorm I lived in when I was in college and if that’s not enough, Katie’s room is 2 doors down from my old room.

It’s really fun for me to know where she is and what she’s experiencing (somewhat). The bathrooms have been remodeled but are basically the same and the laundry rooms are still in the exact same places just with newer equipment. I told her it would be a hoot if one day she’s putting a daughter in the same dorm.

#legacy

Katie’s roommate is a really sweet girl and they are getting along great!

#blessing

We got the room all set up and decided they needed some more wall decor and curtains to add some more color so we’d go hunting for that Monday.

Isabel, Hayley, and Katie. Isabel is our friends daughter and she attends a different college and is going to leave to study abroad in Greece soon. How cool is that?

We took the girls to lunch Monday and then started shopping.

If you are lucky enough to have friends that have been with you for lots of years then you’ll be able to understand the relationship we have with this precious couple. They are some of our dearest friends and the people who are kind enough to allow us to stay with them whenever we are in town. We’ve known them for about 19 years and enjoy every single minute we get to spend with them.  When we are looking through old pictures they make lots of appearances and Kent and I can’t help but laugh at how his and Paul’s hair color have changed so much over the years and amazingly mine and Elizabeth’s hasn’t. (wink, wink) They are a lot more salt than pepper these days, but with the salt has come wisdom and experience and those are good things. Here’s a little walk down memory lane.

Nashville 2004

Gatlinburg 2008

Asheville 2008

Williamsburg

Chicago 2011

We don’t discriminate when it comes to the ages of people we like to hang out with. This is another sweet couple from our Richmond days and now they also live in Nashville and we got to catch up with them over dinner Monday night. Leslie and Jason are like a younger brother and sister to us and we just love them to death.
#theyplayspades #jasonthinkshesgreat;)

Now if someone can tell me how we got from these little guys…

First day of 3rd grade and kindergarten.

To these two college kids so fast, I’d really appreciate it.

OKAY, back to the move in…

We found curtains and I cut them off and hemmed them and added lights above Katie’s bed. What did girls used to do in the dorms before twinkle lights? You see them in so many rooms and I have to say they really are cute and add a certain warmth to the room. They still need some wall decorations, but we’ll just keep an eye out for those.

Had to get a picture of the girl and her daddy.

And then came the goodbye’s along with some tears. I was too slow and didn’t get the sweet hug between them.

Katie and her roommate all dolled up. They had a nice dinner for all the incoming freshman and they had to dress up for it. 

This is Katie and who I think you’d consider her new BFF. These girls are not only what Lipscomb considers “legacies”, but their friendship could easily fall into that same category. Here’s what Cassie said to accompany this precious picture on Instagram…

If you had told Kim or myself 25 years ago when we graduated college that we’d be putting our girls in the same dorm, the same year and that they’d become besties like we were I don’t think we could have imagined it. Life’s funny and this is going to be so fun to watch.

I guess you can tell that the weekend went great, we had a ball and the future is wide open for Miss Katie. We couldn’t be more proud or happier for her and the experiences she will have in the next four years. My memories of my time at Lipscomb are among some of my favorite and now both of my kids are there making new memories of their own.

#fullcircle 

Happy Monday friends!

Lisa

XOXO