Thread 35 - Covid Cohort from GCSE 2020 'What They Did on Their Summer Holidays'

[OrangeCinnamonCroissant]

This is a thread for supporting all young people post GCSEs 2020, regardless of their educational setting. It is respectfully requested that all are supportive and helpful to each other. If you want to start a debate, e.g state vs private, please don't within this thread. Please also be sensitive when responding to threads about grades. It's all relative!
Some of us have been here since first thread back in yr10, some will be new. Everyone has been friendly and helpful in the past. Everyone is welcome. It is hoped this will continue.
Our DS/DD may continue down various pathways ( employment, apprenticeships, higher ed) We have decided for anyone interested they will find a thread within the Further Ed board.
Possibly a move to Parent of Adult Children Board in future? Post Results?

Previous Thread

@Seeline I would be tempted to leave it down & do no food prep until someone gets up to help. Or charge into their rooms bawling at them 😤 ( what I would do more than likely!).

@Cinnamon well done to your DD on getting another job. I hope you've got a mild version of Covid. You must be the last one on this thread.

Sorry to hear about the covid @OrangeCinnamonCroissant . DS and I frequent Fratton Park fairly often, I have sometimes thought it must be a good place for casual work. I guess the hours could be all over the place with functions etc as well as matches.

Piggy - what a nightmare, I'd want to run too. We are all so dependent on our phones even more with two factor authentication for so many things. On my to do list for this summer is to have a mass unpick of all our itunes accounts, all our phones except DS's are on DH's itunes account (going back to the early days of iphones as it was the only way to share apps and music), as are the DCs ipads. We do all have separate itunes accounts its just complicated making sure no one loses eg all their passwords.

Who was it said they went to Iceland 25 years ago, was it you @Seeline ? I went 25 years ago this month on my own with one of the group travel companies and it was just amazing (and we did see puffins).

Shopping with my two today for DH's birthday. We are off to visit DFIL in Birmingham tomorrow.

As regards working, DS has his two volunteer roles, they are both doing pet sitting for family friends, DD still has a paper round, they are both still doing sports and we seem to be away every weekend so they would find it quite hard to fit in. It's getting to the point where its hardly worth it now it feels like. Luckily neither are big spenders as they are very much homebodies.

@EspeciallyDeIighted it was actually 26 years, we went for our honeymoon 😁 We spent just over 2 weeks driving around the whole island. I absolutely loved it - I did a geography degree 😉 Always wanted to go back for our silver anniversary but covid. Couldn't go this year as I didn't want to leave DD mid exams. Maybe next year....

Sorry to hear of covid @OrangeCinnamonCroissant

Took my DS and a friend paddleboarding this morning. Now he's helping DH take things to the tip. Trial work shift on Monday. All sounds good, but...we go away next weekend then he's away pretty much till Xmas! So when exactly he's going to actually work and earn the monies for these trips, who knows? 😮And no he hasn't got any plans /tickets/visas/vaccinations dealt with either. Apparently he'll "do it later, mum" 🤔

It’s not so much the spending now @EspeciallyDeIighted but for spending at uni. DD has about £1700 from child savings and CTF but I don’t think that will last long if DD1 was anything to go by.

Shit - DD just had an email from her insurance choice saying her course has been withdrawn. 3.30, Friday afternoon, 3 weeks before results - thanks very much Kent 😡

Oh no @Seeline - why on earth have they waited so long? What happens now, does she get to choose another insurance (if she wants any of the others that offered) or is she just left with one option?

They've offered up an alternative which she's not interested in, so if she turns that down, she basically has no insurance, and will go straight to clearing if she doesn't make her first choice. She's gutted as her insurance was really achievable.

Hello all - just dipping back in. No news at all here! DD is refusing all mention of results day and has convinced herself that everything went badly exams-wise. I know she found a couple of the papers tough or oddly phrased but there's no way of knowing until the results are out, and I keep reminding her that she was happy (or at least not unhappy!) with the vast majority of her exams at the time.

Looking forward to our holiday and hoping a change of scenery will pull DD out of the doldrums. She hasn't been out with friends at all since prom; she did a month's voluntary work placement which did take up a lot of her time but now that's finished I'd hoped she would socialise and relax a little.

That’s really frustrating @Seeline . I hope she gets the grades for her first choice and it’s immaterial in the end.

We’re just back from axe throwing/archery/crossbow which went down well with ds. Back home tomorrow sadly, and back to my busiest month of the year at work and trying to pack everything up to move in a month. 😬

Sorry to see the woes on here today - sympathy to all those other parents with grumpy, entitled, disorganised DCs - there is definitely a comforting, if grim, solidarity to be had by reading this thread. And @HarrietDVane my DD's view of her results is exactly like yours: at the time they were all "fine" or "ok" (and she is usually a good judge of how she has done) but now if she speaks of them at all (I am not allowed to of course) it is in a much more negative light. I think this is partly missing out on GCSEs and so never having been through the external marking/moderation process before (can she trust her school's marking processes?) and partly the natural tendency of some (including her) to dwell on the known errors. I did ask her whether she was going to look on clearing before 18th (both her offers are very high) as I had taken a very quick look and seen that a couple of other unis she looked at had her course offered) and got such a withering response I haven't raised it since (though she did say that OF COURSE she would be looking at that).

Sorry to hear that @Seeline how frustrating. Not what she needs at all. We looked at going back to Iceland again this year with the DCs but it was prohibitive for four adults.

@Benjispruce4 DS does have more in CTF/savings as I have been putting aside his DLA/PIP for him for years (he has autism and dyspraxia) and covering his additional living costs as part of family spending. He is likely to find it significantly harder than a lot of students trying to either find or hold down part time work while studying so his PIP will really help with that too, takes the pressure off him.

Gosh @Seeline that is difficult. I see to remember we all looked forward to this bit as downtime!

That's so disappointing, seeline. Hopefully, she'll have smashed her grades and won't need a back-up, but that won't be any comfort until the 18th.

Sorry you've got Covid, Cinnamon. I hope it stays low-key.

@Zebracat my 3 dc's never answer the house phone. They answer their own mobiles. If I needed one of them to answer the house phone I've phoned, put the phone down just before answerphone kicks in, then phoned again. By the time I've called back about 6 times, one of them might answer.

@OrangeCinnamonCroissant your new name won't tag. I hope you recover from covid quickly.

@Piggywaspushed I hope the phone and passwords etc can be sorted soon.

@Seeline that's not good news so near to results. Fingers crossed for firm.

Ds1 isn't returning to his temporary job. He's stuck it a full week, which apparently no one else has. I'm sure it was hard work, but I still think he could have stuck it longer. I am sure I was made of tougher stuff at his age.

Ds2 told his boss today he will stay full time until 16th sept. The others all chose the Friday before so they get a week off before university. Ds might move in on 17th but we don't know exact date. So but much time to pack.

Thank you @icanbewhatiwant and everyone else. Feeling OK but super emotional. I haven't watched Neighbours in over 20 years...I can't stop crying at it ...so ridiculous. There are lots of flashbacks to a time when I was a young girl!

I blame the Covid !

@CinnamonOrangeCremeBrulee I'm watching neighbours too. Not seen it for over 20 years. Ds2 is sitting with me, surprised there are people in it that are famous (Margot Robbie and Guy Peace) of course Jason and kylie too.

I'm going to have to see it on catch up - BBQ wrangling! I was an avid viewer in 80/90s. Remember watching Scott and Charlene's wedding in a packed Student Union tv lounge 😆

This thread is so reassuring!
Dd has a job, kind of. It's at subway, but the manager is now on annual leave until the 8th, so she has to go in then to sign a contract. All being well she'll be leaving for uni in the middle of September, so she's probably going to work, very part-time by the sounds of it, for a month. Every little helps I suppose, but it hardly seems worth my effort in all the CVs I sent! Still, at least she's not spending loads of money, her friends are obviously skint as well because they're mostly hanging around in the park.

I'm worried that I feel like I'm micromanaging her a bit at the moment, because if I don't it feels like nothing productive gets done. But I worry how this bodes for when she's at uni and on her own. It will be fine though, I just have to remind myself of when she was 12 and I had to prompt her to brush her teeth every single morning (despite that she'd done it for years without this in primary school) and I seriously worried she'd never be able to live independently - at least we've moved on from that.😂

I mentioned rapidly approaching results day this evening and asked how she was feeling, she said 'excited, but nervous'. When I asked which subjects she was nervous about she said she wasn't sure because she couldn't remember anything about her exams! She's not really talking about uni much, previously she was really excited. Maybe she's in denial about the big changes coming and this is why she seems to have regressed a bit.

The page has crashed 4 times while writing this, so frustrating.

Sorry to hear about difficult situations. I can’t quite imagine DS going off to Uni and not losing everything and actually knowing what he is doing as he seems so young still. He isn’t, was 18 in January but he is very naive and small-townish. Just can’t picture him coping!

He very much enjoyed his mystery shopper working this week and hopefully will get approx £250 for his two days. Unfortunately his swimming assistant job stops during school holidays but he should get quite a few shifts in September before he goes. He has restarted swimming himself over the holidays after over two years away and really wants to compete again at Uni so that’s great. Has been watching the Commonwealth’s and that has reignited the passion again I think. Don’t mind if he doesn’t work in August as he has saved a lot this year and never spends it.

Had to laugh at National Trust visits earlier on thread. DS loves a good castle and gift shop! His one complaint of Lanzarote holiday, which was fabulous, was that there were no museums. But then if he is going to do history I suppose he needs to like a good museum…

Trying not to think about results day. I feel physically sick every time I do.

BBQ seemed to be a success last night, and quite an early finish too as most use the trains and didn't want to get stranded with the strike today (our trains always stop early the day before).

The day has finally come -DD is 18 today! she's my 'baby' so seems very strange 😆

Happy 18th to dd @Seeline !

@craggyrat Ds is intending to study history (with philosophy) at university. He wouldn't go in a museum though, he's not been in one for years. I suggested a museum or castle as a trip out as he was studying history...he said just because I like history it doesn't mean I like museums. I thought he'd want to go. The dc's always moaned as youngsters at visiting NT property or museums so not sure why I thought he might have changed.

Happy 18th to mini Seeline! Hope she has a fabulous day celebrating!

Ive come down with whatever DH has now. I ended up having to take him to the GP on Wednesday, who diagnosed a throat and chest infection, so I’m hoping I don’t get that bad.
DS has been away on an orchestral course for a week and we’re due to watch the final performance of their tour tomorrow, so I want to be week enough for that.

DD went on a date yesterday. She’s being very tight lipped about who with (no one we know, apparently).
Is it unreasonable to ask who/where, for safety reasons? DH and I have no idea what’s intrusive, given she’s 18.
Advice welcome!