2017 seems so long ago, now they're fledgling graduates.

[latedecember1963]

4 years since A Levels and the wait for August and confirmation of where our chicks were about to fly the nest to.
It's been 4 years that has sprung a few surprises along the way, not least this lovely series of threads.

SMaCM, I hope your DD feels better for having made her decision. She's had a really rough time; I remember you telling us about her not being able to access essential textbooks as one example.
Hopefully a job will give her a chance to get back her equilibrium and think about what she wants to do long-term.

Yes - no library books, no lab time, no face to face lectures, no meeting her course mates, cocktail bar where she worked closed. Not a great year.

But as the song goes - Things can only get better.

That's really tough @SMaCM. I hope your dd is feeling a weight is lifted now she's made her decision. I agree that health is so so much more important than the letter B or M after a name. Will she be staying in her uni house or coming home? I hope you keep us updated on what she does next. So many of them are in such a state of flux at the moment between uni life and working life,

Sorry to our daughter has had it so tough SMaCM , it’s been awful for so many students this year with so little support.

DS is incredibly stressed at moment, dissertation due in on Tuesday, and he had lots of issues over Easter with his laptop breaking , the old spare laptop not having the software he needs etc.

I’ve been chief proof reader and recipient of rants and stress for last month or so! I will be glad to see the back of the dissertation.

He’s desperately trying to maintain his average , last year was 73% this year is 70% so far - so on the fringes of a 1st.

Graduation dates announced this week as last week of July which is later than normal as they need to do all last years students as well - full 3 weeks of graduations over the summer - all being held in a marquee on 1 of the sports pitches.

Good luck o he read daughter. She will be doing in Scotland the equivalent of the course my sons are doing in England in September too - currently (although the English system is about to change to an extent) that is the Legal Practice Course year followed by the 2 years of training (so not too different from Scotland). My daughter had a very good friend when she was about 5 - 10 who left their school then. I'd like to know what she ended up doing. I suppose if I used facebook and could remember names I could look them up... although never did what I did about 13 years ago - daughter was moving departments at her law firm and mentioned name of her new boss. I spent about 1 second looking at his linkedin profile but that alerted him to it and he mentioned it to her. It was fine but I never did that again and I put all my linkedin settings to just about the most private you can have. I was not even particularly interested in that person- it was just a departmental move.

I hope the SMaCM daughter feels better. Sometimes just taking a decision makes people feel better whatever it might be. it has been a very hard year for many although I think not too bad for may 2. One called yesterday whic he does from Bristol on his way back fro the shops when bored I think.... he was happy (as would anyone with all exams for this year over and with zero to do until September) although as ever not seeking out useful work experience. He and I have been trying to find out if the course he and his twin are doing in September has been 100% online this academic year. I found a few youtube videos of people doing it (keen girls on how to do really well and laid back boy on how to do as little as possible and pass......) and they were online. The exams were more supervised than my twins had this year - so webcam on all the time, very hard to get a bathroom break, sound on int he room, timed, we think no cutting and pasting despite being open book, but does not sound too bad. For post grad not having to spend 2 hours a day commuting into London is not all bad although it means you don't get to know the others.

We shall see. My daughter was saying when she did the same course she would leave here around 7.30am 4 days a week. for me of course the girls were out of the house too (where I work) so I suspect this academic year will be yet another with people (gorgeous childlren but huge people) under my feet.....jsut did my weekly cleaning and I have had ONE week with no one here and it was so easy...... apparently the non Bristol twin is back on Monday. I do realise other mothers weep tears at being separated from their chilren so I am in a special category of enjoying empty nest. May be I am some kind of wicked carrion crow and the other mothers are cute mother hens.... or perhaps because I had our first in 1984 it has just been quite a long haul. It is interesting having them home. It is fine really, just harder work for me.

I am glad people are getting graduations. I think the twins will have to give up on that (graduated last year and beem doing law conversion course this year). i did do fake photos of them in my old gown and hood from 1982 so at least we have something I suppose.

DD has managed to secure 2 jobs to start on 17th May (a bar and a restaurant). She was even able to choose her favourites. So hopefully the rent will get paid and all will be well. She seems quite positive about it all.

Ah, that's great, SMaCM! I know it's not how she expected this year to go, but it's a start of a new direction.
Our DS1 had to take a major "detour" in his life path 9 years ago. At the time he was just exhausted with trying to make what he was doing work and we were increasingly worried about the toll it was taking on him.
Although he'd still prefer not to have gone through it, he says that it made him realise that changing tack isn't always a bad thing.
It made him very protective of his brother when he 1st went to uni and I know he still keeps a weather eye on him.
Hope everyone's having a good BH. We've escaped to our caravan on Anglesey where the skies are blue and it's warm and sunny. A vast improvement on the sleety rain I drove through past Stockport yesterday!
We seem to have been adopted by a rabbit and her kit. Very cute.

Brilliant news @SMaCM, well done to her.

DS has resumed studies after his Easter break and is planning his dissertation.

I'd forgotten it was a BH till my boss mentioned it. As the people I work with are in the US I usually take a different day off - the roads and things to do are best avoided on BHs imo. Anglesey sounds wonderful though.

3 exams down, 3 to go. DH persuaded the bloke at the house behind us to delay chainsawing and chipping a tree during one!

Aw, I Iike that your neighbour did that Errol and also that your DH asked him. 🙂

Yes, it was decent of them - but it did sound at least as bad as a pneumatic drill.

Lovely rabbit. We never seem to get them around here. There are loads of squirrels in the garden and foxes and at various times of year muntjac deer even but not rabbits. I suppose that may be simply because all the foxes would eat them.

We get quite a few rabbits here (we back onto a nature reserve). They never come into the garden though, strangely.
I've just spent a nice hour watching the local wildlife, mainly squirrels and birds today. 🙂

There used to be a lot of rabbits around here, we had a couple of years when we had kits in the garden - unfortunately quite a lot fell foul of the main road, and a few to a local cat. But I think they may have succumbed to a disease, I believe there was some sort of myxomatosis outbreak a few years ago. There are a few, just not in the same numbers and I've not had any in the garden for some time.

I've seen a hare in the lane at the other end of the village though.

I love seeing them in the countryside. We live opposite woods but are in suburbia.
One twin is back today. I spoke to the other one who is in Bristol yesterday - he had had an early start (paintballing for someone's birthday which is outside so I suppose is now open) and had to go to a birthday thing that night ( and said it was impossible to turn down invitations as everyone knows he has finished this year's course entirely. He was tired and has been sleeping 11 hours at a time. Perhaps having to do things outside is more tiring than inside. Anyway I am sure he can catch up on sleep and he sounded happy

Hope all well with everyone and the dissertation submission went to plan on Tuesday, Eve.
DS2 is similar to your son in being on the fringes of a 1st. I don't remember being aware of my precise averages etc during my degree and nor were my friends. We obviously had a rough idea from our essay marks. I was the 1st in my family to do A Levels and higher education so I wasn't as clued up as this generation are.
It's all go here today. DH has just dropped DS1 at hospital to have a broken collar bone set as his fiancee doesn't drive.
He'll be collecting him later to get him home again as I need to take my MiL to an audiology appointment.

Sorry about the broken bone late. One of my sons did not get his first last year by a small margin but never mind - it can be a bit unpredictable. A 2/1 is fine. My first job was conditional on a 2/1 and only a third of people in 1982 got a 2/1 or higher so it was touch and go but thankfully I got it. i still have some hand written letters from my very helpful personal tutor at university which I scanned last year about the 2/1 issue and what I would need to do to make sure I achieved it.

One of mine is doing his first Linkedin profile today (about time) and then taking action on law job applications I think. Both are home so I can help if needs be. His twin had a zoom or telephone appointment with his law school's careers people to go through his CV and offer advice which he said was useful. He also found he could still use some of his university's careers help too even though he has finished there. As my 2 are free until September's course starts there is no excuse for not doing job applications for jobs from 2022.

DDs finals are all done now, as are her housemates - she had a long chat with her phone in one hand (periodically focussed on the dog) and a large glass of Malbec in the other. DH is taking her back on Sunday, we'd hoped to take her for a good walk tomorrow but the forecast is very wet.

DH woke at 5, so DD is delivered back already and he should be well on his way home (though he may have stopped for a nap in the car somewhere).

I went for a walk and bumped into a couple whose DD went to the same primary as mine - nice to hear how she, and a few others they'd kept in touch with were doing.

DD starts her new cafe job today. She's glad to have something to pay the rent bills for the rest of the year while she plans her future. She also has a graduation date for July which she's really pleased about. It's the day after she returns from a holiday she's booked with friends, so that was lucky.

That's good! Hope she enjoys the job.

DH has booked us a hotel for DDs graduation dates, in the hope that there's something for parents but I suppose at least we can see her outside somewhere.

I always wonder what the deleted posts are. I am glad some people are managing graduations and people are getting jobs. My son's girl friend has found a week's legal work experience and my son was just in here with some legal questions for a paralegal exercise which is massive 28 pages of instructions just for a non qualified job (30k) , not even a trainee solicitor job. He was doing well with it and I was no help I think.

His brother returned to Bristol yesterday after a long weekend here. I think he is enjoying his last of 4 years i n Bristol with all his friends but finding the tiny bed room, noise outside, lots of things still closed and friends very busy with finals a big contrast to the relative luxury of being home but he definitely wants this last chance of time in Bristol to end of term so I certainly don't mind if he pops home occasionally. Second daughter is enjoying married life and off to get her passport/driving licence photo today - she is moving things over to married name as it's simpler as did her sister (and indeed did I, although I certainly understand why lots of women want to keep their own name). I have ordered some of the wedding photos and a lovely big wedding album similar to the one I bought when my older daughter married so I will enjoy putting the photos in there when they come.

I think there was a massive spam attack across the site. Lots of deletions across various threads.

Fingers crossed for parents attending graduation Errol. 🤞 Last I heard, DS said theirs were cancelled. 😟

Hope your DD's first day has gone well @SMaCM.