I have written a lot about last times!  Now I get to write about a First!  A new beginning.  My son starts college this week.

We deliver him to Juniata College on Saturday for Inbound”, a 4-day freshman workshop.

I’m excited for him.  I know he will do well in college and each  time he comes home I will see a new level of maturity and confidence.

He is majoring in International Studies and will be studying abroad during his junior year.  So even a bigger separation on the horizon.

Things will be different for all of us!   Our nice little family will be forever changed.  Seems like it has been the three of us forever (and we loved it that way!)  and now it will be just the two of us on most days.

So it will be a new beginning for all of us!  A chance to reframe all of our relationships and our family dynamics.

More time for doing personal things and maybe just relaxing, but an adjustment none the less. Especially when I was happy with the way things were.

I have so many mixed emotions.  Happiness for him, sad things have to change, excitement for the new challenges ahead for him, sadness that I won’t see him every day, thrill he has the opportunity to attend a top notch school and earned a scholarship, but sad it means the end to life as we have known it for 18 years.

I wish my son continued academic success and a steady thirst for knowledge.  Can’t wait to see what all he accomplishes and does with his life.   But I will miss him terribly!

****Note to Neal……Just in case you read my blog….As we celebrate this new beginning, always remember our history together as a family and know you are and always will be an important part of our family.  You make us smile, laugh, and feel so proud.  We love you always to the moon and back!

We can all have “new beginnings,” actually every day is a  new beginning.  How do you celebrate new beginnings?