Celebrating Your College-Bound Graduate by Cindy Hopper for Alphamom.com #backtocollege

Party & Play

Celebrating the College-Bound Graduate!

This post is sponsored by Target Back to College

It’s graduation season and we are enjoying celebrating our high school grad at events filled with friends, food, fun and gifts. Our son has worked hard and now is ready for a new adventure. It is hard to let him go, but I am focusing on getting him ready, rewarding his hard work and sending him off in style.

Back to the Future

What an amazing journey it has been. How much we have loved watching my son and his friends grow. From little kids eating cupcakes…

and now off to college! These children of ours have so much potential and are blessed with so many gifts. I am so excited to see what life has in store for them.

These boys are still enjoying cupcakes, and I made sure to have cute graduation-themed ones served at our party this past weekend for my son and his fellow grads to enjoy.

College Prep 101

My son will be going out of state to Arkansas for college to study business (he’s an entrepreneur at heart) and needs a few items to keep him comfortable at school. We registered with Target’s Back to College registry so he had a hand in choosing some of the graduation gifts he might receive. The Target College Registry is ensuring he is getting the items he wants… and useful things my husband and I think he really needs. We hope it will make moving-in day easier, so we don’t have to run errands al day and can spend time exploring his campus together instead.

Words of Wisdom

The part that made these gifts extra special was we asked guests to share advice in the greeting cards accompanying the wrapped gifts.

This mini fridge was a generous group gift from a few family friends and the card read “Make sure to fill your fridge with healthy snacks to keep you growing and going!” Nice and practical advice.

I can only hope this is what I will see in this refrigerator when I visit him at college!

Another dear family friend gifted him a Keurig from his registry and recommended that he make his own coffee since it’s less expensive per cup than to buy one at the coffee shop every day. I found this great Graduation Party card box at Target and left note cards out for other party attendees to share additional words of wisdom for our graduate. Coming from me, these words could sound like nagging, but this is practical everyday advice he actually needs to hear. I’m hoping these helpful words are being imprinted on his brain, so every time he uses these items while at college he’ll remember what he read in his graduation cards from the other caring adults in his life.

Guests who didn’t include cards or didn’t buy anything off the registry also shared words of wisdom and advice for my son’s new life at college. While my boy may say that he does not want advice from his mom and dad… he might listen to his more experienced family friends. I found this great Graduation Party card box at Target and left note cards out for party attendees to share their thoughts. I loved reading notes from my dearest friends where they tell my son “to be authentic,” “to follow his dreams,” “to be fearless.” It was also comforting to hear them reminding him to use college as an opportunity, not waste it.

These boys have had a great time and I know they are ready to go…

One thing I’ve learned in raising this graduate… it sure does take a village of family and friends. I hope the one thing he will feel more than anything is that he is loved to the moon and back by his family…always!