The main thing on my mind, because I just sent the last of them off this morning, is the Halloween care packages I sent to my own three college kids plus several of their college-freshmen friends. The sending-to-their-friends thing is new to me, and came about because Elizabeth has several friends who have become dear to us, and because there were several things I wanted to buy that came in larger packs than I needed. For examples:
(image from Amazon.com)
A four-pack of maple-leaf string lights. You may be thinking “But Swistle: you were sending to three children, and means only one leftover set, and you could surely find a use for that extra set yourself!” Well, TRUE, except: I sent a set of these to William several years ago, so he already has some; but also I found out about these string lights when my friend Surely sent me, by accident, twice as many as she meant to, which was exactly as many as I needed. Still a problem I could cope with, but then there was:
(image from Amazon.com)
A 24-pack of flameless candles, which seemed like they would be fun for dorm rooms that don’t allow flames of any kind. But most importantly, there was:
(image from Amazon.com)
A six-pack of Squishmallow-like small black cat backpack charms. Well, I mean! This was the moment when I (1) decided on approximately six care packages; (2) purchased the six-pack of cats; (3) purchased the candles and the leaf lights; and (4) basically lost control of the situation, because I ALSO bought six bottles of clear nail polish (after trying the nail stickers myself, I would next time go with white nail polish) and:
(image from Amazon.com)
12 sheets of assorted autumnal nail stickers, AND:
(image from Amazon.com)
a 20-piece eye-mask set, AND:
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glow necklaces and glow bracelets, AND:
(image from Target.com)
pumpkin balloons (uninflated), AND:
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pumpkin spice hot chocolate, AND:
(image from Target.com)
cute little baggies to put things into if they seemed likely to spill in a care package (e.g., nail polish, hot cocoa packets).
And of course a bunch of Halloween trick-or-treat candy, which I used to fill in the gaps.
It was a fun and surprisingly time-consuming project. And you might think, reading through the list of things, that the resulting packages would be ENORMOUS and OVERWHELMING, but they were not. However, the pile of things waiting to go into care packages was enormous and overwhelming. I ended up first assembling/sending the packages to my own kids, and then waiting to see if I had the oomph to send out more. Which I did. But I’d say this was a one-time fun thing, and not something I would keep doing again and again for a whole batch of kids. Perfect for a couple of months into freshmen year.
I love the autumn leaf lights and hope the kids enjoy the gifts! I took your recommendation for the lighted white trees about a year ago and haven’t regretted having extra & festive lighting, especially during the dark months. They are now adorned with some homemade colorful leaves.
Concurring with MCW! I bought the battery operated candles you recommended last year and loved them so much I bought a bunch more. SO helpful/cheering when it gets dark early. I might even program some to turn on in the morning before the sun comes out!
I bet the kids will be so pleased!
This is so fun!
What excellent choices!!! I bet everyone will be so delighted.
How FUN! Now to make sure that the recipients all know how to check their mail and that they should be checking their mail….
THIS. (Hi, me as a freshman, who only ever checked my mail when a paycheck was due.)
My mom sent me a little string of skeleton lights in a care package during my freshman year of college, and I still think of them fondly twenty years later. (I actually might even still have them somewhere…)
That’s so awesome!
You are so fun! What a great idea!
How sweet to send it to friends.
This is exactly the content I need on my internet today 🧡
I am very behind on blog reading, but in this case it is okay because I am gathering ideas for care packages to send next year when my oldest heads off to college. I love the idea of sending some to her close friends as well! Can I ask for planning purposes how much it costs to ship one of these packages? I know obviously weight and distance are factors, but just to give me an idea on what I should be expecting next year. Thanks!
Ug so the USPS has decided to be a postal CAPITALIST PROFIT-IS-OUR-GOAL BUSINESS rather than a postal SERVICE as created, so it is more expensive than it used to be when my firstborn went off to college. But the medium flat-rate boxes, which were large enough, were (I am sorry, you should brace yourself) $17.10 each to ship, and in my case two of them could go cheaper by regular priority non-flat-rate rates, but those were still about $13 each.