FRESH START

Right before your eyes your little boys and girls have grown into young men and women and, before you know it, will head off to college. As eager as they are to get out of the house, whether they admit it or not, the creature comforts of home will help make the transition into dorm life a little easier. So why not help give them a fresh perspective by sprucing up their dorm room. As a Freshmen in 1991, I headed to Ikea with my roommate, Chris, and with a screwdriver and $150.00 we transformed (what we thought was) a prison-like room into a comfortable, unique pad (we purchased a loft bunk bed, used the existing mattresses and found a cheap carpet remnant at a local carpet store). The market is saturated with innovative, inexpensive, functional designs for teenagers, from Pottery Barn's teen division (http://www.pbteen.com/) to Target (the dorm collection), it's easy to breathe fresh air into an old room. So, for their Freshman year, start them off with a fresh start and watch the evolution of the traditional dorm room go from drab to fab!

FRESH BEGINNINGS:

PB teen has great color schemes for rooms, inexpensive sheet sets and fun wall decorations. Target also has inexpensive "beds in a bag" for under $30.00 in fun colors and patterns. Some of my favorite quick tips for dorm rooms are the peel-and-stick cork board tiles from Staples and Office Depot (come 4 in a pack, easy to peel and stick for $9.99) for message keeping or use chalk board paint, paint a 2' square, nail a wood frame or glue ribbon around as a fun border for keeping track of class schedules. My latest hot find...after pulling an all-nighter, wake up with fresh cereal. You can't control what they eat, but you can make sure it's fresh! Target's "fresh cereal dispenser" for $19.99 keeps cereal fresh longer and looks cool!

TIME TO COMPLETE TASK: Five minutes

COST: $19.99 at Target or http://www.target.com/

STRESS LEVEL: Starting the day with a fresh idea: LOW