I always try to find out what college the graduate is going to and give a sweatshirt from that college as my gift. It is always a big hit!

We're honoring our son's interests at his party for family and family friends. He's headed off to Los Angeles to try to break into show business. So his party will include boxes of popcorn and other movie treats. And we'll have a video playing clips from his stage performances over the years. We chose to have an adult-friendly open house in the afternoon, freeing our son up for the evening celebration sponsored by the school.

We won't have a problem with rowdiness because the crowd will include family and family friends and will occur in the backyard on a sunny afternoon.

Have a theme and more to do than sip soda and dance. ave photag and maybe a casino, or maybe like Epcot have different "countries" to visit around the venue where you can get a passport stamped as a souvenir. Definitely have a virtual place to share Ipods or plug in to World of WarCraft...attempt to have something that is a draw to as many aspects of your graduating class demographic as possible to INCLUDE as many folks as possible in the night and the memory that will be created for a lifetime. Even if the class nerd is there surfing thr web all night next to his bud, he was there....and that is what its all about in 30 years....

Middle School graduation parties are great at the beach!

Beach parties!

When my son graduated from high school last June, we had a small private dinner for the grandparents the day after graduation. The grandparents are just old enough they wouldn't appreciate noise and activity and I would rather keep the two groups separated to make it easier to concentrate on each group.

For our friends, and my son's friends, we invited everyone over for a Sunday afternoon. I can't imagine it getting rowdy since families were invited, and I know the families attending. I think the key is to invite people you'd trust in your house, make it clear it's a supervised event, and keep the guest list manageable.

As for gifts, most people asked what to give to him, and I suggested things that would be helpful to help him furnish his dorm. Some people took it to a really neat extreme and created fun "midterm/final packages" that included small gift cards to Starbucks, his favorite fast food, 12 packs of his favorite soda, and plenty of really nice advice. He's still gradually working through them, almost a year later.