I started playing with Wordle, this cool word cloud-generating website this weekend and pretty soon, I was churning out more wordy pencil cups than I knew what to do with! It's ridiculous fun and wildly addictive - and a perfect little activity to add to any graduation party or dorm craft party. You can customize it to suit, using music words, science words or college freshman lingo. You'll notice I made the word "study" really, really big. We moms can hope, right? :-)

If you have a serious musician at home, then you know - marching bands are prized by football fans and teens who love getting out there to play with friends. But teens and 20somethings (and 30somethings) with an eye on the concertmaster chair (or an aria on the stage of the Met) are in the market for something very different. So here's the scoop on the 10 best music conservatories in the U.S. - the Juilliards of the West and East Coasts. Among them, a school that offers a full ride to every student and a conservatory with a hip hop major.

Psst, if you're looking for Peabody or Eastman, you won't find them on this list - they're on next week's university/music school lineup.

Everyone around your kid may be reveling in college acceptances and housing contracts, but it's not too late to still apply for fall as a transfer or incoming frosh at - amazingly - 375 U.S. colleges, including the University of San Diego in California, Agnes Scott College in Atlanta, Georgia, and Evergreen State College in Olympia, Washington, which was dubbed one of Loren Pope's 40 colleges that change lives. The National Association for College Admission Counseling, which says that's a huge increase over last year's 279, has posted the full list here, and it's searchable by state.

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Cupcakes are always crowd-pleasers at graduation parties, but there are other ways to fill out that dessert buffet too, from baskets of plump, ripe strawberries, to colorful homemade marshmallows, decorated cookies and these ridiculously cute mortarboard candy pops, inspired by Bakerella blogger Angie Dudley. Here, mini-Reese's Peanut Butter Cups and Ghirardelli chocolate squares play the role of classic graduation hats, balanced atop lollipop sticks.

Related posts:

• Tips on Planning the Perfect Graduation Party
• Graduation Cupcake & Dessert Ideas
• Graduation Ceremony Survival Tips