The holiday season is coming up, so you know what that means... home sweet home! Here are a few of the many things to look forward to:

1. Getting to eat edible food

Just when you think you might barf if you have to eat dining hall food one more time, break rolls around. Whether it’s your mom cooking your favorite meal for dinner or eating out at your favorite restaurant, during break you dine like a king. After eating microwaveable mac and cheese for three months straight you have a new found appreciation for everything you eat at home.

2. Sleeping in your bed

No matter what fancy XL-Twin mattress topper you invest in, your bed at college will always pale in comparison to your bed at home. When you’re back in your childhood bedroom you can’t help but feel cozy, safe, and at ease. Every single pillow and blanket seems a thousand times softer and comfier when they’re in your bed at home.

3. Cuddling your pets

Quite arguably the best part of being home is being reunited with your furry pal. Even after forcing your parents to show them on Facetime every night, your pet will always be the family member you miss the most. With one cuddle from your wet-nosed ball of fluff, all of your stress from college instantly melts away.

4. Experiencing nostalgia

Whether it’s driving past your middle school reminiscing about your hardcore Belieber days or walking around your house all day in your old Spongebob pajamas, getting nostalgic when you’re home is inevitable. Being back home, you can just pretend you’re back in fourth grade watching Lizzie McGuire and munching on Dunkaroos without a care in the world.

5. Being able to sleep in

As a college student, one of the best feelings ever is going to bed with no alarm set on your phone. When you’re home, there’s no annoying 8:30 a.m. lecture to trudge to, so you can sleep for as long as your body would like to, even if that may be 15 hours. But fair warning, there’s a high likelihood that your mother will decide that 8 a.m. is a perfectly appropriate time to vacuum the entire house.

6. Catching up with old friends

Getting back together with old pals from home is so important to do while you’re home for break. The best is when you can automatically resume your friendship from where you left off as if you hadn’t just been apart for 6 months. And you can’t forget to gossip about old classmates to find out who’s doing what and more importantly if anyone is pregnant yet.

7. Being in your hometown

Even if you couldn’t stand your town when you still lived there, when you come back to it after being away, everything about it just feels nice and homey. Little things about your hometown that you could care less about before, you now find charming and endearing. You start appreciating small things that you hadn’t realized you missed. Except for traffic, traffic will always suck no matter what.

8. Going shopping

There’s something about being home that makes you lose all regard for being fiscally responsible. Somehow being under your parents’ roof again makes you feel like you’re also spending out of your parents’ pocket again. No matter how penny-pinching you are at school, when you’re back home all bets are off. We all know the struggle of coming home with one suitcase and then leaving home with three and a duffle bag.

9. No laundry

Let’s be honest, most college students become professionals at not doing laundry until the last minute – or the last pair of underwear. If you’re lucky enough while you’re home your beautifully gracious mother will bless you by cleaning your clothes for you. But just for the record, they will likely get mixed in with the rest of your family’s clothes and you will inevitably find your dad’s sock in your suitcase when you’re back at school.

10. Reuniting with the family

And last but most certainly not least, there’s nothing quite like the feeling of having the fam back under one roof again. Even if that entails your family telling you that you got fat or listening to a laundry list of your sibling’s accomplishments, it still feels good to be reunited. There is usually a no-fighting period for the first 24 hours of being back together, but after that, you can expect the usual bickering to resume. But after all, there is no better feeling than being surrounded by your loved ones once again.

So enjoy your time at home and treasure every moment you spend with your family, even the not so pleasant ones.