You probably want something that has avocado or olive oil or sea buckthorn oil or murmuru butter as its base rather than beeswax, but none of those are going to last for hours. You do too much with your mouth (eat, drink, talk) for that to be the case. Silicone makes stuff slippery, petroleum bases help seal in moisture, as do waxes---when you move to healthier products, you just trade off that they don't last as long. The cheapest, cleanest thing you can do if all you're looking for is hydration is just to put some coconut oil or coconut butter on your lips a few times a day. If you're wanting a decent tint, look at Honest Beauty's products--but they don't feel super soft and lush to me.

I have a stuffed dog. He is the perfect height to lay my right arm on with a slightly bigger head to rest my hand on. I've had issues with carpal tunnel before, and this is the most comfortable that right arm has been in years - slightly tilted up/elevated with the perfect inverted bowl shape to drape my hand over.

Honestly I think the Rhetoric sequence will more than prepare for college level writing. I would continue to do what you are doing and just read and discuss literature on the side. You could assign a literary essay per semester and if you feel uncomfortable giving feedback, hire a tutor for several sessions to work through with her. I think Cindy Lange at Integritas does some tutoring. If you really want another class, look at CLRC lit classes (not the Great Books program). They used to not have a lot of assigned writing. But before signing up, I would ask for a syllabus to make sure workload isn’t crazy. It’s been a while since my kid took them. Stay away from Great Books. It’s nuts from the workload perspective.

You have made things complicated.

Blistex. It's the only thing that works for me, and it's great.

Honestly, until you get a grip on what exactly it is you are reacting to, I would avoid restaurants altogether. There are too many weird things that go on. And, I say this as a person who grew up with almost no allergies and developed some very serious ones well into adulthood. Until you have epipens, only eat at home. You can go from fine to code blue worthy in as little as a minute, and if you don't have epipens, you aren't necessarily going to be ok waiting for an ambulance. I will also say that allergies can be like a bucket. I am much more likely to have serious reactions to foods when my overall allergy bucket is full. Right now is a terrible time for me, so I'm being very careful to eat at home to avoid even a slight contamination. (And, relatedly, lettuce cross reacts in people with birch allergies.) If you have a true and serious sulfite allergy, you need to know. Avoid grapes, dry gravies and most sauces, maraschino cherries, pickled onions, dried fruits, and a long list of other stuff (google for high sulfite foods) until you can get in for testing. I really hope you don't have a sulfite allergy, for real, but don't assume it is just lettuce until you get tested. Also, if you aren't well versed on food allergies, do a bit of reading. Anaphylaxis is very different from the standard sniffles and hives that a lot of people have with seasonal stuff. For the first few years, I really disbelieved I was having anaphylactic reactions. Like, my brain would not compute it. Dh would have to prompt me with epipens. I now know not to trust my brain but to look for the symptoms in my body. But, just on the off chance your brain places denial games with you also---do a bit of reading.

My son is finishing up 9th grade. This year for English credit, I had him take Rhetoric Writing 1 with WTMA, work through a list of books (focusing primarily on ancients such as The Odyssey) that we frequently discussed, and finish up his formal vocab study (Vocab from Classical Roots). We did extensive grammar study in the earlier grades so we only did necessary review as things came up. Anyway, as I plan 10th grade, I am planning for him to take Rhetoric Writing 2, but I would also like to incorporate more formal literature study. I want to be sure he can write a solid literary analysis / critique. I have been looking at different curriculum pieces, but nothing is jumping out at me as the right fit. I want to be gentle (as he will be doing a good bit of writing for his rhetoric class in addition to algebra 2 and chemistry), but I also want to make sure he is ready for college level writing (possibly planning to DE in English comp during his junior year). I have an engineering background, so though I am capable, I don't consider myself as particularly strong in literary analyses as I haven't done tons of it. So, I need a bit of help in teaching it. Recommendations, anyone?

Prayers for quick relief and a good trip.

double post, sorry internet has been hiccupy today here

(( I'm so sorry. )) Talking to someone sufficiently skilled... with whom you get to a relationship of trust... who then is able to push you a little bit (but not too much or too early or too fast) further/harder/into places than you'd be inclined or able to go on your own... and is able to pierce through the defensive armor you cannot help but put on... along with applying particular tools/ methods/ approaches... ... enables you to work out how to better respond YOURSELF to facts that can't change. But you have to be ready. You have to want it. Premature therapy is vanishingly unlikely to do much because ( ellipsing only because every recovery journey is different, and people respond differently to therapy and medication and other tools and sheer time; but this is a wonderful image of the GOAL ) CBT v DBT (behavioral "tools") v other analytical methods of how to confront disordered patterns I also have found a mostly CBT-leaning approach to be very helpful. I know many others for whom a more DBT-leaning was the one. Based on my personal circle, I wonder if there's maybe a "fit" issue where folks who think more analogously/metaphorically/systems-y find the CBT "framing" stuff helpful, and those who think more linearly and concretely find the DBT tools more helpful. But in any event. It starts with finding a skilled person with whom you can get to a relationship of trust. And who can read your (inevitable, none of us can help it) defenses for what they are, and figure out a way to move forward nonetheless. (( good luck. )) I also really wish I'd tried seriously, which -- fair warning, and, I do understand how very hard it is to work through this when you're under water and impaired -- included several rounds of finding a person with the right fit, years earlier.

Chiming back in re: immigration---I mean, realistically, with the amount of global warming that is already baked into the system: Copernicus's sea temperature graph--look at the 2023 and 2024 numbers: https://climate.copernicus.eu/copernicus-february-2024-was-globally-warmest-record-global-sea-surface-temperatures-record-high the reality that we are currently on the RCP 8.5 climate change path, with AMOC signaling it is more likely to collapse in the next 10 years, and that that will bring with it significant sea level rise, coupled with the information from the fifth national climate assessment https://nca2023.globalchange.gov (funded by congressed, information processed by NOAA, we're not talking quackery science here) We're looking at some very serious issues. Agricultural yields are going to drop--probably by at least 30% globally---overnight temperatures aren't going to allow soy seed pods to form, or wheat to head in those key windows. Moisture levels are going to become more chaotic with longer stretches of drought and more intense rainfall. Saltwater infiltration as sea level rise causes freshwater tables to be infiltrated with salt water, making it unsuitable for people or plant or animal use.... Reduced ocean yields of food as we see more anoxic patches and food chain collapse Increased utility instability as demand for electricity goes---data centers aside, just sheer air conditioning demand as well as potable water shortages---but also problems along coastal areas from sea level rise, knowing also that the demand for transformers is pushing a couple of years out and that we're lacking key metals to be able to do a full green energy transformation increased hiccups in global shipping, particularly along river fronts and canal passages (Danube and Mississippi were both affected last year, as well as Panama canal), as well as ports that are going to be affected by sea level rise Like, it's a long and cascading list of failures we're tipping into.....we need reduced population numbers AND we need to try to maintain some sort of stability as well. I think, globally, we've been focused on all of the wrong things....and I think to some degree in a FAFO scenario, having FA for 40 years and not only not fixed our environmental problems but have made them exponentially worse we're going to have a really unpleasant FO era. Life will continue, but I'm not at all convinced that even half of human life is going to be around at 2100.

Hope you feel better soon Mercy!

It’s been 16 years. Here is the link https://www.irs.gov/credits-deductions/individuals/child-tax-credit. You can do it either way. We had our employer take out less each paycheck by lowering our deductions. Other people like getting money back. There are other credits low income folks can take ( and medical care and supplemental mental food benefits)

My favorite: Badger sunscreen lip balm

I hope you get rid of it quickly!

What a terrible doctor! This reminds me of a time when I chaperoned my dd's class for a field trip. Dd was fine when I left her at school after the field trip, but an hour later she spiked a fever and had terrible pain. I took her right to the doctor because the pain was so severe and it was an ear infection. She was 100% fine until she was miserable.

I thought it was a fairly widespread approach, so I'm not surprised that the USA has found some way to reduce the expense of parenthood. It's interesting that the USA does it as tax credits -- Does that mean lower deductions off every paycheck (more per month) or a bigger tax refund (once per year)? Are the credits 'worth more' to people in higher tax brackets than lower ones? I suppose that parents who don't make enough money to pay significant taxes get other low-income targeted benefits of some kind? I wonder what the pros and cons are for making it a tax-reduction strategy over a direct benefit strategy. (Just general curiosity -- no need to answer if you don't know off the top of your head.)

I hope it passes soon and easily!

I loved this when we were in Canada. However, practically speaking, there were tax credits when we moved to the states that weren’t there in Canada that ended up amounting to the same amount of money. I had been concerned about the loss of the supplements and that we’d have less money, but it really was quite equal.

Oh, ouch. So sorry you’re going through that right now. Hoping it passes easily and soon!

I've had lots (and lots) of kidney stones over my lifetime, but I really need to get rid of the current one quickly. DH and I are taking a mini-road trip tomorrow and I have to go; it isn't optional. I'm really not looking forward to a long drive with this thing still inside. I have hope that the end is in sight (worsening discomfort and blood in my pee). Please pray / send good thoughts that it will come out soon. My last one was massive so I am a bit nervous. Thank you, friends.❤️

All packed. Grabbing a nice salad at Chopt before I head out. It’s hot outside!

What must be done will be done. All of a sudden, certain news outlets will shut up about "invasions" and start running stories about how immigrants have revitalized X area or X industry. We could fix the problem pretty much instantaneously if we attached criminal penalties to employers who fail to use E-verify, and yet we don't. There's a reason business likes unfettered illegal immigration and the wage suppression it brings. If it becomes too politically volatile a topic, we'll see a "solution" and it will drop out of the news. I'm really cynical about this particular issue. I think a lot of ethnic groups are going to be subsumed into "whiteness" just like the Irish and Italians and Jews and Poles were. Isabel Wilkerson's book, Caste, is a thoughtful reflection on this tendency. I wish that we could just include everyone and maybe the Zoomers and Alphas will do better than we did. This remains to be seen. I think it's important to distinguish between overall growth and per capita growth. I don't think we're necessarily headed to a drop in per capita growth. Realistically, we have to reduce human population. We're stressing the planet's ability to carry us. We can do this the easy way with a drop in birth rates or we can do this the hard way with a new Black Death. I'm actually impressed with our innate ability to regulate our birth rate in accordance with our environment. Malthus really was wrong!

Don’t beat yourself up over it. I took my three year old to pediatrician the day she complained about her ear and woke up with fever. She had had a mild cold, but seemed normal and energetic in days prior to ear issue discovery. She ran, climbed and did normal tot activities. The pediatrician we saw that day jumped onto me and said there was no way she had just came down with the infection and was quite intimidating , just stopping short of accusing me of neglect. Never returned to their practice again. That ear infection was only one she ever had.

No, I like Julia Marie. https://www.juliamarielopez.com. She is so sweet and encouraging.