I'm leaning towards sending the RSVP card back with a short note. My kids aren't 'in' the wedding - my sister had the good sense not to expect that. RSVP yes for dh and I. Dear sis, so pleased for you and dp! We have decided not to bring the kids, I'm sorry to disappoint you but we feel it is for the best. {We will head home early from the reception too, as we'll have a bit of a drive, so please don't count us for expensive meals!} Not happy with this wording...

Thank you. Actually I'm a giant PITA, I haven't been faultless in this whole mess. I'm trying but it's hard and I just want to cry and eat mars bars...

The only thing that would appease her is if I divorced my husband - she put that in writing for me, twice.

The only thing that works with my mother is... total capitulation? ?

Sorry, I know this is getting self indulgent of me now, but I'm dealing with lots of emotion over this. Thank you all for helping me see clearly. It is also a lot of losing my family sadness, some of which is my own fault. Conflicted. Too much to get into. But hanging onto my sister is kind of momentous in my mind as the last of my family. That's probably not a healthy mental road.

Another factor is that I feel extra guilt with not telling early because she will have paid for reception places/meals for us, that's 2 adults and 4 kids - expensive! Though I guess an rsvp for ceremony only would solve that. But that is also going to be a disappointment for her... argh. This is hard.

I don't know if I can realistically say that we're planning to bring the kids. I'm not a good liar and she's likely to specifically ask... We've done the last minute sickness thing before though. Ugh. I know you're all right, it's going to suck no matter. I just hate that my sister's wedding is marred with this crap, she deserves better.

See, I think not telling her beforehand is a recipe for drama on the day, as she'll be disappointed, our mother will be disappointed (she'll no doubt be building up a reunion narrative in her mind) and I'll be right there along with an audience to unleash their emotion on...

This is complicated, isn't it always! My sister understands that our mother can be difficult, she has had minor run ins with her, but not to the no contact level. She still thinks that the episodes are one off aberrations that I should get over, rather than toxic patterns that I won't expose my kids to. My sister doesn't have kids. She has also borne the majority of my mother's handwringing over missing me/my kids - and all the history rewriting that comes with it - so is emotionally invested with supporting mum. There's more but, yeah...

Thank you. Yes I've still been in contact with my sister. It is very difficult for her being stuck in the middle. It strains our relationship because I hold back info that will get back to our mother, and she became our mother's emotional crutch. So in my sister's mind I will be the unreasonable bad guy who won't just play nice with mum. Npd is narcissistic personality disorder, without getting into it, I was deeply hurt and my family threatened by her.

I'm catatonic with anxiety over this. There's a lot of backstory but the basics: My dear sister is getting married late this year. I have been no contact with our mother for 5 years. There's a whole lot of emotional baggage in there for me, saying no to her is literally, physically painful. She's textbook npd. I'm dreading the wedding but I will go because I love my sister. I am not going to bring the kids. It's not negotiable. It will cause a scene, as our mother will be drinking/smoking pot, become emotional, fawn over them, cause them distress. Also, the wedding is a 3hr drive away and starts at 5.30pm, not easy timing for my little kids. The older 2 could deal, but my oldest especially is the one my mother will make a scene over. We plan to support my sister with the least amount of likely drama- come for the ceremony and a little bit afterwards, leave before everyone gets real boozed up at the reception. I have to discuss this with my sister ASAP. She's going to be upset. She will understandably want my kids there. I will, yet again, be the family bad guy causing issues. Hurting my sister is the 2nd last thing I want to do. Putting my children in that environment is the last thing - and I won't do it. Ugh. Praying folks please pray for me. I'm being a real baby about this, avoiding calls, being petulant cos I'm so anxious... Should I call, text, write a letter with the RSVP card? How would you word this?

Yep. The crux of it.

Ugh how infuriating. See this article spoke to me precisely because I do make a conscious effort to choose widely for my daughter - I look for strong female protagonists and female authors. I have expended less energy towards thinking about this for my son. He's such an avid reader and often picks up his sister's books so I'd sort of not had to worry about it - but on reflection, he does pick up the more 'boy' books and is starting to feel that girly books are not for him - an attitude that I wasn't on guard for.

Haha awww that's adorable. My daughter hated them. She hasn't warmed to Austen yet, I got her to watch the BBC p&p because her friend loves them. Got a firm meh. She did love all the Alcott books.

Thanks for your reply. I feel like I'm about at this precipice with my oldest son, he has the gendered reaction but will still trust my judgement and read the thing happily. This article made me realise that I could be more intentional about this while I still can. I've also just realised that he hasn't read What Katy Did and I think I'll rectify that immediately...

Interesting article! I admit that I have given less thought to this topic than the counterpart in relation to encouraging my daughter to read widely. Ds1 read Secret Garden this year and loved it, after doing a little sneer about 'girls book' - it was a very pretty pink and flowery edition lol. I adore little women and will definitely have him read it next year (6th grade) It's long, and I don't necessarily agree with every word, but made me think. ? https://lithub.com/why-dont-more-boys-read-little-women/?single=true "In the words of Carolyn Heilbrun, it is “perhaps the one fictional world where young women, complete unto themselves, are watched with envy by a lonely boy.” Girls are for once at the center, and boys and men are on the margins."

Another trick is to get them to read their sentences out loud to you. Then they can feel that they run out of breath (see where the commas should go!), and they physically hear how it doesn't sound right. Then you can edit it together. I would expect to have to do these things often with a 3rd/4th/5th/6th grader...

I agree with pp's We did end up taking a break around week 24 and circling back to finish it in 7th grade.

I think wwe would help. I'd also really recommend listening to SWB's writing lectures, they're phenomenal. https://welltrainedmind.com/p/a-plan-for-teaching-writing-focus-on-the-elementary-grades-mp3/ https://welltrainedmind.com/p/a-plan-for-teaching-writing-grades-k-12-mp3/ Run on sentences for that age (and older) is common, they're tunnel vision focused on getting the thoughts on paper - making sure what's on paper is technically correct is a different skill and the merge of those skills is a logic stage brain maturity issue. Ditto spelling. With the copying, what do you think is happening? Do you think it's a taking enough care issue? Maybe focus on shorter copywork passages and 100% perfect copying for a little while. Killgallon's sentence composing for elementary school might be helpful.

My young 8 year old only handles short bursts. At the moment he does about: 20mins maths 30mins LA (spelling, FLL, WWE) 15min independent Reading 45 mins ish morning time 10mins music practice Joining in with science a couple times a week. He spends a lot of time outside and in his head. I'm really happy with his schooling at the moment.

Awww gorgeous girl! Congrats Lady Florida and Family!

Yeah, manipulatives take much longer and I often forget until he's frustrated, then I remember! I often just draw them out on paper lol. Just this week we drew all sorts of things to show the concept of multiplying fractions... He often tries to jump in with overconfidence when he's kind of grasped the surface level of a concept, acts annoyed like I'm patronising him trying to explain again lol. Manipulatives help here too, it feels like fun and it's the blocks doing the 'explaining' I also work hard to support the idea that mistakes are great, your brain fires more synapses when you make an error (even if you don't realise it) and resolving it/working through is really good for developing that understanding. Incorrect answers are like road signs, they help us eliminate choices and point us to the answer. ?

Also, I shop lifted all the time when I was about 11. All the time. We had plenty of food at home, middle class family. Of course shop lifting is wrong. I haven't read details of this case beyond this thread. But wow tazing a shoplifting preteen sounds like warped priorities to me.

My dh worked at a logistics place for a supermarket chain. It is absolutely, sickenly obscene the amount of good food wasted. You have no idea. They had to throw away pallets full of produce. We asked about donating it but they said that the supermarket already had a donation scheme and that they couldn't donate this stuff due to public health liability. I'm talking hundreds of punnets of beautiful fresh raspberries and the like. Now he works at a chocolate factory and the food waste is still obscene. Someone made a scheduling error and you have tons of ingredient going straight off the line into the garbage bin. Not because there's anything wrong with it, but because the other ingredients weren't scheduled and it's cheaper to start again rather than store it. Reminds me of Grapes of Wrath, security guarding the ditched fruit while people starve to death...

A few thoughts, may be helpful or not! 1. I have a kid that at that age bombed tests. He'd get frustrated, over think, get frazzled. Bomb. Part of that was just maturity. 2. They're never too old for manipulatives. Maths concepts are abstract, putting them in concrete makes it clearer. I spent a lot of time teaching long division with base 10 blocks. 3. Conversely, is she bored and therefore not concentrating? I have been known to allow chapter skipping if they ace the end of chapter exercise. 4. Good luck! Lol.