We have just been through this with both of DH's parents in the past 2 years. I don't have much to add except to say that the funeral home and attorney will have very helpful information to give you when the time comes. For now, make sure you know where the ORIGINAL (signed, notarized) legal documents are located, make sure you are a joint owner on the bank accounts (rather than an authorized user), and know which funeral home you plan to call. It would also be helpful to have your mom's address book handy so you can start making phone calls to let people know - or start making a plan for other relatives to help you with that task. When MIL passed away, it all happened so quickly that we had to scramble around to find phone numbers for some long-time friends who needed to know. There were 5 adults staying at my SIL's house, and only 1 landline available to use. Of those adults, 3 had extremely poor cell phone coverage at SIL's house, so it was nearly impossible to communicate. This was something no one had thought about. Also, plan for the entire process to take much longer than you think. FIL passed away 15 months ago, and his extremely simple, straightforward, uncontested estate has not been closed yet. Waiting for a judge to sign off on the paperwork has taken months for each step of the process. Death certificates were issued with errors and needed to be corrected. Things we never thought about have come up. But every time an issue comes up, DH calls either the funeral home or the attorney - they have been very good resources even after the immediate death and funeral.

Many teens around us wait until they turn 18 to get their license so their insurance will be lower, or the parents make the kid get a part-time job to pay for insurance, then once he has enough saved for the first year's premium, then he is allowed to get his license. For us, we need our DS to drive himself places when he turns 16. He runs cross country and track with our local high school, which = practice 6 days per week, plus he'll be dual enrolled next year in community college classes. It's just not practical for us to let him get his license, then not drive. DS had an online driver's ed course a few months ago with an assignment that asked how much his insurance would cost (among other things) once he became fully licensed. Our agent looked at our policies with combined homeowners, multi-line, multiple vehicles, good driving discounts, etc., and estimated that DS will add $270-300 per month when he is 16. They also gave us the recommendation to list the teenage driver on the vehicle that is cheapest to insure.

My niece lives in SE Georgia and is still under a mandatory evacuation because of the flooding. Her city is saying they may have to shut off municipal water supply because of the flooding and damage there.

Last year I had my DS take the PSAT at a local private school. I had called our local public school and talked to a guidance counselor who wasn't very helpful and couldn't commit to having space for homeschoolers. I hung up the phone and called the private school, who were thrilled to accommodate homeschooled students. Last week (before the hurricane madness) I called our local public school again, spoke to a different guidance counselor who was very friendly, and DS is now signed up to take the PSAT there in October. I guess my experience would lead me to tell you to call some local private schools in your area. Hopefully you can find one who will help you. I would also call ALL of the public schools in your district. I also wish the registration process was the same as the SAT or ACT.

We are fine and have no damage except for a bunch of limbs in the yard. We have power. Still tropical storm outside, but the worst is over.

This is what is so frustrating about living through hurricanes. The eye of the storm is now about an hour due east of us. We are still having wind gusts into the 90+ mph range, but Tampa is not getting nearly what we expected to receive. Our power has gone off several times but is currently on. I have family in Orlando, Clermont, and Daytona that have been without power for hours and have been getting tornado warnings all afternoon and evening. We aren't out of the woods yet, but we have been very fortunate. My poor dog hasn't been out to potty for 8+ hours now, and she won't use the improvised box we set up for her in the garage. It's still too dangerous to take her outside, but hopefully in a couple hours she can finally get to go out.

Tampa is getting full blown tropical storm force winds now and blowing rain. No tornadoes in our immediate area (yet). We still have power, for which we are very thankful. One more meal cooked, one more day with a working fridge, one more hot shower, one more load of laundry done. It's funny how your priorities change.

I totally get it. You can't evacuate the entire state. We are not in an evacuation zone, have a concrete block house, our roof is only 7 years old (and was replaced to post-Charley and post-Andrew code), and we have windows rated for 140 mph impact. It's still a gut-wrenching decision, but we made what we thought was the best choice for our family. About half of my friends have left and half are staying. Lots of people here have left and have no idea what they'll be coming home to. Those of us who chose to stay have no idea what we'll wake up to tomorrow morning. I'm thankful for every hour we have of air conditioning, power to cook, a working refrigerator/washer/dryer, and internet connection. It makes other stuff that I thought I'd be doing this week (...like, should we upgrade our older iPhones since they're announcing new models this week?) seem so petty and insignificant. So far, so good here in Tampa. My kids are currently binge watching Outrageous Acts of Science while we still have power. We've had drizzle and a little bit of wind for most of the day, which has recently picked up to what I'd call blowing rain - maybe 15-20 mph right now. Conditions are supposed to become bad around 7 pm and the worst for us will be between 1-3 am. Fortunately, it looks like it will be weaker than they originally thought by the time it gets to us - a weak category 2 rather than a 3 or 4. I'm praying for those of you further south. It's going to be a long night.

So far, so good in Tampa. We've had steady drizzling rain with a little bit of wind most of the day, and a few heavier bands. It's supposed to get bad around 7 p.m., with the worst between 1-3 a.m. We still have power, so we are eating out the fridge, doing laundry (again), and my kids have been binge watching Outrageous Acts of Science while we still have power. The path has wobbled several times today (totally normal), but the center is supposed to pass very close to us overnight. Right now they are saying it will be weaker than originally forecast by the time it gets to us - a weak category 2 instead of 3 or 4.

I've been seeing local friends post these pictures all day, so a little while ago I looked myself. This is from the Weather Channel app. The blue dot is my house, and the skinny line is the center of the forecast track from 5:00 pm today. We are still 30+ hours away from when we will see the worst of it, but please pray that it will lessen in intensity before it hits Florida. I will check in when I can. ETA: I think I got the photo to upload. On a brighter note, it was gorgeous here today. My teenagers are really taking to heart the task of eating out the fridge while we still have power. We found a tube of cinnamon rolls in the fridge that we'll make for breakfast tomorrow, we have lots of cookies and my freezers look like ice factories. The FedEx truck came today and delivered 4 more battery operated fans that I ordered at the beginning of the week but didn't think I'd see before Tuesday, and I found 2 unopened packages of D batteries in the back of the hurricane cabinet.

I get it. I'm a native Floridian too. It's such a hard decision! We actually invited relatives who live in Miami and Daytona to come stay with us in Tampa a few days ago when it looked like the storm would hit the east coast. They waited, and it turns out that now the storm is headed straight for us. We replaced our windows last year and were required to replace them with impact windows rated for 140 mph winds & debris. I never in a million years thought we'd actually test them out with 140 mph winds.

By the time the storm gets that far north, it won't be the monster that it has been in the Caribbean. It will likely be a Cat 1, maybe Cat 2, so wind speeds around 75-85 mph. Not fun, and she's in an evacuation zone for sure, but she won't be coming home to the kind of devastation you are seeing on the news from places like Barbuda or St. Marten. In 2004, I think it was Charley that actually rearranged the land between Sanibel and Captiva in SW Florida as it came ashore. But that was a Cat 4 in nearly a direct hit (actual landfall of the eye was a bit further north, but that SE side of the storm had quite a punch with onshore winds and storm surge). I have no idea how insurance was handled in that situation, but to visit today, you would never know it happened.

There are special hurricane riders in effect for homeowner's insurance policies. Losses from hurricanes are typically not covered by regular homeowner's insurance, and there is a separate hurricane deductible. It's really, really complicated - I'm not sure I even understand all of our coverage and exactly how it works. But we've never had to use it before. We may find out next week.

One thing that helped one of my children become more independent with certain subjects, when this child was easily distracted, was to use a timer. They timed themself doing each subject each day, then kept a log of how quickly they got the work done. (We checked for accuracy, and added that time to the total if there were a bunch of careless mistakes.) The incentive of knowing that math only took 15 minutes yesterday was encouragement for this child - they knew that it was only 15 minutes, not forever like it seemed sometimes. My kids have also become much more independent as they've gotten older. There were times when we switched to a more "get 'er done" type of curriculum for the sake of independence, and it really was OK. Feel free to be creative with your read aloud time. For a long time, our best read aloud time was during lunch. Having busy hands and mouths helped their attention spans. But it was very clear when my older child was ready to split from his sister, move faster, and do more of the read aloud-type work on his own. The first subject we split was science, then the following year we split history & literature (we used Sonlight). It was a natural break around the time that my oldest started middle school. If you have a 5th grader working on a 4th grade level but with a 3rd grade attention span, I'd probably plan to keep them together (if this is your oldest) or work more closely with this particular child (if this is your middle child) for a while longer. I wouldn't expect complete independence until around 6th or 7th grade (attention span AND workload), but it could take a little longer if you end up with hormone-induced brain fog at those ages. Hang in there, though.....it will come. Yes, for many years, I did read all of the books ahead of time. My "homework" was bedtime reading, about 2 books ahead of what they were reading for school at the time. Not everyone needs to do that, but it worked well for us. Can you set up a schedule where you work more closely with this child, but only one or two days per week? Maybe your other children can have their own projects to work on during that time. Or could you shelve python for now and do it over the summer, when you have fewer academic responsibilities?

I had to go out today in Tampa and about half of the gas stations I passed had gas, and long lines of people waiting. Publix had no bottled water, peanut butter, gatorade, or toilet paper, but had plenty of everything else. They are evacuating residents in zone A in Hillsborough and Pinellas counties. My goal (after my Publix trip today) is not to leave my house until Tuesday, if for no other reason than to conserve gas and not add to the traffic. It's really hard not to go stir crazy. There's so much to do, yet so little to do at the same time.

My DD plays both classical guitar and ukulele. My DS plays acoustic guitar and bass (electric) guitar. If your ultimate goal is electric guitar, then an acoustic (steel string) or classical (nylon string) will translate much easier to electric. Ukulele is easier to play but the chords and strings are different than guitar. When learning guitar, make sure you get a size that fits your child, and not a guitar that's too large. For the first few weeks, expect sore fingers. Five minutes of practice every day will go much farther than 30 minutes of practice 2-3 times per week. After about a month, the fingertips will develop calluses and it won't hurt anymore.

I'm pretty sure Disney shut down last year for Hurricane Matthew, which didn't directly hit Orlando - it just skimmed the east coast, like what Irma is projected to do. Your hotel room may be needed by people evacuating from South Florida, and you do NOT want to be stuck in Orlando in a hotel room, paying for a vacation with absolutely nothing to do. Florida is the last place you want to be right now. I would probably call your hotel tomorrow and ask them what they recommend. They will probably reschedule with no penalty whatsoever.

I'm in Tampa, and people here are panicking too. I made the mistake of pulling into the Sam's parking lot this afternoon (to get some other stuff, non-hurricane related, but if they had any, I would have picked up some D batteries). The gas station had lines 4-5 cars deep. People were walking into the store, then walking out empty handed. It was such a zoo that I didn't even go inside. It took 30+ minutes just to get OUT of the parking lot. People have already cleared the shelves of bottled water (which won't go bad) and bread (which I'm assuming may go bad by the time we have any potential storm here, next Monday or Tuesday). There are no C or D batteries to be found. I have lived in FL my entire life and I don't think I've seen this level of panic. Personally, we are not in a flood zone, not in an evacuation zone, and the worst we could experience is a tree falling on the house, or (more probably) being without power for a while.

I'm so sorry. My DH's cousin was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer at Thanksgiving several years ago and passed away the following February. Her diagnosis was a complete surprise. She did end up in the hospital several times during the course of her treatment, but only for comfort measures, and most of her care was coordinated by hospice. The most important things to do in the short term are to coordinate legal documents. Make sure your MIL has a POA in place, a DNR order, and a will. Add your DH to all of her bank accounts right away, and make sure he is a "joint owner" of the account instead of an "authorized user." She will probably need to go to the bank in person to make these changes, and your DH should be with her as well, so I would do this ASAP while she is still able. The banking situation was really sticky when DH's parents passed away. There was one account to which he was an authorized user as POA for his mom, but as soon as she passed away, his access to the account disappeared, because the POA ceased to exist upon her death. If your DH is a joint owner on all of her accounts, he will have access to be able to pay her bills while she is alive but also after she passes. How is your MIL handling this? How is your DH?

OP - keep him in boys' sizes as long as you can. Men's size clothes are expensive! Unfortunately, you're going to have to have him try on clothes for a while to see what fits, but once you find a style/brand that fits, when he outgrows it, you can try to just buy the same thing in the next size up for a while. A piece of unsolicited advice - once your DS is 10 or 11, don't buy clothes too far in advance. Somewhere along the lines in middle school (usually around 7th grade, but could start earlier), he'll have a HUGE growth spurt and go through several sizes in a single year. Definitely buy only what you need. I did a happy dance a couple months ago because my DS finally grew into a 28 inch waist. He also wears a 34 inch inseam. 28 x 34's are much easier to find than 26 x 34's, but I have found some nice khaki's (by Dockers, I think) in a slim fit from JC Penney that fit him well. Sometimes Old Navy slim sizes work for my DS too.

Are you able to do a quick "drop in" visit to ONE of the weekend's events, perhaps at a time not centered around food? That might be one way to honor your family without putting yourself in such an uncomfortable situation. I think it's also perfectly acceptable to say, "No, I'm sorry, we can't make it." Last year my FIL passed away. The funeral was held in the city where he & MIL had lived for 20+ years, because they had many close friendships there, even though they had moved away several years prior to live in assisted living, and no one else in the family lived there. FIL's sister, my DH's aunt, sat next to me at dinner the evening before the funeral and blurted out, "I get really anxious when I'm around extended family that I don't know very well and people I've met many years ago but might not remember." I'm an introvert, and don't really care to hang out and make small talk with people I don't know either, but it dawned on me when DH's aunt made that comment that there would be other people there who were as uncomfortable, or even more uncomfortable, than I was. It gave me empathy for the awkwardness of the situation. I share that to say that if you could manage a quick pop in to one planned event for the sake of family harmony, you might be able to find someone in the family who doesn't want to be there as much as you. But if this just isn't possible, I'd just say, "Sorry, we can't make it" without any regret.

Like others have said, the worst part is the beginning. Not only did your dd have teeth pulled, but the teeth move much more at the beginning of the braces treatment. My DD has had her braces on for a year and a half now, and the adjustments barely phase her anymore. The first few months she was very sore after every adjustment. My DS had a palate expander for the first few months of his treatment, which was also very painful, but by the end of his treatment he was fine after adjustments. Nut butters are great. Will she eat non-dairy yogurt like soy or coconut milk yogurt? Spaghetti with ground beef in the sauce (chopped up fine so she doesn't have to chew much), soups, stews, etc. would all be good. You can also make a smoothie with non-dairy yogurt, non-dairy milk, a frozen banana, some protein shake powder, some peanut butter, and some chocolate syrup. Throw all of that in the blender and it makes a great shake.

I would use the "my lessons follow a recurring pattern" option.

Find an estate sale company. We worked with one long-distance when my ILs had to move into assisted living. They went through everything, trashed what couldn't/wouldn't sell, cleaned it up, checked to make sure everything worked, then held an estate sale. What was left over they hauled away to Goodwill. They arranged for a dumpster service for everything that got trashed. Their fee was a commission based on a percentage of what sold. If you are currently renting, I would arrange for a cleaning service to come in after the estate sale is held to clean your home before turning in keys to your landlord. If you own your home, a real estate agent should be able to recommend a cleaning service before selling your home.

I have a friend who had this surgery about a week and a half ago. She said this has been the toughest recovery of any surgery she's had (and she is in her early 40's and is very athletic). She was in the hospital for about 4 days, then needed care at home for several days. Today was day 10 or 11 post-surgery and was the first day she was totally alone at home to take care of herself without her mom or husband there to help her. She has a grabber to pick up things she drops, a walker to help herself stand up from the couch, and needs to change positions every 30 minutes or so. If you or your husband can't physically stay with your MIL for at least a week post-op (and it's totally understandable if you can't), I think the idea of a rehab center is a really good idea. Even better would be if you or your DH could go with her to her pre-op appointment with her surgeon to ask questions about how much care she'll need, how long she'll be in the hospital, etc. If she refuses, then once she's in the hospital, ask to see the hospital's social worker or care coordinator, and ask them for a recommendation. They shouldn't (and possibly won't) discharge her to home by herself if she isn't able to care for herself.