I am REALLY liking Sid!!

😯😲😱

Same here. 33% still no masks, and everyone going back in the morning. I just can't even...and the local school district dismantled all online offerings so parents didn't have the choice this year of signing up for virtual.

At my son's school, the R.A. and the R.D. in the residence hall can call campus health for help. They do have a means (golf carts as well as campus owned cars) to get the students to the health center which is staffed by two R.N.'s and an ALS certified medic. They can do IV's there. I'm his case, the teaching hospital is next door as well, and campus health can send a driver to take the student there as well. They call ambulances when the student needs to be transported on a gurney. Up to that point, the R.D. and a driver with campus security handle it so it can happen pretty quickly. The campus doc is there Monday - Thursday from 9 am to 4 pm. I don't know what other schools do. When I was in college, I got a nasty concussion, knocked unconscious briefly, and then unable to stand or walk without assistance. My friends called the R.D. who called the chaplain to help her get me down to campus health, and the nurse promptly said "ER now". The chaplain and R.D. chose to drive me instead of call for the ambulance. It worked similarly at my other sons' alma maters.

I am so sorry, Tiggy! And this isn't petty at all. This is a real world hurt caused by poor policies, and has real life, severe consequences. You have every right to be angry and discouraged!

Ticket to Ride - Africa Pinnocle Euchre Equate Battle Monopoly (don't ask, my sons invented it and it is crazy) Apples to Apples Mexican Train Poker for Pennies (My mother in law keeps a quart jar of pennies, we divide it up, play, and then put it all back for next time. She always fives a bag of candy to the winner, lol.) Dungeons and Dragons - we played a really funny one the other night and for off on so many tangents that my son in law (new to dungeon mastering) laughed until he got so hot his hair was sweaty, and then flabbergasted because after three hours of play, we had only just gotten through the introduction. He learned the hard way that maybe the enchanted turkey should not have such tough statistics that it takes an hour to defeat! (It was Mark who used alcohol from the castle kitchen and a candle to ignite a couch which it dropped on the turkey. Couch inferno for the win!!! 😂)

Also, gourmet salads can use small amounts of meat but pack a big punch. The meat is for taste and garnish, and for added protein chick peas or black beans, but then make the salad greens and the dressing the stars of the show. Also chicken schwarma. I make mine with chicken thighs because they are a cheaper cut of meat. I make my own hummus. So I serve one thigh on a bed of arugula with cold quinoa on top, red pepper slices, hummus, and a dollop of greek yogurt. It is very filling and quite yummy. But it isn't a lot of meat so it is very inexpensive per serving.

Excellent advice! If you come to Michigan, our state park rangers/DNR officers are REALLY knowledgeable.

Our grandsons get a lot of toys from their grandparents who cannot visit very often and then the two great grandmas are very generous so it ends up being A LOT. Dh and I focus on experiences, so often we give a book and since covid is still so problematic, instead of a museum membership, dh does projects with the six year old, and takes a train from his collection to Alabama to play with the two year old who is enamored of all things train, but then brings it back home with us. He made a birdhouse with N this year for Christmas and then hung it from a tree on a pulley system so N can get it down and fill it all on his own. I gave him a bird identification book. He has been happily hanging out in the yard cataloguing birds since we left. So I say take them at their word. Diapers are expensive so donate a package, buy a nice book to read, and print off a picture for the refrigerator to remind the oldest child that a zoo trip is coming.

Eggs. When the budget was tight, I fed my kids eggs. I would do six ounces of bacon, then make the scrambled eggs in the bacon fat, and serve with lots of fruit, and some sourdough toast. My kids did enjoy fruit so they would eat two or three servings with lunch or supper. I bought what was in season and on sale, so clementines in the winter, berries and cherries in the summer, apples and pears in the fall. I have also served bacon wrapped asparagus and then not made another meat dish, bacon was what they got, and simply rationed meat to two or four ounce servings and then provided lots of options to go with that serving size. Rice, potatoes, quinoa, polenta, big salads, roasted cauliflower or green beans, vegetable stir fry, etc.

REI's website is where I go to drool, and then I start looking for sales and clearance elsewhere plus used on ebay, goodwill.com, etc.

Will they eat sauce/gravy over potatoes or rice? One way to stretch meat is to take just a few ounces, cook until tender, shred, and then mix with a thickened broth, herb up, and serve over a starch then have larger vegetable sides. This way there is meat, but not a large serving per person.

I have an ankle injury so my hikes are five miles or less. Usually in the 2 miles range. It is a permanent disability so I am not much help to you except to say trail running shoes are your friend. They have the most amazing level of support and that rock plate really saves the soles of your feet. Trail running shoes are now my everyday shoe as well as my hiking/walking shoe. I do recommend bear spray which can be used on animals like mountain lions as well.

Lol, that me! I would be out skiing were it not for the permanently injured ankle from the car wreck. It is weak, and perpetually swollen such that, ski boots are not roomy enough to accommodate the swelling. So I don't get to ski. They have a snow walk trail that does not require snowshoes, and I usually do that, stand at the bottom of the hill and take some photos, then go sip tea and read a book around the fire. Or, that was my routine until covid. Now they ski, and I stay home. My hope is omicron blows thrkighr, and by spring break (end of February/beginning of March), cases will be low.enough that with a KN95, I will feel comfortable going along. The next ski trip is Martin Luther King Jr weekend, just dh and middle son because the one in college in the UP will be too far away to go get just for a three day weekend. I still think cases will be high, so they will go alone with a couple thermostat of hot chocolate, sub sandwiches and snacks, and ski, eating inside the van when they want to warm up. I have no desire to sit in the van for five hours after a 3 hour drive to get there.

Now that said, of you have a back injury, I would not recommend skiing. Maybe, snowshoeing? But I would ask an orthopedic doc, sports medicine doc, or physical therapist about it first.

My suggestion is to go to a well known slope that has a training hill, group lessons, and a magic carpet. Dh took skiing up again after decades of not doing it. He rents his gear and a gets a half day pass on Super Sundays at Schuss Mountain. He took the group ski lesson that came with it just to refresh his memory for form, and then spent two four hour afternoons two Sundays in a row on the training hill. You really are not all that likely to get hurt on it. They make those so there is just barely enough slope to get you going, and definitely not enough to get any speed. The operator only allows so many to go down at a time to keep beginners from getting knotted up and tripping each other. After that, he only goes on the beginner hill (easy). He does not do intermediate or advanced. He really enjoys it.

LOL, we have our grey days for sure. But we also have freezing temps for several days in a row, so I assume between UV and the cold, we get a pretty good disinfection of the masks! Michigan, Oy vey!!!

My suggestion is that you see if you can find some kid size KN95. Those things do a way better job of decreasing exposure than just a standard cloth mask. My daughter was unable to find any that fit her two year old, so she took an adult one, cut it down, and made it over with new ear loops to fit him. He wears it like a little trooper. I am so proud of him! If everyone in your group wears that quality of mask, you will probably be okay. I hang mine out in the sunlight to disinfect.

Hugs, Dawn 💓💓💓

I feel very differently. I don't think we get to throw our hands up in the air when hospital and ambulance systems are failing, literally collapsing especially in my state. I refuse to deliberately contribute to spread. It is a 12 hour wait for an ambulance here, and people are dying in the parking lots of hospitals because there is no one to treat them for even otherwise treatable things besides covid. This is no longer an individual decision because getting it and requiring medical care has massive, negative impacts on everyone else in way that is unprecedented in modern times. This is not always about the individual.

Right. And normally I would agree with that. But I do want to bring up hospital overrun. I have had three relatives and my mom's best friend die of this, and each one died during hospital overwhelm. It does mean much more suffering because there aren't staff to monitor them enough, it means dying alone because visitors aren't allowed, it means making end of life care decisions over the phone, it means fights in the family about to handle funerals, and this is NOT hospice. No one gets sent home to die because this is a communicable disease. So there is no caring for your dying loved one at home. It can take weeks of being on a paralytic on a ventilator with NO ONE there but a nurse. None of my relatives, nor my mom's friend had encountered human touch beyond the nursing staff for three weeks or longer. Anyone who decides, "Screw it! I don't care anymore!" needs to make peace with how they will die, and their family needs to make peace with it too.

Chickadee.

I am so sorry. Parenting with him must be so stressful! Hugs. 💓

This. I have a grandson with a heart condition. So I am way covid conscientious as is DH so it is reasonably safe for us to be around him. We boostered, and now we KN95 if we have to be in a store - and we try to do as much online, drive through, delivery etc. as we can - and we do not ever go around my brother and his wife who are not vaccinated and take no precautions of any kind. Anything we can do to keep from transmitting this to our grandson, we do.

I am so sad!I really liked her, and thought she was a neat lady.