It is so expensive. We don't have chronic health conditions and so have only carried catastrophic for years because the premium plus deductible on any plan is 10x what we pay just buying health care OOP through the year.

July Johnson would beg to differ 🙂

I like these: https://www.etsy.com/listing/573591437/minimalistic-decor-chunky-knit-decor?ga_order=most_relevant&ga_search_type=all&ga_view_type=gallery&ga_search_query=crochet+ornament+modern&ref=sr_gallery-2-8&organic_search_click=1&col=1

I dunno, while it doesn't bother me if other people pronounce my name differently in a different accent, I can see wanting it pronounced correctly. Mercedes pronounced the Spanish way is fair enough. My name is Sara, and when we were living in NZ it sounded like See-rah. (in the US the first a has that short a sound that I think NZ english doesn't even have).

I think the light blue one is lovely, and I am not an old lady (yet).

I knitted about half of a fingerless glove and got so frustrated that I shipped the whole thing, still on the needles, with balls of yarn attached, to someone from the Etsy forums. What they did with it I have no idea, I just wanted to not see knitting needles again for a long time. So I am not sure if that means I can knit or not. Technically, yes. Would I have the patience for two entire socks? Hard to say 🙂

I would like to knit DH a pair of socks. He would like either 100% wool socks or some combination of wool and cotton, but I can't seem to find decent ones on the internet (warm enough/thick enough). I bought a great pair on Etsy but she is now out of business. Everything seems to have some nylon or acrylic. So anyway, I know how to knit, technically. I think it would take me approx. 40 hours to knit a pair of socks.

beautiful baby and beautiful quilt. I love that unicorn print! And hand quilting a whole quilt - what a serious investment of time and care 🙂

yay baby! congratulations 🙂

We gave up Prime. We don't use the video streaming - the vast majority of modern media we find to be kind of morally bankrupt, or at least obnoxious. We plan ahead so we don't need things in 2 days, and if we have a last minute need we just go to WalMart. We never did Subscribe and Save.

can you turn up your thermostat? DH and several of the kids would take 2-3 hot baths a day if we kept the thermostat as cold as I can tolerate it, so we keep it warmer because a couple of thermostat degrees is a lot cheaper than constantly running hot water.

I've been doing more modular meals recently. So, a pot of noodles, a pan of steamed vegetables, a pan of steamed cod (just take the frozen filets and steam them, very simple), a jar of tomato sauce, and an olive oil/garlic mixture. To scale up, you just do two boxes of noodles, 2 bags of whatever veg, 2 lbs of cod, and plan to use up the whole jar of tomato sauce.

After we started the business, about 6 years ago, one of the very best things about it (and this is among things like being able to buy a reliable vehicle, pay the bills on time, buy food other than rice and beans, etc.) was when people would say, "what do you do? (and/or what does your husband do)" and I could say that I co-owned and operated a small online business instead of saying I was a SAHM. Of course I think there's more as much value in mothering and homemaking as in the business, but I'm sensitive to people's social reactions.

We stayed in a VRBO this summer that had beds so comfortable I took off the sheets and mattress cover so I could find out the name brand of the mattress. It was a Zinus, this exact one: (https://www.amazon.com/dp/B00Q7EPPDA/ref=twister_B07792YVXM?_encoding=UTF8&psc=1&pldnSite=1) I measured.

It is kind of beyond me how this can happen at a nursing home and no one in a position of authority there says holy crap, how did this happen and what can we do to make sure it doesn't happen again? I mean, this isn't just some incidental bump or bruise. It's awful. If this isn't the exact thing you're trying to prevent from happening to elderly people, why run a nursing home in the first place? just ugh. I am glad you are going to do the difficult work of being bad cop.

I just wanted to say I'm so sorry for your poor mom and I hope she recovers quickly.

puberty itself actually makes more sense to me as a possibility because it is an independent hormonal change lack of confidence isn't causing puberty, and some other environmental stressor isn't causing both lack of confidence and puberty (although it may accelerate puberty or change the mechanism somewhat)

I meant a few of the quotes were inferring causation where it wasn't necessarily present. The fact that women in traditionally male positions in society often play competitive sports does not mean that playing more competitive sports will make women better at business or management.

that's a lot of mistaking correlation for causation (or rather, assuming causation when only correlation is present)

a chicken tender is a piece of fried chicken (like fish from fish and chips), just a strip of it. Ranch sauce is a slightly sour, kind of herbed mayonnaise, a little looser, for dipping.

I have house shoes and sleep clothes. I know what a pocketbook is but I carry a bag/purse and sit on a couch or if it is fancy, a sofa.

Which, for the record, I also find reprehensible

I am not religious, so it makes no sense to me, but I can see how it would be difficult, if you believe that unbelievers will go to hell, to not spread the gospel as widely as you can. Especially if you believe God is using you to spread the gospel and keep people out of hell. I can see how you'd have to think, logically, that their lives on earth were less important than just getting them to accept Jesus already for the (literal) love of Christ, because an eternity in hell is pretty stark.

I am sure that killing innocent babies does confer some good to some people - the people who would be harmed or inconvenienced by the continuation of the baby's life. That doesn't make it good, like morally good. I mean, are we really arguing about whether it's morally acceptable to kill a baby to preserve your own way of life? Are we saying that genital mutilation is okay if you're part of a society that believes in genital mutilation? Is rape okay if you're part of a society that believes women don't have the right to consent or non-consent to sexual intercourse with any man who wants them? There is a difference between killing someone, especially a baby, and not giving them things they need to live in a certain way or live longer with a certain disease. I mean, this is not rocket science. If my neighbor comes over and says hey, I'm hungry, I need your stored food or I will continue to be hungry, refusing to give him the food is kind of poor behavior unless I need the food myself to survive. But it is not as poor of behavior as going to his house, waiting for him to come out to pick up the mail, and shooting him. Insisting that people learn to make their own way, or saying that there is a certain level of social support provided but it is not entire (that is to say, sometimes people will suffer either from poor choices or bad luck or both), is different from outright killing people in order to prevent their effect on our lives.

I don't know how to make fire unless I have a fire starter of some sort (that is to say, a lighter or matches). I have zero idea how a lighter or matches are made, and of course I couldn't make one if I did know. Probably DH knows how to make a fire with sticks or something, I dunno. (actually I guess I could do it with a magnifying glass, but again I don't know how to make a magnifying glass, or even how to make glass).