HAHAHAHAH....sounds like the house i grew up in! My mom was always losing things. "But I just put it in a safe place where I'd know where it was" always meant UH OH!! Mom was crazy bad at losing things. Once b/4 I was born, she lost the monopoly game - it was found the next day in the bottom of the fridge. :) Remote controls have turned up in the car and phones have been found in odd places as well. Keys have been lost far too many times to count. Bad thing is, I'm JUST like that now and it kills me. Talk about growing up and turning into your mother! My DH is my lifeline...he always knows where things are and if I need something found I have to turn to him. Sometimes he jokes that "wanting someone to keep track of my stuff" was the only reason I married him! :)

I'm 26 and pregnant with my 2nd baby and already noticed that the congratulations from everyone has diminished as compared to our 1st pregnancy. I've even started to get comments such as "2 is the best number", "it's not wise in this economy to have more than that", etc. One lady (who had only two children..now grown) even went as far as to say "oh your dad is going to be so mad" (said in a tone laden with the message "you're stupid for having more"). I rebutted with feigned ignorance and said how excited my father would be...why wouldn't he..because he loves his first grandchild. Why she would even say such a personal thing about my father (who she only knows in passing) is beyond me. Thank God my husband's family is supportive of 2-3 kids. We do want 4 children though, so I may end up in your position some day as I have a feeling that 2-3 children are the max when it comes to my inlaws view of "how many is right". My mother-in-law already disapproves heavily of me being a stay at home mom. She's a nurse, my husband's sister is a nurse, my husband's brother's wife is a nurse - so all the women in that family are big money earners. I have felt looked down on so many times (not overtly...just the feeling I get with some of the undertones of things they've said to us) because we're not big money makers and big spenders. I know for a fact that my MIL thinks we're doing poorly (NOT true) because of me staying home. During a week long visit with us once, my father in law (someone who doesn't own and doesn't like animals) told me (an avid animal lover!) that we should get rid of our 3 dogs because they're "too much trouble and cost too much to feed". (Again, part of the "they're doing poorly" mentality because Im a SAHM). He said this as he polished off the last of the 3rd carton of beer he'd purchased in 3 days (which cost well more than $40). He's not an alcholic, but he does drink every day. We don't drink...and it only takes $30 to feed our dogs for a month! He had just spent more in 3 days than what we spend on our "problem dogs". Yet he doesn't like the fact that we don't keep beer in our home?? Needless to say I was livid inside, but had too much respect for him as my FIL to respond back. I simply said "I disagree. Please excuse me while I go nurse the baby. Goodnight". And went to bed. His opinion is simply that, his opinion. If I were in your situation, the first thing I would do would be to make it clear to DH that his mom is HIS responsibility. It is his first priority to make sure she understands that your family decisions are just that - YOURS AND HIS. Period. If conflict arises, he should handle his mother. I made it my #1 priority when I married to always show deep respect to my in-laws - thusly, it's my husband's place to manage huge conflicts with his family, KWIM? Not saying that you should be a wetnoodle and "agree" with everything, just that in heated situations, the blood member should be the one to stand firm for the decision that was made and have those heated discussions. Also, I would wait until after Christmas (why spoil the holidays????) to make the announcement - then make it with as much pride as you had with your first. If anyone in your husband's family feels annoyed, HE needs to take care of it. Once the baby is here I'm sure all animosity will pass anyway. Babies have a tendency to provoke love in all Grandparents regardless of previous feelings. :) Finally - I second the poster who said to consider that they just might not understand how hurtful they are. My in-laws are upstate New Yorkers. I'm bred, b'rn, & raised a "Yes Maam" kinda southerh girl so I hear a lot of things said in passing that kinda bristle me under the skin! haha Sounds to me like your MIL may just be passing along some of her own fears and anxieties she had as a younger mother! P.S My brother in law is a public school teacher and my MIL & FIL do not support homeschool. We have yet to mention to them our plan to homeschool our kids..lol. We mentioned it briefly to FIL once and was immediately dismissed as if we were nuts... High school sports is the main reason for high school in his opinion. Oh heaven forbid we miss that!

Thanks Lynn & Karin for sharing your *opposite side* stories! :) I have heard the "the devil planted the fossils" reasoning too although we were taught in our school that fossils were a result of the great worldwide flood. The way it's taught makes sense, and for non-scientific minds it doesn't occur to us to think through it deeper (I mean, really, there's so much more in life - sometimes we just have to throw our hands up and believe what we're told instead of scrutinizing everything under the sun...we wouldn't have time to breath if we scrutinized everything). I grew up having absolutely no comprehension how liberal "Christians' could meld Christianity with "evolution". Being from a conservative literal mindset back then, it just didn't make any sense to me how someone could deny the creation-as-told-in-Genesis in favor of chance happening of evolution. It wasn't that I was dumb or whatnot - it was simply impossible for me to mesh those 2 viewpoints. I have a hard time sharing my background and my views between evolution & creation. I can't admit to the people I grew up with that I now lean away from young earth....YET I can't bring myself to acknowledge to others that I now am more accepting of an old earth and that evolution isn't the evil I once thought it was. It's a huge emotional deal inside of me because of all the thoughts implanted in my head about what "God says". Independent Fundamentalist Baptists (at least down here in South Carolina) are extremely literal in the interpretation of the Bible and to this day I can argue all their main points of "why" - and I know them so well that it scares me when I consider "disowning" that part of my core being! This is stuff I grew up believing 100% up through my 21st birthday. There is some ignorance in both camps, but mostly I think a deep hidden fear is a huge motivator for young earth believers. Most people who believe Young Earth truly and sincerely love the Lord and they so very deeply want to believe & honor Him - and when you believe that the Bible is 100% literal, with all the verses used to back that view up, you feel like you're calling God a liar if you believe any differently - (you become a backslider, and it's akin to turning your back on God) - and evolution is as different from Genesis-Creation as you can get. And that's a huge huge thing - no one wants to call someone they view as their beloved Father a "liar". Also, when taking the Bible as 100% literal (7 day creation, genealogies of the old testament as father/son/age accurate, etc.).... the reason for Christ coming was to provide redemption and restoration to God for the sin & death that had entered the world through Adam during the "fall of man" - which is when Adam & Eve disobeyed God in the beginning of Genesis. Before "the fall of man", God's creation was "perfect". Believing in evolution would mean that a.) adam & eve wasn't the first humans, b.) death & suffering occurred millions of years before humans came on the scene c.) if there was no "fall", then there's no reason for Jesus to die, and thusly d.) all of the Bible would therefore hinge on a lie - so what could you believe after that? I'm not a theologian or whatnot, but I do know how it feels to believe deeply in the 100% literalness of the Bible - and the reasoning in the paragraph above creates a huge fear and core dissonance in any 100% literalism believer. I doubt many young earth people have taking it as far as to reason out those thoughts behind why we believe what we believe...but that's what I've come up with. Most are simply content (like I use to be) to just listen to what they're told about God and use their main reasoning powers for all other aspects of life (like living, child rearing, careers, etc.). Not saying it's wrong or right either way. It's just a little insight to what triggers the "attack" response in many young earth creationists. It angers me when I see others from the evolutionary camp speak of people who believe in this as if they're sheer idiots - because none of the people I grew up with were idiots. They're just sincere, loving, kind (most of them!!!) honest people who have a completely different background and REASON for believing what they do. On the flip side, however, I can no longer tolerate jabs I now recognize as "making fun of" evolutionists (like those I witnessed in my science curriculum growing up). :) Hope this gives a little further insight. If only people everywhere would just stop to consider that each individual truly does have a deep-seated reason and background for believing what they believe (religious or not), then there might be a whole lot less arguing in the world.

I've played by ear since I was 4, and never took lessons. I did however learn to read music very well in school through years of choir & band. I think the biggest problem with those who play by ear is that we tend to want to play music OUR way and can usually play modern pieces on our own much better than how they're written down anyway. After playing by ear, reading music can feel very stifling! For his age I would suggest the best "ear training" would be simply lots of time banging away at the piano. Give him a list of easy songs that he loves - have him hum them one note at a time and then find the note he is humming on the piano. Provide a variety of song lists each week that you know he is familiar with...the First Noel, TV Theme songs, Hymns, etc. If you have a tape recorder let him have fun recording his songs. Let him play with just his right hand if that's what he's comfortable with. Once he's ready to add left hands, it's easy to learn the basic 3 finger cords (such as C, G, & F). He'll be able to "hear" the harmony of the chords if you search online and show him basic finger placements - he'll be able to take it from there. Don't push him right now either...let him enjoy the pleasure of playing around on there. He has a gift that he wants to let out! FUN is what I would emphasize most at his stage or you could easily turn him off (another reason why many who play by ear have trouble learning to play by music - it's makes it into a chore that is no longer fun!). There is no better feeling on earth than to be able to sit at a piano and make the music that you hear in your head randomly pop out on those pearly white keys. :) --------------- P.S. Just re-read the thread and realized I don't know how old your son is...I had thought you said 6 years old, but that was DD. So your son may be well past the stage I just talked about...sorry. :)

For what it's worth....I'm 26 years old (plan to homeschool our kids someday - oldest is 18 months), and I've been working through giving my own self a quick form of classical education for well over a year now. I tried at first to delve into the originals...especially the greek tales...but they were just way over my head. I once thought my Christian private school education was a good one but I've come to realize there are many things it sorely lacked - a rigorous historical study and appreciation of literature being one of them. And I was valedictorian of my class and considered a "nerd" back then! SOOOO...instead of suffering myself through the originals, I've been going through "kid versions" of the originals to introduce myself to the stories. It's really helping. I've read D'aulaires Greek Mythology book, Black Ships to Troy, and quite a few others. I even have some children's Plutarch and other children's versions of Livy, Herodotus, etc. coming in the mail this week. A few months ago, I read Charles & Mary Lamb's versions of Shakespeare and for the FIRST time in my life I finally understood what the stories are about - and it got me excited to finally read them in "real form". I think it's an awesome way to introduce a difficult piece of literature to a child. I plan on using this method with my own kids, irregardless of who else might suggest differently. :) I can't wait to get the Beowulf version from Yesterday's Classics so I can finally learn what that story is all about too. (haha) One thing I might suggest though is make sure your kids understand it is the "children's version" and somewhat "abridged". I use to devour those little classical illustrated story books from Walmart when I was young and didn't realize until high school that ALL of the classical books I grew up reading (Dickens, Verne, etc.) were nothing more than extremely simplified abridged versions. No one ever bothered explaining the difference to me and I never thought to ask....

:lurk5: I know this thread is a wee old, but I couldn't help but want to chime in. I am 26 years old and a SAHM to an 18 mo old and one on the way - we plan to homeschool our kids, and I have been researching my little heart out for over 2 years now. For my own education, I attended an extremely conservative Independent Fundamentalist Baptist Christian private school from kindergarten through 12th grade. They pretty much used Abeka in all the lower grades and BJU press in the higher grades and the attitudes of "you're stupid if you don't believe the way we do" were extremely prevalent in ALL of our science courses - even moreso in the upper grades. I was taught a strict YEC view from day one till I graduated and it wasn't until I was around 22 that it finally hit me that 95% of the world truly thought that view was bonkers. We were taught that those who DIDN'T believe in a young earth were deceived by Satan ("those poor souls"). The only time evolution was mentioned - EVER - was to make fun of it and "debunk" various things about it. Darwin was extremely vilified (I still work through emotional issues when I hear his name and have to sort through what's "truth" verses what I was simply "taught"). The biggest thing I remember learning in science courses was how stupid it was to believe evolution, how stupid & blind modern scientists were, and how stupid you would be if you fell for their traps. We were encouraged to never, ever read or study evolutionist materials because it was "Satan's tools to draw us away from God". I remember my science teacher in physical science (i think it was) laughing at scientists who "fell for carbon dating" and using a weird example of a volcanic rock that was misdated as "proof" that all carbon dating was wrong. There were even cartoons in science books of "dumb" looking evolutionistic scientiest puzzling over the "circular reasoning" of how they dated things - "fossils are dated based on what layer of earth they're in...yet the layer of earth is dated based on what fossils are in them" ("harrrdeee har har!"). Sincere, wonderful, kind adults I grew up admiring truly believed all of this. I "believed" it all too until after I left high school, but the attitudes displayed never did set well with me. As more and more years passed I gradually realized the depth of these "you're stupid if you believe this" ideologies. In my 13 years of schooling, we were never taught any history / science that would have been pre- 4400 BC. Never knew about any ice ages, none of the historical eras (jurassic, etc) (to this day I still can't name them), never studied neanderthals or cave dwellers. Today I find all of these subjects sheerly fascinating and lean heavily towards theistic evolution (although I still have issues of "fear" to work out due to ideas implanted in my head concerning the fate of those who DO believe in "evolutionary-anything"!). I don't want my kids to ever experience science the way I did. I will teach them both sides of the coin and let them research their own evidence. And I never want them encountering a science textbook which makes fun of and stupidifies 95% of all modern scientists like the ones I grew up with. I felt like a pure idiot when, in my early 20s, I realized the depth of all the science and history that was "sheltered" from us. Anyway, just my 2Cents, from the perspective of someone who grew up under 13 years of indoctrinations from the solidly young earth camp. I honestly feel I was cheated in the area of true God-honoring scientific study.

I would like to preface this by saying I have 3 mother-in-laws! My husband's birth mom (lives 10 miles away), my husband's adopted mom (lives 800 miles away), and my husband's adopted father's new wife (lives 800 miles away). My perfect MIL would be one who would accept me into her immediate family as "one of their own". I would not be looked down upon or treated differently because I wasn't "blood". She would never try to run OUR household. Offering advice is fine IF asked, but she would never dictate the way I should do things. I would not call her "Mom" because that's a sacred title reserved for my own mom. To expect me to do so is a No-No. She would never ever look down on our personal private family decisions (such as choosing to stay at home or homeschool), even if they greatly differ from her own. She would treat my children with as much love as she would any other grandchild she may have. She also wouldn't be quick to defend her son's every move just because he's her baby! I say that last one because a.) that's the way my Granny was with my dad, and b.) that's the way I'm afraid I'll be with my own son! lol

I really didn't read too much outside of school assignments when I was younger than 11. After that, I'm guilty of reading every single one of the Sweet Valley, Babysitters Club, & R.L. Stine books too. :) A few harlequin paperbacks passed my way also (those stayed WELL hidden because the covers are dead giveaways). My mom wasn't a reader, so she knew next to nothing about books. My dad only knew the classics. They never cared what I was reading outside of a cursory "What are you reading?" question (which I knew they didn't care to hear the answer to anyway). I do remember when I first started reading 17 magazine when I had just turned 13, mom got mad and said "But you're NOT 17!". I would still read it though. My little 10 year old cousin is currently reading Twilight. I about jumped out of my skin when I found that out!!! NO way would I let my 10 year old read that as the themes are much too mature, IMHO. I was still into barbies at that age! LOL

I hated group projects in school as well. I always found that 1-2 of the "smart ones" were saddled with all of the work because they were the only ones who truly cared about getting a good grade. As I was the "A+" student in our class, teachers would purposefully place me with a consistently low grade student thinking that they would suddenly want to become grand achievers or something or that I would "rub off" on them. I ended up doing many reports alone at the last minute during high school group projects because those in my group could have cared less! Where's their research? Where's their effort? Where's their half of the project? "Oh I forgot / didn't do it / didn't want to." I had goals to achieve and I wasn't about to let someone else bring my grades down. It drove me nuts. :glare: On a lighter note I ended up LOVING group projects in College and in the business world because people actually cared to do their part AND did a great job too. :grouphug:

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