I think I've noticed a few of them giving you an option to download to a device to be watched offline - I haven't tried it though, so I don't know how that works. We use our devices to access our purchases. My purchases just stay there in the cloud.....somewhere :laugh:

have you looked at Khan academy? Not a book, but it may really help and its free.

We have several - like others have said, they are larger than regular cards, and well made. We used to use them a lot while waiting - car rides, dr offices, etc. We'd make up games with them, etc. They are fun!

for weeks after I wax, I tweeze any renegade hairs that pop up, until it just gets to be too much, then I wax again. I've also used the Olay hair removal, and its ok - got rid of all of the hair, and was painless - the regrowth just feels more stubbly than it does with waxing, so I still prefer waxing. I do it at home using this stuff which works way better than anything I tried from the drug store. I've also done it at the salon and pretty much get the same results, with the same level of pain, as I do with the sugar wax, but it costs much more and a jar of that sugar stuff lasts a long long time. I've also tried nair facial, and that didn't work very well at all. That said, I've never heard of the REMspring before, I went ahead and ordered it on amazon. You could say I take my hair removal pretty seriously....... I'm just not quite ready to embrace this side of myself:

That works! What a great looking house!! I'm excited for you!

You can do that via facebook now, if you are a facebook user - I've shared facebook albums with my inlaws and husband who are not on facebook. There's also Flickr.

Sounds like my 13yo - every little thing "stresses her out" (her words) and we are SO relaxed......I am this close to enrolling her in public school for highschool....

did you maybe accidentally check the "free standard shipping on orders over $25" instead of the "prime shipping" when you checked out? Prime shipping is the default on mine, but the first option is the "free shipping - 5-9 days" or something like that - I never look that close when I'm checking out, since it defaults to Prime, but if it got accidentally changed or something, I think it could affect your shipping time. I'm always a bit confused as to why that would even be an option - yeah, sure give me the slower free shipping..that's why I'm a prime member. Duh. I don't think any primer user would ever check that option

weird. I did have an order last week that was delayed because weather delayed the shipping company, but other than that, I've never had a prime item come late unless it was one of those that had "available after" dates - I hope you didn't break it, Amazon Prime is often the only thing I can count on :laugh:

And don't go using any credit or spending weirdly between now and closing - we've heard so many horror stories. The worst was a family that had a contract on a house, and preapproval for the mortgage, and were good to go - so a few days before they were due to close and take possession and move in, they went out and bought tons of furniture for their new dream house, all on credit - they get to the closing table only to find out that the mortgage company checked their credit right before closing, and they no longer qualified for the mortgage - the furniture was all set to be delivered and everything. They didn't get the house. I was nervous because my husband travels for work, and uses our AmEx for all his business expenses so the balance on that varies widely from week to week - we pay it off every week, but I was nervous that if they pulled the credit at the wrong time or something - I must have asked my mortgage agent multiple times for reassurance on that issue. Plus I work for myself from home, and that made me way more nervous this time than it did 7 years ago when we purchased. They required so much more than just my tax returns. Last time the tax returns was enough to prove my self-employment income was there.

We've been in this house for a few months and I'm really missing our mortgage brokers - they did send a nice card for my birthday :laugh: We closed in 30 days or so, but started the process way before we even found a house.

Yeah, I wouldn't worry about the google voice call - probably entirely unrelated. Regarding the mortgage - we just bought this house and the mortgage process was way more complex and detailed than it was when we purchased 7+ years ago. They needed copies of so many things - the first week after we were under contract was very overwhelming. Every day it was like, "They want WHAT?" but then they got everything they needed, and it was calm and smooth sailing up until closing!....So deep breaths. You'll get through it.

I think I heard about that diy site on a Ted talk - or at least a Ted talk started me on a rabbit trail that led to it, I can't remember - we love it :-) I also found some summer camps and extracurricular programs based on the "maker" concept that look SO cool.

I'm following along closely. Faiths13, I could have written every one of your posts though, except mine would be for my DD - I hadn't thought about delaying highschool though, that idea made me go "hmm, maybe?" Right now she's so resistant to anything that remotely looks schooly, so its hard. She's an artist. She does tons of graphic art and films/animations - That's all she wants to do. She's amazing and so talented...but I want her to be prepared for anything - college, different careers, etc. RIght now, we're remediating math with Mastering Essential Math Skills: 20 Mins a Day to Success and ALEKS - and its going well.. Its my hopes to have her ready for prealgebra by next year, but that's still at least a year "behind" where she should be for 9th grade. She loves to write, but says she hates reading (its like a dagger through my heart when she says that) - but even though she loves to write, she doesn't like to be told what to write...she writes well, but creatively. Not much experience with academic writing, essays, etc. Anyway, This thread has been great. Thanks for starting it.

check out https://diy.org/ - she can earn vitual badges for doing different "maker" activities - this site led to my 11 year embarking on fort projects over several months, culminating in a huge cardboard gingerbread house, that was quite an engineering feet.

I do it all the time. Its legal because you are using it for your own personal use.

Oh my golly! Genius!!!!!! Thanks so much for posting this!

From the last 30 days, I've ordered: Drain stopper a bunch of math things (These kids WILL learn their multiplication tables!) Wishbone DVD ballet tights printer toner a gift card for a birthday gift some books homeopathic cold meds zicam a car charger for my phone wii game huge bag to store my artificial Christmas tree a set of styluses for my ipad (these things are GENIUS) ETA - that list doesn't include my digital items - kindle books and videos rented and purchased. I did nearly all of my holiday shopping on amazon, the "free" shipping with prime makes holidays so much easier! In the past, I've bought food items, magazine subscriptions, bar stools, printers, cameras/lenses, food, vacuum bags...just anything.

I'm working my way up, so if I'm repeating posts, I apologize. Anyway, this is my first winter in Portland, and its lovely - we've had two or so "cold" days so far - I put cold in quotes because we moved here from the midwest, and despite how the Oregonians responded, those days were so not COLD :blink: - these people don't know cold :lol: - today its around 50 degrees. It is rainy here though - I like it, but I know that isn't for everyone. This is the perfect climate for me - not too hot in the summers, not too cold in the winters. Everything is so green and pretty (because of all the rain) and the sunny season is just amazing!

I was actually coming here around then too - I didn't last long, and I don't think I even created a user ID - but I had read TWTM around then, and was hanging out here to get advice and suggestions - I lurked for several months and then just stopped coming. I visited sporadically over the years, but didn't feel I belonged here until recently - and in the past 6 months or so, I've been coming more and more regularly, and trying to post some too. Its so much different from what it was!!!

I have an external drive and an online backup that backs things up automatically - I'm currently using Crashplan - I looked at Carbonite, but crashplan better fit my needs. It backs things up every 15 minutes. I'll never loose another file (again, sigh)

Oh wow! That looks amazing! I can't wait to see the "after" pictures....since I'm drooling so much over the "during" pictures and all :drool5:

Going to have to run to Target tomorrow! Side note, I also wish the phonogram cards were numbered so I could put them back in order if I mix them all up for a game or something. The Spelling Rules cards are numbered - I keep thinking I should take a sharpie to the corners, but I hate altering items I've purchased. Its one of my many endearing quirks :tongue_smilie:

This is hard. From my time in the Bible Belt, I learned that if I tell people I'm not religious, or don't have a church home (sigh), then they still assumed Christianity. And the talk continues, and the assumptions are left unchallenged and it starts feeling like I'm actually lying about who I am...and then I always worry that the kids will spill the beans, even though I'm not actively hiding anything. Years and years ago, the don't talk about about thing was my philosophy. Until we got dumped by a Christian family - I think they found a dictionary and looked up the word "secular" and put two and two together - they joined our secular homeschool group, befriended many of us, and then they were appalled at the lack of religion, sigh - but anyway, they lived near us, had kids the same age, and we got along for the most part and frequently got together to let the kids play, but when they realized what kind of homeschool group they had joined, they actually dumped my family as friends. Told us that we weren't they type of friends they wanted for their kids. My own kids never understood why we couldn't play with them again. It was sad. Then we moved to a more Bible Belt area, and I found it just easier to tell people that we were not Christian. And leave it at that, and then as relationships evolved, sharing exactly what we were. But then as the kids got older, they started forming relationships through classes, etc., that didn't involve me that much, and I always worried that they would feel that they had to hide parts of themselves or our family just because people assumed we were Christian - after all, we lived in KS and we homeschooled :-( There was no way to really get around it though...my middle daughter had a really close friend who found out that not only are we not church-goers, but we are actually nonbelievers. This friend didn't stop being friends with my daughter, but all of the sudden each conversation they had centered around how great it will be once my daughter was a believer too, and all the benefits she will experience when that happens (there wasn't an "if" in there), there was a lot of praying and Jesus talk - and it made my daughter so sad because she really valued this relationship, but it all changed and became about her friend trying to change her instead of hanging out and having fun...I don't know how we could have avoided that - they knew we didn't go to church, but just assumed the rest :-( I did find that being very clear at the beginning of relationships enabled us to find really great friends, of all faiths. But it wasn't easy and it took time. My daughter's situation above was one where we weren't friends with the family, she developed this relationship on her own, and I don't think its fair to ask my children to introduce themselves as atheists every time a friendship starts developing.

:bigear: I'm sure my system wouldn't be of any help - our cards are all jumbled up in a pile on the table. We switched to LoE from AAS, and I miss how organized my AAS cards were :001_unsure: