I am about the same. My feed is mostly health related groups and gardening groups. I unfollowed most of my list last election and haven’t gone back. If I’m thinking of someone, I can just look them up. I have a sister in law that I like a lot in real life, but not on Facebook. She’s very very very political and pretty caustic to my personal belief system. I want to continue to think well of her so I don’t read her Facebook posts.

I so agree!!!! We do judge the fake redhead. I have always felt like red hair is something you have to endure as a child so you can fully appreciate it as an adult. My childhood was full of wishing I could have hair everyone else’s color and getting so many tomato head and carrot top references (yes, carrot tops are green but just try and explain that to a kid). My sisters and I were a blaze of color whenever we were out in public. We’ve all faded quite a bit as we’ve gotten older, but we’re still redheads.

I did start vegetable gardening again and added a perennial garden—somewhat for my sanity and somewhat for dd. Now I’m at a loss. DH and I are completely wiped out. We have taken a couple of weekends away from the house and kids and it was wonderful. Not nearly enough. We have secret desires to run away from them for a month.

The identity part is very true. It’s how I identify myself apart from others. I’m always “the redhead” when I want to remind others of who I am because it’s a pretty distinct separation from anyone else. People automatically remember who I am based on my hair color. It’s how I would find my sisters in a crowded store. I just recently had to admit that I needed to wear glasses all the time. I have become both near and far sighted and contacts just weren’t cutting it anymore. Now, my hair is slowly starting to go white. My appearance is changing faster than I would like. I may hold out a little longer if I go down this road too quickly, but I have no idea how anyone will replicated what I have. Every red dye job out there looks fake.

Why didn’t they make you take your mask off?!?!?! How is that supposed to be a good identification picture? Why even bother at this point? Covid has made people make insane decisions in the name of safety.

I have darker red hair with “ruddy” medium tone skin. I am also getting white hair -mostly at my temples. What about highlights? I have heard that red hair doesn’t take dye very well so you may want to look into that. I’ve decided to just let my hair change when it wants to. I’m 50 so most of my age group is going gray anyway.

Warm bath. Getting out is bad because you get the shivers, but it feels good when you’re achy and cold.

Get rid of gluten to start and dairy possibly. My ds gets IBS symptoms (diarrhea/gas) whenever he eats gluten. Most wheat in the United States is covered with round up. It interferes with the gut. Look here for an academic article : https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3945755/ or here for “the common man”. https://lauraschoenfeldrd.com/glyphosate-gut-health-symptoms/

I too have this issue. I test anemic when I don’t take iron supplements and when I do, I get into low normal—just above the anemic level. I have low iron related issues. I’m pretty sure I have some gut issues and am being tested for them. I don’t eat dairy or gluten and haven’t for a while but the problem still persists. I am working with a naturopath to figure out why instead of going the conventional doctor route. A good naturopath will try to figure out the whys instead of just treating the issue they see.

My dh and I went away for two nights. We brought our own bedding. The smoke from wildfires is getting to me too. Now, just being outside isn’t healthy either. So, the only thing that was safe for sure away from the house is not now. This year needs to go bye bye.

I went to a small church thing Sunday night. I haven’t been back really since March. I just missed seeing people in person and keep tossing around the idea of just going back to whatever new normal is there (social distancing mostly and various levels of masks). But, again, what used to be simple seems fraught with danger - mostly for my very disabled son. Just going and not being able to let my guard down as my son tries to hug people or they want to hug him. And it stressed me out so much that I was practically in tears for two days. Just having to figure out “should I let this person hug me?” is soooo much not something that I should have to think about! I need hugs—especially from a person who loves me. But, to have that even have to be a decision is exhausting (she did ask first—that’s why there had to be a decision).

One of our pastors really described it well. Decision fatigue. Decisions that used to be on auto-pilot now require multiple layers of decisions. Like pp mentioned- buy shoes online, wait, go to the store?...It used to be simpler. I need shoes? Just go to the store and buy them. Every simple decision has become complex. The pastor had the example of school for most. Last school year started and parents had to go and buy school supplies and get ready for the first day. Simple. Now you have the online or hybrid or in person full time or waking up having to quarantine because some kid tested positive. A decision that used to be an autopilot decision for most now has so many little decisions in the midst of it. Everything has become like that. It is exhausting.

I have a “my pillow”. It fluffs up really well and I can wash it without it getting wonky.

I’ve had a Bosch mixer for almost 20 years. It’s still going strong. It can knead four loaves of whole wheat bread at a time. My mom’s professional KitchenAid struggled with two. It doesn’t do as well with smaller batches of baking that you may need to do though.

Go here to find out what should be tested and what thyroid levels are optimal. Now actually finding a doctor who actually knows how to interpret the esults is a whole different animal. https://stopthethyroidmadness.com/recommended-labwork/

When we filled our ramp van with three kids smushed in the back row and my son’s wheelchair taking up the second row of our minivan, we were certain we were done. We had no more room. It’s a thing!

This will be the next wave of chaos...when the schools open again and some kids have learned the material well because their parents were able to help them vs. the kids who barely squeaked by because their parents just couldn’t. There’s going to be a huge gap of skill levels across grade levels. That will be the next thing that make parents question the public school. You’re right...the Walmart math book may be a good choice considering the alternative of learning nothing. My daughter was one of those kids last semester who would have learned absolutely nothing with math eLearning. I basically told her math teacher I was using Saxon math and ignoring the Khan academy math lessons where she was learning absolutely nothing (she doesn’t learn via computers at all—khan does work I’m sure for other kids).

So why is it that the relaxed come what may homeschoolers have the bigger voices? It sounds more popular? The “ Homeschooling is easy! You barely have to teach at all and they’ll be just fine! The public school requires too much nonsense work anyway...”. Maybe the majority of us here are introverts and just don’t want to cause a scene?😁. Or maybe they just have more time to put their opinion out there? I don’t have a happy go lucky attitude about homeschooling. I give it to people straight. When a mom who wants to get her kids off of eLearning tells me she has 20 hours a week to devote to homeschooling, I feel her it is possible for her two younger children, but it’s another part time job for her. I don’t lead her or anyone else I talk to down a rosy path of unicorns and rainbows. This probably explains why most of the ones I’ve talked to keep their children with the public school.

It keeps coming. I am on a Facebook group for my local city’s homeschoolers. The advice for the newbies is HORRIBLE! Here’s my favorites of the day: I am pulling my kid’s from eLearning public school and want to homeschool. “I have 3rd, 4th, 7th, and 9th. Can I just buy a math workbook from Walmart? “. The answers? Yes! It’s plenty! With lots of agreement. Then following is advice about giving them a break from school for a while and all sorts of nonsense. The minority are the people who are trying to offer real solid advice, but they get drowned out. My concern is that this mom is probably going to send her kids back to public school the next year. The advice to make learning a part of the day as in, “help mom write down the shopping list” That’s spelling! Yes, I agree generally as a side learning activity, but what about the rest of the week that has no spelling? There are just too many newbies who aren’t giving good advice for older kids. There is a LOT of advice to use easy peasy homeschooling where you can have your kids less than an hour of school a day and be done (for all grade levels). Sigh....I’ve told people to just call me and I would help them based and their kid and who they were as a parent including how much time they have to actually homeschool their kids. I think I’ve talked more than one person out of homeschooling and encouraged them to stick it out with eLearning until their kids could go back with person to person learning. I’ve tried to do it on the Facebook group also. Some of the people I’ve talked to really want to go back into the public school so that changes what should be recommended also. The group leaders are doing a good job having live forums and question/ answer times but it’s still not enough to stop the crazy.

I like the stories of packages taking random trips around the country. Makes no sense. It’s like someone either was lazy or overwhelmed and decided not to sort the packages at a certain location and just threw them all together to go somewhere else for someone else to sort properly. Last time my package said, “delivery delayed”, I never received it. I have low expectations for the latest one.

Tell me your delayed package stories! In the past couple of months, I’ve had two weird package issues I’ve never seen before. One was a used curriculum that got all the way to Denver (I live in Colorado) and then wound up in lost mail because they couldn’t deliver it any further. It got damaged or something unknown. It was shipped to Atlanta where all the undeliverable mail goes. Yes, I did get refunded and the seller is trying to get usps to pay up for the insurance she put on it. Just now, I checked to see where a new package was since you could track it. Denver. Great! I should receive it soon. Unfortunately, somehow my package was diverted to Puerto Rico on it’s relatively small trek to get to me (it’s a put it on a truck type deal-no plane ride needed). So, it’s delayed. No kidding! I’ve never had stuff like this happen! I’ve heard many more people are having mail issues. It’s gotten to the point that if I can choose a different carrier, I will-even if it costs a bit more.

This is exactly what is happening to my sister’s school in a Chicago suburb. The private school is open for in person instruction. There has been a slow steady trickle of new students into the school because the public schools are still not open at all.

Apparently half the country seems to be moving to Colorado Springs. I have never seen a place grow so fast—something has got to give as housing prices are insane. Houses are selling in a day with multiple offers over asking. We have a ton of hiking trails writhing 30 minutes of our house. I guess people felt that even if everything shuts down, at least they can hike. Hiking has been our main activity with Covid. Our economy has also recovered about 75%.

Anyone use these? Are they worthwhile?

My 20 year old ds has a google mini in his room. When his friend was over, I got screechy opera music on Spotify and told it to play on his google mini. All I heard from his room were ds and his friend asking “hey google, why are you playing opera music?” They couldn’t figure out why the google device was playing weird music, Then I had it play Barney music. That’s when they figured out it was me. Yesterday, for ds’s birthday, I had it play happy birthday songs after he had woken up. I’ve decided to safe my abilities to mess with his google device for special occasions😁.