I would go with a gentle, people-friendly boy. Also, black would make the most sense in our house because our floors and furniture are dark and I wear lots of black. :)

Of course you are not wrong; we all handle things differently. I handle things similar to you. I had a horrific loss over a year ago. It was so terrible, I could not verbally speak to anyone about it, by phone or in person. I told all my friends not to call me. (I was out of the state for a very long time, so they couldn't visit me in person.) They were/are all very caring people, and they have honored my feelings, but they did want to check in often. They texted me -- that's something I could handle. And I could send a quick text back. Even now, I can only speak to a handful of people about it. My friends know this is how I deal with it best. That's just the way it is.

We watched this on New Year's Day and enjoyed it a lot. However, I believe in the book, Smiley was more the central theme; his character slowly unfolded as the story went. If you watch the original TV mini-series, you'll see this more clearly: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0080297/ But, the movie was very good. We thought the best characters (as far as acting) in it were Jim Prideaux and Ricki Tarr.

Two of our children have nickname versions of their formal name, and we've always used the nickname. Another uses a shortened version of the formal name. One of the nicknames is quite unusual (at least in our culture), so people are always so surprised if they happen to hear her "real" name. If people end up calling one of my children a different nickname or shortened version, it is usually done affectionately, and it does not bother me at all. Or, if they call them a nickname/shortened name by mistake (Rob instead of Robert, for example), I won't say anything -- really, I'm just glad they're making the effort to remember the name and use it! Of course if they get the name completely wrong (calling her Sue for Samantha, for example) I'll correct them, but if they were to call her Sam -- event if WE don't call her Sam -- that's fine. If my daughter chooses to call them on it, that's fine too.

We tinkered with foreign languages a little in upper elementary/middle school: little songs to learn, very basic vocab... but didn't hit it hard until high school. This was important to us; we are a highly mobile family that loves to travel and gain experience in other countries and with other cultures, and given that my kids were not so passionate about math and sciences, it seemed a good thing to push. We required three years in high school, and several will have had four years. Because they enjoyed it so much, we encouraged them to work at it even moreso after high school. When our oldest three decided they wanted to take a gap year after high school, they ended up going abroad and studying their chosen languages even more. My two older girls went to language immersion schools -- one in France and one in Costa Rica. Our son worked at a school in Germany. They all picked up the languages very well. Our son -- though not fluent in the languages he studied (Spanish and German) -- is proficient at both and can get by quite well with either of them. Our two oldest daughters are both completely fluent in their chosen languages (Spanish and French). We never required or even expected our kids to become fluent, but have always encouraged them to continue working at it once we realized their love for languages. It has opened up many doors for them that they never dreamed of! Our oldest daughter is now a full-time university student in Costa Rica (all classes in Spanish), married to a Costa Rican. Our next daughter down received a full-ride scholarship partly because of her French fluency, and recently returned from studying in Senegal, W. Africa (all courses in French). It definitely helped that they love it. If they didn't, we still would have required three years in high school. And btw, we let them choose the language they wanted to study. Whether it was practical or not, it seemed like a good discipline.

Having a more relaxed year one year when a couple of my kids were in high school. It was health-related so kind of necessary, but still, it set them into a bad pattern that was difficult to break. But, life happens, and all in all, I feel pretty good about how it went academically, and very good about how it went with them growing up to be kind, happy, creative, independent adults.

I don't really know what to tell you, but I just want to say that I think what you're doing is wonderful!

We average 1.5 times every day.

Under most conditions, I would not consider keeping a large, 5-bedroom home just so my five children have a place to stay with their families over the years when they come home for the holidays... I mean, that would be wonderful, but to me not logical! (Of course there are exceptions!) We are a very, very close-knit, but highly mobile (someone else used that term and I liked it :) ) and fluctuating family. Usually we have two kids out of the state or even the country at once, and another older one suddenly home for six months, or sometimes even an adult child and spouse living with us for a few months. And of course our two youngest are still living at home full-time. We have spent every other year for the past five years away from home, sometimes in bigger places, sometimes in smaller places. Our home -- wherever we are -- is still home for my adult children, and I always make sure they have a special spot that is their own if they come home for a week or for a year. I cannot guarantee they'll have their own room, just their own "spot" -- bed, place to put their clothes, etc. I had one child living/sleeping on our upstairs sleeping porch for five months, another living in our den with a simple room divider giving them a little privacy. We are a family of 7, although 9 now with the two oldest being married. My kids don't have a problem with this arrangement at all, although we've always lived this way. Don't know if this helps you in your decision, but at least it's one way to look at it. :)

Ha -- as you can tell (by the time I am posting this), I have trouble sleeping too sometimes. This past year has been very stressful for me. As a result, I fall asleep easily, but wake up every night around 4am and begin mentally going down my list... I either lie in bed for two hours before falling back asleep, or I get up and do something quiet (reading, computer). If I get up, my eyes usually get quite tired in about 1/2 hour and I'm off to bed again, sound asleep. I've actually come to enjoy this 1/2 hour of a very peaceful quiet time.

I'd say the senior year for me, because my kids (some of them, anyway!) were so ready to be done and excited to do something else!

I am so very sorry. How is your dad doing, emotionally?

Wow, convicted when he was three? That is...incredible! I don't think my three-year-olds would have had enough education/understanding yet to even know what it was about. Perhaps he didn't either? And now that he has finally tasted meat, he realized it's not so bad afterall?:) On a different note, I know of many people who have gone back and forth on that issue throughout their lives, including me!

I've struggled with this a little myself, because during the first six months after my husband's stroke with extensive brain damage, his siblings all stepped in to help with little things here and there. It has been a year and a half now, and although I've thanked them all many times in person, I've wondered if I need to be sending them gifts or something more "official." Due to the overwhelming grief of it all for me, I still haven't done anything. But in the end, I've kind of come to the conclusion that they are family... isn't it their "duty" to help out their brother? I mean, I'd certainly help my own brother in a nanosecond, and definitely wouldn't expect a thank you in return. If you do go down that path, then I as my brother's sister would also need to send a thank you gift to his wife, for helping take care of my ailing brother. And, your MIL's sister should send YOU a thank you gift as well for taking care of her sister! That's all hypothetical, but I'm sure you get what I'm saying. :) In the end, I'll probably still send a nice thank you card to my husband's siblings at some point with my heart-felt gratitude for their help (which wasn't huge, but at least was something) -- just because I STILL feel like I'd like to do something, and I want them to know I appreciated their help. You can do the same for your MIL's sister -- a nice, hand-written card, or one bouquet of flowers with a little thank you note.

Definitely "Pushing Daisies." However, for whatever reason, Netflix has suddenly pulled it from their online streaming. Perhaps it will be available again...? In the meantime, there are apparently other sites (online) where you can view it for free. (check out sidereel.com).

No opinion. Either is fine!

My personal favorite is potatoes, although the quickest is rice or pasta, so those often win out. However, since three of my five children are presently on the paleo diet (meat, eggs, and veggies), we usually have an extra serving of veggies instead.

It's called "Mom and Dad" -- ha ha. :) We keep our computer in the dining room where we are all the time. Also, our kids up to a certain age were only allowed on the internet with a partner (meaning an adult or older sibling). Only our kids 21 and over have a device that would let them access the internet outside of the home, such as an iPod touch or Blackberry. I know it's not the answer you were looking for...

In our marriage, "NO" always wins -- although there are special circumstances. I can see that circumcision -- under circumstances such as Lynn's -- would be very important. In that very special case, I would probably let my husband make the final decision. Part of marriage is knowing when to "break the rules."

I'd probably give a loud guffaw, but on the inside be a little hurt...at first. Then I'd be more realistic about it and assess whether she/he was actually correct. If I happened to have a particularly brilliant child, then you can be sure I'd go out of my way to change directions so that he/she could be challenged. But if it was more that my way of teaching didn't line up in the way that she/he learns best, then I'd work at figuring out a better way. I know that in our situation, my kids wouldn't have said that unless they believed it to be true; so, I'd need to get to the bottom of it. On the other hand, we all knew all along that I wasn't very advanced in math skills. However, I always told them that as long as I kept one step ahead of them, we were doing okay.

That's an age when a lot of kids are trying to figure out what their more grown-up interests are, I think. I don't think I'd force him to volunteer. Perhaps you could first volunteer as a family, or as a parent-son team? Other than that, I'd try exposing him to various activities to cultivate an interest. Often an interest leads to opportunities to volunteer. For example, one of my children loves singing and playing her guitar, and she is asked to volunteer at nursing homes, non-profit business Christmas parties and gatherings, etc. Does he have one other friend you can arrange to have over once/week? Maybe you could help get them both into an interesting project: putting together models, a carpentry project, gardening... My two children who love to read also eventually learned to love to write. Perhaps he'd be interested in writing? Are there community ed classes you can send him to, so he can try out different interests? At that age my kids and another homeschool family with similar age kids got into circus performing. Nothing fancy, just stuff they could do at home, or on a farm: unicycling, juggling, trampoline, etc. Eventually they were asked to unicycle in parades. They did this every summer for years. Karate? Chess? Cooking? Just trying to brainstorm. I also would support someone else's idea of perhaps paying him a little to volunteer. Is there a volunteer group he'd be especially interested in? Working at a humane society, etc? Would he do it if you paid him $5/hour? Usually I wouldn't use money to "bribe," but I don't think of this as bribing. I think it can be useful to jumpstart an interest. When my daughter was past the beginning level of guitar/singing, she thought about quitting. We felt she was talented, and didn't want her to give up just yet. My husband offered to pay her to arrange five hymns. She happened to owe us money, so this was good incentive for her to do it! She spent several months working on it, and it eventually led to her life's passion (at least for now ;)).

Our state requires us to do it yearly, ages 7-15. We did the Iowa Basics.

A lot of great ideas here, I think. I think 13 and up kids often take themselves too seriously, but of course you can't tell them that. What you CAN do is try and take her mind off of herself. Brooding and listening to a lot of music can make it worse. To help her feel excited about something and feel a sense of adventure/freedom coming up, can you help her plan a fun camp to go to next summer? This was a first step for my kids once they started feeling antsy. There are so many camps nowadays, some close to home but others out of state that might still be reasonable. Our son went to an outdoor biology camp on the west coast one summer. A daughter attended a musical theater camp. Several attended a Christian camp. Until then, would it be feasible for you and her to go on a little weekend away? Stay one night at a bed and breakfast or somewhere? Does she have a good friend whose mom is a good friend of yours that you could even do this with? Perhaps you could go to a different city nearby that has interesting museums. Or, if you are in a city already, you could go to a b&b out in the country to get a whole different experience. Maybe you could set the guideline that no electronics are allowed. :)

I would get a box of Zatarain's Red Beans & Rice (found at most grocery stores, I think): http://www.zatarains.com/Recipes/Red-Beans-and-Rice.aspx Mix in a pound of cooked and sliced nitrate-free sausage and some cooked frozen corn. Serve it with a quick salad, and corn bread from a mix. Are any of the kids old enough to whip up the corn bread? End the meal with applesauce.

Our situation is a little different, because of my husband's health. Our daughter is home from college abroad for a month and a half, and then gone for another semester abroad. My expectations under normal circumstances would be to help in the kitchen (daily), help with rides for her younger siblings, do her own laundry, spend lots of time with her family:), and try and get a little part-time work in, if possible. But, I've told her that I'd rather she spend all of that "chore" time with her father instead. She's a great gal and IS spending tons of time with him. But, this is something they both really enjoy; she doesn't look at it as a chore.