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mamaraby

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Posts posted by mamaraby

  1. 13 minutes ago, happysmileylady said:

    The per girl average thing may be totally different for different councils.  And if you are scaling back your overall participation, I don't think that's a problem.  But one thing you mentioned was that some girls ONLY did booths....I would never tell a parent no, but I have said that I would really prefer for parents to just be out if all they really want is to be out, and explained that the per girl average matters.  

    So, the incentive field trip requires a pga of 252 per council which I interpreted as each girl needs to sell at least 252 for rhe girls to get the trip and those that sell over kind of make up for that. Am I understanding PGA correctly? In other words is it better for the troop for that particular group incentive if we sell that 252 per girl or does it not matter.

  2. 1 minute ago, happysmileylady said:

    The amount the troop gets per box depends on the pga.   I have no idea if that has changed or when, it's been over a decade since I have been a leader or cookie mom.  According to my cookie book, up to 179 boxes, the troop gets 55c per pox.  Between 180 and 239, the troop gets 60c per box.  And 250+ per girl average, the troop gets 70c per box.  Per Girl average is of course total number of boxes sold by the whole troop, divided by the number of girls participating in cookie sales.  So a girl who sells nothing, that doesn't count towards that pga.  But if a girl shows up at the last sale with a signed agreement and earns 5 boxes sold at that booth, she counts as part of that average.  We have one girl who has already said she's not selling, and that's totally fine.  

    One of the options I was considering this year was minimal participation like we do with the nuts and candy sales. A few boxes to a few people, no door-to-door effort, and a booth so they get the badge. I wouldn’t want to hurt pga, though, and i wouldn’t want the troops not to get the field trip award that’s based on a minimum pga.

  3. 7 minutes ago, Acorn said:

    I would only be upset that the council uses money for “incentives”. I’d rather see that money used for programming or experiences instead of more plastic water bottles.

    From what our council says, some percentage of the cost of the cookies goes to incentives. We can either choose the incentives or we can donate the equivalent money to charity. One of the charity options is the council’s camper scholarship fund.

  4. 28 minutes ago, katilac said:

    Can you clarify if your dds are missing out on further incentives by the reassignment? Or is 600 the limit, so to speak? 

    Not that I wouldn't be annoyed either way. 

    There are further incentives. It didn’t knock dd down a level. The next incentive level is 804 so even being short those 60 boxes leaves her at the 600-803 incentive level.

     

    17 minutes ago, happysmileylady said:

    I am a troop cookie mom this year and that is NOT something I would ever do.  I was going to ask you about cookie booths, because in terms of a cookie booth, all sales at a booth would get spread across the girls who participated, which would probably result in a discrepancy between families (like I am the cookie mom for DD10's troop, but DD8 is in a different troop so they will be doing different booth things, etc.)  But other than spreading booth sales across the girls that participated, no, I would never reallocate cookies like that that.  I am not cookie robin hood.

     

    Having said that, I also have no intention of keeping track of the number of cookies either of my girls sell other than what it necessary (and of course, as cookie mom for DD10's troop, it's more necessary to have exact figures for each girl in the troop)  If DD8 sells more, great.  If DD10 sells more, great.  We will buy an even number from each girl, and I will be taking both girls door to door together and taking turns house by house.  But I have no intention of making sure that if DD8 runs across someone who buys 50 boxes, that DD10 finds a way to sell that many too.  

    And, I would only make a stink if the reallocation meant that a kid missed an incentive.  I guess what that means is that to me, it's wrong enough that I would never do it, but not wrong enough that I would be bothered if it happened to us, as long as it means my kid didn't miss out on what she earned.  

    To take it just a step further, if a parent came to me and said hey, ABCDE needs 6 boxes to get to X level, so if you can, my daughter QRS can give up 6 of her boxes to ABCDE so she can get her prize...that I wouldn't have a problem with.  But I would never do it outside of something like that.  

    I have a feeling she did it previous years with booths. Last year the girls were at a two person booth with my two girls the only ones at it so we were the only ones to split the cookies with and since we had checked the cookies out as a family and run it, I split the sales between the two. Door to door, it’s just easier to maintain one cart of cookies and one pot of money. I don’t track who sold what on a door to door basis so I’m sure one dd might sell more than another if I broke it out per house, but they’re both out there for the same amount of time at the same time(we can clear a street quicker this way). I just split it in half at the end of the night and update inventory/sales totals. We’re doing it direct sales instead of order taking because then we don’t have to do twice the work.

    I don’t remember her saying that she split each girl’s sales up at the parent meeting, but had I remembered it, something like what you mentioned at the end of your post is how I would haveenvisioned it. 6 boxes, sure. 3 boxes, of course. 60 boxes amongst the Junior troop that doesn’t have that many girls in the troop to begin with seems like a lot.

    • Like 1
  5. We're heading into Girl Scout cookie season which means my "huh, that's odd" thought from the award ceremony this fall has come up again. I'm trying to get a feel for how unreasonable my feelings are on the issue and since none of you have bought cookies from my girls you're an uninterested third party.

    I have two kids in GS. For council, 600 boxes is considered a "top seller" and when you reach that level, you go to an awards banquet where your scout goes across the stage to receive recognition for the number of cookies they sold. This is where the "huh, that's interesting" part comes in. While I have spreadsheets that track cookie sales for both of my girls, I don't carry them with me. Dd1's official number according to council was 601 boxes and Dd2 was somewhere around 640-ish. At the time, I know there's something not right because I make sure my girls sell exactly the same number of cookies every year. I knew at the time that Dd2's number was closer to what I thought we had sold, but I couldn't say for sure what it should have been.

    Fast forward to yesterday. In looking at last year's spreadsheets, both Dd1 and Dd2 sold 661 boxes of cookies. Which means according to council's numbers, dd1 was shorted 60 boxes. I don't know for sure how many dd2 was shorted, but it was nowhere near that many. This morning, I called the troop leader and she tells me that what she probably did was take those 60 boxes and spread them out among some of the other girls in Dd1's troop - because if they were short of an incentive level, then by taking dd1's cookies and crediting them to those other girls, those girls earn that incentive they would have otherwise not earned. In the meantime, she makes me feel like I'm being unreasonable in questioning it because a) she's done this every year since she started with the daisy troop and she's been doing this a long time, b) she says she mentions it at every parent's meeting, and c) if I feel that strongly about it she can make "a special exception" for my girls.

    Here's the thing - between the two girls the cookies reassigned to other scouts in their respective troops is somewhere around 60-80 boxes. When the selling is good, that's about half of what we sell door to door on a weekend day. Towards the end of the season when no one wants cookies, that's probably all the girls well sell on a weekend day. We're talking 10am-dusk or after, door-to-door in the snow because I live in the midwest and of course cookie season is in February. Am I being unreasonable to be upset about this? 

    We're significantly scaling back our sales this year to the per girl troop minimum average number so we can't be accused of costing the troops the troop incentive trip. It means fewer incentives, but I'll be giving my kids some cash because I'm burnt out on cookies. Some of the people I've talked to about this (who also happen to be related to us) feel what the troop leader is doing is unethical and that the other girls knew they hadn't reached the incentive level when they stopped selling and if they had wanted to, they would have kept selling. Some have suggested that we not sell cookies at all this year. Dh thinks we worked too darn hard for this. All of these people think I should do more than I have about the issue.

    I would have been ok with a few boxes each girl to help someone out. I think 60 boxes is a pretty big number to have given away to someone else - especially since last year's cookie season was hellish with a stomach bug that would not quit. It makes me not want to sell cookies. I can't go back and get her to undo what she did last year, but it feels wrong to do nothing and wrong to make a big stink. So, what say the hive. How unreasonable am I for being upset about this and do I do anything?

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  6. Yesterday was an interval workout. Today was the first post 5k race workout with the kids. There was some grumbling beforehand, but I told them I wasn’t interested in grumbling. I was leavng at x time and anyone who wanted to run could join me and anyone who didn’t could stay home and either choice was fine. Grumbling ceased and the run was fun. There was also this big yellow ball in the sky that’s been absent quite a bit lately. It was a mystery. ?

    Non-guaranteed entry for the Chicago Marathon opened today so I put my name in for the lottery. December 11th they’ll let non-guaranteed entries know if they’re in. I hate big races like that, but Chicago has sentimental value so I’m going to give it a shot this one time. 

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  7. Halloween is one of those holidays that holds little appeal indulgence wise for me, probably because most chocolate is not vegan and the vegan candies do not appeal to me. Maybe also because if I were going to bake, I would need to be home. And we all know soccer season means being home with that kind of free time is an illusion. ? @soror - feeling icky is no fun! Sometimes that helps me mentally shift the framework because then I can more easily avoid it to prevent feeling icky.

    While dh and the kids did the soccer thing, I went with but got my run in on the bike path because that sounded more interesting than my neighbordhood route. 50 minutes total which began with me shivering and ended with me shivering after I had cooled off waiting for the soccer peeps to be done. I love running in the fall and yet sometimes I wish it were warmer!

    I have an easy run on the schedule today and an interval run tomorrow.

    • Like 3
  8. On 10/22/2018 at 7:48 AM, wintermom said:

    The thing that got to me with all the local 5K races was the cost. I did manage to find a couple free runs, but then I didn't go to those. So maybe attaching a payment keeps more people committed to going! ?

    I’m sure it’s partially that, but it’s also things like chip timing (not free), road closures and police/EMS (not free), permits (not free), etc.

    If free is the desire, then maybe instead a sponsored training run would be an option? I can only speak about my area in the US, but about 30 minutes or so away there’s a local running store that often holds runs like that. It’s not exactly a race, but it’s got the group aspect of a race. Or a local running group that gets together to run? The later probably requires a certain pace. Sponsored training runs may be more pace inclusvie, but that’s going to vary too.

    Fun runs and runs put on charities can be less expensive, but likely not timed. If chip timing is not a desire, and running together is, then maybe just setting out on your own route (trail probably is better because it cuts down on traffic crossing) and using a GPS app to keep time could be just as fun. 

    Oh, or signing up a year in advance. Races are cheapest the day registration opens, but you really have to plan that out so that’s probably not so helpful.

    Just throwing ideas out there. ?

    I ran 10 miles of dh’s 18 mile long run. He decided to push the pace and while I could have done the whole thing with him, I decided being post-marathon gave me the privilege of saying “Yeah, I don’t want to work that hard. I’m done.” ? It was a great feeling. I took a rest day today. That felt great, too.

    Since I haven’t had a chance to get a true race pace effort since May, I decided to use the local Turkey Trot ($20) 5 mile race as my chance to do that. It’s two weeks after dh’s marathon so while we’re both signed up, I told him this time I’m leaving him behind. I have just enough time to go through the peak training and taper phase of the 80/20 Running 10k plan. I’ll start that tomorrow.

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  9. @soror - It sounds like you’re chugging along!  Can you set a reminder/recurring alarm for the meds so itks automated and someone/something else does the remembering? Re:5ks, there are some really unique ones out there - especially holiday themed ones. I often check the listings over at runningintheusa.com. I think you're in the US. If not, ignore that. ? Won’t help. If you are, though, you can filter by state, distance, and month. 

    • Like 1
  10. @FairProspects - Sorry about the knee! Congrats on the weight loss. That’s fantastic!

    Friday I went out for my first solo run since the marathon. Felt wonderful. We ran our race yesterday. Ds ran by himself and surprised himself with his speed. He’s got bigger plans for running now. Dh figures he takes after me. He’s probably right, lol. My middle child did fantastic. Not as fast as she had hoped, but still amazing. My youngest initially was upset with me when I told her I didn’t think I could keep up with a 9:00/mile. She insisted that’s what she was going to run so I promised I’d try my best. Her goal turned out to be too ambitious for her. Still, so ridiculously proud of all three of them! Hands down, the most fun race of 2018. They’ve already picked out the next family race.

    Unplanned rest day for me today. Spent all day in my car either driving a child somewhere or waiting on a child somewhere. Two weeks until soccer season is over. I am feeling slightly burnt out on soccer at this point.

    My big surprise was that 9:00/mile. Turns out, I probably could have hung on until the end and gotten it in the low 9s. I also saw a picture of me from the race and found for the first time that I could say “hey, she’s looking slim” about myself. It’s been hard for me to see it. I think my perception of myself is finally catching up with reality. I still have some weight/body fat to lose, but I’ll take every step in the right direction.

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  11. Last C25k run with the kids before their race on Saturday. The three kids all have wildly varying paces so dh ran with the slowest and Zi ran with the mid pace kid - she was tough to keep up with. If she can make the whole 5k at that pace I’d probably wrangle a PR. Not sure that she can. They’ve all done so well and ai can’t believe 10 weeks have passed!

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  12. 5 minutes ago, Rachel said:

    Sorry, I don’t want you to think I’m picking on you. It’s just that in the last 2-3 years I specifically remember more than one article talking about how smoking pot (Peter Segal from NPR wrote one of the articles) affects running performance and also whether or not sex before a race affects a performance.  There are also monthly features focusing on running for weight loss. The OP may or may not have read the magazine in recent years and should be given a heads up before blindly subscribing. Your daughter may be ready for those kinds of things, but my kids aren’t. 

    I’ve been subscribed for three years and I don’t remember any pot articles. They’ve also gotten a new editor recently and changed up the format quite a bit. A lot of the long term columns are gone or changed. I’m less than enthused about the recent changes.

    I’m with @Jean in Newcastle, it’s not so much that you disagree with RW for your 12-year-old and more that you expanded that to all 12-year-olds with a blanket statement. Lots of different ways of parenting here.

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  13. We’ve done Softpaws in the past, but found they never stayed on as long as they said they would. Then they became annoying because we had to put them on so often.

    I think humans need to be careful when they say declawing didn’t bother their cat. We don’t really understand fully what cats feel since none of us are cats, but we do know that when they are in pain, the signs can be so subtle. I would err on the “I’m not in the body, so I’m not qualified to say there is no pain” side of things and not declaw. It would not be an ethical choice for me.

  14. @wintermom - I like long distance. I’ve got my eye on a 50k. ? And a 30k. A trail half. I’m contemplating trying the lottery for the Chicago Marathon next year. Chances would be slim, but it’s a bucket list item for me.

     @Kim in Appalachia - Score! The day before my marathon, I got a short sleeve running shirt at Target for $4.80 and I thought I had found a deal, lol.

    C25k with the kids today. It was 37 F when we went. I wanted cooler running weather, just not so sure that’s what I meant. I miss the big pockets on my running shorts for my phone and I’m feeling too cheap to buy new capris.

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  15. 2 hours ago, BarbecueMom said:

    Charter (Spectrum, whatever) basically has a monopoly here now.  They won’t do that anymore unless you switch to AT&T or a satellite provider (with lower speeds and/or data caps), then switch back.  It’s not worth the hassle and interruption anymore.

    We pay $65 a month, but have zero problems with them otherwise.  No data caps, speed is fine, connection problems are extremely rare.  I figure I’m paying extra for the peace of mind knowing that DH can work at home whenever he needs to (bad weather, sick kid, back flare up, etc.) without issue.

    Same. To all of the above. What I have used to be $29.99. It’s gone up over time to the current $65/mo cost. AT&T speeds are ridiculously slow and they have data caps. Spectrum (formerly known as Charter) cannot have data caps per whatever merger agreement they reached awhile back. That provision was time limited from what I remember, but it won’t change for awhile.

    I believe they even changed some state law to allow competition awhile back. There’s still no competition and Charter’s not offering deals because let’s face it, there’s no real competiton (see also: above). We have had some connection issues the past couple of months, but they also just replaced our modem so maybe that will help. The connection issues are unique - it’s definitely not something we experienced in the past.

  16. 11 hours ago, Margaret in CO said:

    Yeah, Goldens will welcome in intruders, show them all your valuables, and then roll over to have their tummies rubbed!

    Well yes, because they like to be helpful. You wouldn’t want them to not be helpful, would you? ? Those humans might be unhappy if they did not help them. “I halp” - the motto of all Goldens, everywhere.

  17. 12 hours ago, Ktgrok said:

    And, after researching bit statistics, and really considering my top priorities.....I think I'm going to forget about the intimidating part and get a Golden Retriever (once I convince DH). It would have the trainability I want, be more human focused than my hound, and be about as safe as you can get with a dog for a family with kids. They do shed, but it's the kind of fur that can be cleaned up versus the weaves its way into everything kind of fur. And I'd look for one with less coat, just because of our heat and my wish for quicker bathing/drying. Plus they love to retrieve and play in water and we have a pool and a fenced back yard, so we could exercise one the way.

    Heh, someone needs to tell my Golden about that bit about them loving to retrieve in water. In his opinion, water, unless it’s the kind in his bowl, is scary, yo. Very scary. Back up, run away, and hide scary.

    Human focused? Yes. Trainable? For sure. Handsome? You bet.

    He does shed a lot, is not quick drying, and the groomer bills to keep him handsome are more than I anticipated.

    Mine has separation anxiety of a sort. I can leave him home alone out of his crate if we’re gone all day and he’s fine. I can go on a trip, hire a pet sitter to come twice a day, leave him home with the cats, out of his crate, and he’s fine. I cannot, however, take him to a kennel or have him stay at a family member’s house. In the case of the kennel, he’ll stop eating and won’t eat regularly for more than a week after we’re all back home. He does slightly better at my sister’s house. This last time he was there for one night and my sister said he cried/whined every time he heard a door close. That was Sat/Sun. It’s Wednesday and he tries to follow me everywhere I go for fear that I’m going to leave him again.

    But yeah, he does a fantastic rug impression when he’s not afraid he’s being abandoned. And he loves people. And love. And cats. But also, love. Is someone hugging somewhere in the house? Don’t forget meeeeeeeeee!

    • Haha 1
  18. @wintermom - Well, this was actually his second marathon. He did *much* better in his first marathon (last fall) than he did this one. The moral here, of course being, respect the distance. 26.2 miles is no joke. We’ll re-run this marathon since dh feels he has unfinshed business with the course.

    @HollyDay - my cynical side is with @soror. The trainer obviously would prefer more frequent visits from a business standpoint. I understand the fear bit, too. I’d want to preserve fitness and prevent injury. What if you chose to stick with what you’ve budgeted and what you feel confident can keep injuries at bay while tabling the increased frequency discussion for the future?

    • Like 1
  19. @wintermom - I hope you can get some answers at the doctor!

    @lmrich - It’s tough to speak up! You have to, though because you’re worth it and no one else can do it.

    @Kim in Appalachia - I love a good plan! And a coupon. Dh does feel badly about how it went down. I feel badly (and not) about how it went down because there’s a part of me that thought that he wasn’t going to be able to keep up. My last long run in August was a tough one and he was really struggling at the end. Honestly, I should have paid more attention to that run because that run was a pretty good harbinger of things to come. I don’t think he appreciated just how much fitness he lost by not running as often as he should have because of work. And he missed the 20 miler because he always chooses to take the kids out to visit his parents in August which in my mind is a dumb time to travel if you’re training for a fall marathon. Life is so complicated, ya know?

    I had my pitty party at mile 18 as I watched all of my A, B, and C goals slip away. Complete with tears which was probably not helpful since dh was already on the struggle bus. I chose not to leave him behind even though he asked me to. I chose not to chase my goal and I have all sorts of conflicting feelings about that. Man, though, mile 16 right before that aid station where it became clear how things would go down...I was flying. It was amazing. Even miles 20-23 were just steallar runner’s high territory. Fantastic. Amazing. I crushed that training cycle and should not have doubted myslef in the slightest. Like, #BAMR to borrow a term from Another Mother Runner.

    We should have based our pacing plans on dh, not me. If we had started the first half about 30 seconds or more slower per mile, I think we could have finished stronger and possibly spent less time running than we did. It’s just that I’ve always been the slower runner and we always base the strategy on me. Those last two miles were the worst, though. The slowest, I’m not sure this will ever end miles. I was strong, but man, no matter how well trained you are, almost six hours is a long time to be running. I eeked out a D goal when we got to the finish line and saw gun time at 5:59:40. I was *not* going to finish in 6 hours (gun time) so I ditched dh an sprinted so I could cross before 6. It was probably silly, but there was just no way I was going to be a six hour runner. Nope.

    What I hate is that if anyone just looks at my splits from the race, then I look like just another runner who was undertrained and went out too fast. I’m in that group of people that some faster marathoners complain about. We’re dragging down average finish times and all that. But you don’t see the context in those splits. Sure, one of use was undertrained and went out too fast. The second of us chose the other person over the time goal. And really, if you run back there, there’s just no way some of those people who finished around us chose that as their result.

    I won’t do that next marathon. Next marathon I run for me. 5:30 - I’m coming for you. Anyone not trained up will be left behind because there has to be a marathon result that reflects me as a runner and not someone else. So I’m a little sad, but mostly just f-ing pleased with myself because I did that. I chose to change my life in 2014. June 2015 I decided to change it more by starting running and I decided I’d run a marathon before 2019 even though I had a few people who thought I should wait and see how the running went. But I also learned not to listen to the people who try to slow me down by trying to get me to be “realistic” about my goals. Dh believed from the start that I could reach my goal even when I had my doubts before the race. And again, he probably feels worse about the race than I do because we both know I could have done it.

    It’s so cliché but I found myself by running and that’s pretty fantastic. It’s like a non-scale victory, but in this case it’s a non-time based marathon PR. Next up is a four week reverse taper. I’ve got a McMillan plan to follow for that. This week that mostly means I’m running with the kids for their C25k plan. Those runs are always super easy for me as evidenced by my HR and how I feel post run so it’s a good way to recover by not doing anything taxing or challenging. I’m also thinking I’ll shoot for a more agressive goal for my 20k in May so I’m pondering what that might look like.

    • Like 3
  20. I did it! Marathon completed. Dh was undertrained so the wheels came off around mile 16. Pacing for me was spot on up to that point and I think I would have met my time goal had dh been trained up. Still a win in my book even with the slow second half. Now I’m going to sit around some and not do anything. 

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    • Thanks 1
  21. @wintermom - Thanks! Happy Thanksgiving! It does seem incredibly early so I don’t blame you. Hope your celebration is a good one!

    Final runs in and done. I’m still hemming and hawing about shoes and clothes and pace and... It’s a list. Ds has come down with a cold that started with a sore throat. Now I have a sore throat. Naturally this has not helped my nerves.

    @soror - Have fun camping!

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