Yes, there are a multitude of other ways through it outside of he says to move, she says they won't and that's the point. It's not that "someone" has to decide as if there's one person who has the ultimate authority and the other has to go along with it because they're not chosen by god to do so. It's "they" have to decide because it impacts both of them. She could get a job. They could both get part-time jobs (in any combination) until something better suited comes along. They could sell a house, downsize, move in with family, etc, etc. The perspective matters a great deal. Neither of us believes that my husband is the final authority, "tie breaker," or head of the household so we by necessity have to be able to work our problems out together. Compromise. If there are other problems in our relationship that hinder our ability to work together then we address those issues outside of the decision in question. If we can't resolve those issues then working together is no longer an option and we have no business being married. Divorce is very likely the best solution if it comes to that. IMO the only time that a "tie breaker" is necessary is if you believe that neither partner has the free-will to leave an unhealthy situation and so then you need a way of forcing the issue. I do not. You can try to dance around the issue all you want . You can try to avoid it, soften it, and make it pretty, but "wifely submission" means a hierarchy, authority, power structure. The love bit is to make it more palatable, but the base is still about who's really in control. Otherwise why talk about "submission" in terms of parent/child, slave/master, Christ/the church? This is precisely where the passage about husbands/wives falls. It's meant to be seen that way and it's absolutely within a culture that saw women as possessions...patriarchy. The "dummies" explanation did a fantastic job of skirting the issue, but that doesn't mean it's not there. If you believe otherwise, we'll agree to disagree. If it works for your relationship and you accept that then I won't tell you that you shouldn't do it that way. I just happen to think that it's not the best way to approach marriage. IMO there are far better, more humane, ways that manage to both function and to show love for one another in a marriage. I'd rather raise my daughters in that sort of environment which is why I choose to live the way that I do.

To be honest, this idea of a tie breaker sounds rather foreign to me and a little absurd. Why does there need to be a tie-breaker? In all these years of marriage we have never reached an impasse. Maybe that's because we have no expectation of someone being a "tie-breaker." We don't go into a decision with the expectation that someone can get their way just by being a particular gender. We go into it expecting that we're going to have to come to a mutual decision. That isn't to say that we've never disagreed or done so passionately. Sometimes we may table the discussion for awhile - sleep on it, live through it, ponder it, but I can't think of any decision that we've had to make that had only two options (mine vs his), there have always been a multitude of ways forward.

What about GVI? I don't know much about United Planet, but here's their page on teens.

That would save me traveling to every Target within my reach. :0) Thanks!

I had sealants put on my molars back when I was younger and have never had problems with them coming off or with cavities because of them. I don't know when I had them put on, but I'd say it was in the 20-ish year range. When the dentist mentioned putting them on my ds I didn't hesitate.

I vaguely remember seeing that on the shelves awhile back, but when I looked today they didn't have it. Can you see if there's an ISBN or what the title of it is? I would like to see if I can find it online.

I was going to suggest the same thing. Both of them were huge hits for my son.

During class time or during free time? If it's during class time and it's germane to the discussion then they could continue. In a discussion about bugs in a science class it would not be appropriate and should be treated like any off-topic comment. It's not the time or place. In topics where it's appropriate (history, comparative religions, a book where characters hold religious beliefs, etc) as a pp has mentioned then it can continue. During a student's free times, in personal conversations with others, etc it's within that student's rights to do so.

I'll agree with this. While I like using iPhoto to organize my pictures (and the facial recognition to create "albums" of my kids really nice) I do not edit my pictures with iPhoto. For that I usually use one of the free programs online because spending money on photo editing is always at the bottom of my list. I *want* to shoot in RAW so that I can get all of the benefits of that particular file format, but I've never been able to figure out how to do that in iPhoto and because the file names are basically the same I often have difficulties figuring out which one is the RAW file and which is not. Which doesn't even get to the issue Spy Car mentioned as far file structures is concerned. Sometimes once they get in iPhoto, it can be hard to allow another program to get at the file. I'm not a power user and I'm not a novice when it concerns photos and it feels to me like the middle ground is a bit fuzzy. I'm confident there is an easier Mac solution, but I'm afraid that likely require more money than I have to spend at this point.

I'm north of where the storm really picked up steam, but I started watching it across the radar once the warnings fired up just south of here. It was one monster of a storm! While I would not want the wind, nor the loss in power, we could desperately use the rain. The last time we had a really good rain storm was back at the end of May. The grass in my mostly shaded lawn is turning brown which almost never happens and we've only mowed the lawn three (yes, 3!) times this summer.

1. Have you used both mac and pc? If so, how would you compare them. Yes. I grew up using PCs - our first was a Zenith running DOS and then we went from there. My last Windows PC was a Dell I got when I was in college. We had it for something like 9 or 10 years before we had to replace it which I believe was probably two (?) years ago. We bought a Mac mini and I would never go back. You could not pay me to buy a PC at this point. 2. What do you love about your mac? It's super easy to use. The interface is intuitive and I've had a fraction of the problems I used to have with my Windows computers. I now have difficulties when I sit down at my mom's HP laptop with figuring out where to find things. I plug stuff in and viola! It works. When we switched over I put my dh in charge and thought it would take hours. Not more than 10 minutes later and we had put all of our files from our Dell on the Mac and it was ready to go. I'm seriously in love with iTunes, iPhoto, iMovie, and Safari. Christmas presents for the fam last year was a gorgeous photo calendar that I put together using iPhoto (comes standard on the Mac). The quality of the calendar was head and shoulders above the online stuff I used to use. The other thing I like is the way all of our stuff works together (Mac mini, Airport, Apple TV, older versions of iPod Touch and iPod Nano, and a 2nd gen iPad). Seamless, really. 3. What do you dislike about your mac? Ummm....Nothing? 4. Do you find it easy to use? Super easy. 5. Do you have trouble finding compatible software? No. The App Store makes finding software really easy (in some ways too easy, you could spend *a lot* of money in the App Store). I used to use Microsoft Office and I did briefly consider buying it, but iWork was a fraction of the cost. It's taken me a bit to figure out how to use it, but the functionality is the same. I adore Bookpedia (and the PocketPedia3 app for my iPad) to keep track of my library of books (homeschooling and otherwise). Now I don't have to wonder what I have, I know. I do miss Microsoft Money a little bit. Not all of Quicken's options work with the new Mac OS and I've read what they do have is limited in functionality compared to the Windows version. Right now I use iBank which has all of the functionality I need minus the ability to import in things from my online banking. I can import them, but I run into problems with duplicate entries (iBank does not see that the transaction with a date of 6/15 is the same as the one that cleared the bank on 6/20 even though everything but the date is the same). I enter everything manually at this point and have been able to work around it with very little stress.

I used it for about three months. The first couple of them weren't bad, but then as time went on there were more and more meals they had planned that just weren't something my family would eat. I used to get the Cooking TF meal plan when we had fewer kids and more money for groceries and much preferred that one to e-meals. Eating Well has a vegetarian meal plan that covers 28 days (and all three meals) that's free on their website. Otherwise, I'd probably look into something like Veggie Meal Maker which has a 30 day free trial or something like Whole Food Meal Plans.

I'm not a big words on t-shirt kid of person, but I think there are far, far more offensive things (on t-shirts, signs, bumper stickers, and coming out of the mouths of folks I otherwise respected) that I have seen and heard in the last year and a half. Not a single one of them had anything to do with "profanity" or swearing either. I don't think it's a sign of a small vocabulary and sometimes I do think there are situations and sentiments for which they are entirely justified. In this case I get it and I don't have a problem with someone wearing it around my kids.

I don't typically get the "your order has shipped, here's your tracking number" email from RR until after ai've received my package. what do you usually get from RR for this?

Ummm...does "Quiet" count as non-school related? I started out reading it just for myself, but it's rapidly becoming a great deal more about school than I intended when I started. Otherwise, I'm reading a book by Thich Nhat Hahn and one by Jack Kornfield (which isn't the one I really wanted to read, but the library doesn't have it). Oh, and I just got Margaret Atwood's "The Handmaid's Tale" from the library today. And a couple of cookbooks...can't forget the cookbooks.

I suspect, after reading about the third party companies that run their warehouse operations that it has a great deal to do with how (little) they pay the folks who fill and package their orders. I struggle with it quite a bit, honestly because I have a Prime membership and order from them quite a bit (like the Coleman Instant Tent we got as a gift this year that cannot have been cheap to ship). About the only thing that makes it better for me is that they at least ship UPS. It would be a deal breaker for me if it was FedEx. I must live fairly close to RR because once it ships I get my stuff super quick. I'm more likely to buy elsewhere, though, because coming up with the money in order to not have to tack shipping on top is a big stretch for us. I was really glad to see this offer because I'm again having difficulties coming up with the $150 and would likely need to put our order off for a bit until I do. This way I can split it up and get some of the things we need sooner rather than later. Seeing it on their website literally took a huge weight off my shoulders.

I'd point her to the NAPW's webpage on employment issues (and discrimination against pregnant women/people with family responsibilities). They also include specifics for New York state. I know there are those who have issues with the NAPW, but when it comes to supporting mothers in the workplace, particularly as it intersects with pregnancy, they really are top notch. You can find it over here. They also include suggestions for finding pro-bono help.

I can see where that would play a role and could temper the results somewhat. He has struggled with narration and the periodic reading comprehension type worksheets so I don't think the result is necessarily out of left field.

I elected to do DORA testing for my rising 2nd grader. Based upon some of the difficulties he has with Voyages in English and the like I had a nagging feeling that there were some issues. Overall he did test quite well when it came to things like HFW, word recognition, spelling, and vocabulary. When it came to phenomic awareness (eg If you say the word "smile" and remove the "s" sound, what do you have left?) and reading comprehension, though, he's below grade level. On the comprehension part he's coming up more than a year below grade level. He especially has difficulties with inferential questions about the text. We already incorporate SSR and read alouds daily. It does seem, at least to me, that he is able to track the story. So I'm wondering if it's an issue of more practice? We probably don't do narration as often as we should, but is narration alone enough? If your goal is to help a child who struggles with reading comprehension, what would you do?

But it's more than just chlorine levels which is why testing strips check more than just total chlorine/free chlorine levels. I wouldn't let the kids go swimming because it's a sign to me that something's off in the chemistry of the pool. If it was a non-vinyl pool (meaning not one of those inflatable ones) I'd be looking into better cleaning practices including brushing down the walls of the pool (even if they seem "clean"), backwashing the filter, cleaning out the filter basket(s), and keeping closer tabs on the water chemistry. I'd see it as a gentle reminder that things need a bit more attention and add in an algaecide fo back-up to address the current issue. The kids would be welcome to swim again when things were better under control.

I have a pseudonym for mine. If you go to "Your Public Profile" under the "Personalization" section of "Your Account." There's just one "name" field there and that's where I entered my pseudonym. I've only ever had one bad experience with leaving a seller review. It was neutral for a substandard product that did not match up with seller's description. They called me at home (!!!!) and absolutely would not take no for an answer. It was creepy.

Quarterly

Ten years ago my Dad went in for a physical and had routine bloodwork done as he had every year of his adult life. The bloodwork included a PSA test which was standard at the time for his age. Between his test the previous year and the one that year, an aggressive form of prostate cancer developed. He had surgery to have it removed and made it seven years before it came up again. He went through a course of radiation and is still alive and with us to this day. Without a yearly physical, my Dad would not be with us. The cancer was that bad and came up so fast. By the time he would have experienced symptoms or thought something was "wrong" it would have been too late. My kids would have never known their grandfather and my sisters wouldn't have had their father there to walk them down the aisle. We still live in six month intervals between PSA tests, but thanks to preventative care (yearly physicals) he's still with us.

The only one that ever made sense to me was Homeschol Skedtrack. It's basically just a glorified spreadsheet. You set-up your courses and then enter the activities for each course. If you don't get to a particular activity, then It shows up the next time the course is scheduled. Since my dh works on a non-traditional, rotating schedule I also manually enter in our weekends, tell it that we school every day, and then use a simple spreadsheet to keep track of hors so I have an idea of when we'll be finished for the year. I like that I can enter field trips in as well. I tried a paper planner, but the erasing drove me nuts as we wouldn't always get to what I thought we would. Skedtrack fixed that issue for me. I start researching the next year's curriculum once I have all of this year's bought. By January I pretty much finalize it and start pricing things out. I pick up the spines first (HO, RSO, etc) or Teacher's Guides if I'm buying them used, and from that point yes, I do enter in my plans, track down secondary resources, and pick out any movies, documentaries, etc. I also maintain book lists using my library's online catalog that match up with the subject so that it makes requesting them easier. If I need to buy additional books (or get them on something like PaperBack Swap), then I also keep a spreadsheet with author, title, ISBN, source, and price so that I have an idea of what it might cost. It makes it easier for me to compare prices between sources as well as keep track of price fluctuations as I usually buy my books/curric over a period of several months. I have another spreadsheet to figure out costs with Amazon's 4for3 and whether it's cheaper there or RR. When I buy it, then I move it to the "purchased" spreadsheet for future reference. Oh, and I also keep a similar spreadsheet for things like manipulatives, science supplies, art supplies, etc. I'd say we follow my plans true to as their written about 80-85% of the time. I do make adjustments along the way. 2011-2012 we had a couple of weeks worth of stuff for a handful of subjects that we didn't get to so I just copied them over to the 2012-2013 school year. Skedtrack makes that very easy. At the end of the year I export it from Skedtrack and keep it all in a spreadsheet just so that I have a copy on my hard drive. I appreciate that Skedtrack is online which means I have access to my plans no matter where we might be. Should you do it? I'll be the first to admit that what I do isn't for everyone. I have spreadsheets for everything (and plan out what bills to pay when a year in advance) so I suppose it just makes sense for me. I couldn't imagine doing it any other way, though, and it helps my stress levels considerably by having it planned out well in advance. What can I say? I'm geeky that way.

I'd recommend reading this book as well. I'd also encourage you to follow his cues. You may feel like he's missing things that he "used to" enjoy, but maybe he didn't enjoy them as much as you thought? It could be that he didn't enjoy them quite as much as you thought, but didn't feel like he could speak up before. He's getting older so maybe he's now more comfortable to speak up. It could all just be a periodic thing, too. Maybe he just needs a bit of quiet for a season? Keep the lines of communication open and try not to push to hard. I hate it when people try to push me into social situations (both now and in the past).