Thinking of your girls. We have family and friends there, too, but not our kids. You must be so worried!

Another Loft vote. They usually have good petites. :)

Whoa. Repelled.

I did ours about a year ago - almost exactly a year. :) No chipping. I haven't reapplied the wax at all. They've been easy to keep clean - I was worried about that, with the light color we chose, but it's been fine. Annie Sloan says the wax needs to cure for a few weeks - so we were gentle for the first few weeks. After that, normal use (and I'm pretty sure the kids were only gentle for the first day or so!). Oh, actually, I have one area that I didn't wax - the inside of a cabinet door, over our kitchen craft area. Where it hits the cabinet box, when closed, has chipped a tiny bit. But I don't often notice it, due to the location. I just missed that inner door when waxing, and don't care enough to pull out the wax and do it! To be fair, that's the cabinet that sees the roughest kid-use (it's where we keep craft supplies). The waxed inner doors never had this issue, so I'm chalking it up to the lack of wax. (Bad pun!)

With the soft wax on top, they are very slightly shiny. I'm not sure shiny is the right word, it's more of a sheen. The paint goes on, and looks a bit chalky. The wax bonds with it, creates a harder finish. It darkens very slightly. I adore the look. We found chalk paint because DS is sensitive to VOCs, and we needed a paint that wouldn't set off his asthma. What a happy find! It can go over KILZ, in fact, that's a good primer. I finished our kitchen with one quart when we did duck egg blue. Two coats. A little goes a long way. If you're doing a white or cream, then over the KILZ you'd probably just need one coat. Then wax. You can get samples of the colors. :) We settled on a slightly off white and love it. Very warm and inviting. I distressed them slightly, but that's not necessary. BTW, our ceiling and trim is Ben Moore Cloud White. And we like their Aura paint - low VOCs, great quality!

Oh! Paint the inside of the doors, but I wouldn't mess with the shelving, inside the boxes. :)

I've painted kitchen cabinets with Annie Sloan chalk paint. Twice. :) Easy to do, almost no prep. But choose your color carefully. My second experience was fixing a poor color choice. You need to consider your wall and floor colors, and anything else visible. I couldn't possibly vote.

This thread is making me want Girl Scout cookies, and a giant bowl of cereal.

Rub some bacon on them? Bacon fixes everything.

Another vote for check. It's most appropriate in this context, for reasons stated above.

1 yr olds serving themselves breakfast? This discussion has devolved into the nonsensical. 1 yr olds don't serve themselves breakfast. Some 1 yr olds aren't even walking, or just barely. Some don't talk yet. Montessori-inspired kitchens notwithstanding, 1 yr olds are not left home alone to forage and get on the bus alone. I'm not sure how cereal and milk at home became the alternate solution on this thread, either. Any look at the food budget threads here will show that boxed cereal is not the most economical option for breakfast. Some parents cannot afford Cheerios. Really. It's that simple. So breakfast must be cooked or otherwise prepped. Not poured. Boxed cereal is a luxury some can't afford.

That book saved my sanity when our oldest was a tween/teen. He's 23 now. We survived. I had forgotten all about it, thanks for the reminder!

Thanks for posting that. :)

How horrible. :( I hope everyone recovered, in that case. We deal with food allergies, so potlucks aren't an option for us. I do think, for the most part, they are safe. How very tragic when they are not, though.

Yay! So glad you tossed it! And now you have a great excuse to make ice cream. :)

Yes, I emailed the doc at the same time I posted.

Thanks, kewb! How's your DH doing? I hope he's still making progress in the Lyme fight. Wonderful to hear! Do you remember how long it was before you saw changes? ...I am anxious for some positive results, can you tell? :) Oh, and by sublingual - you dissolve under the tongue, like a homeopathic tablet? Just making sure I get this right. My brain is fuzzy, and I seem to need very specific, detailed directions lately. Fingers crossed that this will change soon.

First, is it Armor or Armour? :) I keep mixing it up! I am switching to this from synthroid, and am looking for any tips/experience. Pretty sure several of you here take this type of thyroid med? I read a little bit online, and was surprised to read that we should take it twice daily to keep the levels consistent throughout the day, and one article said to chew the pills before swallowing. My doc and pharmacist didn't mention any of that! So, do you split your pills and take in the am and pm? Do you chew them or swallow them whole? And if you switched from synthetic, what changes (if any) did you notice?

Why not toss it and pick up some other type of ice cream? I wouldn't risk it.

I've never tried any other type of chalk paint, but purple painted lady's shipping has always been very fast. :)

I don't know about bugs, but I'll just throw this out there again: food in the classrooms can be problematic for more reasons than bugs. I completely support feeding kids, and I'm all for breakfast. I fully support feeding kids. But I don't think it should be in the classroom itself - it's too easy for crumbs, smears, and trace amounts to be left behind and impact kids with allergies. For kids with life threatening allergies, it's important to have a few safe zones, where they don't have to feel anxiety. Home should be one, obviously. A classroom seems like it should be another. Unfortunately, it's not - as food in classrooms is pretty common already.

I love using Annie Sloan Chalk Paint. :) It's easy to use, I wipe things down to be sure they are clean first, but not sanding or priming. If you want to distress it afterward, it's super easy. My favorite site for how-to advice for ASCP is the Purple Painted Lady. I don't have a link handy, but just google her and she'll pop right up. I've ordered paint from her as well. You can order samples, too - a sample pot will cover a dining chair - so it's fairly large. I often get samples for small projects.

Parent of a child with multiple LTFAs here, and I still think a healthy breakfast is a good idea. Not donut sticks, of course. I do, however, think it needs to be in a cafeteria. Not the classrooms. For kids with severe food allergies, keeping classrooms free of food in general goes a long way toward safety. But then, what do I know? We chose to HS rather than send a child with LTFAs to a school that didn't think it even necessary to create the very basic peanut-free classroom, or keep prescribed epipens accessible to teachers in classrooms with allergic kids. Clearly, I'm out of step here.

Goodness, just reading this makes me hurt. :( None of my cysts have dissolved nicely, that I know of. They've all ruptured, and it's been agonizing. I've had multiple cysts. Never fun. OP, definitely go on and schedule your appt for the first day your insurance takes effect. And if the pain becomes intense, please go to the ER. :grouphug:

Take florastor 2 hours apart from the ceftin, along with the usual probiotics. It will help prevent c diff and other GI issues. Drink lots of water, sit up for 30 minutes after your meds. Feel better soon!