I would *love* to use hot glue, but I think I'd face a gingerbread rebellion! :D Thanks for the links - I will definitely check those out, and hope to find something useful. Every recipe I've found so far has meringue powder or less-than-stellar reviews. (Hot glue is looking better and better... if only they made an edible version!)

I have hunted the web for hours looking for an egg free Royal Icing, now I'm turning here, to the hive... :) We are having a gingerbread house making party. (Yay!) One little boy is allergic to eggs, and I can't seem to find an egg free Royal Icing to glue our houses together. We are not using kits - too many food allergies - so everything is made from scratch. Anyone have a good recipe? I did find a sugar cookie frosting recipe that dries hard, and is egg free. Not sure if that would work... Any ideas or advice would be appreciated!

Yay for Florastor! I've had recurrent C. Diff, and thank goodness for Florastor. It may save you a world of pain and agony.

Excellent information! One more thought... If your thyroid and everything else checks out... Maybe check your adrenals. I thought my thyroid issues were not being addressed properly for a long time - spent months and months tweaking. Finally did an adrenal panel from Diagnos-Techs (the 24 hours saliva panel), and wow, were my adrenals off. Sometimes just some mild adrenal support can help. Thankfully, we found out that I have Addison's Disease (which is on the less-than-mild end of the spectrum) before I went into a crisis (which can be quite serious), and the best part is that now that I supplement for adrenal hormones... Wow. Life is good again.

We haven't had the exact scenario... But have had the small "test" purchases, then the big charges show up. Apparently the thieves do some small purchasing first, then the big guns come out. For us, I think it was electronics purchases, after the small charges (the small ones were pizza & McDonald's - 2 separate incidents). Glad you caught it! Now I'm going to go check all the boxes that have been arriving here... I've just been imagining that they are really our purchases, and putting them in the garage. Oops!

Eek. I hope the buggies go away soon. Not to freak you out more... but I have a friend who had ticks come off of her live tree... So keep an eye out for those, too. (We do artificial now, because I am paranoid about ticks.) If you haven't decorated the tree yet, maybe you can take it outside and do a quick non-toxic bug spray?

I haven't read all the replies, but I'll just throw out our experience. Laminate has been a huge help for our allergies and asthma! We ripped out the carpet in our house. We did the main level first, replaced it with high end laminate. We could have bought an engineered hardwood for the same price, but really liked the look of the laminate, and the fact that it would resist scratching from our dogs' toenails. We loved it. After a year or two, it still looked brand new despite our doggies. So we replaced all the other flooring (with the exception of the kitchen and bathrooms, I'm not a fan of laminate in areas with water). We love those areas, too, it's been 2 years since we did the rest of the house - and all of our floors look brand new. We did have two floods - and had the water mitigation company out each time, and had to replace two separate sections of flooring. (Yay for good insurance!) ... Both times the insurance company had to verify that our laminate was higher end, so they would reimburse us the higher price. Other than that small hassle... It was painless, and all still looks brand new. Our neighbors went with a less expensive laminate in their basement - and theirs is warped and wrinkly now. I'm not sure if they had water issues, but whatever happened, it wasn't good. We wipe up spills immediately, to be safe. For keeping it clean - and ours stays looking pretty darn clean, even when it's not - we use a dust mop with windex or water and vinegar. We used to use laminate floor cleaner, and then found some great advice that it's basically the above. Ok, and I do cheat on this a little bit, because we have a weekly housekeeper - who uses window cleaner on the dust mop, too. So either it stays looking clean because it doesn't show dirt, or because we're cleaning it often enough. :) My one complaint is the "tick tick tick" sound when the dogs walk on it. I notice it mostly in our upstairs hallway, because it's quieter and there's less to absorb the sound. Hardwood would have been wonderful, but it was out of our budget at the time, and this is not our forever house... Laminate has been a great compromise. I'd do it again in a heartbeat. (Oh! And as a weird side note, we have heavy duty environmentalist friends who consider laminate a more eco-friendly option as it reduces on cutting down trees. Nice thought. Not why we chose laminate, but... food for thought.)

LOL, the bonus is that I get to grab an espresso - yummy! You all rock!

Oops, Unicorn, I just saw your post... Loving the pen idea... Now I'm thinking that might be great for the guy who doesn't do Starbucks at all (he is opposed to corporate coffee)... Thanks!

Whew. This is good. Thank you! We don't have a Williams-Sonoma terribly close, but I've got their hot chocolate on my list to buy for *me* next time we're there! Yum. :) Starbucks - that I can handle. Really, running into Starbucks hardly qualifies as shopping, and I can just pick up a few of their travel mugs to put the gift cards inside... Wrap, and go. And it's perfect, as they are always in and out of Starbucks when visiting clients. Woo-hoo! Problem solved!

DH has asked me to come up with gifts for the "guys"... Christmas party is in 2 days! Aaaack. I am terrible at these types of gifts, and on short notice - I am drawing a blank. Plus, I hate shopping. Really. I shop online for our goodies, but we don't have time to do that for these gifts. Ugh. I need gifts in the $20 - $30 price range for employees (their main gift is in a different form, these are just tokens). All in their 30s, some with kids, some without. All work from home offices, so lots of the office type gag gifts don't work. Any ideas? Pretty please?

Brilliant!

Thank you. For thinking this through so well. You are the kind of parent we'd all like our kids' friends to have! Here's my answer... and I have a severely allergic kiddo, who is super sensitive. ... My preference would be that another child in my kiddo's group not eat pb outside the facility or on the way. That said, of course it's really out of my control, and everyone is free to do what they feel they must. The very fact that you are thinking about this really warms my heart, and gives me hope that we can start branching out a bit more with my DS. For your kiddo's sake... can you imagine his feelings if this other child did have a reaction? Even if they could never pinpoint the source? I wouldn't want that stress on him, either. Could you brainstorm some other food options for him, so he has plenty of easy alternatives? You might also consider asking the mom of the allergic kid. That could really help, actually, as you'd get info about that particular child's allergies. As for this... We never know. Never. And that is why we live on edge, we carry epipens, we keep benadryl on hand all the time. That's why when we go to a movie theater, we arrive early enough to physically *clean* the seats and surrounding area, and we wipe down every table and chair before sitting. Yep, we get weird looks. But the weird looks are better than the alternatives that we've faced in the past. Every gesture made by another family, every small sacrifice (not eating pb & j on the day of the activity) is deeply appreciated. You are giving the gift of more safety to that child, the gift of less fear, less feeling excluded, less feeling different. Thank you so much for being so thoughtful, and caring!

Ouch! I have the creepy crawlies just reading this! Have had my share of scorpion stings, too, when we lived out west. :) Last one happened in the car... scorpion on my head rest, got me on the back of the head. So strange. I didn't want to get in that car for months! DH and I traded cars for awhile. Glad you are one less scorpion in the house!

Lentils are very close to peanuts. My guy recently had an airborne reaction to lentil soup cooking... didn't even know he was lentil allergic. Keep us posted. :grouphug:

Biphasic reaction? The second part? I'm guessing you know that reactions can be biphasic, and several (4 - 8) hours later there can be a second round to the reaction, which can be worse than the first part of the reaction. So sorry. My kiddo has similar allergies and we've spent way too much time in the ER. Not fun for anyone. And when it's a mystery reaction - it's even worse. It leaves you wondering for, well, forever. (I still wonder about one of our mystery reactions.) Hugs to you and your kiddo...

In college, I thanked my roommates for living with my "chronic 2 year old"... My Aussie. He was a wonderful dog, and my doggie-soul mate... Even at 16 years old, before we lost him, he had his toddler moments. :001_wub: I miss them. Now we have 2 pups, and oh boy, are they like little kids! They wrestle and get rowdy at the oddest moments, and I inadvertently taught them the command, "Take it outside!" :D

Thanks! I don't have a Twitter account either, but can imagine setting one up to use pinterest.

May I ask a related question? I received an invite, wanted to join, love the idea of pinterest... But does it require a Facebook account? I am one of the last Facebook holdouts. Does that mean I'm out of luck on pinterest? (Sorry to get off the topic a bit, but the question seemed related... )

I hope so, too! Have been thinking of your lost pup. Hoping for good news...

My close friend had a diabetic cat for many, many years. She injected him twice daily. It put a crimp in her vacation plans (she was single) but that was her biggest complaint. Her kitty lived many healthy years. He is gone now, but he left at a respectable old age. I will be thinking of you and your cat...

I'm sure there are many varying viewpoints on this, but my initial thought would be to help with college as planned.

We have tiny bedrooms, too. We use a lot of the ideas Sheri listed above, and try to be very creative with storage. I love her idea of taking pictures of creations and set ups - we are going to do more of that! All clothes go in the dresser, which frees the closet for toy storage - DH installed shelves and we have bins to fit. Books for pleasure reading are on one big bookcase in the bedroom, and lots more books on bookcases in the living room, along hallways, and well, lining any free wall we can find. Ikea is great for storage ideas - just browse their online catalogue to get ideas. We've scored some great finds on freecycle, and craig's list. We have toy bins in the living room, inside cabinets under our bookcases. Outerwear and shoes in a coat closet and/or shoe basket. Art and science supplies in the kitchen. I find that the kids don't play in their rooms, but rather all over the house. And, honestly, I sort of like it! Maybe we're just used to it... :)

What a good perspective. No, you don't have to take out the ring. But doing so out of love, out of respect, out of just making this man happy... That gives a different spin to the whole situation, doesn't it? None of us have our Dads forever. And, despite the issues we have with them (and yes, it sounds like there are some issues for you to work through)... Showing them we love them is always good. Maybe you can take out the ring for the cruise, as an act of love? That changes it from being controlled by your father, to doing an act of love for your Dad, who despite his faults, is supporting you and loving you in the best way he can.

Ditto on the tip. For the clothing question - my understanding is that if you leave on an article of clothing, it means, "Don't touch me there." I would suggest you talk to the therapist ahead of time, but any good therapist is going to preserve your modesty. ETA: just read the above post! So my understanding is totally wrong. :) FWIW, when I go to a female massage therapist - I go au naturel. That sheet covers everything, and they are adept at preserving modesty. The only time I've been to a male, I kept my undies on, and he was very respectful. (Going to a male therapist took some courage for me, but I have to say - it was the best massage I've ever had. Helped to know that he was, ummm, less than interested in girls, too.)