:001_huh: That woman is a real piece of work. I'd definitely be sending Shannon's letter. And she had the nerve to call you self-absorbed? I want to give her an imaginary punch in the face.

I wouldn't. To me, it wouldn't make much sense. All that's in the books are the problems, not very thorough instructions on what to do. However, if you've done the higher grades and are comfortable teaching "decimal street" and everything, then maybe? :D Sorry, I know that's not much help. For me, I'm so uptight, I want to make sure I get everything covered, even at that young age.

I still can't believe someone would do that to you. I'm so sorry. I know it's been repeated so many times, but you are worth so much more and do not deserve to be treated like that. :iagree:You know, several months back my husband pointed out that the women with perfectly clean houses who always looked perfect still had their faults. A clean house and perfect image do not make someone better than another. It means they have different strengths and priorities and are at a different place in life. You have a two year old! I'm sure that in and of itself keeps you busy. You're a VERY talented photographer. And if I remember correctly, you have a very busy schedule taking kids to various activities. You sound like a great mom! A very great mom. Don't worry about what makes you less than perfect, go ahead and change what you can when you can. But give yourself some grace.

Yes, there is a big adjustment. It might be tough at first, but you'll find your groove:grouphug: Good luck to you. I remember the first time I paid all our bills after my husband finally found a job. Being able to pay them all at once, long before they were due-such a relief!

I am so sorry, OP. I am completely flabbergasted that someone would say that to ANYONE they know. I wouldn't say such b*tchy things to someone I hated, much less someone I called a friend. I can't imagine staying friends with someone who thought humiliating me in such a shameful way was ok. Please know that you did not deserve such a talking down to. She is not your mother. You are not her underage child. You are a grown woman who can wear your hair however you please and smile whenever you want. That she stooped to such a level is absolutely disgusting.

What I do: (I'm not a recipe follower, so I have no exact measurements) ~Cut up a LOT of carrots, onions, and celery. When I say a lot, I mean my pan is about half full with these things. ~Cook with oil on medium high until the carrots start getting soft. ~Add chicken stock. If you need more liquid add some more water and chicken base. I have the water come about two inches over the vegetables. ~Bring to a boil and add the egg noodles and chicken (parsley and pepper are optional). Try and stir them in so they're under the liquid. Cover and cook until noodles are done. ~This is so not healthy, but I've been adding cream to mine lately. It's so delicious and I'm so addicted (but again, not healthy :lol:)

I'm sorry. My point was not that "he's a celebrity, let's give him a free pass." My point was, "He's dead, we don't need to speak ill of him." Maybe I'm just weird but I guess I don't like speaking ill of anyone who has just died. I'm not here to start an argument or anything, I'd just like to get back to the fond memories and all. :001_smile:

the majority of celebrities act that way. that doesn't mean we speak ill of them when they're dead

sad day. he and peter were my imaginary friends when I was little. I love the monkees; shades of gray is one of my favorite songs ever

Breakfast? Eggs and grits. Lunch? leftover chicken curry Dinner? No idea yet. I might pull out another freezer meal so I can get caught up on cleaning. The house is in a bad way after Digby's strep throat. He cried so much all I could do was hold him and even that didn't always make him happy. What are you doing today? Celebrating that Digby slept from 115 am to 735 this morning. :party:Then I'll be cleaning and later tonight I'm going to a sewing "party" at a friend's house. We're going to make reusable sandwich bags. Do you or your kids like classical music? If so, what composer is your favorite? I don't know that my kids know any. I only know and like select songs: Pachebel's Canon, Ronda alla Turca (not sure on the spelling of that one), Beethoven's Ode to Joy.

third grade

There are so many I ought to say, but for now the most important is antibiotics. Digby was so miserable last night, he only slept three hours. At least I know the antibiotics will get rid of the nasty strep. He's really really bad off right now.

Thank you everyone. I ended up bundling everyone up and making the trek. It was well worth the ridiculous wait as she barely looked at his throat before ordering the strep test. She said it was so swollen and filled with pus. :crying: DH met us there and we got some antibiotics. Hopefully Digby will be feeling better soon. (Ok and can I say how nervous I was when we got there. I've taken him in twice before thinking something was wrong when nothing was, so I was nervous about that. But all weekend he's been less energetic, but as soon as we got to the Dr. office he was running around like his normal crazy self. I was so worried they would think I was making stuff up. Good thing you can't fake a fever and strep! :lol: oy!)

Digby came down with a fever on Thursday afternoon. It was up to 102.2. It would go down for periods of time, then back up to 102.2. After a few days, he started saying his throat hurt. Now the fever is mostly cooled, but still goes up to 100.5 occasionally. He's extremely congested, but won't let me help him blow his nose. I think he thinks it's like being suffocated to have tissue over his nose. On Friday night he had a horrible bloody nose in the middle of the night (he said he picked it). On Saturday night he threw up a teensy bit in his crib. Now he often says he has to throw up, but he doesn't. I give him Tylenol at bed and before naps to help him sleep. I just noticed that the warning label said to see a doctor if a sore throat was accompanied with a fever or vomiting. Do you know why? My doctor's office is pretty good about getting us in the same day, but I don't have the car today and we'd have to walk 30 minutes. Not impossible, but not ideal. Tomorrow I would be able to take DH to work, then have the car. Is it urgent enough that I ought to get him in today? (and a *GAH* I hate cold and flu season!!)

Good morning everyone! So, how is it in your part of the world this morning? It is overcast outside, but I'm assuming it'll clear up soon. Utah seems to have missed the memo that it is winter. Going anywhere today? No, Digby is really sick and I'd rather keep him home. Are you taking, or planning on taking a spring break? Ummm...no. We've still not really recovered from Christmas, which is technically ok, since Kindergarten isn't required here. I'm also trying to figure out how to keep the littles occupied. So maybe our winter break will turn into a spring break :lol:

No real advice, only sympathy and :grouphug:. We're about to be starting that phase as Chuck gets more and more mobile and more and more curious. If it were just Digby, it would be easy enough to bring him into the school fold so to speak, but I've got to keep my eye on her now. I'm not sure what I'll do either. More :grouphug:

I once took a huge stack of curricula to the library and reserved one of their quiet rooms for a few hours. It allowed me to read ahead and prep in peace and quiet. I think I might be going again tonight because the constant noise is wearing me down.

Praying for your family. :grouphug:

Jean, would you post how you made your gyros? Pretty please? :bigear: Breakfast-pop tarts. Lunch-PB&J Dinner-Chicken and lentil soup Plans for today-I have to clean the whole kitchen. Try and survive a massive sleep deprivation headache. Try to survive Digby and Chuck's illness. Tomorrow-some friends are coming over and we're putting together freezer meals. Then we are going on a search for a bunk bed. I love baby girl dearly, but she needs to get out of our room. We tried sleeping in our room last night for the first time since she CIO. Yeah, it was awful. Pets-DH has a small saltwater aquarium. There are two clownfish, Nemo and Marlin. He also has an even smaller aquarium with a mantis shrimp that he rescued from his old job. The shrimp's name is Seymour. He also got Pigby some Triops:ack2:. I'm hoping those die off soon. He also has two poison dart frogs that are unnamed. If they're side by side, you can tell the difference between the two, but just looking at one, I can't remember which it is, so they were never named. (I'm the one who insists on names for the "pets").

Do you have links? I'm not sure I'm finding the right things. :bigear:

I love that I taught my son how to read (Ok fine, Jessie Wise and Sara Buffington did the majority of the work!) Watching him learn was truly like a miracle to me. How many thousands of people throughout time were illiterate and yet, here was a four year old reading. I feel very blessed to have given him that gift. I love that he looks through the Lakeshore Learning catalog and wants so many fun, educational things. I love that he loves learning. I love that I got to take a long time to recover after baby Chuck was born. I needed it. I love that Digby tries to copy Pigby doing "school." He started asking me to write the letter "D" over and over. It makes me happy because that's how Pigby started his fascination with letters when he was about the same age. Oh man, I had forgotten how many letters I had to write on his magna-doodle. I love that Pigby wrote my sister an equation (? + 4 = 7) and asked her what the answer was. She stared at it a bit. Then stared at me. Then stared at him. "Megan, this is an equation!" "Yes, I know." "He's five! How does he know what an equation is?" I love that he loves math so much. It scares me a bit because it means I have to bring my own math game up to snuff, but that's another thing I love. I love that I can pursue my own self-education. I felt so woefully unprepared for college work. I am loving the fact that I can fill in my own knowledge gaps. I love that I can prepare them much more than I was *knock on wood* I love that we can have fun. That's a huge thing that attracted me to homeschooling. I could do all the fun stuff with them!

:grouphug: I'm sorry, that sounds so annoying to have to try and educate your own doctors. I haven't noticed it, but I've never taken medication while nursing.

You're making me blush! OH! My TeA post! Life would have been so awful if all y'all hadn't had such good advice about TeA :leaving:

Oh, you :blush:

Some people have suggested that I use the time when my children are little to further my own self-education instead of elaborate lesson plans for kindergarten. I don't have time or money to go back to school, but I think I do a decent amount of trying to learn various hobbies. And for some reason, I was inspired to get the Life of Fred books out on Interlibrary Loan. I have the first three high school books. I'm only half way through Beginning Algebra, but WOW! I've never thought of using math that way and it makes so much more sense now. I have finally figured out why you add a negative number to a positive one (for example why 7-(-8) is really 7+8. They never taught us that in school, they just showed us how to draw vertical lines when we saw two negatives next to each other like that). I'm really hoping to get a better understanding of math so I won't be so terrible at it when they reach high school. Of course, next I plan on studying history more in depth. I've tried reading SWB's History of the World, but my eyes glaze over. I need them on audiobook. I've been considering buying WWS and FLL4 so I can learn how to diagram sentences (we NEVER did that in school) and learn all SWB's writing tricks. I'm painfully lacking in writing as well. And then, you know, I ought to cover science. Chemistry is so painful for me. And I didn't even bother taking physics. Science scares me even more than math. So obviously, I've got lots of work to do in all areas. It's a good thing I have so long. Even burning rubber :auto: I'll need to take advantage of the time I have.