Ugh, that is definitely annoying! Machines are so great when they work well, so aggravating when they don't. I'd vote for keeping the iPod for music even if you take a break from the other screens! My complaint of the day is that I still haven't figured out why my router sometimes just quits. Also, it gets poor service in the part of the house where I really need it to work the most, the kitchen, so I can use a mobile device while drinking my morning coffee or for recipes while cooking. But that's to be expected; that's the spot absolutely farthest from where the router is stationed (because that's where the line into the house for the DSL enters). It's very flaky, which is the most annoying part.

My standard breakfast is a couple of fried eggs, over easy or medium, with a touch of salt and pepper, but I also make omelets a lot with sauteed mushrooms and cheddar or Swiss cheese. DH makes really yummy omelets on weekends and adds dried tomatoes and onions to the mushrooms and cheese. We also sometimes pour the omelet batter and mix-ins into muffin cups and bake them in the oven for about 25 minutes at 350, instead of using the skillet on the stove. I also like the sweet omelet sometimes, as a change. I saute some walnuts in butter until they're toasted, and then I remove them from the skillet and add a mixture of eggs, a splash of milk, and a tiny bit of liquid stevia (not sugar). Once that's mostly cooked, I add the walnuts and a few dollops of cream cheese, and then I fold the eggs over like a traditional omelet. Sometimes I sprinkle some cinnamon in with the walnuts. It's a little sweet, not overly so, and it kind of reminds me of stuffed french toast.

Depends on the day and the subject. Latin and history usually get my otherwise reluctant child to do work. Math, not so much. My other child is pretty compliant in general and actually likes doing math, reading, and even WWE, but even with him, Legos will win every time. Legos will win over anything, actually -- schoolwork, playing outside, even eating. Screentime is about the only thing that beats Legos, so that's on lockdown during the week. We have been off since before Christmas. I started again yesterday with a little reading and math; today I read SOTW and two chapters of Percy Jackson: The Lightning Thief, which they've decided is fantastic. (I'm pretty impressed with it myself so far. My 10yo doesn't care for overt, silly humor, but she loves subtle stuff, nods to other works, etc., so I think she's going to love all the references to Greek myths.) They're building with cardboard right now, and I'm going to go make them do a bit of math and independent reading. Tomorrow we'll probably do some science and music, and we won't start back to a full schedule until next week, though it might be the following week for a full load. When we started back in July, I took about six weeks to get to a full schedule, and easing into it worked really, really well for all of us (myself included).

I feel your pain. My daughter is the same way, exactly -- everything is a "creation." (Right now, she's building something out of cardboard.) I really have to make her clean it, and by make her, I mean I have to tell her exactly what to work on (tidy your desk, get all the books off of the floor, etc.), and I have to follow up on her a lot. She'll start working and get distracted by something. I do try to limit what's up there, but things just kind of creep in over time. If she doesn't put her laundry in the basket and put the basket outside her door (DS2's morning job is to collect dirty laundry from around the house and bring it down for me), she doesn't have clean clothes. That does at least get her to keep up on that particular item. Otoh, she's fun and creative and makes cool and interesting stuff, so I try to remember that when I'm frustrated by her room.

One thing you might do is call the credit card companies and discuss the situation with them. Ask if they can offer you a hardship plan. Sometimes that means that they close the account but fix the interest rate at a much lower rate, and then you know that you can afford the payments and get it paid off in a reasonable time frame.

If you can't behave at the table, you will leave. We use the same plates and utensils; the children (minus the baby) each have a hand-made pottery mug and bowl that is specifically their own. There's no arguing over any of it; if there was, the child who was arguing would be removed from the table. We didn't set out to have assigned seating; it just happened that way, because of certain people needing to be certain places (the baby's seat is strapped to one chair all the time, the 4yo is between DH and me so we can pass things around him easily, etc.), and now we don't deviate from it unless there's company. Again, if people argued about it, they'd leave the table. We do have some assigned chores, but they're morning tasks, not dinnertime ones; if I tell you to help set/clear the table or whatever, I'm not asking if you feel like doing it -- I'm assigning it to be done. Any complaints about how much I make them do gets met with the question, "Would you like to do what I do all day?" or the suggestion, "If you've got energy to complain, the toilet needs scrubbing." I think in your case, I'd assign some seats and enforce that. Once that's a firm habit, move on to the next behavior you'd like to correct. And so on, until you see much better table manners. Also, I wonder if maybe a snack a couple of hours before dinner would help? I know if my children get too hungry, they get really grumpy, and it's harder to snap them out of those moods. Easier to stave it off, though.

Honestly, I think there are up sides and down sides (and some things can be both, depending on the day) to every family situation/size/lifestyle. I've just accepted that my children will have some benefits and some challenges that they might not have in a different family, but there are other benefits and challenges that they won't have at all. I've just had to let go of any guilt about what I might not be able to provide for my children and just focused on the blessings we do have. Sure, I could afford more outside activities if I'd stopped at two children -- but could we imagine life without our two little guys, and would we trade them for anything in the world? Nope; they bring us incomparable joy. My children may get less of my individual time, but they are playmates and buddies for each other in ways that I can't be. (And actually, having a few older children means that four kids has been easier than two or three, because they have each other, and because they can do stuff like help get the little guys ready to go, etc., which frees up my time and energy, which means I have more time and energy to spend doing fun stuff with them.) You have the family that is right for you, and just appreciate it, the good and the bad.

Oh, how wonderful your Christmas must have been! Congratulations all around!

I do understand. People say to get board books for toddlers. Well, one of my toddlers took those as personal challenges and would actually try to rip them apart (and usually succeeded). There was a time when I just kept the really nice books out of reach, and I still do that with my curent toddler (though he's actually quite gentle with books, board or paper). Yes, sometimes things get destroyed, but I think the non-electronic aspect is important for small children. Check thrift stores and library sales for good deals, and keep the nicer ones out of reach unless you're directly supervising them.

I noticed that when we were shopping at Kohl's the other day, looking for some tops for my 10yo DD. The children's section (of which she's at the top of the range) had trendy and trashy stuff, not nice, basic tees. The junior section had a slightly better selection, but the tees were so thin. We ended up going over the adult section and buying nice tees for her there in an extra small. I guess maybe they make the junior stuff thinner and thus cheaper because tweens/teens want to change their minds frequently, but ugh.

I did not make any gifts this year (we also gave very few gifts to anyone other than our children), but in the past I have sewn doll clothes and knitted several things (cowls, earwarmers, glittens, toys, socks, etc.), and they seem to have been well-received.

Or they're still all cotton but are thinner. I used to love the tees and dresses from LE, especially for my DD, who tends to be hard on clothes; they were a thick interlock. Now they're a thin jersey, and they still cost a lot, even on sale.

I returned to this thread to copy the lists of apps so I can look them up later, but I also wanted to say that while Gutenberg has lots of free books, iTunes made it even easier to add a bunch of free books to my iPad, so if you're like me and new to exploring all the joys of the iPad, spend some time browsing free stuff on iTunes. :)

Well, how very odd. I tried Google Drive, but my internet was being flaky and wouldn't work. But then all of a sudden, Dropbox was able to view the .xls file, and now QuickOffice is opening it too. Happy day!

My small local bank meets those criteria, except for maybe the app (I haven't checked). They do refund ATM fees for other banks. They don't have the envelope system, but ING works well for savings.

I don't have a stylus yet, but I ordered one from amazon. I can write with my fingertip (and that's how I did my grocery list yesterday), but I think a stylus will make it much more useful. The fingertip was kind of chicken-scratchy. DD tried doing a math test that way and found it frustrating; hopefully she'll have better luck with the stylus.

Notability -- I love it! I also have the Gmail app and the Chrome app, which are useful, as well as the Dropbox app. But Notability is making the iPad really, really useful to me -- PDFs, grocery list, scribble pad for the kids, knitting patterns. . .

I can, but .xlsx isn't one of the options.

I have the Lodge non-enameled cast iron dutch oven; I think it's 7 quarts. It has the flat bottom (not the feet), so I can use it on my stovetop. I love it a lot and use it alllll the time -- for roasts, stew, soup, chili, etc., on the stovetop or in the oven (and sometimes both in the same meal). It makes plenty of food for my family of 6, with leftovers.

Yes, you should see the other two in the LOTR trilogy first, but no, it doesn't continue like that for the entire movie. There *are* some violent and slightly scary parts and some battles, but some of the best scenes in the trilogy are in ROTK. There are so very many scenes in it that make me cry. every. single. time. (And some hilarious scenes too.) There are violent battle scenes in all of the three films, but do start with Fellowship -- its opening scenes are simply beautiful (and honestly will give you a real sense of just WHY they do what they do in the other two films). They're really meant to be viewed as one continual story, so you absolutely do need to see the first part first. ETA: I had read The Hobbit but not the LOTR before I saw the LOTR movies (and honestly, seeing the movies did make me interested in reading the books, whereas I had not been before; I did finish Fellowship so far), but obviously I saw the LOTR movies before I saw The Hobbit movie. I think The Hobbit movie works well as either the first part in the long series, or as a prequel, so I think you could view either the LOTR trilogy OR The Hobbit first. There were some nice nods in The Hobbit movie that you'd only get if you have seen LOTR, but I think you could see The Hobbit first without being confused either.

Sigh. This technology thing is beyond me. Okay, I have OpenOffice on my desktop and use the Calc part of it for spreadsheets frequently, saving them as .xls files. I also have QuickOffice Pro on my iPad. It seems to open and read the OpenOffice Writer files just fine, but it won't open the .xls files from Calc. It looks like I need to convert those files from .xls to .xlsx files. Can anyone tell me how to do that?

I voted "100 miles," but I would actually say closer, within 15 miles for produce (and often within 2 miles) and within about 45 miles for meat. (My direct area grows a TON of apples, plus other produce, and it's beyond fantastic in season, but our favorite place for beef is a little farther out, but it's the best price for 100% grassfed certified organic beef from a Christian-owned business.) Convenience -- generally it's a bit more inconvenient, but it varies. It's most convenient if I buy all of my food at the nice chain grocery store, but at the height of produce season, I generally make the extra stops to purchase local produce from farm stands/markets. Expense -- hmmm. It's hard to say. It's usually a little more expensive for ground/stew beef, but the quality is much higher, so it's usually worth it. It's way more expensive for nicer cuts, even though the quality is higher, unless I'm buying a full quarter, in which case the nicer cuts are way cheaper, but then the ground stuff is more expensive, and right now, a quarter is still way more expensive per pound than the occasional package of ground beef, which is mostly what I buy. Poultry is way more expensive if it's local, but it's much higher quality. Eggs are a bit more expensive locally but again, much higher quality; we buy from small farms that have semi-free-range chickens (and have seen how they raise the chickens), and it's worth the slight increase in price (10-20%). Produce -- varies. At the height of the season, the best produce might be the same, slightly cheaper, or slightly pricier than non-local stuff, but it's generally much better. I don't buy peaches any other time except during the height of local peach season. :) We have a pretty decent growing season here, but still, in the winter, there really isn't much local produce. Local milk and cheese are much more expensive, but they're also raw and grassfed and worth the price when I can afford them. So, all in all, there are a few things I only buy locally, and for others, it depends on the day. Overall, I do have a very strong preference to support local small farmers/dairies, but sometimes, it's just not possible, and having sufficient quantities of food trumps local and/or organic and/or grassfed/pastured. ETA: Even during the winter, it's very easy for us to get sufficient fresh produce, even if it's not local, and it's not astronomically expensive either. We do eat somewhat seasonally even when buying from the grocery store (and in the summer, our chain grocery store does carry local produce) -- like, in the winter, we'll buy oranges, but we generally don't buy them in the summer. But in the summer, strawberries will be on sale a lot, so we'll buy those then. Or I'll buy more cucumbers in the summer when they're nicer and cheaper. But bananas -- I buy those year-round, and lettuce I'll buy from the grocery store when the local farm markets don't have it anymore, and the prices are pretty much the same all year-round, especially when bought on sale. I realize that I am very blessed by living in this area when it comes to food, and I am really, really grateful for it.

We really liked it, and I think DH and the kids are going to go see it again. Some of the changes we thought were good -- like showing it as a prequel to LOTR, merging in some of the Silmarilion stuff -- and some of them we weren't sure we liked. I thought it, for better or for worse, obviously played to the LOTR movie fans. Overall, we felt pretty positively about it. We took 10yo DD (who actually was the most critical of it, of all the kids, but she remembers the book very well, and I expect that she had an idea in her head of how it should look), 7yo DS1, and 4yo DS2. The 4yo sat through the whole thing and wasn't scared. (However, I'd be cautious about taking most 4yo to see it; this one is particularly adventurous and not easily scared.) 7yo DS1 did feel kind of icky after it was over, nauseated. However, he also had a cold and was a bit congested, and he also hadn't felt like eating that day, so I suspect he was hungry/low blood sugar. So I don't know whether it was the movie speed or other factors or a combination. He wants to try seeing it again, though. Overall, we're looking forward to the next one, and I'm glad to have gotten to see it in the theater, as well as with the kids the first time they saw it; DH usually takes them to movies while I stay home with the baby, but for this one, we took my dad, who is a huge Hobbit fan, with us and my mom stayed with the baby.

Slight aside -- the Amazon Prime lending library really only works with a real Kindle, not with the Kindle app? Guess that makes my decision about whether or not to pay for Amazon Prime easy..

I would tell him that you'll pay for his diagnostic time, but I would tell him not to fix anything until he talks to you after he does the diagnosis. When he calls with the diagnosis, I'd just tell him thank you (and pay him for that time) and that you're not going to fix it right now. We have done that with our mechanic before and have been up-front that we can't afford to pay him to do the work, so DH will do it himself.