I do miss it when the kids could play for hours and I could talk for hours, but when the kids were little it was me choosing which groups we were a part of based on interest. Of course I could talk for hours at a LLL meeting or attachment parent group, all the moms agreed with me for the most part and my kids would play with whoever was there. Now they are incredibly picky who they are friends with. Sometimes they don't want to hang out with the kids of the people I am friends with. My two older ones have friends who are really nice but I can't stand the parents. I am relieved they we can just do the drop off thing with them.

DH and I prefer live trees but due to allergies we have artificial. Every few years we forget what those allergies are like and go and get a real one. Last year was one of those times. We got the tree right after Thanksgiving and it lasted about three weeks. DH and I both had headaches for those three weeks and I felt sick and short of breath. Add to that most of the needles fell off and the tree looked bald. A week before Christmas we took all the ornaments off, threw the tree outside and went and got a pre-lit artificial. I like having it pre-lit. When I put the lights on it takes at least 2 hours with as many times as I take them off because I don't like how they look.

If I am reading correctly, your sister is 22, has a son from a different relationship, and has been told not to have any more kids, this man is fine with her son being the only child they have. She may be accepting his treatment of her because she believes this is her only chance at a family. She may be wondering what other man would want to raise someone else's child and not have any of his own. (Just to clarify I do not think this way. I know there are many wonderful men out there where this situation would not faze them.) If that is her state of mind, you are going to have to go beyond pointing out the abuse.

I spent 10months in a mentally abusive relasonship when I was 18. It wasn't long but it was incredibly damaging. Family and friends told me he wasn't good and tried to get me to leave and I wouldn't do it even though I was miserable. What finally got me to leave was a good male friend told me " I rather see you put a bullet through your head than stay with him" My friend rather seeing me dead than with him shocked me into getting the hell away from him. There isn't much you can say to her. I would call around to police, shelters, anywhere where you can get pamphlets that state what abuse looks like so you can put them in front of her. Show her that what he is doing to her is textbook signs police look for on domestic calls. Point out all the people who are warning her away from him. Remind her that love is supposed to make one feel good and happy, ask her if she cries more than she laughs, ask if she is excited when he walks through the door or nervous he will be upset about something. Ask her if she wants to live like that. Ask her if she wants her son to be just like him and treat his future girlfriends that way. Then tell her your phone number will never change, you will pick her up anywhere anytime and to please not let pride get in the way of her calling you when she needs to.

I think she meant it. She was angry and wanted payback. There was no reason for her to pretend to go along with putting the Capitol children into the games, she was set to execute Snow in a matter of minutes when the meeting was called. I don't think she thought to kill Coin until she was out on the balcony and started thinking about her conversation with Snow; up till that point she was in denial about what he had said to her. The only motives in Katniss's life are to keep herself, Prim, Peeta, and Gale alive and revenge against Snow. Katniss is not a hero, she never intended to be, never wanted to be, and only went along with portraying herself that way to serve her own ends. Katniss is not one to think ahead to much. She is reactionary to the situation she is in. One of the things I really liked about this series is how realistic Katniss is.

I am not allowed to go to the hair salon with my mother. In the 15 years I have been married I have gone with her 3 times and it is always a disaster. The first one was 3 hours before family portraits with my parents, brother, grandfather, aunts, uncle, cousins. The cut is horrible and every time I walk into a family member's home I see it. 14 years I have been looking at that awful hair cut. The second was a week after my first baby was born. I wasn't feeling very attractive so my mother took me to get a 'pick me up'. I can not even describe what it looked like. I went to another salon a couple of days later and the stylist picked up a section of hair like one whole pick up a dead mouse and said "what on earth is going on here?" I cried and just asked her to please fix it. I ended up with a very cute, very short, shaggy bob but I hate having that short of hair. It is not just hair. When my hair doesn't look good I do not feel good.

I think it may be your age more than your attire. I think most people have an image of an older woman when they think 'pastor's wife'.

DD has really sensitive ears, I try to stick to gold or sterling silver but sometimes there is a pair of earrings that she thinks are awesome and just has to wear. We put clear nail polish on anything that will be touching skin and she is good to go. She reapplies the nail polish each time she wears them just in case some of it has chipped off.

Your 4yo is a very rare child and you have started comparing your children and finding one lacking based on the traits of another. He is 6, you are the parent and you know how forgetful he is. Why are you not asking him if he has everything before you leave somewhere? You are being completely unreasonable making him pay for the lost things, including the watch. You knew before he wore it out that he was going to lose it. You forgot to check his wrist to see if it was there before you left. How is that any different from him forgetting to grab it after taking it off? I opened this thread up expecting to read about a teenager and I was ready to commiserate since my 13yo DD can't remember where she left her $200 iPod or her phone which she has set to silent.

Family of 5 and everyone has their own basket. DH washes his own clothes whenever he feels like it, but usually it's on Sundays. Then each person has their own day. DD on Monday DS1 on Tuesday DS2 on Wednesday Me on Thursday Sheets and towels on Friday Everything is folded as it comes out of the dryer and since there are only clothes belonging to one one person it gets sorted into piles according to drawer for fast and easy put away. Actually that is the way it is suppose to work, I get the system set up and it works for a little while and then we descend into mayhem again. I grab what needs to be washed, hopefully move it to the dryer before mildew sets in, once it does get dried what is needed will be taken out but the dryer won't be emptied till a new load needs to go in. The laundry then goes onto a basket where it will stay, unfolded, for days while we pick through it for what we need. When I get about 3 or 4 of these baskets taking up space in my bedroom I will get tired of looking at them and finally fold them and try to get the above system back on track. Today was a really productive day. There were about 5 loads of laundry piled up in front of the washer and I got it all washed, dried, folded, and put away. Tomorrow we are set to start back on our system!

My kids have asked for Pillow Pets on the past but I always blew it off thinking they have way too many stuffed animals. I was planning on getting all of them body pillows for Christmas but after reading this thread maybe I will get them the Pillow Pets.

YouTube had great videos, but find a local yarn store. One of those small independently owned stores. Usually they have reasonable priced classes or they have an open night where there will be a number of people willing to help.

I watched The Goldberg's last night and I just read the Halloween moving thread, it made me start thinking about trick or treating when I was growing up. We always went to my grandmother's house for Halloween and went trick or treating with my cousins. There was a house on our route that gave out homemade, warm, cinnamon donuts. We always went inside and said hello and got our donut and went back out. The lady who made them was always referred to as "the lady who makes the donuts" even by the adults. DD was horrified when I told her. When we got back to my grandmothers all the kids would dump their candy on the living room floor and the adults would come in from the kitchen to rummage through and take a few pieces. I always lost my Snickers to my dad and my Whoppers to my mom. I would try to eat as much candy as I could because I knew that my mom would take the bag from me and put it on top of the refrigerator where I would get one piece a week and my parents would pick out of it till Thanksgiving when whatever was left would be thrown away. At the time I felt it was extremely unfair. Now that I have kids I understand. I operate pretty much the same, the only difference is my kids know that on Halloween they can eat as much as they want. I do it so they don't feel cheated out of candy and if they eat too much and get sick it's a learning experience.

I remember going wearing a garbage bag as a witches costume because of rain on more than one Halloween. I also remember having to wear winter jacket a couple of times. Most of my memories are of good weather.

I had a great conversation with my father today. He is 64 and stays active by playing softball in an over 60 city league. When he was in high school he played a lot of sports; basketball, baseball, football. The high school he went to is in a neighborhood that is still really close and every year the school hosts the reunion, every student from any year is welcome to attend and my dad goes every year. Every year Mr. Rice is there also, he was my dad's government teacher and baseball coach. My dad graduated in 1968 so Mr. Rice is in his late 80s. The reunion was a couple of weeks ago and my dad sat and talked to Mr. Rice for a while and told him he was still playing ball and Mr. Rice asked him when his next game was. My dad thought he was just being polite, but at the next game Mr. Rice was there to watch him play ball. I just thought it was really neat that after 45 years my dad's former teacher still wanted to watch him play ball.

Daniel is gone, he died twice. I am very interested in the happy ending Regina was supposed to have with Robin Hood. I don't like that Emma and Neal keeping talking about being in love. I really would like Hook and Emma to get together. The look Hook have her before the kiss had my toes curling! DD and I both loved that Emma held back Snow so Regina could take the heart. I think it is very interesting Emma has started calling Henry "our" son when talking to Regina.

I didn't really see it as setting ground rules, but we got married so quickly after meeting that I wanted to make sure we were on the same page about major things. We talked about how many kids we wanted, that I would be a stay at home mom, we would move wherever his job took us, that we were equals and there would be no head of household, and I am sure a bunch more but that was 15 years ago and I can't think of them. That is not to say everything has run smoothly. He had problems thinking of it as 'our money' instead of 'his money' when I stopped working. He also cut me off after two kids when we had agreed on four, but I got a third. I know there are a few things that he could point out about me. Now that DD is 13 and DS 11 I have started talking about how sometimes love is not enough, that sometimes it is possible to be in love with someone who isn't good for you and you need to be strong and walk away of that happens, that love is very important but there needs to be respect with it, that opposites do attract and that is fine as long as they both want the same kind of life, and that while people change over time you can never change someone and you can never fix someone. Everything I had to learn on my own which I am sure they will have to learn also. I just want my words in their heads to help them when they do go through those lessons.

I think you are being taken advantage of, the rescue group is depending on your big heart and love for animals to keep the dog. They knew what was going on, the dog was at a farm that couldn't handle her (if a farm can't handle a dog you know something is wrong) and they passed her on to you. I think they are trying to manipulate you by saying she will go to the pound if you don't keep her. They are using your big heart against you. There are many rescue groups, it think you should find another to work with. If you do want to keep trying with her you could try Bach Flower remedies. http://www.bachflower.com/rescue-remedy-pets-bach-flower/ I have had really good luck with using them on cats and I know some people who have had success with dogs. If you don't have success with those, it may be time to admit that this may be one of those dogs who will never be able to fit into a home. It sucks and it's sad, but there are too many dogs and cats that will make good companions to waste resources on those who won't.

We have 4 bedrooms and when we moved in 10 months ago each kid had their own room. About 3 weeks ago the boys asked to share a room again, they are 11 and almost 6. It seems to be working, they do fight during the day but not about anything to do with their room.

I really like the co-op idea. I second making the kids do a lot. Make up a Kaper Chart, google it and you will find tons of ideas on how to design one. For my GS troop I make it quite clear that I am a volunteer, that I do not receive a paycheck nor do I get any cookie kickback. I also make it quite clear that I am giving my time to THEIR daughter. Visuals are always good. A leader I know would make paper hats and each hat would have a position or a job written on it. She would line them all up on the table at her parent meeting and tell the parents these were the need of the troop. She could wear one or two comfortably, but any more the hats would topple off. She would tell them if they wanted a good scouting experience for their daughter they needed to help and asked them to choose a hat.

I was bored one night so I randomly choose a screen name on AOL to IM. It wasn't the cleanest of conversations, but when he IMed me the next day I was at work and told him to be nice. We quickly moved from IMing and emails to phone calls. 1 month after the first IM I flew to where he was stationed to meet him and three weeks after that we eloped. We have been together for 15 years. During that first month of talking, DH printed out every email I sent him and still has them in a file he keeps in his closet.

We got DS the Leatherman Skelatool. It's a great utility knife, made in USA also which is a huge plus for us.

That is impossible. The Tigers beat the A's and the season ended.

Before DH and I got married we decided 4, then we had two and DH cut me off. It took me 5 years to talk him into number 3. Sometimes I get resentful and think there should be a child between 2 and 3, but I don't dwell. Recently DH hit 40 and started thinking we should have another one, it was his way of trying to hold on to being young because only young people have babies. I always thought I would jump at the chance to have another baby, but when he said this all it could think about was how much I don't like being pregnant, how much I don't want to go through labor, and I don't want to nurse for another two years. I really like being able to sit and talk to the other moms at the park, I don't want to be shadowing a toddler all over the playground. I like being able to go camping with Girl Scouts, out for Margaritas with my friends, Las Vegas with DH. I realized that while I will always dream about the newborn that lays on my chest for hours in perfect contentment, I am done having kids. We were at Disneyland recently. Our youngest is now tall enough to go on all but two rides. We didn't have to use the rider switches anymore. DH and I saw all these young couples with toddlers that looked like babies themselves. It drove home even more that we were done with that stage of life.

There is a website that offers college courses for free, it is not accredited and doesn't give degrees but it is set up to take classes just for the sake of learning. It is not a website that has a collection of lectures from universities. It has developed its own classes and when they are working on putting a class together it shows a percentage of how completed it is. I know I found out it about here, I had it bookmarked but that was on a laptop that no longer works. Anyone know I am talking about?