I dont believe in a God that is a paternal figure sitting "up there somewhere" pulling the strings of the planet with sadistic humour, calling it love. I don't think there is a superbeing separate from us, that can manipulate and control us and it works in our favour if we pray a lot to him and do what he says. I see that as an immature belief system. However, I do think that a lot of suffering on the planet is because of what man does to himself and other men, and blaming God is not quite fair. Wars are man versus man, massacres, poverty...even the skyrocketing rates of cancer have a lot to do with man (lifestyle, envionmental pollution, poor diet, radiation etc). If we need a scapegoat, I guess God will do, but ultimately, when it comes down to it, while we might not individually choose our destiny (family of origin, conditioning, country of birth, life circumstance) to a large extent we do create most of the suffering. This could be a paradise- heaven on earth- but we are doing such a good job of destroying that. But that is mankind's evolution, I presume. In Buddhism and some other philosophies, there is a distinction between the pain of life, which is inevitable, and what we make of it, which is suffering (which is pretty much inevitable too but we have a lot more control over). I don't believe in the Christian God, but I don't have a problem with the concept of God, because I don't expect "him" to be responsible. And I do believe "he" is pure Love. I guess your post touched something in my heart, because I do know in my heart that we are all good, and life is good, in spite of all the evidence to the contrary.

I'm having one, dh and I decided :) He had his 15 years ago. Time for me now. Im 43. Having had my kids in my late twenties...and having just finished homeschooling them, and them in their teens....I am really wondering what to do next. And some days, it causes me angst, and i wonder if I should be doing Some Really Big Thing but I dont know what. So since I cant work out any Really Big Thing to do with the rest of my life (no pressure on myself or anything) I am wondering if I am supposed to know what to do next and I just dont get it, or something. Its a good recipe for makign yourself really silly crazy, so instead I am going to the beach and cleaning the house. I think it is a natural phenomenon when people reach middle age and realise that their lives are finite, (they have lost the illusion that they will live forever,that young people tend to have), and its a point at which many of us say to ourselves...is this it? Is this what life's all about? Is this what I thought I would be doing? Am I happy? Is this really what I want to do with my life? And for many people, its obvious that to be true to themselves, they need to change things. I think its real and natural...it doesnt always look pretty, or mature, and I am sure not everyone goes through it.

Lifts. Once when I was about 8 or 10, my parents, brother and I were staying in a one room motel room- my parents watched a horror movie that involved a lift cable breaking and a big drama ensuing...they thought I was asleep. I wasn't- I peeked. I have been frightened of being in lifts ever since. I also confess to being quite frightened of dogs. I have never been bitten by one, that I remember, but they just intimidate me. I love dogs too, and we have 2 dogs...but when I am in a dog exercise area, or dog beach, I am on edge to some extent. I confess to being scared of the dark, too.

Because life is change. Nothing ever stays the same. Even if you are a Christian, I hope you have grown and matured over the years, and you have continued to grown and question your spirituality, even if the larger context is a Christian one. I hope you didnt just decide to be a Christian and stop there, as if thats it. For some people, growing and maturing takes them into new territory...what they used to believe no longer holds water for them. And every growth involves loss on some level- for some it is the loss of an identity as a Christian. I was never a Christian although I was sent to Sunday School and a Christian Girls School. It never held water for me. And...no marriage, no belief, nothing on this earth is 100% secure. Its best to make peace with that.

This is what we had, too, when the kids were younger. I also only used it for emergencies- it stayed in the car glove box. They got phones when they could afford to pay for them, and pay for a plan. Around 12/13- in ds15's case, he got aphone before dd16 because he was soooo desperate...it turned out that his peers werent relaly phone savvy yet, generally speaking, and he didnt use it. It wasnt till he was 14 that he got another phone which he now uses (a lot!). But both have enough part time work to pay for their phone plans.

Lol, Americans listen to and believe their media rather a lot. Not everyone sees the U.S. as the good guys in world politics, I can assure you. And no, they dont do it for free. Nothing personal.

I somehow suspect picky eating is somehow related to the same environmental/social/whatever mysterious reasons that are behind the huge surge in all sorts of things such as autism, adhd, and allergies. I just think somehow there is some sort of connection. I dont know how much is nature/nurture (not saying autism is that...just that it is so much more common nowadays). Probably some of both. I have a picky eater and a picky eater dh too. It has been the cause of a lot of heartache on my part, so I really empathise. I lvoe to cook and take care fo the family, but not being able to make a meal that all 4 of us will eat, is pretty unsatisfying. My brother grew up a picky eater- woudl literally only eat cereal and milk, toast and a couple of toppings, meat and potatoes, tomato soup (no other vegetables), and bananas for fruit. That was it- although he did eat a lot of icecream too. My mother gave up and let him eat just those foods. (Meat and potatoes was pretty standard fair back then anyway). He was healthy- he grew up healthier than me, probably and i ate widely. He is even a chiropractor and passionate about health. It wasnt till he started goign out with girls that he expanded his tastes so he coudl take them to restaurants :) He is still fussy but much better, I believe. I sometimes cajole and encourage, sometimes bribe, sometime lose my temper and make him sit there and eat something. But overall, he is getting fussier in some ways- and now that he is mature enough to articulate, it is a texture issue, every time. He also has texture issues with clothing and even carpet. Mostly, since he will eat raw vegetables and loves tofu and meat and rice, I can work something out for him. ANd he is clear he is not trying to hurt my feelings etc...he just really gags at certain foods. For him, anyting oily at all..even mashed potato...is a challenge. Since he is my LD kid...I figure it is one of his quirks and although I get very frustrated, I dont force it very often. ETA: for some kids, being deficient in zinc makes food taste pretty awful. YOu can get a zinc taste test and its worth a try ...zinc is very related to taste. Another possibility is just to give a multi vitamin daily, and make sure it has zinc in it.

I always felt we just wouldnt get our work done and school day over, if we didnt get started at a fixed time each day. Since teh kids often had afternoon activities, we couldnt just take all day. So we had a routine for years- 7am get up, 8.30am school started. However...I am a morning person. I am not good in the afternoons- that made a strong impact on my decision to make sure we got most of our work done in the mornings. If I wasnt like that, I might not have been so rigid about it. I think routines are good, but everyone is unique and i wouldnt say what worked for me would work for everyone.

Whatever the answer is (and I dont really know it), the manufacturing and consumption of cheap junk is hardly a good thing to base economies on. Its not ethical, its not sustainable, its destructive to the environment, it causes suffering....better we let it go than hang on to it in case it hurts economies in the short term.

Its been an issue at time- dh is far more social than I am. Its not so much the quality of friends as the quantity :) Dh no longer drinks alcohol and so a certain grade of friend did drop away many years ago. We have our separate friends and our together friends. I did try and control his relationships with some people but nowadays there is peace in that area. My issue is more than most of dh's friends tend to look up to him, put him on a pedestal, and that can give a certain sucky type of energy- needy,wanting something- that really bugs me at times. Overall though, we have worked through the issues and its not too bad nowadays.

DH was very, very clear about it. He has a daughter from a previou marriage. For him, it was financial- he did not want to support more children- he wanted to be able to take excellent care of the ones he had. He has 3 kids, I have 2. I wanted more, and it has been difficult fo rme at times to accept- and he has much compassion for me over this issue- but it is still very clear for him. ALso, he is 14 years older than me, so our 2 were born when he was 40 and 42- he didnt want young kids into old age. Fair enough.

I voted 7. It depends on the kid and what area I lived in. If I lived in a high crime area I would have behaved differently but we left the kids from a young age, living in low crime suburbia.

I bought and love YNAB but since we have a lot of cash, it kind of got messy- YNAB works best if you can manage it all online- so I designed my own system for our cash- I pay myself a month ahead and allocate the money to various catagories. It works well. I basically have an envelope system, but I use the Savvy-Cents wallet for the practical day to day of it. I went through a financial management overhaul after reading Dave Ramsey, and eventually worked out a system that fitted our unique situation.

Whats your weak point, Laurie? Whats your achilles heel when it comes to food? I have discovered mine since doing WW, and kind of know the key for me now. I eat really healthy and in summer, mostly raw, but I tend to snack on high fat vegetarian foods like nuts and avocados. When I read the raw food people, many say they could eat as much as they wanted of those foods and still lose weight, but that isnt the case for me at all. I know nuts are something i can only have a small amount of, ocasionally, and while I used to scoff a whole or half an avocado easily, now I am just as happy with 1/4. I also have to watch the fruit intake. The new WW had me fruit binging. I think we all have our emotional reaosns for overeating, and then our patterns. I can overeat and put on weight, nowadays, on a diet that would make most people lose weight, apparently.

Drink a lot of water to help your body go through the transition. Hot water or herbal teas is ok. You will probably feel better in a few days, but the cravings may last longer, and you may get more symptoms on and off- but overall you will feel better. But if you give in to the cravings, they will make you feel bad again. One thing that happens is that you get more sensitive to the effect on your body of what you eat, and the short term pleasure of taste no longer becomes as important as the long term effect of how it feels in your body after you eat something unhealthy. I am doing a no meat, no dairy thing at the moment too (I already did no sugar or processed foods). I am finding I am very achey- all my joints ache. I am hoping it passes soon, too!

Maybe it would help to just accept yourself more, your limitations....and then accept her more, too. You can only do what you can do, and I can really relate to the whole having friends over thing, as well as driving them places. I did see it as my job for a long time, since they homeschooled. Now that they can catch public transport it is much easier for me and I often say no. But some acceptance of your situation- your health, even your perception of your daughter's shallowness- and compassion for yourself, might also help you be a bit easier on her. She is probably doing her best in a situation that she isnt perceiving as ideal, either. Maybe find some common ground and focus on her better side, when you catch yourself being critical. I think it is sometimes the hardest thing in the world to see the people who are closest to us- our spouses and children and parents- as completely separate human beings with their own character, personality traits, likes and dislikes- and to honour them for beng who they are, instead of wanting them to be different- for us. My kids are definitely shallow. They dont care about saving the environment, about taking care of their grandparents, about starving children in Africa (I know some kids do- mine don't). I cant make them care- they are who they are. They do care about their friends, they do care about me, they do care about each other sometimes....we work with what we have. They see me caring though, and their dad...maybe it is planting seeds in there somewhere that life will water one day. I tihnk who we are and how we live probably makes more impact on our kids than what we say, anyway.

I just wanted to agree that while there is a slow motion massive collapse of the present world order....what is also happening along the lines of technology such as you are saying, is so wonderful as to make me optimistic rather than pessimistic. There is SO much creative stuff happening on a small scale, but so much that it is makign a huge difference (for example the whole micro financing movement). Change is inevitable and what is not sustainable- continual economic growth is simply not sustainable yet our governments seem to think it is- will die and what IS sustainable will thrive.

I think all western countries have been living in a false sense of security for a long time, and it is fairly clear that a reckoning is coming. Better not to be in denial about it (which many still are). The U.S. will probably cop it worse than many countries (and many agree it is the end of an empire), but then, many European countries are already in crisis too. Here is an article that came into my inbox a few days ago-an interview with the guy who wrote Rich Dad Poor Dad, Robert Kiyosaki. http://finance.yahoo.com/expert/article/richricher/280356

This is us too. :lol: Works for us.

I peel and chop them into chunks and freeze them in a bag. Then use them for smoothies or banana icecream. They dont seem to go brown and are fine for quite a while. Green SMoothie: handful of frozen banana, some frozen berries, handful of dark lettuce or baby spinach, some water. Blend. Yum. Banana Choc ice cream- blend frozen bananas with raw cacao powder- instant ice cream. Can also add berries.

I wish my mother had put my brother and I before her new boyfriend. I wish she had been more present and aware to realise we needed more boundaries and a bit less freedom, before it was too late. I wish she had been able to handle her marriage breakup to my father, much better than she did. I wish she had sent me to counselling after that breakup (age 13). With my daughter, it is soo different. Her nature is easy going and not as trippy and sensitive as I was. She is very different to me, yet we get on very well. I parent quite differently to my parents, however in some ways it is similar in that I value being friends with my kids, and I value the trust we have together. I value our intimacy and I am not an authoritarian type- neither of my parents were, either. However dh is. With my daughter, we just keep talking, and keep hugging. I am so grateful for homeschooling, and even these boards, for reminding me that building relationship is more important than being right or wrong. My dd has an incredible propensity to forgive and let go, and she actually rarely even gets very upset- it takes a lot to get her angry. She is a true gift for us. She is our compensation for having a challenging other child, who we fortunately love just as much :) I really think the best thing you can do is keep building the relationship, staying connected. No single issue is more important than your connection. Stay open to listening, to her perspective, and also share yourself, so that she knows what its like to be an adult woman, too. My dd is very social and has many friends, so sometimes we dont even see each othe rmuch for days- but then we will just open up and share with each other. People often tell me my dd and I look like sisters. Last night we went out to dinner and got all dressed up and dd16 told me how beautiful I am and how she loves that I look like her sister. She hugged me a lot- and hse is a sophisticated young woman- my mother never hugged me. I am so lucky. Yes, sometimes we have to say no, sometimes we have to deny her what she wants (like going to New Years Even parties across town with people we dont know- yikes!), but so far the bumps are few and far between.

I have noticed that it is something both my parents have become fascinated with as they got older, but it wasn't a big deal when they were younger. My mother has written detailed biographies of both her parents- both of which are a little boring to me to read, but on the other hand, times have changed so much, there is certianyl some fascinating stuff in there. TO me though, what woudl be more interesting woudl be udnerstanding their values, the way they thought and what they believed- more than what they actually did. Its interesting that more native (and Asian) cultures put quite an emphasis on honouring and remembering their ancestors, yet in the west we dont- we tend to forget them completely after a generation or 2. I think there is something we are missing, personally, but we dont have a context for really valuing them.

I agree it depends a lot on your kids and whether they are likely to get into mischief or do something silly. My 2 are close in age and dh and I used to put on a video for them and go for walks when they were around 4 and 5, and soon after that go for short errands. By the time they were 7 and 8 we would ocasionally go to a movie or shopping. But they are very sensible kids and loved to be trusted. We didnt even hav emobile phones back then, but they did know to go to the neighbours if there was any emergency, and they had phone numbers to ring too. Dh has a dd who is 5 years older than our dd, and we woudl never leave her alone with our kids- she would be a liability to them. She is ADD and lacks- even now- the normal sort of common sense and boundaries that most people develop.

Morning chores: one does dishes, the other does the chickens and dog poo. One does bins, the other takes care of the swimming pool. Always before school, otherwise it woudnt get done. Afternoon/evening- person on dishes has to do more dishes.

I am going to get a refurbished one (or IMac) soon. They are on the website. They have the warrantee and all.