Ananda
-
Posts
265 -
Joined
Content Type
Profiles
Forums
Events
Blogs
Classifieds
Store
Posts posted by Ananda
-
-
When your child easily writes with correct spelling, you have achieved the goal of "spelling". My kids will probably have spelling school work forever. Our family is the opposite of natural spellers.
-
Plum Brook Boys' School. I tried to be serious. Plum is local geography. Brook was the best thing we could come up with to fill out the title. I have three sons, so I decided to capitalize on that. School seemed the most straight-forward word. Academy didn't have the right feel. Coming up with a school name was the trickiest part of filing the notice of intent.
-
Congrats! Bitchiness was always my first pregnancy symptom. Wishing you a smooth pregnancy!
-
1
-
-
False equivocation here. We are not talking about all beliefs, but a specific one. And a reaction to a specific one.
I'm not circling this drain, been there and done that for a decade plus on the internet and it's never worth the time. Ever.
Just curious, why? Clearly this is important to you. Why wouldn't you want learn about the topic? Science is such a fascinating area, and useful too. Why would learning about it ever be a waste of time? I don't honestly don't understand.
And as far as religion is concerned, I am sure there are many Christian posters who could explain to you how they reconcile their faith and science. Personally, I would be interested in your perspective. The dismissive reaction you keep having toward both the science & the faith sides of the discussion perplexes me.
As a lurker I always hesitate to post because I feel my contributions aren't valuable. I want to encourage you that your contributions to the discussion are valuable. Obviously, you take a minority position, but I would think that would make your words more valuable, not less. I am sorry you are feeling discouraged and silenced. :grouphug:
-
5
-
-
Soft touch. People these days tell children to touch softly. No, eww! It makes me feel so gross. Firm touch only please. Or better yet, no touch.
When things come out of the dishwasher dirty. A fork with crud stuck to after going through the dishwasher is much worse than a dirty fork.
I agree with pp: talking on the phone & call-in radio. I would extended that to interview situation where one person is being stupid instead of trying to provide genuine dialogue.
I'm quirky, I have a bunch.
I'm vegetarian, when something that is otherwise vegetarian has some small amount of meat added like bacon bits. So I can't eat it.
*cough* my mother *cough*
When people offer my children food they can't have. Then I have to be a meany and say "no, actually they can't have chocolate milk with their meal" and my kids cry.
-
5
-
-
SHHH! You can't admit that on here without everyone's perception of your IQ dropping thirty points and being accused of science denialism. For your sake, pretend you agree with the herd on this one.
I don't think that is fair. I was very careful not to attack Christians, young earth creationists or otherwise.
As for this board, I think you will find that you aren't alone as a young earth creationist. There are many. IMHO YEC-ism is a perfectly valid interpretation of the Bible.
As for Ken Ham, I am unapologetic of my disdain for him. I fully support YEC producing science & history books that agree with their world views. Homeschoolers and Christian schools can educate their students as they see fit. Answers in Genesis is free to fund & promote research in Creation Science. BUT Ken Ham's behavior toward his fellow Christians & toward the secular/scientific community, and especially toward more moderate homeschoolers is deplorable. Divisive is right.
Ken Ham didn't put a rainbow on the ark to inspire Christians in their faith. He did it as an overt attack on people who disagree with him. His intent was ugly, and in practice his message is lost in translation.
-
11
-
-
It's Ken Ham. Nothing good ever comes from Ken Ham. As for the rainbow on the ark, the message is entirely lost. If I were driving by to ark, I would either think that some activist had done it, or think that the Ark people were supporting GLBT people (if I didn't know about Answers in Genesis).
-
16
-
-
Well for me it's two things:
1. I do need to lose a bunch of weight after 3 children. I am the type to go all scorched Earth, so I will probably go on a very restrictive near starvation diet. That's just my style. I am either all in or not. I plan to do this after my child's birthday party this weekend.
2. I try to be intentional about what we eat as a family. I try to consider animal welfare, environmental impact, health, budget, practicality and on and on. I haven't found the balance there yet. Everything seems to be "bad" these days. If I am honest, I have to admit I'm overwhelmed. I don't know where to draw the line.
Add to that: a morbidly obese husband who has his own battles to fight, a picky bird eating 7 year old, and two little children. No, we don't just eat food. Honestly, I wish we didn't have to eat at all.
-
Dementia is so tough. My grandma had Alzheimer's, my grandpa had such a time trying to keep both her & himself safe. Best wishes. :grouphug:
-
1
-
-
I am confident the vast majority of children "come back" to their mothers over the course of their twenties. This is what I have seen with my friends. Hope for a bright future is alive.
But, I am 32 married, married 10 years with three children and I haven't come back. With age the relationship has improved. I have learned to be civil. I have learned to leave, instead of getting angry. I have learned guard my silence and let her have the last word. The relationship has moved from turbulent and even toxic to distant and formal. I am satisfied with it. Of course, my mother isn't. She is always pushing for more. It isn't healthy though. So there you have it.
I have one piece of advice though. Don't push. As previous posters have noted, the desire for distance is developmentally natural. Let her have some space to mature. I think that is what my mother did wrong. She has never once waited for me to call her, arrange a visit with her, email her. If we have a visit, I can expect a long sentimental email within the hour it takes me to drive home. I can expect a phone call trying to arrange the next visit within a couple days. She never allows me to miss her.
As a mother though, :grouphug:
-
I am not sentimental, so I don't understand crying about things like a new baby. I don't cry when I am sad, frustrated or overwhelmed. I haven't cried at a funeral yet. I have lost close grandparents. I think I would cry if my husband or children died, but not if my parents or brother died. That is purely speculative.
I do cry when my heart gets broken. Teen break-ups made me cry for months. I don't know why, I wasn't even sad. I still cry if I think too much about "the love of my life". Uggg.
I cried when my week-old baby and I ended up incarcerated in the NICU, when he got a fever. Now mind you, I didn't cry when they were testing him for meningitis and everything else under the sun. When had been stuck in the NICU for several days and he had gotten all better but they wouldn't let us leave, because they couldn't figure out why he had been sick. They wanted him to finish an entire course of antibiotics & anti-virals. I cried. I felt guilty, because everyone else had a preemie or a sick baby fighting for its life, and I had a perfectly well baby. So shouldn't I be happy?
I also cry when I am angry. This makes me feel like an irrational silly little girl, which makes me angrier. I have tried saying, "Please ignore my tears and listen to my words." People don't. I wish I could suppress it, I try so hard.
-
I use miracle whip & mustard. If I used mayonnaise, I would add something to give it some acidity.
-
We are weird. I have three answers.
1. We school year round. I see no point in stopping.
2. For my own planning, I plan school years January to December.
3. The way my state's homeschool paperwork is set up requires your start & end date be between July 15 & July 14 so . . . our official school year is July 15 to July 14. I do register as split grades, to honor our quirkiness.
-
We use hook & eyes. Our toddlers have all figured out the dead bolts before 18 months. The only way we keep them in the house, is if we routinely lock the doors. Even now my 20 month old call me over to squawk & point at the hook-and-eye on the back door. He can't talk, but he knows what needs to be done. Our hook and eyes have little spring things so they can't just push them off with a stick or find something to climb on.
Toddler adventures sure keep you on your toes.
-
I have a bunch of little boys. I wouldn't be able to take them to a whisper only library. Our library allows reasonable noise in both the children & young adult (teen) sections. All the adult sections are usually quiet, for whatever reason the periodical room is dead silent except for the turning of pages. They also have quiet study rooms and an adults only computer lab. Honestly, I think this arrangement is best for everyone.
-
14
-
-
I send my children to a b&m preschool. I have nothing but good things to say about their experience. Our preschool is really awesome. It is a gentle play-based program. I send them three mornings a week. My oldest has special needs (poor impulse control, difficulty following instructions etc.) and hey were so wonderful working with him & our family.
As far as transitioning to homeschool after preschool, we didn't really have too much difficulty. I start having little phonics & math lessons, when they are preschoolers. We just keep doing what we are doing as far as home/school life. The preschool has a graduation ceremony, and all the children disperse to various public & private schools for kindergarten. My oldest was disappointed that he was too old for preschool, but he never asked about going to kindergarten. His kindergarten year he had micro soccer & a group music class. That worked well for us.
Preschools seem to be variable, so your millage may vary. I have heard horror stories. But I say if you find a good one, go for it.
-
Well my bed is really old, I don't know exactly how old. My husband's parents gave it to us when we were married, so ten years ago. Before that it was my husband's bed for at least another 10 years. Before that it was a hotel bed. I have no complaints about the bed. It is still great.
My husbands bed is maybe 4 years old or so. Before that he had an economy mattress that died right after we bought it. He was very uncomfortable until he agreed to get a nice mattress.
My 7 year old's mattress is 2 years old, I hope it will last many great years.
My 4 year old's mattress is 5 years old, it is the best toddler mattress they sold at target. I am wondering if we should replace it. It isn't comfortable when I lay on it, but of course I am an adult.
Our futon mattress is new, we replaced the first one after 9 years of faithful service.
Come to think of it my parents still have the mattress that they bought for me when I was a toddler, so 30-ish years ago.
In summary, it seems the lifespan of mattresses is highly variable.
-
1
-
-
I agree with everyone that your son must handle the conflict between your vacation plans & his employment himself. I also feel strongly that he must make the decision about what to do himself. You can offer advice/support of course, but it is his decision to make. I see three viable options:
1. Make a final appeal, then quit properly when it is denied. They may be open to him reapplying.
2. Take off the one or two weeks that his job will allow him and have him fly down to participate in the bulk of the family vacation.
3. He says home & works; you go on the vacation without him.
This is one of those bitter lessons that makes you chose your priorities.
-
My children are little but . . . Sure you can take a break. We take breaks all the time at our house.
My experience thus far: Toddler learns letter sounds LONG BREAK
Preschooler learns to read one syllable words, but isn't ready for sentences or for two-syllable words. LONG BREAK (This is where I am with ds4.)
Child suddenly can read a short sentence. We quickly jump forward in reading ability learning to read sentences & multi-syllable words. But the child is easily intimidated by stories that are too long, that have too much text on the page, that have too small of text, that use a funny font etc. So LONG BREAK Also child reads like a depressed robot.
Child suddenly can read normal picture books. This is where I am stalled with ds7. He isn't able to track paragraphs in beginning chapter books, but he can read fairly complex picture books in terms of vocabulary & sentence structure. It all boils down to amount & size of text.
I assume some day my ds7's eyes will magically learn to track small, dense text and the world of literature will open up to him.
My advice, yes take a break. Just have him read a little every day. You read a ton. It will all work out.
-
1
-
-
I call them deely bobbers in a casual setting. If I were talking to adults, I would call them antennae (no martian).
-
1
-
-
My mother was raised Methodist.
My father was raised agnostic and really got into eastern religions in college.
By the time I was born they were attending Quaker meeting. It was Christian enough for my mother; the silent worship suited my father.
When I was five we moved to a little town in the Midwest. No Quaker meetings were nearby we sometimes attended the Methodist church, other times Presbyterian. I had strong atheist leanings as a young child.
When I was older we moved to a large city with a Quaker meeting, so we did that again. I stopped attending as soon as my parents would allow me to stay home alone. I became very interested in religion in high school. I attended Catholic mass for a few years, but never believed. I dabbled in Buddhism.
I have always been quasi-atheist, but I would say that religion has remained a large interest of mine.
As for my parents:
They still attend Quaker meeting. My mother is still Christian. My father describes himself as a "Vedic Quaker", so Hinduism, Quakerism and lately Russian Orthodox Christianity. So yeah . . . It's complicated.
-
1
-
-
Can you please explain this to me? How is this enforced? How was it communicated?
ETA: PM is fine; I don't mean to be so public.
This was in reference to my family being quarantined (at home) for five days when my preschooler got whooping cough.
It wasn't enforced. I suppose we could have been jerks and just gone out and about. I did go to the store once to get the prescriptions for antibiotics filled. As far as I know, our compliance was on the honor system.
When the results of the test for pertussis came back positive, the doctor called us. He told us that since our town was in the middle of an outbreak the CDC was overseeing everyone's care and they wanted us all to stay home, until we finished a course of antibiotics.
Later the doctor called us again to say that the CDC wanted us to take a 5-day course of antibiotics instead of the 3-day course he had prescribed. Then the CDC called us directly. They asked a lot of questions about where we had been and our health over the past few days. They used their bossy voices to tell us how we were public health hazards and how we might spread it even without symptoms. Pertussis is very serious, it can kill people etc. We readily agreed to stay home. I seem to remember that they called my husband's work (that also may not have happened). I know the CDC was in contact with my child's preschool.
They called us again after the five days was over. They asked if we had stayed home and if we had stayed healthy.
-
2
-
-
I learned about how ineffective the pertussis vaccine was when my oldest's preschool had to deal with an epidemic. The first child (vaccinated) got it and the preschool had to inform everyone that they had been exposed. They also made a rule that children with any cold symptoms had to receive a doctors note that they didn't have pertussis. This was a preschool during cold season so that applied to most of the children, including my child.
Anyway it turned out that my child did, in fact, have pertussis. The CDC required that our entire family be on prophylactic antibiotics and be quarantined (at home) for the five days until we finished them. I know a lot of the preschoolers ended up catching it despite the preschool & CDC taking precautions. I understand that occasionally a vaccinated kid with still get the illness. But it shouldn't be able to spread through a vaccinated population. I wouldn't call that success.
On the other hand, I wouldn't call it failure either. While many kids got sick, most didn't. All of the sick kids had mild cases and didn't pass it on to siblings or their pregnant mommies.
-
6
-
-
We have neighbors. They regularly scream at each other from either side of the street. At first I thought it was scary, but now it is just "how they are". They say terrible things and disturb everyone, but I think they are pretty harmless. One time the lady was yelling "call the police, someone call the police," so I did. You shouldn't yell stuff like that, people might actually you know call the police. They were so angry with us. And honestly, while I kinda knew she was fine, she might have actually been in danger.
-
2
-
Lacto-ovo vegetarians--what do you eat? Critique my meal ideas?
in The Chat Board
Posted
I have been vegetarian since I was 11. I haven't found protein to be much of an issue. Obviously when we stay with my mother-in-law and she cooks meat & two veggies, and we only eat the two veggies --- then protein definitely becomes a concern.
The things that have sometimes been problems: B-12 and iron. My family just takes a supplement for B-12. We have to be intentional about making sure we get enough iron. I usually supplement iron when I am pregnant & postpartum and occasionally otherwise.
If you want to lose weight, yeah . . . you have to watch calories. I am in weight loss mode myself after three pregnancies. I got fat on a vegetarian diet.
Your diet is so very different, than mine. I don't think it is a matter of better or worse, just different. I will tell you what we eat.
I don't eat breakfast. My husband usually has premade & frozen burritos & raw veggies. The children have something like oatmeal, toast with peanut butter or cream cheese, smoothie, or yogurt. Often the children have fruit or orange juice with breakfast.
Lunch is very varied but usually quite simple: leftovers, reheated soup, quesadilla, eggs, burritos, entree salads, mac-and-cheese, sandwiches etc. For lunch veggie it is salad, raw veggies, or frozen veggies heated up in the microwave.
Snacks are fruit, veggies, hummus, hard boiled egg, nuts, yogurt, cheese, crackers. You get the idea.
Dinner we eat a lot of ethnic food. I highly recommend this approach. So many great international vegetarian options. Dinner (the evening meal) is the big family meal at our house. We always have a salad and often fruit.
So for example, yesterday:
Breakfast: Me: none; dh: burritos & raw veggies; dc: yogurt with peaches & granola
Lunch: Me & DH: salad; dc: bean & cheese quesadilla, raw veggies, grapes
Snack: veggies & hummus, almonds, I had a peach, the children had banana & ritz crackers
Dinner: saag paneer (a spinach dish), brown rice, curried chickpeas & cauliflower, salad; for desert sweet potato w/ cinnamon.