DD(15) has had stomach problems on and off for years. I was getting ready to post here to see if you all could offer solutions and then realized I had posted in the past (almost 6 years ago!). Here is my old post. So, dd has always complained of her stomach hurting. She also always has frequent headaches. I have taken her to the doctor multiple times, and other than suggesting she was constipated after having an x-ray once and putting her on Miralax for several months, nothing has really been done. The problem really is that she is a complainer by nature. So she complains about things all. the. time. It is difficult to know when things are actually bad or when they aren't a big deal. Also, every time I have taken her to the doctor about these problems, she is in horrible pain when I call to schedule the appointment, but by the time we go, it's not that bad anymore. The past few weeks she has been complaining of stomach aches again. Today, she is texting me from school telling me that she is hurting. She says that she feels bloated and gassy and that she is having sharp pains in her stomach. We have talked about doing an elimination diet in the past, but she has not agreed to give it a real try. She spends enough time away from me (school, dance, friends) that I can't really control her diet. I have always wondered if it would help though. Do you have any resources for trying this if she will agree? Aside from that, she has been tested for celiac (twice - via blood test) and she doesn't have that. I don't really think talking to her pediatrician will get us anywhere. Any other suggestions? I feel awful for her, but I just don't know how to help. We don't have a great diet and I am really working to clean it up. We were on vacation in Punta Cana prior to Christmas and she did complain of her stomach hurting there. But she complained before we left too. Oh, one other thing...my ds (now 18) went through this when he was younger and he ended up having an endoscopy. Nothing was ever found to be wrong with him and he was eventually diagnosed with anxiety. Dd's situation seems different, but I wonder if she is also dealing with anxiety? I wish there were some easy way to figure things out.

I’ve never seen My Clever Fox, but it looks like something I may want to try! I’ve attempted to bullet journal for several years, but I stink at keeping up with it. I think having some planned pages may actually help me. But what I love about this planner is the blank pages in the back (and love the idea of indexing them!). I think I will give this a try this year.

I’m in! We just had a very expensive December and due to some crappy changes with my husband’s job, we really need to focus more on intentional spending in the new year. I know the one thing that would help me the most, yet I can’t seem to ever make it happen - meal planning. I don’t know why I stink at it, but I do. I made meal planning my focus for 2022 and I failed miserably. I asked for help here, read blogs, etc. and still couldn’t make it work. We overspend at the grocery, then with no plan, we eat out too often. It is awful! I know that I have to get a handle on this and it would really help with my finances. This is a great thread and I really need it. Thanks for starting it!

I absolutely love YNAB. It has completely changed my family’s financial situation. I always tried budgeting with an excel spreadsheet, but just couldn’t make it work. I used an older system called Mvelopes (I think it’s gone now), tried Mint, and used Dave Ramsey’s Every Dollar. But nothing clicked for us. Finally, in October of 2018 I started using YNAB and it just worked. We had credit card debt at the time, which I’d been trying to pay off for a while. YNAB made it easy to pay off the debt and helped us to start using credit cards for points and miles! YNAB does have a learning curve, but it is really worth it. There is a YNAB group on Facebook that has been so helpful and I would recommend that you join that if you’re interested in giving it a try. It’s called YNAB (You Need a Budget) Fans!

Super helpful info!! I will definitely look at the categories, as I think that will help a lot! And for anyone who is curious, I am already down 6,323 emails (started at over 11,000!) so I am making progress. Thanks!

Thanks. I will give that a try.

Great suggestions. Thank you all so much!! I currently view my gmail account through the email app on my iPhone. I wonder if it would be more user friendly to try the outlook app, or the gmail app? Or maybe even logging in on my laptop? Any thoughts??

My main personal email account (gmail) is out of control. I have over 11,000 unread messages!!! I honestly would like to just delete everything and start from scratch, but I’ve had this account forever and I do have some personal emails that I’d like to keep. This is the email that I use when signing up for “stuff”. So I get a ton of emails from all the random companies. How do you manage personal email? Any suggestions on cleaning this up? I’ve even looked at some of the email clean up services, but don’t know if anyone with personal feedback. Thanks!

Young adult

We’ve been trying to get home for Christmas for three days now. Flew from Punta Cana yesterday (Christmas day) to Baltimore. Our connecting flight to Columbus didn’t happen (they never cancelled it, but the flight is gone) and no more flights to Columbus on Southwest until Wednesday!!! They booked us on a flight to Cincinnati and we have a car rented when we get there. Will have to drive to Columbus airport to get our car and then 3 hours to our home in WV. Oh and we just learned that at this time, there are only 2 flight attendants assigned to our flight and they need 3. Hoping one more shows up somewhere. So we slept in the airport for the first time. We are tired and exhausted, but have met people who have been stuck in airports since Friday. This is such a mess!!!

Update on my family…we are the ones taking our once-in-a-lifetime vacation in Cap Cana, Dominican Republic right now. We were supposed to fly home today, Friday. We first changed our flight to Thursday, then back to Friday with the plan to fly through Ft Lauderdale. Yesterday evening, all of our flights cancelled and we are now rescheduled to fly out of the Punta Cana airport on Sunday. So two more days here. Positive is two more days in the most beautiful place we’ve ever been! But negative is that we have to pay out of pocket and hopefully get reimbursed through the travel insurance we purchased. Thankfully the resort gave us a pretty nice discount since our flights were cancelled. So that helps. Other negative is that we aren’t home for Christmas Eve with my family. I’m really sad about that. But our kids are older (15 and 18) so we are all fine. We will arrive in Columbus Ohio late Sunday night and have to drive to WV. Hoping and praying the roads are good by then!!!

We changed our flight to Thursday, but that puts us getting into Columbus at midnight Friday morning. We had planned to drive, but we can just get a hotel room and wait until later on Friday to drive home. I’m just hoping we can get from Baltimore to Columbus on Thursday . What a mess. ☹️

We live about 2.5 hours away from Columbus. Our plan was to drive straight home, but if we can make it there, I seriously doubt that will happen!

I wonder if it would do us any good to try to leave Thursday? I will go talk to the front desk to see if there are any rooms open for Friday night. But gosh, will travel Saturday be any better? Even if there are rooms, since this is an all-inclusive and there are four of us, an extra night will be very expensive. I knew that flight delays would likely happen, but I just never dreamed of getting stuck here. Ugh!

So for anyone who travels a lot and/or watches the weather closely, what are your thoughts about my situation? Earlier in the thread I mentioned that my family is vacationing at an all-inclusive resort in Cap Cana and flying home on Friday. We are supposed to fly out of the Punta Cana airport at about 1:30pm EST to Baltimore. Then we fly from Baltimore to Columbus, OH at about 10pm EST. What are the chances that our flights will happen? Are we likely to get stuck in Punta Cana? I checked on the resorts website and it says no available rooms for Friday night. If I think we may actually get stuck here, I will go talk to someone in person. I didn’t really even realize the weather was going to be this bad until I saw this thread. Just enjoying my once-in-a-lifetime vacation. I knew with planning it right before Christmas we were taking a chance, but I had hoped the weather would cooperate!!

Oh my gosh…I wish we could! I can’t even imagine the cost to add days in over Christmas. But I guess we will see as we get closer.

My family is vacationing in the Dominican Republic right now! We are staying at an all-inclusive resort in Cap Cana. This is a first for my little family and we have been looking forward to this trip for ages. Of course, we fly back to Ohio on Friday (layover in Baltimore) and then have a 2.5 hour drive to WV. We are aware that we may not make it home for Christmas, but what a bummer that the weather is turning bad during our trip home!!! Also, it is crazy to be in such a beautiful place, in the pool and drinking a daiquiris, while hearing Christmas music. So strange!!!

Yes, it really is that expensive. My dd is in high school, but at a new studio where she is just taking classes this year (no company, no competition team). She will be in 3 recital dances in the spring and her 3 costumes cost over $400. I hear that the little one’s costumes are just about as much as the older girls. I think it’s absurd, for what it’s worth.

I also ordered from Crocs and got the same email today. I ordered some shoes for my dad for Christmas, but I also ordered myself some super-on-sale flip flops for the vacation I’m taking the week before Christmas. I really hope they show up before we leave!

Happy Salmon is a fun, party style game. A think a family would enjoy it too. https://a.co/d/9hK5tf7

Santa Baby for sure!! (I kinda like the chipmunks Christmas song)

First let me start by saying that I know absolutely nothing about sewing machines (sadly) but I’m hoping to learn. Now onto my question… Many years ago, my mom had a sewing machine that she used for basic things (nothing fancy). It broke several years ago and she just never got around to replacing it, although there were many times when she would tell me she wished she had one. My dad mentioned that a sewing machine may be a nice Christmas gift for her so I need help knowing what to buy. I know she doesn’t need too many bells and whistles, and nothing computerized. She is 75 years old and prefers to keep things simple. What am I looking for in a sewing machine for her? If you have a specific link, that would be great. Other than a sewing machine, what else do I need to buy that doesn’t come with it? I’m hoping that my after my mom gets the hang of using a sewing machine again, maybe she can show me. It seems like something fun for the two of us to do together.

My family has an Apple Music subscription and I like it fine. We do have to pay for it (maybe $15 a month?). Before the subscription was a thing, dh and dd were spending tons of money buying songs, so paying monthly is fine for us. It’s pretty easy to use.

Good point! I guess I’m so used to shopping for teenagers who do care…a lot!!! Thanks for the reminder!

Thank you all so much!!! And thanks for including links. It is so amazing how toys change in just a few years…I was clueless about the lol dolls. I am so excited to shop for this little one ☺️