Our kids are so spread out that we only had two as teens at a time, we only have one left and she is 17, but when she turns twenty we will have been parents of teens for 21 years.

In the case of a day care they will probably run a back ground check and find out anyway. I'd put in on my resume and talk to the person about the actual experience. I would make sure the new employer knew that you DID give a resignation and worked for longer than it was supposed to be for. My own oldest child is a preschool teacher at fancy high end preschool/ daycare places and they are ALWAYS understaffed. ALWAYS. The employer had no business trying to hold you hostage like that. It was unprofessional and lacking any personal boundaries.

My sister and I loved Days. We were devoted! We watched Another World for a long time too, but it got super silly when Rachel got preggo at the age of like, 79, lol.

Wellll, being frugal is harder as children get older. IME it is easier to bring in extra income than be frugal once your kids get to middle school age.

I was thinking of you and am glad you updated. You are still in my prayers. Take care of yourself!

I once catered an outdoor wedding where right before the ring bearer and then the bride walked down the aisle they unrolled something just to keep her dress nice and the flower girl sprinkled flower petals on it and they rolled it up once the bride was back down the aisle. It wasn't awkward. I think the young men who did the unrolling probably practiced a few times at the rehearsal dinner. Also, if you are having it catered see what they will do in terms of decorating, then you don't have to bring things. When I catered wedding we brought lots of extra decorations all the time at no cost to the guest. Most caterers probably have a similar "prop closet".

I actually have slipped back into frugality pretty easily. We do still go to movies (a big extravagance, but I only have one kid at home) and out to eat once in a while, but otherwise since starting the business and putting everything back in my habits from college days really picked back up. But then, I was never wildly extravagant with the six figure income we had for many years. Even when we had it I made sure dh's student loans were paid off, and we only ever had two new cars. We did buy all new furniture twice, for two different houses, and travel a good deal when we had the higher income, and I wouldn't take either of those things back. I can be happy with little.

When I was pregnant with ds and for the first ten months of his life we lived in a 749 square foot two bedroom apartment. Our oldest was 6/7. The thing that SAVED us was the good sized balcony that overlooked a lovely creek. Whenever it got tight we could go out there. Our neighbors had a big couch and tarp over theirs and it was another room. The front window looked right into a tree (we were on the second floor) and so it was super private for an apartment. It was enough space four our family. The kitchen was a perfect galley kitchen, not big at all, the smallest apartment kitchen I have ever seen, even the Worldmark kitchens are bigger when we stay at Worldmark. The dining area was big enough for a table of four and dh's computer desk. He did a lot of programming at that desk. The bedroom dh and I had was big enough for a queen bed and a crib and changing table. The queen bed was a captain bed that had all our clothes stored in drawers underneath, so we didn't need a dresser, I'm sure that helped. So... our family of four lived very comfortably in 749 square feet for almost two years, and that was with a baby and constant house guests and an elementary school child who had lots of friends over. I could see just dh and I living in around 600 sf with the proper design. The design is CRUCIAL. I have lived much bigger places that were not as comfortable as that particular design.

This makes me so mad at the system I can't even say.

I am an educator, even though I have not home schooled for four years. I loved being a home school mom and I was good with it. My dd now attends what may very well be the best school in the state based on test scores. Only one elite private school did better than her school did year before last. I am not like the teachers she has at her public school. I could have been, with the right training and energy and patience to deal with bureaucracy. I might have liked to in another life. So, I don't consider myself a teacher, but education is important to me.

Okay... I don't know about that... I've owned three and they do not let got of anything once they get a hold of it. I never really thought their jaws were stronger than other dogs. I think their brains are smaller and unable to reason when they have a hold on something, lol.

None of those things will cause a pitt to let go of something they have a hold of. Wasp spray maybe... but once a pitt has a hold on something they don't ever let go and their jaws are like iron.

This is a hard one. Some men who are not super masculine do have this problem. It may always be a hard problem for him, but it IS his problem to solve, because the situation does go beyond your dd, even according to him.

That is the beauty of Facebook. I have moved, not that much, but enough, and others have moved and without it my past as a married woman would be a black hole, because I would never keep up with people snail mail.

All of my kids have thanked me for being strict. My oldest was very unhappy with my parenting, but at 23 she told me she was very glad for the way I parented her. She also admitted it was a super good thing she was home schooled during her middle school years. Previously she had been really unhappy over missing the joy that is junior high. After doing junior high ministry with her church she realized at the age of 24 that she was not cut out for junior high and would have been miserable every minute.

I will admit to that it's easiest to make salad when you have prepped veggies... which we do.

YES!!!! Our family has been on a salad only diet for a long time because the restaurant is using so many leaves of romaine for burgers and sandwiches that we are swimming in salad mix made from the inner parts, lol.

Just a funny story about dd's school's FES... The student is from Thailand and didn't like any of the food his host family served. They let him cook his own food... But... Wait for it.... Their rice cooker broke.... Living in the North State it took time to get a new one and until then he didn't eat... because no one in their family could imagine cooking rice on the stove. Yep.... No idea that rice could be cooked without a rice cooker.

I thank you for the explanation... I still don't see how its an arm's length relationship, but in another world I suppose things are very different.

I'm not trying to be a jerk... but... if a healthcare entity is funded by tax dollars... how is is not part of the government?

I had a weekly Bible study with a woman from the UK. Her mother suffered a LOT from people in charge of her care. Any hospital funded by taxes IS the government. I understand your reaction, but I disagree with it. I have a lot of mixed emotions about this case for many personal reasons that I already stated on the political group and this one. I went to grade school and middle school and half of high school with someone that LOTS of people know on this board who had weird medical stuff and had a lot of kids who need over the top medical care. This person never should have had one kid, given his own bad health. It was irresponsible. But this person belongs to a "religion" that thinks you need lots of kids. So he had a bunch. Now they all need lots of complicated medical care. I don't begrudge him the money, although it's in the $$$$$$$$$. But, dude, you were never healthy to begin with, why did you have so many kids who might have been the sole responsibility of your spouse????? It was truly reckless. I may be outed, lol. But, this issue is complicated. Once the child is here, that child deserves everything a parent can do. A parent that doesn't fight for their kid... that isn't me. I have not only fought for my kids, but I have stood down for my kids. Standing down is the harder parenting skill, but you don't have it until you have been through everything. These poor people haven't been parents long enough to know standing down is SKILL!

That would make my blood boil.

I agree with most of your post, except that I do think the right thing to do is let the child die at home in his parents arms if that's what they want. I have thought a lot about this case even before we discussed it a bit on the political social group. I have had a friend who every physician said was about to die at any moment who responded very well to experimental medicine. It is a good thing she and he husband got the experimental treatment. The end of her life was full of love and activity rather than just dying right away. Also, medical advances were made because she took a risk. Everyone with liver cancer benefits from my friend's risk. The other thing is I have another friend whose dd with Down's was wanted for a certain study and my friend almost lost custody of her to the hospital. The doctor doing the study waited until my friend's child's primary care physician was in Hatie for six weeks on a mission trip and then told my friend (a single parent) that if he didn't participate in the study he would just take custody of the child and deny my friend any visitation for the rest of the child's life. Sooo, I think that was cruel and the child in question suffered A LOT, and was even disqualified from the study later so no medical advances were made that I can see. Just a cruel doctor who thought they had something to gain manipulated a single parent and caused a child a lot of pain. There are going to be very rare cases where a parent is not going to be able to make a good decision and the courts must step in. This may be one of those cases. But the real trouble is that no matter how much media attention this has been given, it is hard to know all the ins and outs.

I think lots of people look better or worse. Lots of people are incapable of posting anything other than their real life and it is really sad to read their fights with their spouses, their kid's unplanned pregnancies, their white power carp. It is heartbreaking. Some people are great at marketing their lifestyle. Particularly those who want to sell you direct marketed items. I do know those people don't have the life the pretend on FB, but I think lots of people don't know that. The same people who think posting about the mean name their spouse just called them do not have the savvy to see through those people who are only posing about how well their new diet product works.

Speaking of NPD, my poor 17yo dd just had a customer at the restaurant tell her, "I was going to tip you, but you were so rude, with such a terrible attitude, that I'm just leaving now." My poor dd can't figure out what went wrong. DD was upset, "I was soooo nice and I gave her free ranch for her fries???" But calmed down a little. I told her the woman was older and possibly early onset Alzheimers, which due to our elderly clients is on dd's radar. Once in a while we have someone who is surprised that the food they ordered is there, lol. The NPD witch who said this probably didn't know it was the end of dd's shift and that she didn't ruin her day completely. Or that dd is getting immune to bad people. DD is calm now. Sometimes I wish people with their mean issues knew just how much others really know how to hold their own.