augh, the whole this frustrating. I have some things to think about at least. The boys don't have an under the bed. They have a triple bunk bed, and the bottom 'bunk' is the mattress right on the floor. We have a playroom upstairs, and that's where all their toys and games are, so I'm not up there all the time to monitor what they have out. But I'm thinking about buying some new storage or having dh build something, to get ready for school b/c there is a lot of wasted space up there. It makes it hard too b/c the 3 and 5 yo play with the lego/playmobil, and so it isn't always the 8 yo's fault that it's a mess or the organizing gets messed up. I do like the shallow bin idea for the legos. I'm thinking about having dh build some shelving or cubbies, so maybe we could slide under the bed bins into that or something.....

HOW do you do this??????? I'm about ready to throw them all away!!!! For the legos they are basically in a couple of bins. But then the boys dump it all out to find the pieces they want. and then the pieces stay all over the playroom floor. Sigh. For playmobil, I went and got bins and sorted them all to pieces. Guys went in one labeled bin, weapons and stuff in another, big castle pieces all went in one bin, miscellaneous in another bin. The big bin with the castle/building pieces always gets dumped out, b/c they say it hurts their hands to dig through the bins to find what they want. So then they get stuff out from all the different bins, play with it, and then when they put it away, they dont' want to spend an hour sorting as they put it away :tongue_smilie: so they just throw it all in big bins to put it away. Then next time they want to play, they have to dump it all out to find what they want, b/c it hurts their hands to dig through the bins. I have no idea what the answer is or how to store it all. We have a lot of playmobil - mostly castle/pirate stuff, and a bunch of legos, some regular and some star wars, but they mix it all together. So at the end of the day, there are legos and playmobils all over the floor, half of them set up, and half of them just remnants from being dumped out. And then everyone is overwhelmed when it comes to cleaning up, and I don't blame them. I don't know how to organize it so they can find what they need to play, and yet clean up in a reasonable time.

ooh cool. We're doing church history this year too and I'm so excited about it!

I remember reading a book when I was a kid and I loved the book, and now I have no idea what it was called. I think it was an older book, and I don't think it was a terribly long book. I don't even know if it had chapters. The main character was a Chinese boy, and his family had moved to America - I think maybe Massachusetts or somewhere on the east coast. And he would always go down to the docks to watch the ships coming and going, and I think there was bamboo involved...like he planted some at his house, or something. :confused::confused: That's all I can remember, so it's hard to search for a book with that vague of a description, lol. Does this ring any bells for anyone?

oh that is so going on my christmas list!! that is awesome! I don't need it for the public - I just need it for my kids to see!!!

woo-hoo! we should have a full league soon! if anyone else wants to join we could take 2 more people :001_smile::001_smile:

We only need 2 more people and we'll have a full league for some Well-Trained Fantasy Football! Send me your email addy and I'll get you an invite. It will be a lot of fun!

So, 100 ppl out of 300 million in 49 years? I can't do the math :D but I'm safely guessing that's like .0000000000000000001 % of the population, right? If we didn't swim in warm, inland lakes, there wouldn't be nearly as much swimming in MI in the summer! You have a higher chance of dying of anything else!

I'm in 54, so no. I only check maybe 3 or 4 of them with any regularity.

:iagree: I did this to my mom a couple of years ago. She was having her third wedding in about 3 years (with a broken engagement in there too!) She had serious issues that she refused to deal with, and was getting married in a hurry again and was just spiraling downward. She was having a huge wedding and wanted our kids to be in it and everything and I had to sit down and tell her that we couldn't support the wedding, didn't agree with her getting married, and told her my concerns, etc...and she had a fit that we weren't letting the kids be in the wedding, and we said that actually none of us would be there. If everyone in a person's life is just standing idly by, disagreeing with and worrying about their life decisions, but no one ever says anything, and everyone shows up to support them every single time, why would that person ever think they are doing something wrong or needed help? No one was saying anything to my mom, and everyone was going to the wedding to support her. Support her in what? ruining her life even more? We were the only people who were willing to tell her to slow down think about her life decisions. What's the point of 'speak now or forever hold your peace' if it really doesn't mean anything? If everyone just shows up to a wedding so they won't be cut out of someone's life? And really, if a bride or groom can't handle a friend/relative strongly disagreeing with their decision and making a stand on something, and have to cut them out of their life because of that decision, then the relationship really isn't that strong anyway. It seems kind of selfish to decide that your decisions should be automatically supported by everyone, no matter what.

I finally joined after seeing a thread about this awhile ago and I luuuuuv it! It's so cool. I got overwhelmed by following people - just because a person has a couple boards I like doesn't mean I'll like all of their boards. So I usually just follow boards and not people. I'm here

this looked so cool, and we couldn't fit it in when we were on vacation. I was bummed. That was what we were going to do the same day of the Mariner's Museum actually. I forgot about that one.

I think so. The Merrimac (monitor? I get them confused) exhibit was soooo cool. I don't even really care for ships and I thought it was a neat museum. I would do other stuff while I was down there if I was driving 3 hours for it tho.

I love this thread! I didn't realize there was a term for it..I've never heard of 'decision theology'. Love that. I don't want my kids asking Jesus into their hearts either and people usually look at me a little crazy when I say that. In addition to all the other reasons mentioned, Jesus says, count the cost. I just don't think a 6 yo can really do that. I think they can be taught and discipled without having to 'make a decision' so that when they are older, they know what they're getting into and what it means to really follow Jesus.

oh nice. I got mine about a month ago, and wavered over buying it then or waiting...glad I got it then! I don't have an opinion, because I can't stand e-readers :D

We only need 2 more people!!!

every time I see a new post on here, I get excited, and then it's just a bump :tongue_smilie: You know you want to join people! It's so much fun, and if you're married, all the other husbands are jealous because yours has one who likes to talk football with him! That's a fun reason to join, right? It's ok if you know nothing about football or fantasy, and want to learn and have some fun. My first year I didn't know what a quarterback did :lol::lol::lol:

ooh what book did you get? I read Why Gender Matters when my ds was 2, and it was amazing. I haven't read a whole lot of gender stuff since, but I should, since I bet I've drifted towards a more girl style with him over the years.

haha, thanks, I wasn't. I always called it double-sided.

I don't have a Mac and I don't know what auto-duplex means :tongue_smilie: but I have a laser printer and it's amazing. I have this Canon one. I would love a color laser printer but they're so expensive. This one is a copier/scanner too, which I use a lot. I buy toner online, so it's really cheap. A laser printer is soooo cost effective. I don't know why anyone would buy a bw inkjet printer.

woot woot, got another one! Now we only need 3 more people, but can take up to 5 more!

allllllllllllllll the time! At least 2 or 3 times a week. I loved the library. I would stay upstairs in the kid section forever, and my dad would stay downstairs in the adult section forever, and then I'd come find him when I was ready to leave. I still remember wandering the adult aisles, fascinated with all the books I'd get to read someday. I still remember finding a huge biography of Lucille Ball and wanting to check it out someday. I wish I could take my kids to that library just to show them it, but it's kind of run down and in a bad part of town, so I'm kind of scared too :tongue_smilie: But we have an excellent library here and I love it...we're there once a week. Sometimes twice, if I run up at night and I'll take a kid or two with me. I've never seen any kids older than preschoolers at the library, now that you mention it.....that's kind of sad.

I just taught my 10 to wash pots and pans, and her and the 8 yo do the dishes. We don't have a dishwasher either. You're not being unreasonable. Stick to your guns! If there's too many for him, there's too many for you. Why does he think you should have to do the work instead of him? That's what's unfair! ;)

ha that was great! I wish I could be funny like that.

This is my tentative schedule. If we don't get everything done, we'll have to go into June, but I really want to just go Labor Day - Memorial Day. We're doing 4 day weeks, but they're going to be sort of long days to get everything in, so we'll see if it works or not. I have one week off at Thanksgiving, 3 weeks and Christmas, and 1 week for spring break - scheduled whenever the weather is nice. So that leaves 33 weeks. My goal is to fit it all in there, but we'll see. On paper I can do it :D