The phrase an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure comes to mind. I am the opposite of a hypochondriac. Seriously, if left to my own devices I would have basically never sought medical advice and I never, ever stayed home from work. Then I married my husband who showed me that staying in bed when he was sick for a day or two usually meant he was sick for a day or two vs. a week for me. And going to the doctor early on with an infection meant that he got antibiotics and got better and whereas the sinus infection that I mistook for allergies and then shrugged off thinking it would heal itself spread all the way to my eye and I risked permanent damage, on top of being miserable for weeks. Now, I am much healthier thanks to his better example.

Totally agree. I do believe also that cheap can be expensive. I would rather buy high quality shoes on sale infrequently than buy cheap shoes more often. Also, my feet will just like me more if my shoes are comfortable and painful shoes are just not worth the few bucks saved. We do have hobbies but we do them frugally...my husband plays guitar and piano, I work out and do roller derby. Yes, that means we bought a piano and skates but we download sheet music for free or get it from the library and I get the value punch card for skating and work out outside of a gym :D

Costco has packs of the 3m ones often. We need them and they do come off. I will have to try the super glue trick. :001_smile:

Used, modest car. One car for the family. Both husband and I commute with bus or bike unless I need the car for work, in which case my work pays mileage and parking costs. Small wardrobe with quality but not upscale pieces. Keeping things for a long time. The shirt I am wearing right now is 10 years old. Using up, making do, doing without. Cheap entertainment options...dollar theatre, netflix instead of cable, library instead of always buying books. Eating well but not out a lot. Making meals with less or no meat. Cooking from scratch. Fixing things before replacing them (this is not always easy because our companies no longer readily produce and sell replacement parts, but I digress) Buying most things used, only buying new when used is not available. We do not have smart phones...everyone we know in our income bracket does but I just do not see the point, and this is after trying one briefly (that I got from my brother).

They say table it, I move to table this, etc in Congress. They have for many generations. I have never heard anyone say "I move to lay this on the table" ever. And I know Robert's very well, having served as a party officer as an adult and being a political nut since childhood (mock congress, model UN etc).

More than will fit into a minivan with both mom and dad. So families of more than 7-8 people (5-6 kids) seems like a lot/big to me. In my city more than 3 is pretty uncommon though. I would perhaps like to have 3 or 4 but fertility issues pretty much limit us to two until we are in a house that would be considered large enough for adoption in our state.

I think this is an example of learned optimism. Good way to put a positive on a negative. That said, no. I have never heard of it before this thread as being a good luck sign.

It most certainly does. And shelve something means something way different than table. When you table something, you are coming back to it later most often. The connotation with shelving something is that you are done with it, it is being forgotten at least for the foreseeable future. It is "off the table".:001_smile:

Business jargon grates on me. Like "I don't have bandwidth" used instead of "I do not have time for this project.". You are not an internet connection.

Yes. Sometimes overexposure can trigger the new reactions. I unintentionally gave myself an allergy to soy when as a low income, busy, college student and new vegetarian because I ate way too much tofu scrambles. For weeks on end, that was pretty much the core of my diet. I could get tofu for like a dollar a container and scramble it with veggies and I ate that a couple times a day. Before long I was allergic to soy. That was more than 10 years ago.

My mother loved Christmas mugs. She had a lot of them. When she died, we counted more than 20 for a single woman, often they were gifts. We kept nearly everything from her apartment in boxes in our garage for nearly 2 years before I had the ability to sort and get rid of stuff. I finally got rid of most of those mugs, but I kept one for each kid. :001_smile:

I agree with you. My brother is African American with Caucasian parents (we have the same biological mother and our mom married and our dad (my bio dad, his adoptive) adopted him and they had two more kids) and it takes a lot to raise a child to deal with the racism that exists in the culture. Not being able to handle that does not mean that the potential parent is racist but racism overall is the reason why it is still an issue. And it is proof of how much we are still dealing with racism in this country. It is very very upsetting.

There are not as many legally free for adoption infants and young toddlers as you might think. Domestic adoptions can also be fraught with what happens when the mom or the dad changes their mind in a certain time frame. I have friends who worked with 4 pregnant moms, at great cost financially and emotionally. The first three moms changed their minds and kept the baby. That is totally an acceptable choice but imagine going through that as the hopeful adoptive mom and a dad. Later, when they tried to adopt a second child who was already legally free, it was very, very hard as well. I have other friends that foster and adopt and they raised a son from birth, the boy was reunited with him mom at age 1 and then the mom's recovery fell apart and the foster parents got the son back and legally adopted him...after he had spent almost a year being physically and sexually abused by the mom's boyfriend. :crying: I can see why they never want to go through that again as parents. Also, some people feel drawn to adopt for a particular country either because if their heritage or just a feeling. Finally, sadly race still plays a factor. I have a friend who is an adoption coordinator for African American infants specifically and many parents won't sign up for it. She has couples from Canada and England and Germany in some cases adopting from her all infants program.

We are comfortable. This is despite my husband choosing to work part time and despite me choosing a career with at least a 50% lower pay level than my similarly educated and talented peers because I went non-profit instead of into business or law with my economics and math education. Why are we doing well? ALL of the above reasons you list except for genetics. We have good educations, we were both raised in backgrounds that valued learning, we have been blessed with very good health and no exceptionally large medical expenses, we work hard, we live in a city with a strong job market in our fields, we have been lucky many times, we received a cushion of funds from my husband's deceased dad when he died and for other, I especially benefited from various non-profit and government programs- scholarships, student grants, low cost housing for my formerly homeless family when I was a child, unemployment benefits when I was briefly unemployed in 2007 due to no fault of my own etc. Finally, my husband has always worked for companies that offered spectacular medical benefits. I do not think that we are comfortable because we want to be or because we work harder than others. This is not because I am entitled or made all the right choices, it is a convergence of choices and circumstances that have worked out in our favor. I have not always made the right choice and I have many flaws. I know others who have done many of the same things etc and worked as hard, perhaps harder, but did not get as far because their industries declined, they had health issues or a very ill child, they did just not have things go their way despite doing all the "right" things. My life might NE very different had I not happen to fall in love with a man from a well off family or had I been diagnosed with MS, like a dear friend of mine. There is no idea that is more repugnant to me than that people will suceed if only they tried harder or wanted it bad enough. This prosperity gospel stuff that is circulating in some churches now is frankly total theological bunk. My mother was a brilliant woman, far more talented and smart than me IMO and she had a far different adult life and when she died she had been on disability (which was about $500 a month before most of it went to rent, utilities and luxuries like laundry soap and toilet paper, not some imaginary grand amount that folks think those on assistance are recieving) and living in section 8 housing for years. She was an amazing woman who gave much of herself despite her disabilities. She had a 6th grade education but conversed as easily with the mayor as with a homeless guy sitting on the sidewalk. We would all be lucky to be 1/2 as kind and warm as she was. I get sick of people blaming folks like my mom for circumstances far beyond their control, especially when they may know of poor people but they so often don't actually REALLY know and respect a single very low income person.

Too funny. I guess if you are going to eat it, it might be best to not read Charlotte's Web this year.:001_smile: I would totally keep it and raise it for meat rather than sell it now. A great lesson in food. Here is a local farm with cost information. http://ebeyfarm.blogspot.com/2010/08/how-much-does-it-cost-to-raise-pig-july.html

My son plays in the yard, goes to do stuff with one of us, goes to the park, across the street, reads books, plays with legos and other toys, works on his own projects, ties flies for fishing, practices casting in the backyard, has his screen time if he wants it, reads to his brother, works on scout stuff, calls his friends, emails his friends or helps around the house. One night a week he cooks dinner and that takes up much of the late afternoon that one day because he is very slow. He reads a lot on his own. At least a couple of hours a day, sometimes more. And even though he normally finds plenty to do, sometimes he will claim boredom. Pretty typical for kids. I point him outside if he says that when it is nice and towards his room, full of books and toys, if he says it when the weather is bad. Or play chess or a game with him. Sometimes bored just means "I need a little attention".

I recently bought three things here on WTM and all went well. I do see a lot of posts here offering items for sale in violation of the paypal rules...sending it fee free by sending it as a personal payment and not for goods and services. I don't see thwt so much on other boards. I am willing to do that as a buyer for a few dollars of items but I did not and would not respond to any listings for more than about $10-20 that made that demand. There were at least 5 listings I passed on because of that. In such a case the buyer has NO recourse and even if insurance is bought, the post office is rarely helpful with filing a claim and the person who can file the claim is the seller so then I would be relying on a seller that wanted me to forgo any payment protection to help me with the claim? Does not seem like a promising calculation to me. As a seller, I would always take care of DC and insurance if I considered the price to be worth my time and energy to try and sell at all (otherwise, I would just donate locally).

Potatoes were still pretty cheap the last time I bought them here but I am in a big potato producing state. Food in general is getting very high.

Feeling like a person, regardless of economic means, is not waging war despite the frequent charge of class warfare directed at anyone who has the audacity to suggest that people sometimes need a helping hand and some safety net, made of many things, public and private, is in everyone's best interest.

You are reading what you want to see in my posts, not what is there. I do not think that government is the solution. I do not think charity is the solution. If either was alone, there would be no problem. I think the issue is much more complex than that. We can not afford to pat ourselves on the back (and I have been so guilty of this) for doing a little here and there to help people. We can not afford to think that government spending alone or in copious amounts is a silver bullet. Clearly, clearly not. I was a homeless child. I know poverty personally. I am a middle class adult. I have poured my career into working for social change and not charity. I am the last person to ever think that poor people only need external forces to "save" "them". However, economic policies and government priorities do impact the quality of life and the viability of life for many. Charity only gives about 10% of what goes to keep people from being that much closer to more and more extreme levels of poverty. On an individual level, few hate the poor. But as a group, many people behave in ways that has at best disregard for poor people and worse, often carries hate. Seriously, I have seen up close and personal how so many people slip into forgetting that the visibly poor are as human or as important as they consider themselves.

I have decided that my brain clicks off when dog training or animal training is likened to raising children. It's like those people who discuss their "kids" and then you realize they have been talking about their pets to you for hours or weeks on end. It just ain't the same, sorry.

Point of fact, that is not what I said. I implied that this sort of anti-poor people stuff spouted off routinely by the Heritage Foundation is not in line with the Christian values that many of their leadership and supporters hold. It may salve our guilt to reassure ourselves that the poor in the US have it better than the poor in many other countries, but it does not exonerate us for turning our backs on them. There is nothing moral or Christian about excusing indifference. How do I know people are indifferent? Because so many people are poor. And rather than see that poverty for what it is, we actively work to find ways and write reports to blame poor people and minimize their very real suffering. It is disgusting to me but not the least bit surprising. This hatred of poor people takes many forms, from the same sorry reports, to ignoring people on the street, all the way to middle class thugs beating up and murdering homeless people for sport. Eating out of a trash can, sleeping in an alley and having people spit on you, laugh at you and sometimes even hit you for your very existence sounds pretty darn third world to me. :glare:

$100 a week for 45 hours of care is $2.22 per hour. If it is really not much additional work, that could be a win-win for each of you but you are doing her a very, very nice favor. I would try not to minimize the disruption of an additional child in your home. Caring for a child, even when you already have children around is still work and hard work at that. Childcare is expensive. $800 a month is really quite cheap in my area for that much childcare IMO. Even if a provider has a number of kids, by the time you factor in costs and such, childcare is certainly not a high margin business. To put it in perspective, housecleaners usually earn $12-25 per hour depending in the area and their experience. That is $2340-$4875 per month gross (before supplies, insurance etc). I am always amazed at how much less people expect childcare for. In the grand scheme of things, I would say that my childcare provider is working with much more important tasks.

:lol:

I realized after I posted that you had already posted the exact same link. :blushing: Reading after a long day at work. :001_smile: ETA: a smarter lady than me pointed out that you are the person behind goyb parenting. All I can say is THANK YOU, your site has seriously helped me and my husband and thus our whole family. I reccomend goyb to so many people I know IRL. I volunteer to lead a couple of parenting support groups per year or so and I mention your stuff all of the time.