Thank you! I have been wanting to find something in Chinese.

Since you mentioned Veganomicon- the lentil soup recipe and the chickpea cutlet recipe are good.

We just dealt with a situation like this last week. An item showed up on my daughters card that we had never checked out from a library we have never been to. It was an item that she never would have checked out, the librarians at my own library laughed because they know what my kid checks out and this wasn't it. After phone calls and talking with librarians at several branches I ended up just paying for the item. Apparently if we claim that we never checked out the item, refuse to pay and let it go to collections she could keep her library card for now, but if it ever happens again they will not let her have a card anymore... plus if we let it go to collections there are additional fees and they put a hold on her card so she can't check anything else out. The same thing happened on my card a year ago and I was able to find the item (again something I never would have checked out) on the library shelf. I should have documented that somehow. The librarians at my own library know me well and believe my story, but can't do anything to help me because the library is in a different county. Of course the librarians at the other branch say it's impossible for this to happen. They say there is no system in place for me to even claim that we didn't check out the item. We had the option of putting on the library record that we 'claim to have returned' the item but there is no option to claim we never checked out the item in the first place. We are heavy library users and I don't mind making a library donation, but this is ridiculous. I wish you luck, SKL!

I split wood with a giant hydraulic splitter, but with an ax? No thanks!

My peppers were incredible this year too! The plants were at least twice the size my plants typically get and I used the same seed to start them. I've been stuffing my kids with peppers :)

The one thing that seems to be the most important in keeping my family healthy is making sure we all get plenty of sleep.

Never did any partying/ clubbing not my thing. Hanging out with my friends at those ages was more likely to be hiking or watching a movie :)

I have three close friends. One is my sister, one is the wife of a family friend who I went to elementary school with, the other is the wife of a man I went to high school with. Their wives and my husband were all from out of state and we all go to the same church now. I'm glad my childhood friends married really awesome women :)

I buy them from Amazon.

I think it's perfectly acceptable. It wasn't your child or parent. I've been in the situation of having to make dozens of phone calls during a family crisis ( near death and extended hospitalization of my infant niece). Certain people got all upset with me because they thought I should have called them before I called other people. And because a few times I sent email updates instead of phone updates. I was seriously offended to find out this was being talked about behind my back on the phone and Internet. I would have been the one that had to notify people if she had died since my sister and mom would not have been able to do it. If I could have emailed or facebooked people I absolutely would have. Phone calls are so much more emotionally draining when you have to repeat things over and over and answer the same questions and listen to the grief of the person you are calling when you are already a mess. Everyone needs to show extra compassion and grace to each other in a crisis. I think you should give your family members the benefit of the doubt, they are probably doing the best they can.

What an annoying situation! I'm sorry. I would feel 100% comfortable leaving my kids in the car in the situation you described.

Do you have a juicer? They make delicious juice- 1 huge cucumber, 1 apple, and half a lemon. Yummy with crushed ice :)

I've been in the position of having to call multiple family members repeatedly during an extended critical illness of a family member (my infant niece). It was unbelievably stressful and draining for me to have to keep calling so many people when I was grieving and trying to physically/emotionally support my sister and parents at the hospital. I'm an introvert and already hate phone calls on my good days. If the baby had died I don't think I could have made those phone calls for a long time, and I know for certain my sister and mom couldn't have done it. If I could have texted people I would have. And I would have been really angry to find out that people in the extended family were upset with me for not calling.

We can do 100 books per card. We are only allowed 10 holds per card though so I use 3 cards to get all the books we need. Our library is tiny but part of a huge cooperative so we can get almost anything we want through the holds system.

I would love this too. Anyone?