HUGE :grouphug: He sounds like a looney toon. I would hope a judge's first question would be "Well, sir, since you are SO concerned....where WERE you for those ten years?" People can be such idiots, using a child to try to hurt an ex.

Ideally, I'd shoot for "Yes Ma'am." If they've done something egregious, then an "I'm sorry." would also be in line with what I'm hoping to hear. I DON'T like arguing over whether or not they are in the right, sarcasm, eye rolling, sulking/seething, refusing to make eye contact, the ever popular teen expression "Whatever" (or, if you are my niece apparently it's "WhatEV", because you're far too cool to even finish a word), or something worse like flipping the bird or cursing. None of that is tolerated here.

Hmmm. So the weather wasn't ton cold for swimming even in late November? Wow. Even the pool was a bit too chilly in late March. Of course, I like my pool and ocean water to be like bath water lol We love to swim in the ocean, and hardly use the pool if we are at the beach, so I guess I should be asking if the water is super rough then. I didn't even think of that.

I want to take my kids to Gulf Shores this fall. I'm looking at October, we will probably need a break by then LOL I'm thinking the two best weeks for us would either be the first week of October or the week of the 22-26. When would you go? We always went in late June and it was soooo crowded. We went a couple of years ago in late march and it was so much less crowded and more pleasant BUT the water was icy. I'm wondering if the later date is pushing it too far far comfortable water. I want to experience the beach in the fall, but I'm wondering if that's too far into the fall. Should I pick the first week of October or will it be crowded with PS students in fall break?

Happy Birthday! Hope it's a great day :)

I'm glad I wasn't drinking anything :lol: :iagree:It is amazing what people think it's okay to expect of children. Sit at a desk for hours on end, filling in blanks? Sure. Take away PE as punishment to a child who is hyperactive (and force him to spend ANOTHER 30 min sitting in a desk, filling out papers)? Sure. This child is having a hard time in reading or math and really needs to go back a level, but is on target for everything else.... drop him back a level in that one subject? No. Add 80 problems of homework, because him not understanding the concept is just not having "practiced" enough? Sure... I took hours out for a variety of reasons. Social (too much administrative tolerance of bad behavior in their peers), academic (they each had areas that needed remediation, the older two also had areas they excelled in and could have been more challenged), and health (all the sick kids, contagious disease, and scary food choices - my youngest had severe migraines several times a week for 3 years, within a month of being home we were seeing them abate. He's had 2 mild ones in the six months he's been home. Such a blessing!)

I think I understand what FairProspects is saying, and it isn't JUST about the dinner hour. We use evenings as our family time. DH works all day, we eat supper when he gets home and then often have family time with games or a movie and popcorn. If we are doing something every night at 5:00 or later that means we have to lose the family time. For us, that is unacceptable. I really think too many people give up private time with their spouse and children for all these activities. I see so many kids now that are closer to their friends than their own parents... I want to move to an area that has a higher concentration of homeschoolers. I'm hoping that there will be some class type things offered to a homeschool group during daytime hours, leaving our evenings free. I know that on one Y website, they do a homeschool group thing that meets at maybe 11 am and did things like karate. I WISH we could get to a place that has something like that. ETA: I hope that doesn't come across as inflammatory to someone who DOES participate in evening sports/classes. I don't mean it that way. I'm just frustrated and saddened that I don't have other options in my area (and that when someone asks why we don't do x,y, or z and I point out that doing that would cut into our time as a family, they look at me like I sprouted a second head.)

I wish. You'd think out of my three, someone would be a back rubber. Sadly, that is not the case :( I often beg/cajole/barter my oldest to massage a kink in my back, he would be a really good masseuse, but doesn't like to do it. The younger ones will brush my hair, though :)

OP, it's been my (unprofessional) opinion that they often reduce meds to school/work days only because of the appetite decrease seen in children. At least that was one of the things I found parents most concerned about when I dealt with the meds dispensing in public school, and it would worry me, too. I also had an adult friend who tried Ritalin. She said it was wonderful for her concentration BUT she couldn't take it more than 2 days in a row before she became hateful and mean. She said after two days, she would start looking for reasons to snap at people. That is not her, at all! She finally quit taking it altogether for that reason. ETA - I agree with MomatHWTK, she probably notices the difference. It may just be the lesser of two evils for her. It would stink to be in that situation.

I'd spend the summer looking at other music teachers. If you don't find one you want to try, you can always re-up with her in the fall. Honestly, I know mistakes happen, but that is kind of a BIG one. I mean, I don't teach music, but unless I got an email saying "We can't make that date/time", I would have contacted you to see if you knew what was going on. Didn't she have at least one rehearsal prior to the recital? I would think that she'd have gotten a clue then that you weren't in the loop. I don't think not hearing back from you can be taken as you declining to be in the recital.

If so, do you find it worth the cost? How old are your children and what do you typically use from the site? I keep finding links to it in searches for worksheet/lapbook type things, but can't see the full size (or even reduced size) image to see if it's something I'd actually want to use. For $20 a year, I'm tempted to try it out.....but I also know how "it's only $20!!" can end up costing me hundreds when I think everything is "only $20" :tongue_smilie:

You know what? That just stinks. How is it okay for these predators to move into neighborhoods with family, notice or not? How is it fair for normal, law abiding families to have to re-arrange their lives, live in fear, and restrict their children from otherwise safe activities so that these creeps can get a second chance at being a decent human being? I think we ought to steralize them and ship them all off to a sex offender colony, let them enjoy each others company and keep them out of our hair. :glare:

What a wonderful post, it makes my Monday a little easier to handle! It sounds like she will soon be conducting plenty of business, and thriving at it!

You know, I haven't figure out why it's funny when it happens to other people, but makes me see red LOL That may have actually saved my children's lives today. I got up at 7:30 (which means I gave up on ever sleeping restfully after being up at 3, 5, and 6, beforehand!) and watched an episode of Grimm and had breakfast. I do find that trying to go straight from the bed to the, erm, boisterousness of children is NOT a good idea for me! Hmm, that is food for thought. We do a lot of things on the weekend. This weekend they did a Lowe's workshop with DH, bowled, and, yesterday, we went to a museum. We try to do stuff like that so DH (or their grandad, if we are at home) can participate as they enjoy having them along. However, we could do "fun" school stuff on Mondays I guess. We usually do a 4 day week, with a fun break in the middle, but maybe we should try swapping it around....

I swear, Mondays are going to drive me insane. I briefly thought of not doing any school on Mondays, but that just makes Tuesday the "new Monday" . We had a full, busy, fun weekend. Everyone had some down time and relaxed. You'd think they'd be ready to start fresh today, but no. I did a read aloud during breakfast, which DS8 managed to interrupt twice for silly things :glare:, then moved on to lessons. LIGHT lessons, for the boys, I might add, as it was all review. ODS had reducing fractions to simplest form down pat last week, it was to be a brief run through of a review from earlier this year. We had one (easy) page left from last week, so I asked him to do it today. It took for.ev.er. He kept dawdling and piddling, he told me he was "working it in his head", but it looked to me like he was poking the pencil through his toes. Twice, when I asked what problem he was on, I got a blank stare and "huh?" which makes me think he was NOT thinking about a math problem.... And DD, dear, sweet DD... apparently has some sort of anxiety that causes her to freak out the minute she doesn't know an answer instantly. Forget thinking it through or working it on scratch paper, no go straight to the meltdown :tongue_smilie: Just when I think she has the times tables down, we try to USE mulitplication as part of a problem (vs just saying a x b = _____) and she can't remember the times tables anymore. Converstion from this morning about perfect squares, we had already gone over perfect squares AND 64 was one of the EXAMPLES given as well as being one of the questions on the page: Me: So, why is 64 a perfect square? DD: *thinks for 3.5 seconds* I don't (waaah) knoooooooowwwww Me: Okay, a perfect square is a number times itself. What number, times itself, has an answer of 64? DD: GAAAAAH! I don't know, don't know, don't know Me: Well, okay. One of the numbers is EIGHT. A perfect square is a number times itself. If one of the numbers is eight, what must the other number be? DD: :blink: um...I don't know...3? Me: :001_huh: And THAT is my MOST mathy child. *sigh* YDS has zero interest in doing school today. All he has talked about is what the temp is outside, whether it will rain, when will neighbors be outside, are we going to go get stuff for a trip to the beach this weekend, etc.. We will, if previous weeks are an indication, be back in the swing of things tomorrow. I just don't know what to do about Mondays? Invest in bulk loads of wine just try to survive them? I could school them 7 days a week, I guess, but I think we'd all burn out in about 2 weeks. They all require such hand holding that I can't imagine doing it EVERY DAY. Frankly, I need the break. I wish I could clean the kitchen while they do math, but it seems like if I get one situated then another one immediately has a problem. So it feels like all I do, all day, is cook a meal, do school, clean the kitchen up, cook another meal, clean it up,do some school, do laundry.... Adding in all the "I forgots" and fits on Mondays makes me want to fall over and cry. Maybe we could budget for an in home tutor on Monday so that someone else could be the heavy. Then I can step in on Tuesday, when their brains work again.