uggggggg... I have totally been in those shoes. Quite sure that I was very possibly dying... but the mere thought of getting the phone, or talking/listening on the phone made me just decide to lay there and wait for the Grim Reaper rather than call someone for help. Sometimes my own thoughts rattling around inside my head made too much noise. I would take medicines that made me sleepy (rather than migraine meds) - and sleep it off as much as possible. That was the only way for things to be Quiet enough. Migraines themselves are truly horrendous - migraines with young children/babies in the house.... oh my gosh. :bored: Words fail me on what a nightmare those days were. I thank God every single day for the recent lifting of those migraines. I haven't had one (knock wood) in close to a year and I sometimes can't believe that they're gone. I hope they never come back, and I pray that my children never deal with them. Ever. I did have differing degrees of migraines. Some days, after a few hours, I was able to "function." It didn't feel good, but I could manage to slob around the house to do this-or-that. Answering email was a last resort (only if there was some correspondence that I REALLY needed to get to that day) - but I could do it. I could drive if we HAD to go somewhere. But, other days.... :ack2:

Oh how awkward that had to have been! I'm glad you all had fun anyway! :D Did anyone notify the non-show-uppers about the awkward situation they caused? Sometimes people just really aren't aware of what their not-showing-up causes.

:ohmy: Oh my gosh!!! I had no idea driver's ed was so pricey! My dad taught me in empty parking lots (and then side streets through neighborhoods, and so on...). Is this not done any more? :blink: My kids may never, ever get to drive! LOL!!

:iagree:

My girls (and I) are participating in nanowrimo this year. I haven't decided exactly how to schedule it in. I'm not leaning toward dropping any school subjects, but just adding it in to some random-free time. Hmmmm, guess I have 3-ish weeks to think on this... :)

eeeew. No. It'd be a bigtime no-go here.

DH has an email address, but he hardly ever looks at it. So, we always tell anyone that "If you need DH to respond to something in a timely manner - you'd better use MY email address!" lol He's just not a computer person. He checks his facebook account maybe every 2-3 weeks - once. Kids do not have an email address. There just hasn't been a reason for it yet. Their IRL friends - they can call on the phone, or talk to them the 2-3 times a week they see them. No need to type to them, lol. When they DO need an email account, they'll have their own. I don't want to wade through more stuff than I already am juggling in my email account. Now - *I* - have 3 or 4 active email accounts that I use regularly. They each have a purpose, and I don't want to merge the accounts. It helps me keep things sorted and organized. :)

Haven't read the other responses, but will say - without hesitation - buy the American Girl doll. It will make a world's worth of difference in the enjoyment your daughter is able to get out of the doll. No question. :D (we had one Target doll. The skin turned greenish. It was horrid...)

My dd works out at the gym. She had to take the safety class when she turned 12. They walked her through half the machines - and a week or two later, they walked her through the other half. She's dh's workout buddy, so they are there together. She'd not have any problems going through her routine by herself, though. She's got it down pat at this point. In future, she'll join in to some of the Zumba classes and other things that are offered as well. :)

I just made it worse too. I forced it into uploading into SAFE mode - and then read the very last few paragraphs at the bleeping computers site - where it talks about the dangers of doing just that. Now my computer won't start up at all. I. Give. Up. I've just made it worse. :( I sure hope the extended computer warranty will help me out with this. But, somehow, I doubt it. :confused1: What a nightmare!! That computer cost a fortune - right now I feel like someone just came into my house and stole it. That's how violating this feels. (And I wish it HAD'VE "just" been stolen - my insurance would cover that!!) Very unhappy at the moment. :( :glare:

Just an FYI, because it's looking like I am going to have to take my desktop in to the shop to get repaired.... The first time I ran malware, it found the 17 or so infected files. I quarantined them (or whatever it's called) and all was well. I uploaded a spybot program as well and it found 2 or 3 things that first time. Virus program (Avast) hasn't found anything since the first Trojan virus it found at the very beginning (it flagged a big, red TROJAN VIRUS warning a mere few seconds before the fake-virus protection thing started. Gee, thanks for the warning!! lol) Anyway - it was all running fine. Then, I appeared to have the Google Redirect virus. I have zero idea where or how this thing got on the computer. I ran Avast, Maleware, AND the spybot - and nothing. Nada. Zip. Even though I obviously HAVE the google redirect virus!! Plain as day! Started researching the google redirect virus - - - (not on google... since it's useless to me at the moment...) and about 3 days later - the same fake-spyware (as that original virus) popped up again. The malware that worked the first time isn't working now. I sit right by the computer, and the INSTANT it finishes the scan, the window locks up and I cannot click on anything. It says it's found 5 files, but... I can't lock them up! I also cannot start the computer IN Safe Mode. Only in regular mode. :glare: so - be careful. Just because it seems to be gone doesn't mean that it really IS gone... (or that you won't get it again!!) I have never dealt with something like this and thought I had the computer protected. I'd been told to not install Norton or McAffee and had been recommended Avast or AVG. It's soooo frustrating! Tomorrow I find out if the computer warranty we paid additional $ for will help me out with this issue. I have no idea...

I'm dealing with this one right now (or at least, a very similar one) for the SECOND time (on our other computer)!!! I'm pretty sure one of the kids clicked on it (clicking the "x" will also activate it - you have to ctrl-alt-delete and then shut it down from there... I can get malware to run, it finds the infections (5 this time - it was 17 the first time we had this issue!) - but the virus locks up the malware program before I get a chance to quarantine the infected files. Very frustrated. :glare:

:iagree: I'm currently reading, and really enjoying so far, Sword at Sunset by Rosemary Sutcliff.

Oh MY!! :lol: The Great Dane on the couch is the best thing I've seen all day!!!! How cute is he?!?! (or she??) What a gorgeous dog (and what an expression!)! ♥ Apollo & Athena are fantastic names for the new dogs - they are really cute (and quite the contrast to the Dane, lol!!)

My ds had trouble with the /th/ sound. He had a few other sound-issues, but the /th/ was the last one to go. We (the girls and/or I) practice with him about 2 or 3 minutes every day on the /th/ sound and he's been improving. He has to work at it, though, and think about it (often saying the /d/ sound, stopping, repeating the word with a much-efforted /th/ sound). He just lost his two front teeth (he is 7 now) and instantly he can say /th/. He called me moTHer for the first time last week and I nearly cried. I'd gotten attached to being "mudder"!!! :/ It'd been the one word I never corrected him on. ;) heh Anyway - we considered the speech therapy route when he was younger, but just decided to work with him ourselves and see what happened. So glad we did.

Here is my puppy-instead-of-a-baby. She's lovely (and over a year old now) and I haven't regretted the decision. (well, maybe once or twice. But it was the right decision for us...)

If Jamie isn't doing anything for you yet - I'd just happily put the book to the side and leave it unfinished. The ending of the book won't make you enjoy the book any more. :001_huh: And Jamie is less endearing in the following books, imesho. I fell in love with Claire, really. She fascinated me because I know, if *I* were the one sent back to that time period, I'd have been dead within a few minutes - just from sheer panic, lol! the first book is definitely the best, so if you're not loving it now, I'd just go on my way and read something else. I liked the first book (excepting the end) - and the 2nd book was okay - but after that, she sort of lost me. This last book I couldn't even get through the first quarter.

It took me a while to finish the book. I couldn't blow through them like I did with the first two - there was just too much.... It took me a while afterwards to mull the whole thing over. It's taken me now (a week after reading) to fall in love with it. I love that the series didn't take a Twilight/heartthrob vs heartthrob angle, which it so easily could have. And I love that the price of war was not idealized. Nothing was ideal. NoONE was ideal. There was REAL loss, a REAL price to be paid for choices made (unlike Twilight). It was ugly!!! It was horrible to read, sometimes, and I'm 99% sure that I wouldn't make it through a movie of it (!!! I can't do movies like this!!!) - but... it was "right." The fact that Katniss never became a major leader was realistic - she was what she was and that, in itself, was what it had to be -and the parameters within she had to work. The fact that the main male characters were deeply changed & affected by what they'd been put through was true. The understanding between Katniss and her mentor there at the end. The loss of Prim, the choice to not kill Snow... All of it was very raw, thought provoking, and brilliantly completed. I understood Gale more than any other character. :lol: It's left me wondering what, exactly, that says about me. :tongue_smilie: But, in the scene that Katniss realized she was broken and DONE with the war, the killing - and she looked up and saw, in Gale's face, that it had had the opposite effect on him ... well, at that point in the book, I could relate to Gale exactly and felt what he was feeling. And Peeta just broke my heart in this book. Wow.

:iagree:

We had one when I was a kid and he was AWESOME. Completely awesome - we'd leave records playing when we left the house with whistles and songs and Bo could sing, talk, whistle... He was super, super sweet & would cuddle right up in your arms... My advice? Buy one bird if she wants it to bond with her. Do not put a mirror in its cage (it will think the mirror reflection is another bird. Our current parakeet is in love with his "friend" in his cage.... lol) Spend a LOT of time with it. We bought parakeets for my girls and really underestimated the amount of time needed to really bond with a bird. Eventually, we put both girls' birds in the same cage and they bonded with one another. They were super sweet, though, and took good care of one another. :) I'd suggest buying a very young, hand-fed cockatiel. With all that said - my parents bought another cockatiel years after Bo had passed away. He was young, hand-fed, never-teased... and yet - MAN was he a mean bird! His name was Elmo and he bit every single one of us - hard! Mom & Dad eventually took him back to the breeder and they haven't bought another pet since then. :( Cockatiels are known for having their OWN personality.

We were told (by our local animal control) that if you find a dog you do the following: 1) Make an actual attempt to find the owner. They specifically said you could a) put an ad in the paper (found: Brown female dog: call to ID), post on their bulletin board (same text as above). 2) If, after 14 days, if the owner has not contacted you - then the dog is yours to do with as you wish - whether it's keeping the dog, or turning it over to the pound, or whatever. I would say, even if you technically "know" where the owners are, I would post a note at the local (to them) animal shelter and maybe even run ad in the local (to them) newspaper. Don't describe the dog in extreme detail - and let them call you. IF they do call you - make a big fuss over what a super sweet, sweet dog this is and how much your family has gotten attached to her. Make a note to mention that, if they ever want to rehome her that your family would be SO happy to take her in. Really gush and goo over the doggie. Mention that you found her somewhere near where they live, while you were visiting friends. This will do one of two things. Either they'll decide that, hey, they don't "need" the dog anyway and will give her to you OR they'll look at the dog with new appreciation and will take better care of her. IF they do NOT call you within 2 weeks - then she's yours to keep! (We have a stray who landed on our doorstep a couple of years ago. We were told the above from animal control - and posted/placed an ad and no one ever contacted us. Our dog had obviously been away from home for a while - he was a mess - and after the 14 days were up, we took him in officially as our own. It's been two years and we could not ask for a better blessing of a doggie! I do often wonder where he came from, though...) Oh - and contact your local animal control to see if the rules are the same as where you live. :-)

IIRC, I read that the sequel(s) weren't written immediately after the first book. I haven't checked that for myself, though... but whatever I read left me with the impression that the author intended to write one book and leave it with the open ending - but publisher/pressure/money caused the originally unplanned sequels to be written. I chose to not read the sequels. And, I choose to believe that he died at the end. That ending doesn't make me happy - but I really think it was "right" for the theme and hopelessness of the book, if that makes sense? - Leaving the others behind to hash everything out on their own... :Angel_anim: I hate books with open endings. Usually, if I know it's open-ended before I start to read, I won't even begin the book. I need closure! lol

We've bought the Science Jim classes - my girls "attended" the entire Physical Science/Olympics series. My oldest has also participated in one of the Harry Potter book discussions. Both were truly excellent. Science Jim is awesome. He has lesson plans, papers for the kids to read through after the class has ended AND you get a link afterwards to a recorded version of the class, so you can watch it again. My one complaint is that some of the other kids attending were being goofy and distracting in the "chat margin." Not rude or obscene or anything - but S.J. would ask a question and get dozens of goofy answers, so he (and the other kids reading) would have to sift through a lot of silliness to get to the actual questions. My girls' questions were sometimes overlooked because they would be sandwiched between 5 silly comments (ie. "I LIKE BASEBALL!!!!!!! I REALLYREALLY LIKE BASEBALL!!!!!!! DO YOU LIKE BASEBALL???") on either side of their question. Science Jim didn't want to turn off the "chat" function (because he was using it to get the kids to reply to his questions, and ask questions themselves) - but ... it was frustrating for everyone, I think. There were a couple of times when a kid would turn on their mic and start making goofy noises. SJ has his speakers turned off, and wouldn't realize it (he has the ability to mute people... whereas we couldn't figure out how to do it without muting SJ), so the sidebar would start filling up with "BE QUIET!!!! BE QUIEEEEETTTTT!!!" over and over and over again. I think CurrClick should require an "online ettiquette" class before anyone can enroll in one of their e-classes. ;) The Book Discussion seemed cool, but I didn't overhear any of it. My daughter wore a headset with a microphone. The instructor would "allow" only certain people to talk at a time to answer her questions. It seemed very organized and my daughter really enjoyed it. With all that said - while I thought the classes were pretty great overall - I don't plan to enroll in any other classes. I feel in a good place with the curriculum/schedule/plan we have and just don't feel the need to supplement with anything else for this year. Although the Writing Classes have tempted me.

Well - that probably accounts for some of my Xander non-love. I couldn't stand Chandler either. :D :iagree: He's been mean, tacky, rude, judgmental, petty, hypocritical... I just don't care for him one little iota. Zero redeeming qualities, imesho. Every time Cordelia says something reallyreally mean to him, I cheer a little bit inside. :lol:

We're somewhere in Season Three! I think it's been Dru-Free so far! :lol: I enjoy her drama, though... she's quite over-the-top! lol The character I've had enough of is Xander. But, I have a solid feeling that we have another 4.5 seasons of him to deal with. Ugggggggg.