I never bought any of my girls an EBO and it still comes up. Buy her the EBO. :tongue_smilie:

http://allrecipes.com/recipe/refried-beans-without-the-refry/ This is a very flavorful recipe.

Quill, I am not sure what you decided about the applesauce, but this post made me think of you. :001_smile: http://moneysavingmom.com/2013/11/chunky-cinnamon-applesauce.html

We have the bat cave and my son loved it till he outgrew it, but now we get it out when we have little kids come to visit and it is always played with.

We are known for a "King size chocolate bar." We give a card with a gift card to Game Stop or Target depending on the interests of the birthday child and the chocolate bar. Sometimes I will change it up and buy a gift if I know what the child would like, but I always include the chocolate bar. I figure it gives the child something to enjoy now and a chance to buy something they really want.

http://www.bhibooks.net/catalog/item/4154895/4488099.htm

Stuffed cabbage rolls, mashed potatoes, corn

Aleks?

My husband had this same problem about 12 years ago. He had several choking episodes (very scary) and even had his esophagus/stomach scoped. They determined it was acid reflux causing the spasms. He started taking Prilosec and hasn't had an episode since. HTH, Joy

I haven't read the whole thread yet. I just thought I would share that when I was reading this the first time, I read this as marijuana and went off on a whole tangent in my mind for about 5 seconds until I read it properly.

How loose the jelly is not a safety issue. If you processed and sealed your jars properly, then they will be safe to eat. Whether it is jelly or syrup? That is the question. :) I personally don't mind if it is a looser set. I think it spreads easier. Joy

Where would I find the Great Courses baking lectures?

Thanks for your kind words. :001_smile: Joy

I have not read all the replies, but I have had experience with this situation. My brother had a long term affair and then left his wife. He was an even bigger *ss because my sister-in-law had helped us nurse my Mom while my Mom was dying of cancer. My Mom died in November. In December he moves to a different state because of job situation, but they are still very much together as far as everyone in the family believes including my sil. In March, my sil's Mom dies after an extended illness. In May, my brother sneaks home while he believes my sil is out of town and tries to move his stuff out. It all hits the fan. Turns out my brother had been having an affair the whole time my Mom was sick and the new woman was already living with him. My sil is the one who called all of us to tell what my brother had done. It was hard to call to get. I think brother or sil should be the one to tell the parents, because is it their relationship. We all loved my sil. We had really bonded with her while my Mom was ill. She was a great support to us. I felt my brother treated my sil abominably, but I have already lost both my parents and a brother in the last 10 years. I had to make a decision to salvage the relationship with my brother over my sister-in-law because he is a great brother to me and in the end, my sil had plenty of support from her own family. I did tell my brother that I thought he had acted horribly. I told him he was an *ss, among other things and I have a cautious relationship with his girlfriend. She seems like a nice person and we are all cordial to her at family gatherings, but it is still very hard to deal with. Joy

This has not been my experience with SWR. I used it with my then 8yods and 9yodd. We started it after having used several different phonics programs the previous 4 years. My 9dd could not read. She was still at the sounding out cat and saying bus stage after 4 years of phonics. We had done Adventures in Phonics, Phonics Pathways, and one other I can't recall the name of. After using SWR for 3 years, she was reading at grade level. I am not sure she would have ever learned to read without using a program like SWR. I have recommended SWR to at least 3 others in similar situations who have finally found reading success using SWR. I think with only one child you could easily do SWR in 45 minutes with your dd. You might be able to set it up where you only have to be directly involved every other day if you bought the CD's with the word lists on them, so she could quiz independently. IMO, Dancing Bears is probably way too remedial for your dd's needs. The benefit of SWR is that you could tailor it her needs with the diagnostic spelling tests that come in the Wise Guide. A diagnostic test would tell you exactly what list to start at so your dd would challenged immediately. Another way to bring up fluency that I always recommend is team reading where you read high interest material together taking turns reading every other paragraph or page. HTH, Joy

It gets cold here too and I do it year round on my back porch. I set it on a chair right outside my door. That way I don't have to go far. :001_smile: I love my nutimill too and I don't think it produces a huge amount of dust either. I can't see it and I don't notice that it settles anywhere, but I do have a daughter who has really bad seasonal allergies and it never fails that grinding wheat in the house will trigger a sneezing fit for her, so it makes her happier when I do it outside..

I also have a nutrimill. I have started grinding my wheat on the deck to eliminate the dust in the house. Joy

I love Aldi. I do not buy meat there, though. I don't know why, it just doesn't look appealing to me. I do buy most of our other groceries there. I just wanted to mention that Aldi does have a "double your money back guarantee", so it gives you an opportunity to try things out. HTH, Joy

I have a cricut expression which is similar and I love it. I use it for decorative purposes like vinyl wall lettering, school posters, and scrapbooking. I have had my cricut for several years. If I was going to buy another machine, it would probably be the cameo because you don't have to buy cartridges. HTH, Joy

Someone once suggested to me that kids should be assigned a job long term so they could learn to do it properly. I also like that there is no chart to be made or any question of who does what. These are how the kitchen duties are at our house, 17dd does dishes, 14dd unloads dishwasher, cleans off counters, 13ds puts food away, cleans dishes off table and wipes off table, 10ds sets table. They all know their jobs and what the standards are. Sometimes I have to remind them, but there is not discussion because they know the expectations. My adult daughter who lives at home does the dishes on the weekend, so my 17dd gets a break. I just assign things like sweeping/mopping kitchen, cleaning appliances, etc when I see they need done. Also, if I see random dishes piling up in the sink or if for some reason there are a lot of dishes, I will just tell one of the other kids to help with dishes. On a normal night, we use the above procedure and it works for us.

An average student shouldn't have to do both 8/7 and 1/2. With the older edition, it was recommended to skip 8/7. With the most recent edition, you should do 8/7 and skip 1/2. If you have a struggling student who doesn't do very well with 8/7, then you should do 1/2.

One of the best things I ever did for fluency was back and forth reading aloud. They read a paragraph, I read a paragraph. I would pick a high interest book that was slightly below reading level. This way they get to enjoy the story, but not have the pressure of reading it all by themselves. Most books have repeated words too, so a lot times they have the added benefit of hearing you read a name or word before they come to it. Another thing I did for fluency that really worked was to pick a passage and set a goal and time them every day reading the same passage out loud until they met the goal. I used passages from the dibels website. They are already leveled and if I remember right, they have words per minute marked on them. The 6th edition benchmarks and oral reading passages are available for free. You have to register. https://dibels.uoregon.edu/ These are used for assessments, but that is not how I used them. We would set a wpm goal based on age and read them every day until they met that goal. You could really use any material, but I found these helpful. HTH, Joy

We have 2 locks and a TV. We have always had 2 locks since our oldest was about 3. :crying: Joy

I liked season 16, 17, and 20. They all had teams that I really liked and teams that I really didn't like. :lol: Where are you finding the older seasons. I didn't start watching until about season 16 and I would like to go back and watch the older seasons. Joy

I have the Yesterday's Classics version. It is not hardcover, but it is a very a nicely formatted paperback. Joy