Wow, that's a tough call. I don't have any advice, but :grouphug:.

We sell Schleich toys, so I can definitely say they are good quality. My DD's have some Schleich horses that are great!

Oriental Trading....they have some great stuff!

Leapster 2 can be hooked up to the computer to track progress. The body is also a bit more sleek looking. Other than that, there are really no differences. DD5 has the regular Leapster. They can all play the same games. I think some of the games go up to about 7 or 8 years old. I think that DD5 is at the perfect age for it right now. edited to add.....the games have the age range printed on the front of them.

Hopefully not into your sinuses! When one of my nostrils is completely blocked, I cannot use the neti pot (it also says not to on the box). Usually, if I try it, it will start going down the back of my throat though.

Our faves are Carnival Games, Smarty Pants, Disney's Think Fast, and Mario Kart. Super Mario Wii is on my Christmas list!

That's awesome! I wish I would have waited to order all the Christmas gifts from there that I ordered last month. I spent over $25 but not over $150. Would have been perfect!

I got our family a Wii as a family gift a few years ago. How about something like zoo membership passes? Or check Ticketmaster for something neat that's coming to town shortly after Christmas that your family will enjoy and get tickets for that (a sporting event, concert, live stage show, circus, musical, etc). Or how about a ping pong, air hockey, or foosball table. My parents have a ping pong table and it is lots of fun. Or a ladder ball set. Or get together gift cards for a family fun day outing and wrap it up.....maybe movie tickets, boxed candy to go with them, dinner gift cards, mini golf gift cards, arcade tokens, etc.

My 5 year old DD has taken over my Olympus waterproof/shockproof camera. I guess that if she has to take over one of my cameras, this is the one it should be LOL. We take this to the beach/pool and shoot underwater photos. And it can be dropped from 6 feet up and is supposed to be shockproof. Yes, this feature got accidently tested LOL....it works. So she can drop this camera in water and drop it onto the concrete and it should still be in working order. So far so good! It may be more than you want to pay though.....but it is well worth it. Here's the one I have: http://www.amazon.com/Olympus-Stylus-Tough-6000-Waterproof-Blue/dp/B001P06Q20 . But I think there are previous models for cheaper, especailly if you check eBay.

Aww! Whippets are adorable!! As for advice on adjusting, I'd just make sure I gave her a couple of days to "settle in." You know, just give her some space and let her get used to her new place. Nothing too overwhelming. No kids being overbearing. No taking her other places.....just let her "be" for a bit. Our dog's name is Chase, so I'm kind of partial to that (this was before I started hearing of little boys being named Chase). I like the name you mentioned, Indy.

:iagree: with everything she said. Personally, I do not feel that married women should be close friends with men other than their husbands. It just opens too many doors for possible feelings to emerge.

$5 animals at Buildabear.com. However, their site must not be made to handle this sort of traffic because it keeps crashing and I cannot even get the things in my cart. :glare:

We do four school days (Mon, Tues, Thurs, Fri) and then our homeschool group on Wednesdays. The homeschool group runs for 4 hours each Wednesday and includes fitness time, game time (physical education type games), science time, music time, art time, book club time, lunch, show and tell, and recess.

DD5 cannot entertain herself to save her life. Sometimes she wanders around the house like she's lost, saying she has nothing to do. She'll follow my every step. (Just about drives me bonkers LOL). She's been this way since she was a toddler. DD2 is a completely different story. She can sit and play all by herself with her little people for hours on end. She needs no one else. She loves for her sister to play with her, but it is not necessity.

Oh my gosh....I do not even have any words. I feel so bad for those poor children. The mother is setting them up for life long health problems.

I love that song! But, of course, it makes me sad too.

Totally mindless entertainment, but I just LOVE the movie Elf!

Thanks so much for this!! I just got off the phone with the number you posted and got a 12 pack of retractable colored Sharpies, and a 5 pack of fine point colored Sharpies for $1.05! It's being delivered to my closest store on Tuesday! Wooo hooo!!!

I always use photobucket when selling on craigslist.

My 5 year old is getting an iTouch, and I knew that my 2.5 year old would want one too if she saw big sissy with one. They are best friends and want everything the other has. She is quite mature for 2.5 and thinks she is really 5 years old. :D I thought about having them share one, but it is really hard for two people to watch that little screen. We do a lot of waiting on my 5 year old.....speech therapy, soccer practice, dance class, and we'll probably be adding therapy for her possible OCD sometime soon.....she will love to be able to watch Diego, play some learning games, and look through our family photos and home videos that I'm putting on there. I'm not purchasing a lot of actual toys this year (because they just do not get played with a lot....only certain ones do) so I'm buying only things that will be used a lot. Neither of them will have full reign of their iTouch....I will keep it and monitor it. We limit screen time around here so this will be part of that limit.

Yep, I absolutely LOVE Black Friday! I woke up at 3 AM, out the door by 3:30 to pick up my mom and sister, and we pulled into WalMart at 3:45. We ran in there real quick, but the tickets for the $200 laptop were already gone (my mom wanted this). We didn't want anything else there so we headed across the street to Target. I got everything I wanted there: the $40 little flip video camera for my youngest sister, the Hello Kitty gumball machine for my little cousins, and two Target gift cards for my cousins. My mom scored one of the $15 Leapster game for my DD and got the $30 George Foreman grill for me and DH (she told me not to look under her jacket....I told her I wasn't stupid LOL since I put it on my list and I knew it was a Target). K-Mart was next where I found my DD the Diego shoes for $9 that I was looking for. And I also got the rope lights we needed for camping for only $7 each. I also picked up a lighted Rudolph for half price to put in our house (my girls adore it!). Then we headed to Game Stop, where my mom scored a pre-owned Nintendo DS for $59 for my sister's boyfriend. And I got him a gift card for Game Stop. Movie Stop was a success where I found my girls some movies for cheap. Then we hit the mall. I got the girls some clothes at JC Penny for really cheap. I picked up some towels too. And I found DH some nice shirts for Christmas. My sister's boyfriend found some Crocs for half price at Dicks. Then I ran in Aeropostale for a gift card for one of my other cousins. At Books A Million I found a stocking gift for youngest DD, some wooden magnetic animals. And I found a good deal on two protective covers for the iTouch's that my girls are getting for Christmas. Buy one get one half off. At Michael's I grabbed some of the art sets for $2.74 and some notebooks for all of the little cousins on DH's side of the family. I also grabbed a $5 scrapbook for my mom. JoAnne had some great craft kits on sale that I snagged for a few more cousins and a few for my DD's. Whew!! We were gone from 3:30 AM till about 2:30 PM. It was fun!!

I absolutely love this! I've been meaning to post it on my facebook page.

Most (if not all) of the games for the younger set (each game has an age range on it) can be set for different skill levels.....even for non readers. My DD is 5 years old and cannot read yet. She has the following games: Dora the Explorer, Diego Animal Rescue, Disney Princesses, Up, Mr Pencil's Learn to Draw and Write, Pet Pals, and Creature Create. She can play all of these just fine. Her absolute favorite is Pet Pals though. After that, she probably plays the Dora and Diego ones the most. For Christmas she is getting the new Amusement Park game from my parents.

We have lots of traditions we do throughout the month of December, but I'll just talk about Christmas Eve and Christmas Day. My ideal Christmas usually happens (with a change this year). On Christmas Eve we (me, DH, kids, my parents, my sisters) attend the early (5 PM) candlelight Christmas Eve service at our church. From there, we all head over to my grandparents house. We've been doing this ever since I was a little kid. We eat dinner with my grandparents, aunt, uncle, and cousins. Then we all gather around the Christmas tree to exchange gifts with each other. We eat dessert, then head home. Once at home (just DH, the kids, and I), we open stocking gifts. Santa does not fill the stockings, we do. And we open them on Christmas Eve (been doing this since I was born). Then we head the kids off to bed. Afterwards, DH and I open up the fireplace (to look like Santa left it open), set out the unwrapped gifts from Santa (and put together anything that needs to be), eat the cake (no cookies for Santa, he gets a piece of Jesus's birthday cake), and drink the milk. Then it is off to bed for us. The next morning we get up early! That's part of the fun of Christmas for me....getting up before the sun. My parents and sisters come over to our house at the crack of dawn (they just live around the corner). We turn on the Christmas tree lights and turn on the Christmas music. We wake the kids (if they are not already awake) and they wander into the living room and discover what Santa left for them. Then we all exchange gifts with each other. Usually somewhere in here, we eat a special breakfast of casserole and donuts. Here's where the change comes in. We usually rush to get the kids away from their toys so we can get ready and leave to go eat with family. Not this year! We want to enjoy Christmas a bit more and hang around the house. So the family is coming to us this year. But I do not have to worry about a lot of cooking or anything because we all contribute. We get together with family for a 1 o'clock Christmas dinner. We fellowship for a while. That night, our little family has a birthday party for Jesus, complete with cake and decorations! The kids get a "Jesus" gift to open.....usually a Christian book or video or toy. We sing Happy Birthday to Jesus, eat the cake we made for him, and tell two versions of the Christmas story. First, we'll read the Christmas story from the Bible in Luke. Second, we'll read a children's book about the Christmas story. Then, we all write on a piece of paper something that we want to do for Jesus in the coming year. We each tape our papers to our own helium filled balloons (purchased from the dollar tree the day before). We all walk outside and release our balloons into the sky as a symbol of sending them up to Jesus. I love our Christmas traditions!!

I'd go with a used DS from somewhere like Game Stop.