What's the ideal age to give a child an AG Bitty Baby? My LO is 3 and while she likes baby dolls I don't know if we should get her a Bitty Baby this Christmas or wait another year. She seems pretty young for her age so I'm tempted to wait, but will she be too old at 4 and be ready for the twins instead? What about Bitty Twins? What age is best for those?

In my second paragraph, I didn't mean the the brand of the jeans or boots. Honest. :) It's more the times when she's running out the door and there's a hole in her shirt or a stain or it's pilling really badly. That's all I meant by "blending in". I don't want her to stick out because her shirt looks really worn or dirty. I have never asked her to dress/wear clothes because of brand. I've never asked her to wear particular clothes, only mentioned that she change if her shirt has a hole and we are going to her debate class. I would like her to take care of her jeans and not wear new jeans to paint whether they were $120 or $25 or $10. It's not about the monetary value so much as the value of something that is clean and new. She has 3 pairs of jeans that are worn out and have holes that would have been much more suitable for painting.

I don't think she's actually going into my closet, but rather taking clothes straight off the line or from the dryer. I never thought about it much before this thread but it's possible that she's grabbing whatever is clean and fits because she really doesn't care all that much. I thought she had intentionally chosen mine but I've been given a new perspective that I hadn't thought about.

You know, I never really looked at it all this way before. Thank you. Part of the issue is I do most of the laundry for our family together. I need to sort jeans together as some pairs have dyed shirts dark colours and I do sort blacks and whites. So we have started doing family laundry instead of divided by age group. All the kids help with laundry and maybe sometimes my clothes end up with hers. I guess she doesn't seem to care enough about what she wears because she does wear my clothes but perhaps she is not meaning to. It's just clean and there in her closet, so why not? Does this mean I need to do all the laundry myself? lol

Thanks everyone. I get what you are saying and I am realizing that yes, the clothes thing is my issue. The clothes was just an example because it was fresh on my mind today but it really is everything. She'll go feed the animals and leave the feed bucket out in field and it'll get kicked around and wrecked. Sure, it's only $15 or so but it all starts adding. She'll catch one of the horses to work on it then brush it and leave the brushes on the fence and they get ruined by the rain, she leaves lead ropes and they fall in the mud. I'll buy books for the family and she'll leave them around with the spine upwards in an "A" to hold her page.- and she only does this to the family books, not her prized ones. She shoves things in drawers and pages get bent. It's mostly little things but once you add them all up, it does get to be expensive and frustrating to me. The clothes, I will figure a way to deal with it and just not care what others think. Now that I think on it, I believe that part of the reason I care is because she has a hard time making friends. She admits this to me. A lot of the girls she meets go to PS (not many hs'd teen girls around here) and I'm also trying to help her fit in. I guess that can be seen as a way to change her? I don't mean to. And no, girls won't like her for what she is wearing (that's not what I mean). I'm just trying to get her to perhaps blend in a bit more? I know girls in PS notice this sort of thing. I'll work on myself and just let it go. We do work on aspects of making friends and I don't focus on clothes all that much although I guess it does sound like I do in this thread. And yes, I do see how it came across that way. Thanks for giving me perspective.

Perhaps... but I need her to care enough not to wear my stuff. lol

Yes. She does have executive function issues. I have set up systems with her (we worked together to set them up) but she rarely uses them. It's been a very difficult process. I don't want her to desire brand name things and I don't care for them for just the name. Other than the Hunter boots, I buy clothes at outlets and on sale (or thrift stores) and I choose the brand names because they are better quality. Guess jeans are nicer, thicker and fit better than a WalMart brand. But you are right. Maybe I care too much. When I think about it I am sensitive to this because we are a large family and I feel very judged for this. I don't want the kids to dress frumpy and incite more judgement. We live in an area where large families are not the norm.

She hates shopping and will not go. 😂 Trust me, it's problematic. She will raid my closet before heading to the mall or store. I can't explain it. She just doesn't care what she wears. I've had her show up to co-op with a shirt with holes in it. She's 15. I don't check her clothes as I have many other kids to inspect. She will wear the same shirt over and over and over again (she washes it) I actually had to start making sure she was wearing different clothes to co-op each time before people thought she only owned one shirt.

I'm kind of at my wits end here and hoping I can get some advice. My oldest daughter simply doesn't care about stuff. I don't know how else to describe it. She's not depressed, that's now what I mean. She simply does not take care of anything. I'll give a few examples but these are just the tip of the iceberg: 1. We buy her nice new runners. I tell her all the time to please don't leave them tied then wear them with her heels crushing the back of the shoe. She insists its "just for a few seconds" and keeps doing it. Over and over. Within a month the shoes are destroyed. The plastic has come out of the fabric and now cuts into her heels when she wears them properly and she needs new shoes. 2. She needs to help do some painting. I ask her to wear her ugliest clothes. She chooses a pair of new looking $120 Guess jeans stating that they are her worst jeans. They aren't but I thought that maybe the ones that I had in mind were either in the garbage or she had outgrown them. Plus I don't want to control what she wears. However, when I go to do her laundry in her pile I see the ugly jeans that I had in mind (2 pairs of them). She claims she "forgot" about her uglier ones and shrugs. Meanwhile, $120 of jeans are wrecked. We wear the same size and I could have had them if she didn't like them. 3. She needs a headset for her online classes. She is very careless with it, leaving it everywhere. During her classes she often curls the cord and bends it and even chews on it. The cord gets wrecked. It is the third set of headsets we have had to buy her for this reason in the past 2 years. I keep asking her to put them away (she has a hook especially set up for that reason. In fact, she has 2 hooks so she has choice of location) and to not chew on the cord. 4. I ask her to do some dishes. She goes and takes my nice Pampered Chef stoneware and covers them in dish soap. She knows not to use soap on the stoneware as we have had this discussion a lot of times. In fact, I don't even ask her to wash the stoneware and she could have simply washed the 8 other pots, pans and lids that have accumulated instead. 5. We got her an iPhone 2 years ago. I bought her a nice case to go with it (she chose the case). She broke the case. Get her another case she chose. She keeps taking the case off and on and off and on. Breaks that case. Buy her a third case and now she simply opts out of using a case at all. We keep telling her to use a case, but she says oh ya, I just took off the case, I'll put it back, but doesn't. Finally she cracks the screen. Doesn't phase her. I keep telling her to use the case. We take away the phone if she doesn't use the case. Nothing seems to get through to her. Finally she smashes the entire back of her phone- all the glass shatters. She feels remorseful about that but it's still usable so she's not really phased. Next, she smashes the entire front of the screen and we are left with no choice but to get her a new phone. Now we are back to the same battles about the case... 6. I bought her some nice Hunter boots. They fit me but I wanted her to have them. She loves them but while she has a pair of "farm rubber boots" she wears her nice Hunter boots to do all her farm chores. I ask her to please not do that as it will wreck the boots and she should save them to go out. She insists that it's not a problem and nothing is going to happen or "it was just to run hay to the goats". Within 2 months she managed to put huge holes in both boots and they are totalled. So now, she has to wear her ugly farm boots to go out (we visit other farms and other ag events) and she's not happy that they're ugly. She hates shopping. Often, she will ask me to go out and buy her clothes as I know what colour and styles she likes and she just hates shopping. While usually we are quite comfortable, finances have been really awful for us this past year. Very up and down, and more down than up. I've had to be very careful about spending so most of our purchases (clothes) have been from thrift stores. That said, I spend hours looking for the nice brand name clothes that are in new condition. While I think she appreciates this, she really doesn't care for brands or fashion at all. Thing is, we live in a world that does and she's in enough classes and activities with kids who *do* care that it is important to me that she dresses well. It isn't unheard of for us to get to an activity only to find that she's thrown on a shirt with holes in it (because it's her favorite and she's worn it so many times) or has a stain on the front. Now, I realize that we buy her things and that she should have control over what she does with them, but it is disheartening (and very expensive) to watch her destroy everything we buy for her. It takes money away from other kids who could use nice designer clothes or brand name shoes or toys or whatever. The above are just some examples. She just doesn't really care much to take care of things. She had an iPad that we bought her one year and then lost it. It bothered her for a bit and then she shrugged and claimed she didn't use it anyways. Things like that I would have preferred to pass on to a younger sibling rather than just lose. Would this bother anyone else as a mother? Do I just let it go and let her wreck things and do as she pleases? She's very sweet, polite, thoughtful and considerate. Everyone who meets her really likes her and says she's such a kind girl. She really is, but she can't seem to take care of stuff or care much about it. What do I do? I hope to delete this later. I don't want to complain about her on the internet but I don't know if this is my issue or hers. I'm sad at how much money we have spent on her on things that just get wrecked and broken but I love her enough to want her to have nice things. I don't know how to find a balance or if maybe I'm just out to lunch. I don't want to be an awful mother so I'm here asking for some advice. Please be kind. I'm at a loss here.

My oldest volunteered to go do some painting for a good cause. I told her several times that she needed to wear her worst clothes to go and do this. On the day of, I was shocked by which jeans she chose but since I don't really know what all she has (and what she has passed down to her younger sister) I let it go. I went to do her laundry today and discovered the jeans she wore were her $120 jeans. :( She has some really cheap, ugly jeans that she could have worn but today claims that she forgot about them. I know it's only money but money is really tight for us right now. I would have LOVED to have taken and worn the $120 jeans for myself (we fit the same size) rather than have her simply destroy them. Is there any way to save them? They were using outdoor paint from Home Depot and painting wood. There's not tons of paint on them but enough that they certainly don't look good. :(

I do strive for this. Most days I'm successful but not always. I have little kids who snack a lot so there always seems to be some food out.

And I don't want to be controlling! It makes me cringe when I see she's moved the laptop to the floor to make room for lunch or when the little kids trip over her cord for the 20th time. I can't afford to keep replacing things that she has broken. :) I have made suggestions for other locations that she can work but I think it's part of the age that makes her not want to work where I recommend. :)

We moved this earlier this year and while it wasn't much of a downsize in square footage our new space has a much different lay out. For one, our school area is much smaller and we now have a basement so our oldest has a room down there. It's a nice, newly renovated space. She needs a quiet space to work and do her online classes but I don't want her holed up in her room in the basement. The school area can get a bit loud with all the littles and since our master bedroom has a "sitting area" I turned that into a study spot for her. It has a huge window, a nice desk and shelving that I put in just for her and her laptop. I only use my bedroom to sleep so I'm rarely in there although the room itself is not completely "out of the way." At first dd used it a lot but lately she has completely stopped. Instead, she works at the dining table, at the kitchen island, on the couch with the laptop on her lap, etc. This is driving me nuts. For one, her laptop is a year old and the battery isn't great on it so she has to keep it plugged in. This means cords run across my kitchen floor (no plug in on island), cords across the dining room, cords across the living room. For one, I don't like the tripping hazard this creates. She often doesn't wipe the workspace down and results in the laptop Being placed on uncleaned surfaces- dried soup, crumbs, etc. I can't put food out with her at the dining table lest a little kid spill their drink (all the time!) and trying to get her to clear up for a meal results in her dumping her stuff in random places. Often she will leave the laptop on the floor in the corner of the dining room, which I don't like although she sees no problem with doing this. If she's in the living room she leaves her laptop on the couch or on the floor and this is unacceptable with little kids around. Plus I don't like how she's always carrying it around the house as she can be ... clumsy at times. She does have some processing issues and I'm finding that the past couple of years she's not very conscientious about stuff in general. She seems to lack an awareness on how to properly care for things- everything from her own clothes and laundry to her computer to her cell phone. I'm trying to teach her good study habits and I think having a space to work is part of this. I know she's 15 and wants some autonomy and say over things. Am I being unreasonable in wanting her to work at the desk I set up for her? She does sometimes use the table in the school room and that is totally great with me but IMO the other locations are not. She claimed she doesn't like my room because she likes to be where we are but I don't think it's reasonable to expect everyone to be quiet and I can't run any appliances in the kitchen because she's on a class. We need to get her a new computer and I'm now leaning towards an iMac vs a MacBook just to force her to stay in one place. Lol I'll admit that lately I'm exhausted so my annoyance might be stemming from that. Would you just let your teen work all over the house? Am I being unreasonable? What do you suggest?

My barn cat managed to get into the garage and sprayed all my kids' skates. :cursing: They stink to high heaven but there's 10 pairs of them and I can't afford to replace. He also got to their helmets and several (if not all) stink too. I need your best tried and true tips to get rid of the smell. It's on the inside of a lot of the skates and the laces. I'm going to soak the laces and wash them and I think they will be ok but I don't know how to deal with the skates themselves. Hope you can help me. I can't afford to replace all this.

That's what I wanted to do, but my mixer book is long gone. And when I google, there's too many choices for me.

I've googled and watched some YouTube but I'm overwhelmed by all the different recipes and choices. I'm looking for a simple, easy, fool proof and good tasting white loaf recipe as well as a whole wheat recipe that can be made in my KitchenAid mixer. Can someone point me in the right direction? Bonus if it's made with minimal ingredients- simple is key for me!! I've been making bread in a bread maker for over a decade by have never made a loaf without one. I made a few attempts in the past few weeks to make sourdough bread as someone was kind enough to give me some starter. However, all my attempts failed miserably despite following the directions on the recipes (tried a few different ones). Seasoned sourdough bakers, what's the trick to making sourdough? None of mine rose and were all about 1-1/2" thick. I did cut and eat it and the flavour was there, but I would love to end up with a normal loaf. lo I've since tossed the starter and will follow instructions on the internet to make my own and try again. I could use any and all tips as I really want to make sourdough loaves on a consistent basis.

We use ground walnut substrate. https://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/B000OQRGF2/ref=mp_s_a_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1474606595&sr=8-1&pi=SY200_QL40&keywords=reptile+ground+walnut+bedding&dpPl=1&dpID=51oON8FPiPL&ref=plSrch#productDescription_secondary_view_div_1474606607852 It cleans up nicely like kitty litter. If our beardie poops on it we just use a doggy bag and scoop it up and the smell and mess go away immediately. Easy peasy!

She mostly uses it for her online classes (WTMA) and school work. However, now that I've read your post I am reminded that LightRoom and Photoshop are also on my list of programs to purchase for her this year as she has a DSLR that she is starting to get very serious with. Thank you for reminding me about that. :) Does this make a difference as to whether we should go desktop vs. laptop? She could also use my iMac for Lightroom and Photoshop as everything doesn't need to be on "her" computer. Sadly, we are not in the market to consider the i7 at this time. Now I need to go wipe the drool off my face...

Oh man! I totally forgot about the Air! Now I have to decide between Air and Pro. *facepalm* What makes the Air a better choice over the Pro?

I need to get my daughter a new computer for school work. Shes currently using a Lenovo laptop, which has been pretty good considering the price we purchased it for but now that I have a few kids doing online classes we need something else. Nobody here is a fan of Windows so I am going to get a Mac, but I don't know which to get. For myself, I have a 27" iMac and the kids sometimes use that for their classes and school work. We all love it. However, for my daughter I don't know what to purchase and could use some advice. Money is an issue and I would like to spend as little as possible while getting the most bang for my buck. We are strongly considering a refurb. For the most part, she has a desk in a quiet room in the house but since she currently has a laptop she enjoys the flexibility of moving it to the dining table or into the school room to work if she feels like working somewhere else. For this reason, I feel that we should get a MacBook. However, there are some decent deals on the 21" iMac (refurbished) and I know how much we all love my iMac. ;) I am also considering getting a Mac Mini as they seem to be good value and we would just get an inexpensive, yet good monitor for it. She doesn't absolutely need the portability of a laptop (although yes, it is very nice at times) but because it's what she's used for the past year couple of years I don't know if it will be an easy adjustment to desktop. That said, her Lenovo laptop, while annoying equipped with Windows, does still function quite nicely and would be available for times when she simply doesn't want to stay in one room. How do I decide if we should get a MacBook, iMac or Mac Mini? I think perhaps over the course of the year we will get two (MacBook and something else) but I will start with one for now. Could you please share which you recommend and why? She does need to use (and we have one) an external CD/DVD drive if that makes a difference. I am very indecisive.

I will check out that calculator, thanks. I hang all of our laundry to dry and have for years. The only things that go in the dryer are towels (once per week) and baby clothes because they're too small and I hate crispy baby clothes. I also can't hack crispy towels. I've tried several tips to try and reduce the crispness of them, but finally decided that the cost of the dryer was worth the enjoyable towels. :)

Yes, we typically wear jeans and shirts more than once. Still, in a week I will do: 1 load towels (includes hand towels and dish cloths) 1 load baby laundry (sometimes more) 1 load of boy clothes 1 load of girl clothes 1 load of bedsheets (not the same sheets weekly, but rotation averages 1 load of sheets/blankets per week, plus I have bed wetters :( so sometimes it's a couple of sheets/blankets per week) 1 load of dh and my clothes, sometimes 2 depending on how I sort ( I wash whites and blacks separately but not weekly and jeans and other things, averages 1 load per week) ^^ again, those are with the large front loader that we had for years. I hang all my laundry and when I did a load in the front loader I would need to racks to hang. Now, I can fit an entire load on 3/4 of a rack so I know I am getting a whole lot less in. Lots of the kids clothes get really dirty from farm chores and running through mud and dirt. They also get dirty for riding horses and quads etc. I try to have outside clothes for them but still need to wash them as well.

Thanks everyone! I completely forgot to add that we had moved due to work relocation and we are renting as I don't know the area at all and was very hesitant to buy until I figured out where we want to be. I don't want to spend the money on an RO system as this isn't our house (and it sounds like they are pricey?) but I need a solution. It sounds like the Berkley takes out iron taste? I will look into that. I wasn't sure if it would or not.

We recently moved into a rental due to relocation for dh's job and not wanting to purchase in an area that we do not know. I wanted to be able to get a feel for the area and where we would like to be before committing to buy. This is our first time renting and I have to say it's odd. :) The house, while nice, has an old top loading machine. I don't care how it looks and it seems to get the clothes reasonably clean but I have two concerns: the electric costs to run the machine and the number of loads I need to run per day. We are on a well here so there are no water costs (but there are the electric costs to run the well). In our old front loading machine I typically did 1 load per day every day of the week. That machine, I would venture a guess can fit a good 1/3 more laundry in it, if not more. Here, I find that I am having to run 1 load per day with 2 every other day due to the smaller size of the top loader and not being able to stuff clothes in. I'm concerned that the costs of doing this many more loads in an inefficient machine are going to add up. I'm considering checking out Craigslist and purchasing an inexpensive front loading washer from someone who has recently upgraded theirs but a quick look shows that we would be spending about $300 or slightly more for a decent front loader, much higher if we want anything fancy. Since we only plan to be here a year (although I could take my machine with me and/or sell it at the time of move) does it make economical sense to change to a front loading machine or should I just suck it up and use the old top loader? I do like that this top loader can have a load done in 20min tops while the front loader took just over an hour. That part is nice, but I don't know the electricity cost difference between the two. Are the savings of the front loaders mostly in water (not as much a concern on a well) or electric costs as well? I'm trying to figure out how to leave as cheaply as possible so we can sack money away for a family vacation before we buy our new home next year. :)

We moved to a new place and it seems that the whole area has well water that is high in iron content. It's potable but the water tastes like pennies and nobody is finding it enjoyable to drink (we typically drink a lot of water). I've been currently been adding juice powder to hide the taste but I don't like having this much sugar in our diets but at the moment it's the only way I can get anyone drinking water. I am looking for a more long term and economical solution than purchasing bottled water (we are quite rural and due to family size would require a lot of bottled water). There is an iron filter in place in the house but the water taste is still bad. Are there other filters that I can purchase (countertop or for bottles) that will take away the iron taste? I forgot to add that this is a rental while we get a feel for the new area and look for a home to buy next summer so I don't want to do anything permanent to the house as it would be lost money on my part.