We had lightening bugs last night in our yard in WI. The boys had fun chasing and catching them. :) Oooh! Lawrence! I love Appleton. I have three cousins who went there and one cousin at Grinnell. :) The Milwaukee Art Museum is not to be missed if you're interested in that sort of thing. It was designed by Santiago Calatrava and is stunning. The scenery on the drive from Beloit to Lawrence outside of the cities is very picturesque. I absolutely love WI when I drive around our beautiful state.

:iagree: or try http://www.farese.com/rbcd/usa.htm :)

Woo-hoo! Congratulations to your family! :party:

Reformed Baptist here. We are covenantal not dispensational.

That's fantastic! Congratulations! :)

I'd hire him. :)

Gosh, I'm so :crying: that I couldn't be there. It sounds like it was amazing. Dh and I definitely want to go to the next one of these.

Ha! I should have read all the posts before posting. :tongue_smilie: Glad it was resolved. :)

:iagree: I have boys and would not allow allow them at 7 to change *alone* in the men's dressing room. Until they were old enough to change alone, they just came through the side door of the pool and I brought them home. I can't imagine letting a 7 year old boy into the women's dressing room where other girls and adult women are changing! Eek!

We let our kids play video games, but I would have been upset about the PG-13 movie for any of my boys. Wow, Transformers for a five year old? Really?!?!

I would start with Ancients and use it as a read aloud with your youngest. You might find this article helpful: Starting in the Middle: Beginning Classical Education with an Older Child (Or Anytime After First Grade)

I had GD with my last pregnancy. It isn't something to ignore. Have you met with an endocrinologist or nutritionist? I'm sorry, but your numbers are high. I would get a second opinion to your midwife.

Do you think it's really worth it? Do you know if any of your customers have really ever checked your company out on the BBB? By the way....we are in WI too. On Wisconsin! When it comes down to it, yes, it is worth being a member in our particular industry because we're a small newer company. (We've been in business for 6 years.) People are afraid of being scammed in the construction industry. Unfortunately, there are a ton of unethical contractors out there. We don't get business *from* the BBB. For us, it is one small thing customers can check and feel that they are safe (or safer than x company). Yes, we know customers occasionally check us out there ... we get an e-mail every time someone checks out our record. How safe people *really* are because of BBB affiliation is up for debate based on all the negative articles I've read about the BBB ... but customers *feel* safe and that I guess is the point for us. It's such a down industry right now and anything we can do to influence someone to pick our company over x, y, or z company is worth it. We were also members of NARI (an industry organization). We dropped that membership this year because we felt it wasn't something customers cared about. I don't know what your husband's business is, but the place that's helped us the most is Angie's List. You can't pay to be on there, and we get a large percentage of our referrals that turn into contracts from there.

We tried doing a timeline in first grade with our oldest (a current rising 6th grader). It was helpful for me, but not so much for him at that age. I had him do one this past year (5th grade- Ancients) and it worked out really well. Personally, my advice is to wait for the logic stage for timeline work. We did, too. :tongue_smilie:

We are. As a construction business, we are often asked whether we are members of x, y, and z organizations ... due to all the "helpful" articles for consumers on avoiding construction scams. :lol: BBB is definitely one that customers ask us about.

I would not use VP Ancients with a 1st grader. It is a difficult program even with a second grader in my opinion. We LOVE Story of the World Ancients with the Activity guide for 1st grade. It was so much fun! The goal for us at that age (and through 4th grade) is simple exposure especially to the stories/myths/images from each culture.

Congratulations!!! What a wonderful update. I love your older daughter's smile in the picture!

DS 11: Navy SEAL or pastor :lol: DS 9: General of the Army DS 6: Carpenter Apprentice (to my dh)

I hadn't heard that they were opening every package here yet, but they've been opening a lot more. My post office person said that they catch a lot of people mailing items not allowed under media mail.

My oldest two are currently on a baseball team. They've played baseball for the past 4-5 years and oldest ds played competitive football last year, too. They've also participated in the rec department's basketball, swimming, tennis, and track programs. We must live in a hidden village of happiness, because I haven't run into any crazy parents yet. Yay for our town! :) It's just a game to our boys. They want to win, but they have friends on the other teams, so if they don't win it's not the end of the world. When we get home we often talk about how happy we are that we won, but we're a little sad for the other team. I view sports in general as more than just games though. I don't view them economically (e.g., as a way to get the boys Div. I scholarships), but I view them as teaching many life lessons ... being healthy & active; dealing with success, setbacks, disappointments, good sportsmanship, life not being fair, cooperation, other people not pulling their weight, how them not pulling their weight affects the team, competitiveness, the need for practice, etc.

Like someone else mentioned, I believe etiquette, outside of business settings, is that a woman has to offer her hand. I, too, have found that I've been treated differently based on my size. Although the general experience of the board seems to go against this, I think studies have confirmed this. Weight Halo Effects: Individual Differences in Perceived Life Success as a Function of Women's Race and Weight The Stigma of Women's Weight: Social and Economic Realities Psychosocial origins of obesity stigma: toward changing a powerful and pervasive bias

My son highly recommends the following games/activities/toys :D : Forbidden Lego: Build the Models Your Parents Warned You Against! Many of the pieces recommended in this book are not sold anymore. My son really enjoyed adapting models in this book with LEGOS/other sets he did have. I liked that by doing this he was challenged to go beyond the directions, think about what the piece needed to do, and then figure out how to make other pieces fit together to do that. (See picture below!) Snap Circuits sets -- my son has enjoyed all of these; especially the Rover robot one Power House Kit -- this fascinated him for a long time; he actually combined pieces from this and another kit (Fischertechnik, I think) and made a solar motor. It was really cool! Fischertechnik Mechanic and Static I don't think I can sing the praises of this kit enough! It taught him so much and the manuals were so much better than the LEGO diagrams of just snapping pieces together. They have explanations and then questions for the child about how items work once they're together. :)

:hurray: This describes our family, too. I don't think our children could grow up not loving our country. Heck, I can't even make it through The Star Spangled Banner without tearing up. :)

Dear distant step-cousin, Please stop posting your "modeling" photos. You look like you're auditioning for a soft-core p*rn photo shoot. I know the town of 900 you live in is small, but seriously? That "photographer" is steering you in the wrong direction. K?Thanks.

We just switched a catastrophic plan this month. (Golden Rule Ins.) We had a high deductible plan with a HSA, but the premiums were killing us in this economy. (We own a small construction business.) We went from $1000 a month premium, $5,000 deductible (which was increasing to $1300 a month in July) that included preventative care & pregnancy to the catastrophic plan that is $200 a month premium, $10,000 deductible with no preventative care or pregnancy coverage (which we aren't planning on needing.;)) If/when we do go to the dr. for a reg. visit, we get about a 50% discount and it should still be cheaper than the monthly premium of the old plan. I don't understand why these types of plans are only available in the short term though. It almost seems like the ideal solution for a fairly healthy family.