For all of you who would fix up your homes.. dh and I started watching Property Brothers last night. I don't know where these people live, but they were buying seriously crappy houses for over half a million dollars and fixing them up. By the end of two episodes, we were both feeling pretty great about our mediocre split level with 20-year old finishes.

I'm not certain this is correct. I'm from a Western tradition but I believe Jesus freed us from death, not sin. That's why as believers we still sin. My understanding doesn't line up with this. Those who have never heard are given special grace. Those whose faith is marred by the actions of others (molestation by a pastor, emotional or physical abuse, twisted teaching) have special grace. The truth is, we don't really understand what happens when we reach the judgement seat but we know that God desires for all of us to have his mercy. That's why we're careful never to assume anyone didn't make it to heaven. I'm not sure you read her post all the way through. "He dug that pit and left it uncovered because He had a plan, and the plan called for man to fall. And so he did. By God’s own liability laws, then, He is responsible. So what did God do about it? He sent His only begotten Son who was lifted up on the cross in order to drag all men to Himself. He paid for the sin of the whole world because all of creation became subject to death through Adam’s fall. He bought the dead ox. The ox is now His."

Well, we've had three concussions here. My now 12yo ds had two, when he was about 5 and 7. Playground accidents, he threw up, rested a few days, no big deal. My now 7yo ds was in a sledding accident two years ago and was literally knocked out for ten minutes. He got a night at the hospital and a couple MRIs. Still, he just had to lay low for a while. No wrestling or jumping off high things. We did limit screen time and feed him a bunch of brain-healthy fats per the chiropractor's advice (and took him in a few times to her) but the pediatrician wasn't worried at all and didn't recommend anything much. Today neither have any lingering effects. I keep hearing concussions are a big deal, but my experience has been that there's not much you can do. Hope she feels better soon!

I really like the bolded - good analogy. There are plenty of hints, I think. We just often want more than hints. We want something clear and precise and that makes sense and we agree with. I'm not judging, I'm totally there with you.

:grouphug: :grouphug:

We read a book called "Making Brothers and Sisters Best Friends" about five years ago. It was as hokey as it sounds but it did seem to help them get some perspective about their siblings being around forever when other people might not be. My girls are not super close, but they're 14 and 10 so the age difference is noticeable. They were closer when they were younger and shared a room. I think the only thing we do on purpose is to create as many memories as possible within the family. We used to take weekly trips to museums or somewhere. That's slowed down now that my oldest is in school, but we still try to do fun stuff together on purpose. And we have traditions. Traditions really cement people together.

I love them and my kids humor me. We used to have one going all the time when we had a spare table, but now that table is for school. :) I bought a 3D puzzle several years ago, but we never got around to making it. It was the capitol building. I sold it on Craigslist to a woman who said she loved the 3D puzzles and had one going all the time. They took her 3-5 years to put together!

I couldn't even read your description of what you had done. OW. I'd buy one. We bought all my dad's medical supplies instead of renting. The price difference wasn't that much and what the insurance didn't reimburse us for we gave to the hospice nurse so she could let families who couldn't afford it use them. Totally worth it.

We are (obvs, if you know me) church goers, but even if we weren't, Sunday morning sounds odd. Sundays without church are still for sleeping in and drinking coffee and reading, not going places! :)

Me! I am totally finally doing this because it's 5:30 in the morning and I'm already up and going! Yoga - done! Shower - done! Breakfast - done! Sit in front of the boards with my coffee - aaahhhhh. Happy face. Make muffins Make lunches School, school, school Pick up dd14 from school Work on blog Put laundry away Bible study Dinner PLAY WITH THE CHILDREN (and enjoy it!) Kiss DH Go to bed at a reasonable hour If I'm not back tomorrow, I burnt myself out. Send chocolate.

I second sleeping in the bedroom, but then I'm imagining nights when the teens are in their rooms and you have the living area to yourself. If they are night owls and like to be in the common space, that might not work. I really like the high loft bed idea. Then no one could even see your bedding, let along sit on it. It would give a much better sense of privacy.

Seeing the pediatrician. Kind of boring, huh?

I got an automated phone call a few weeks ago that my oldest was behind on her shots. It was from the Dept. of Health in Arizona. We moved away from there in 2007. I doubt any actual humans are sending these. :)

We have six kids. The short answer is no. As was mentioned earlier, a sit down meal at even a moderate restaurant (Olive Garden, Red Robin) is going to be upwards of $100. We do have space in our budget for emergency eating out - sometimes life gets crazy. So if we go out it's usually a last minute thing, and we'll grab Wendy's or Chik-fil-A if we're feeling spendy. I don't think we've ever seen a movie as a family. Here's what we do: Take one kid out at a time for a date. This is often ice cream or Starbucks (coffee-free frapps for the win!) or breakfast, which is cheaper than dinner. Museum trips! It's much cheaper for a large family to buy a family membership. For example, our history center charges $8 per person, but a family membership is only $70. It's the same price to go for a day or a year. We pick one or two museums or zoos and buy memberships for the year. Sometimes dates will be there, and we get a discount on food. Watch out for deals. My husband just took our 7 year old to see Zootopia for free because he's on a mailing list. They send free preview tickets to upcoming movies two or three times per year. Groupon often has good deals on restaurants and movies. Give gift cards in stockings. $5 at Starbucks or a fast food place is a big deal to a kid. We've also done $10 movie theater gift cards in the kid's stockings. They loved that. Order pizza. Lots of places have deals on Mondays and Tuesdays. It's not part of our family culture to eat out a lot, so they don't seem to mind. We've been very clear with them about making financial decisions. "We have a finite amount of money that we get to spend on whatever we want. We need to make wise choices on what we buy. We could spend $100 on dinner tonight, but then we wouldn't have that money for the new shoes you want. What do you think we should do?"

It's not that much of a problem, really, we just handled it the wrong way. It's our first year as an official thing. We were really trying to steer clear of the legalities, so we made it all up to the parents. Next year we're going to require the homework, we'll just keep the wording that says parents are responsible for assuring their child is receiving all necessary instruction, etc.

Well, we were planning to put my rising 7th grader into the absolutely amazing classical charter school my 8th grader is attending, but he didn't get in! So I found another classical charter nearby, and now they're closing! So I'm bookmarking this thread and panicking. :lol:

You might get a feel for his or her expectations. I, along with a few others, formalized a co-op this year. Even though we teach history and science, we are for enrichment only - we're not legally allowed to replace home instruction - and we made that clear at the beginning of the year. Because of that, all the homework and at-home activities have been given as optional. Frankly, very few of the kids do them. This is frustrating for me, as a teacher and as the director, but because of the way we framed it at the beginning of the year, there's little we can do. Next year we plan on structuring it differently and letting folks know up front that homework is part of the class. It could be that this will be addressed going forward.

Wow! Congrats!

When I was in high school, a boy in my group of friends was molesting his sister. When it was discovered, the family tried their best (as far as I could see as a 17 year old) to get him help and keep the sister safe. He never went to jail for some reason and was just on probation. There was no where they could put him. They ended up sending the sister away to live with relatives, completely disrupting her life. No one wanted to take in the boy, so they felt there was nothing else they could do. She was the victim but was the one who lost everything. It really is a broken system. This was almost 20 years ago, but I don't see that it has changed much.

Re: the bolded - this is what makes these cases so hard. In general, if we were talking about cars, or real estate, or cash, I would agree. You don't violate a contract and then get what you want. But the baby isn't a reward, it's a person. Personally, I would never be involved with a professional organization that uses bad grammar. There are multiple babies, not there's multiple babies. Sheesh.

You know, I used to think differently about parenting, before my older two reached the teen years. I still believe parenting is a huge factor, but I've come face to face with the hard fact that these are people, with their own minds and thoughts and beliefs. There is a huge amount that goes on in their heads that I have no access to unless they share it. I didn't used to think that, when my kids were small. I thought as their mom I was utterly linked to them. But as they reach adolescence, that changes.

I'm interested to see how this plays out. There are so many variables. He's the biological dad. Do all biological dads have the right to demand abortions? Although she is not the biological mom. But if the bio dad can demand an abortion in this case, could a bio dad block an abortion if bio mom is the one pregnant? Where are the lines pertaining to his rights? Her body, her choice, right? How can someone else demand she have an abortion? Doesn't that violate her rights as a woman? He claims it would be more cruel to separate the triplets by adopting one out than by aborting one. That's odd. Sanctity of life issues seem to come into play. All very interesting, and more than a little disturbing. My personal belief, if anyone is interested, is that all life has intrinsic value, so I'm against abortion but pro-adoption and I think our society in general needs to give a lot more support to women who find themselves unexpectedly pregnant. I'm not sure about surrogacy. In most cases it's a wonderful gift, but when it goes wrong, the lives of the new people who've been created through the process are put in jeopardy. We can't just create new life without committing to its well-being.

I took two things away from this video. One, I understand a little better how we can be making such good money (my husband is a pastor, so take that with a grain of salt, but he makes much more than I ever thought he would) and still struggle to pay off student loans or go on vacation. We have six kids, so our expenses may be higher than the average family, but I genuinely have no idea how a family making $32,000 per year makes it. Two, what can we do? There are no answers given in the video, nor have I ever heard anyone propose a solution that makes sense.

Good question! I won't say dh and I have a perfect marriage, but we've come leaps and bounds in the past few years. Here are a few things I learned: *Not everything needs to be said, and not everything that needs to be said needs to be said to him. :) Too often he'd come home and receive the full brunt of all my little stresses and worries from the day - about the kids, homeschooling, the house, my friends, myself, my future, our marriage, the grocery list, the budget, my hair, etc. etc. It was overwhelming to him. Find someone else to release this on (as much as can be). When I saved the truly important things to discuss with him he was more responsive. *When there was something important to discuss, I was careful to plan out what I would say rather than just dumping all my thoughts on him. See above about being overwhelmed. *My dh (like many men) prefers to have time to process things before he responds. This would drive me nuts because after lambasting him with all my concerns, he would say nothing. Cue fight. I learned to lay out my thoughts and then give him some space to think about it, accepting that sometimes this would be a few days. *Writing letters has been very effective. It prevents the verbal onslaught, gives me time to lay out my thoughts clearly and concisely without so much drama, and gives him space to respond when he's ready. *DON'T MANIPULATE. Don't say it's fine if it isn't fine. Don't cry and say it's nothing to get him to ask again. I have been so guilty of this. As far as getting HIM to talk to ME.. ask specific questions and give space for answers. For example, I no longer ask what he's thinking or how he feels about things. Asking for action steps is far more effective. For example, if one of the kids is having trouble I'll ask what he would do or say to the child rather than what he thinks about the problem. If I need to know his feelings, I'll ask. Do you feel angry? Are you hurt by this? Finally, I've learned to respect his answers. If he says something doesn't bother him, I trust him. I don't ask again because I would be upset by that thing so surely he must feel SOMETHING. If he gives an opinion I consider it honestly. I don't immediately shoot down his thoughts if I disagree with him - once he opens up he'll clam up quick if I get defensive or argumentative (you said you wanted to know how I feel...). More respect, more empathy, less drama.

Four pages? I'd take an exacto knife and slice them off. But I'm cheap like that. :)