Not pathetic at all. I remember at 18 when I went away to college and how much my mom cried and how I thought she was being a little melodramatic. :tongue_smilie: Now looking back, and after having children of my own...I get it. Just because they are ready to move on to the next stage of their lives doesn't mean it will be easy for us to let them go. :grouphug::grouphug::grouphug:

DITTO DITTO AND DITTO we LOVE santa!!! I never hated my parents for "lying" to me. In fact, my mom still signs all her gifts to me "from Santa". It's a hoot! And we do all the advent stuff too. The more traditions the better! :D

We never tried it with that show but we use "Bizarre Foods" during social studies all the time.

just got mine over th weekend and I love it! THe volume is great and yes you have control over it. It is really fun!

cw writing strands saxon math (we, too, burned it...literally...in our fireplace and did a little happy dance) Switched on Schoolhouse LifePac Bible FLL Henle Latin But we LOVED 100 easy lessons (both our kids did great with it) AND easy grammar AND all 4 volumes of SOTW. :lol:

thank you so much for these ideas!!!!!!!!

Natalie was born prematurely and even though she has grown by leaps and bounds, she is still at about the 5% mark for height and weight at 11 months old. However, she is already walking and has been for about a month. Not toddling...walking...very well (which is a little early for my tastes!). So I need shoes for her but because she is so small, all the shoes that fit her are only what they call "crib shoes" here...with soft bottoms. I need something with an actual sole to it but NO ONE has them here in anything below a size 3 and she wears a 1 or a 2 depending on the shoe. I am so frustrated! Any ideas for online places I can get what I need?

Could you tell me a little more about these two?

Now that I have my new ipod touch and can download things I need to know...what are your favorite, must-have apps? There are so many to choose from I am going cross-eyed!

It is 7am in your neck of the woods...I pray your baby girl is feeling better and you get the answers you are looking for from the dr. :grouphug:

Please my fellow Americans, please be grateful for your freedoms because, seriously, I am about to lose it here. This country regulates so much for individual citizens that it is REALLY starting to aggravate me. They censor movies before they reach the theater. Now you may be thinking "oh, that's nice...no swear words, no sex scenes" but see THAT is not the stuff they censor. They cut all references to christianity but leave all the sex in. Weird. Also, I cannot download anything wirelessly for my kindle here because the government won't allow it. Even after amazon made their kindle content available internationally, Malaysia STILL won't allow it. Half the things I try to download on youtube are blocked...and people, if you know me at all after these years you KNOW I am not downloading porn. They censor TV ...as in entire series are not available here. But this weekend was the ultimate...I FINALLY got the ipod touch, newest model, with all the bells and whistles as an early present from my dh. We went together to the Apple store at the mall to buy it. I was SO EXCITED. I got home, set up my itunes account and... MALAYSIA WILL NOT ALLOW YOU TO DOWNLOAD SONGS OR MOVIES OR TV SHOWS FROM ITUNES OR NAPSTER OR ANY OTHER SERVICE LIKE THAT. I seriously wanted to hurt someone. We went back to the Apple store at the mall today and asked the salesman about it...my dh said, "We bought this ipod touch here yesterday and we cannot seem to download any songs fom itunes." The salesman said, "No, itunes does not work here. The government won't allow it." So dh replies, "THEN WHY ON EARTH DO YOU SELL IPODS IF YOU CANNOT DOWNLOAD MUSIC TO THEM? DON'T YOU THINK THAT IS HELPFUL INFORMATION TO BE SHARED WITH A CUSTOMER BEFORE THEY BUY IT????" I had to drag him out of there before he got arrested. So right about now I am pretty sick of living under a government that feels it has the right to control what I watch, read and listen to. HOWEVER Living under this government had made me a master of subterfuge. This evening I figured out that if I changed my account to USA instead of Malaysia and used a credit card linked to a bank in the U.S. with a U.S. billing address (which I thankfully still have) then I can get around their little road block and download music.... until they catch me. :tongue_smilie:

Considering I have one caucasian child, one korean child and one indian child...we get LOTS of stares and questions...like the old southern gentleman who asked "Where'd ya'll find HIM at?" about my korean ds and the malaysian lady here that asked "Where you get her?" about my indian dd. My favorite, though, is when the employee at Chuck E. Cheese accused me me of trying to kidnap my ds because "he doesn't look like you".... I'm white, he's asian...well NO KIDDING. :D

We are going OUT for dinner tonight (since we are celebrating turkey day on Friday).

I feel the same way...I'd much rather go through the scanner than be groped.

Just got done reading the news and several articles said that the big Opt-Out protest ended up being a whole lot of nothing. So what does that mean? People are OK with the new procedures? They are not OK with it but they want to fly so they put up with it? People just like to complain a lot about things but they don't want to actually do anything about it? They don't have scanners or pat-downs here in Malaysia so it's not an issue for me flying out. Flying home is another story. After reading all the threads here and the news articles about how outraged everyone is about the new procedures, I REALLY expected there to be some big hullabaloo at airports around the nation but...nothing big happened. ???

your 12yo ds ASKS if he can read "Hamlet"... then gives it a "6" :lol:

ugh! My 12.5yo ds only wants computer/video games for christmas. That's it. He can give me no other ideas. I swear I am going to buy him an ugly sweater. :D

well it is not a sleeper any more but when we first started using it ...it was. Life of Fred math is AWESOME.

Last year we were so out of our element...in a foreign country...didn't know many people...had no idea where to find what we would need for our turkey dinner or even IF we could find it. A nice family we work with invited us for thanksgiving dinner. It made SUCH a difference. So this year I wanted to pass it on... I sent out an email to staff stating that anyone who did not have someone to spend thanksgiving with were welcome to come to our house (I know where to get a turkey now! lol). They responded. Boy did they. I have 35 people coming for dinner!!!! :svengo: It is going to be a blast but holy cow...35 people??? yikes. :tongue_smilie:

Christmas is coming??? Really? Are you sure because it's like 95 degrees out and I could swear it is July! :D

Thank you!!!

I was JUST thinking about that... it was a post about my christmas wish and how I wanted a daughter for christmas. And ONE YEAR LATER she was born ON CHRISTMAS!!!!! Tell me God doesn't answer prayers.... ;)

I am thankful for the baby girl we adopted. Having a daughter has changed my life! I am thankful my husband LIVED and is NOT PARALYZED from breaking his neck in his motorcycle accident this past summer. I am thankful we SOLD the motorcycle. :D I am thankful we have, thus far, escaped the financial meltdown happening everywhere and still have jobs. I am thankful for the amazing experience we have had living in a new country.

I hate those too...and chain mails...and urban legend crap that you can easily disbunk by checking snopes...and the ones they put on facebook that basically says you are an evil person if you don't post it as well...UGH!

Never. I am 40yo and I still look to my mom for advice. She will always be my mom and I will always need her. I will always be here to give advice to my children as long as God keeps me here.