I can carry my Big Lug for an hour without feeling it at all; longer than that, I feel it, but it's not hard. I used my ring sling for a good year, but Theo just got too heavy after that. Plus, he figured out how to swiggle out of it, which worried me. So, we got the Ergo for Christmas. He was too big by then to use the front carry, so I can't comment on it, but the back carry works great. It seems like the Ergo is good for both parent and baby. Baby is sitting on a fabric chair, essentially, instead of riding a fabric horse. Seems like it should be more comfortable for him than, say, the Moby Wrap--at least once he gets bigger and heavier. And for Mom, you've got the wide band buckled at your waist, so that you're hips are doing a lot of the carrying, instead of your shoulders or back. ETA: Oh, and a Dad's opinion: Stephen was never comfortable with the ring sling, even though that's the one he asked me to make. (Roll eyes here.) But he's very comfortable using the Ergo. Again, never tried it with a yittle itty one, but with our Big Lug, Dad is very happy.

I don't like creamer at all, and I don't like the half-and-half that comes with other weird ingredients (what is carageenan, anyway?). I also like it with various adult additions. :001_smile:

. . . no, I never feel like I'm doing a good enough job. There's always something more I could be doing, something better I could be doing. That feeling never goes away, and I hear tell that some SAHPs actually feel it too. :001_smile: However, I am confident that homeschooling is working out far better than any of the alternatives before us. I think if I were in your shoes, I would be comfortable doing it. BUT, I would start to work slowly-but-surely on getting the kids to be more responsible while I was away. Maybe set one goal for a month--have one chore each completed-to-mom's-standards finished before I get home, or some such--and slowly increase the responsibility you expect of them. It will actually take MORE effort on your part those first few months, checking up on them and keeping track of how you're handling failure. But you can slowly build up good habits even in your older kids, if you can tap into some sort of motivation for them. All this assumes that taking the job is a good idea on its own merits--it's a job you would enjoy, it would bring in much-needed money, it would give you more options for when the kids are older and out of the house, it's a concrete step forward in your career goals, whatever. I wouldn't waste the energy (because it DOES take unbelievable amounts of energy to do this) unless the job itself were worth taking.

. . . with lots of fresh fruit, or maybe as part of a salad. I think it's great. But if you don't like dairy, and are looking for healthier eating, I *don't* think cottage cheese is the way to go. The full-fat version is the only one worth eating (although I could do the 2% version if I had to), and it definitely tastes dairy! What about yogurt? Yogurt would be a great way to get in more dairy--unsweetened and mixed with fresh fruit, or maybe put in a fruit smoothie. If you learn to make it yourself, it'll be even cheaper than cottage cheese.

. . . not to be thinking that you "should" put your kids in school for high school! I hope that's not what you're hearing from your friends that have chosen traditional school--that they think homeschooling is for the early years or that kids need the socialization or something. I hope they're not making you feel that you're wrong for homeschooling all the way through. If or when we choose traditional school, I certainly won't be thinking about all my homeschooling friends (like, both of them!) and how they should be doing what I'm doing. (By the same token, I hope they won't be looking at me and thinking that I've "dropped out" of the Real Parents Club or that I've damaged their credibility or something.)

So happy for you!! I was just reflecting this week on how our younger son's name passes both the Back Door test (Theeeeeeeeeooooooooo) and the You're In Trouble test (Theophilus!). So, I can highly recommend the name Theophilus. Isaac passes the first test, but you have to go to the middle name for the second test, so it is *slightly* less perfect.

house, they're fun, and they're fun. Just plain fun is a good enough reason for almost anything, as long as it's compatible with your other goals. Now, I've decided against it for our family, and I have nothing but contempt for people who say that you HAVE to have one to make your kids "normal." But I think "just because we'd have fun with it" is a good enough reason to get one, if the negatives that come along with it (reduced time outdoors or reading, fights over who gets to use it and for how long, attitude problems, whatever it is that you might object to) don't seem serious to you.

. . . one's attitude in the face of things one can't control, no matter how good or bad those things are. Happiness refers to one's enjoyment of that which is truly good. (And sometimes what is truly good can have unpleasant elements to it, but, in general, the emphasis is more on a good person enjoying what is truly good.) It seems, to me, a little more active than contentment.

I told her that I was *not* going to allow her to give me financial counseling, and that no matter what her procedures said, she was required to close the account as soon as I said, "Close the account." She didn't listen to me, and tried to keep "selling" me, so I put the phone down, without hanging up. Four minutes later, I picked it up, and she was gone. An hour later, I checked back, and the account was listed as closed. It took me at least two glasses of port to relax after that one. I was so unbelievably livid.

John Howard Yoder--Politics of Jesus, What Would You Do (which has contributions from other authors as well), Body Politics, or The Original Revolution Stanley Hauerwas--Peaceable Kingdom, and maybe A Better Hope Paul Ramsey has a book called "Speak Up for Just War or Pacifism" (the basic argument of which is that even just war theory is far better than what we have now). Richard Hays' chapter on violence in Moral Vision of the New Testament might give you some ideas, too. Older stuff: Tertullian and Lactantius in the Patristic period; Erasmus has a thing about how awful war is and how loath the Christian Prince should be to enter into the state.

And I don't think it degrades women in the least for them to wear beautiful things, or to have their fashion sense admired. I don't particularly care for people who substitute politics or advertisement or sex for beauty in their dress. And I'm pretty ignorant of things like cut and fabrics, so I might not always recognize beautiful or interesting fashion when I see it. Like all things, fashion is a subject over which the catty will be catty and the stupid will be stupid. If a person is disposed to being catty, fashion will provide a convenient excuse. And if all a person can see when she looks at Michelle Obama (or Hillary Clinton or Sarah Palin and so on) is her clothes, more fool her. I don't think it's bad for people to be judged by their clothing to a degree, because, where you have some choice in your clothing, what you wear is an expression of yourself. Clothing can be a deliberate statement, and when it is, you can't blame people for listening to what you're saying.

(You're the same JLD from the old boards, yes?) I hope you've been doing well!

. . . especially since school is just all-consuming there. So I could buy that she is unused to helping out around the house. I don't recall French teens being demonstrably less polite, though. If anything, French culture is more formal in its expression of basic courtesy. If you forget to say "Bonjour" before asking a bus driver if he stops at the Arc de Triomphe, you just may not get an answer. Letters are much more formal. (Instead of "Regards," you would say, "I pray you accept the sincerest expression of my regards for you," or some such.) So I would say that, while certain instances may not trigger a "thank you" response in her where you think it should, in general, French culture is quite demanding in terms of verbal courtesy. I think it's appropriate for you to tell her that she is failing Basic Courtesy 101. What recourse do you have if you feel the placement is "not working out"? Will someone else house her? Perhaps you could let her know that personal courtesy and pitching in with family chores are just non-optional, and that if she is uncomfortable with that, she should ask to be moved. And then make them non-optional, even if it means getting in her face about things.

My favorite cookbook: How to Cook Without A Book. A half-way decent public library should have it. It doesn't bill itself as a "health foods" cookbook, so you might not think to look at it. But it teaches you how to look at ingredients and get dinner out of them quickly, without resorting to convenience or pre-prepared foods. It doesn't involve the latest fad "health" ingredients--it just helps you use ingredients you normally would in a home-cooked, healthy way. And each recipe is customizable, so you get to cook it in a way that you consider healthy. ETA: So, for example, stir-fry is one of her recipe-formulas. If you're going for low-fat, you use the least possible oil and choose chicken or turkey for the meat; if you're going for mostly vegetarian, you'll pick chickpeas for the protein; if you're going for fresh, in season veggies, you'll pick whichever veggies are at your local farmers' market this week. Make sense?

. . . the seller is responsible, unless he can show, via delivery confirmation, that you did, in fact, get the item. His choice not to get delivery confirmation does not absolve him of responsibility.

If baptism is supposed to be (or to testify to, depending on your denomination) your entry into the Body of Christ, it should accompany an entry into a local gathering of that Body. I wouldn't express it as a "condition" of baptism, per se, but as something that probably should be thought out before committing to baptism. If he just hadn't given much thought to it, and was just so excited that he wanted to be baptized RIGHT NOW, I would happily have agreed to do it, and counseled him that he needed to get serious about finding and joining a local gathering of the Body of Christ so that he could grow in his faith. And if he had expressed the intention to join some other church, I would have gently suggested that he be baptized there, although I would not have refused if he had expressed a strong desire to be baptized at the church of the friend who had midwifed his conversion. I doubt I would have put it as baldly as your pastor apparently did, but I would probably not have performed the baptism if your friend expressed the intention NOT to join ANY local church at all. Accepting Christ but refusing to associate with His Body is a sign that there is still an impediment to faith somewhere, and I would want, at the very least, to have some pastoral counseling with the guy before administering the sacrament.

Don't ask me why I'm okay with facebook but refuse to own a TV. I'm not sure I could tell you. ;)

. . . English majors at my undergrad institution (a state school). I would imagine it was the same for many if not most English programs. Biblical stories are foundational for Western literature.

In an anonymous, internet-guru sort of way. :D This sounds terrif.

The "we" that I meant in my post is a relatively stable "we," capable of earning their living but choosing not to. I'm not referring to those who genuinely need assistance.

For them, freedom was the freedom to do what was in their own best interests. Rightly or wrongly, they believed that humans working in their own best interests would muddle along fairly well, all things considered, and didn't need an intrusive government regulating the details. People were free to work hard at making a living, and to suffer for their own stupidity. I think for us, freedom means freedom from any kind of constraint, up to and including the constraint of the human condition. Yes, we're super-attentive to an overbearing government, and so we protect our liberties. But we also want to protect ourselves from any kind of pain. Being human involves some kind of pain--from the relatively modest pain that's called "work," to the logical consequences of our actions, like hunger or incarceration, to the sorts of pain we can't control, like illness and random violence. It's not so much that we're giving up our freedom in order to get fed; I think we're willing to give up our freedom (meaning freedom-to-be-responsible-for-ourselves) in order to keep from having any kind of constraint--be it pain, suffering, inconvenience, whatever.

So, if I were to want to work on my dh about this . . . what kind of cost estimate should I be giving him?

I also mash it in with the garlic paste in my spaghetti sauce, esp. when it's a meat-free sauce. (Unless it's meat-free because I'm serving vegetarians, in which case I would only do it if I knew they ate fish.)

. . . at our bank. We're trying to get that up to nine or ten months, since we don't yet know how we're going to eat next year. But hopefully we'll find out about grants or jobs by April, and we'll cut that back down to 6 months. We usually have some cash in the house, but just as a result of doing the cash-envelope system. We don't keep an emergency cash fund on hand. DR would say to put the emergency fund in a MM account at a mutual fund broker, because they generally earn better interest than bank MM accounts. Ours isn't enough to make much difference :D, and I prefer the easy accessibility of having our regular bank handle all our non-investment money.

That would only compound the problem, wouldn't it? Pulling out now would just lock in the losses, and taxes and penalties would take away even more. I feel really bad for people who have been saving all their lives and are retiring this year. (Or who've saved in an EIRA and are going to college this year.) But for those of us who are a ways away from retirement, this is really not much of an issue. It may be two or three years, or it may be five or six, but the stock market will recover.