It depends a lot on the purpose of the allowance, right? Fun money? Clothing? Lunch at school? What are they expected to pay for?

A lot of the greatness of Lego is the working-it-out. I want to make a house, and It'll have a window in each side, how do I leave a space? What if I want a windowsill, how can I do that? There are so many problem solving things that go into even the simplest creations. How much more when two kids play at once! You want to make a castle? Cool, maybe we could have a drawbridge! My SIL glues the Lego creations together so her boys can play with them, and I think she's totally ruining them. Ugh. So I'd say yeah, keep the instructions (they're also available online, though, so no biggie if one gets ruined or lost), but don't fuss over mixing sets. We have a kazillion Legos, purchased by the pound on eBay. My huz and I sorted them by type of piece - flats, double wides, plates, onesies and twosies, slanted pieces, etc. - regardless of color. My people have totally disregarded and only the remnants of our organizational goodness remain. But y'know what, it's okay. We love Legos.

With kids (4 of them, 8 and under) 20 minutes would be my max. Without... Well, that never happens. But if it did, probably 45 minutes. We don't typically eat at places with a wait, though our favorite pizza place is an exception.

Our whole group uses the term "Eskimo" for anything gross or uncouth - it's one of many hilarious things from Cheaper by the Dozen.

Can you make it HIS issue? Like teach him to change his own diaper? I remember my girls at that age still being in nighty diapers, and they thought it was hilarious to put them on themselves (actually, it was!) and got to the point where they could do it pretty effectively. I suspect it'd be a lot more convenient for him to just use the bathroom.

Good for you! I hope y'all have a ton of fun! We love our AHG troop.

I think an 8 yo is old enough to be courteous in those situations. A kid who wants quiet to sleep could say, "hey, y'all, I'm having a really hard time getting to sleep because the television is loud even with my door closed. Would y'all be willing to turn it down/off?" And then if it works out, grrrreat. And if it doesn't, maybe "do y'all have a fan I could run in my room to cover the noise from the living room? I'm having a really hard time getting to sleep." An 8 is old enough to be polite about these things. And if he/she is a guest in your home, you'd be polite to honor those requests, yes? And a kid sees eggs being prepared for breakfast might say, "wow, yum! I love eggs that are gooey and runny, would you be willing to make mine that way?" And you'd be nice to fulfil that request, right? If his/her egg came out all wrong and he/she simply didn't eat it, that would be okay. And if you asked why he/she wasn't eating it, it'd be perfectly okay to say, "I really don't care for eggs that are all hard in the middle." And if he/she is a guest in your home, you might offer to make a runny egg? And golly, if an 8 y/o WASN'T able to be that diplomatic, but WAS a guest in your home, I still think it'd be nice to make an effort, just like you would for a grown-up guest.

As far as culture shock, Austin might be gentler for y'all than any of the other major metro areas. Though I suppose if you happen not to enjoy the culture in Cali, DFW or Houston might be a good fit. Another plug for ATX is that it's centrally located - it's just a quick trip to San Antonio, 3-ish to Houston and 4 or so to DFW. So it your peeps are spread out in TX, Austin would be a good hub.

I was going to suggest ballet-y birthday parties. My girls attended one at a studio once and it was the best! time! ever! They each changed into these (old but) super fancy costumes and there were a few instructions and a couple of dance games and they then a couple of songs they frolicked/dances to. And the parents brought a cake and that was it! My people loved it - I want to say it was a 5 y/o party, fwiw.

Tossing it is the way to go! My in-laws were still leaving the driveway yesterday when I chucked all the junk food she'd brought (she's a teacher and evidently ALL her students gave her sweets for Christmas). I didn't tell my kids otherwise when they guessed she'd carried it all back home with her. Heh.

No. But it sounds kind of good!

We use FiestaWare for everybody, aged 2, 4, 6, 8 and the adults. The littlest two girls use the salad plates for everything, because they can't reach to 12 o'clock to put their milk glasses in the proper place with the dinner plates. But everyone eats on real plates and everyone uses real glasses and everyone is responsible for carrying their own dishes to the dirty spot in the kitchen. A few of our pieces have gotten broken over the years, most notably the salad plates and a couple of teacups. But y'know, it's not as many as one would think. We model (and insist on) carrying one thing at a go, using both hands and their opposeable thumbs, climbing down from the chairs before picking up dishes, just common carefulness. Also "big arms" at the table are prohibited -- no grand sweeping gestures or wildly flailing limbs -- to preserve our dishes. Truly, these things are just regular expectations and only have to be taught for a little while - the upkeep on it isn't much. And our littler girls have absorbed it more than been especially taught. The girls *know* I care about my dishes. And the times things have been broken I've been sad (not mad, just sad) and they feel that, too. Honestly, though, it *does* make me nervous when my littlest girl (she was 2 in Sept.) helps me unload the dishwasher. Eek. But so far that's not ended in disaster. My advice would be to invest in teaching/training and not in special kid dishes. If I were 10 y/o, I'd be horribly embarrassed to be using kiddie plates.

We have 4 little girls - 2, 4, 6, and 8. I would have seriously considered having more if I could have been guaranteed another girl! But alas, all of my babies were c-section births, so at 4 the doc was pretty grave talking about the risks of additional children. So our littlest gal is our last babe.

And I'll buy the pajamas instead of sewing them.

My kids will open jammies tonight, but we'll save the other things for tomorrow morning. Growing up, we could choose one thing to open on Christmas Eve, which was big fun! For our kids, though, we really only do 3 gifts (plus PJs), so I prefer to do it all at a go.

Wow! Congratulations to you both!

Our most pressing issue is a hole in the drywall in a kid room. We had a tree come through the siding/wall/window, and have already fixed up the siding and the window, but the drywall issue remains.

The actual Christmassy part is over December 26th here. We take that next week to relax and have fun as a family, but all of our traditional things have wrapped up then. Usually we have grandparent guests that (entire) time, which lends some specialness to it, but not necessarily Christmas special, if you know what I mean.

Six y/o girl A board game A Lego set (shared among the sisters) A cookbook Hubs An audible subscription

I'd carry them instead of checking.

Oh, wow, y'all. I had NO IDEA you weren't supposed to store them all rolled up. I've been an on again / off again camper forever and I've done it wrong my whole life. Thanks, gals!

I won circus tickets one time! And some sewing goodies from a blog another time. I love being a winner!

Your piano teacher should be a good resource - they might even be willing to help you scour Craigslist. And way to go on the $4 Casio!

I think cultivating the opposite - humility - would be a good place to start. Things like serving the poor (food bank? book drive? meals on wheels? foreign missions? raising money for orphans?), sick (hospital visits?), or elderly (nursing home visits?) might open her eyes to other people actually having needs and feelings. It's fairly likely that she can extrapolate to, "hey wow, my cares and concerns really aren't as heavy as I've always felt them."

Cutting the binding, like Ellie said, is the easiest way to handle it. You can hole-punch and file it in a binder to keep the ease of grab-n-go. I think the print shops charge less than $1 to cute the binding off of a book.