I know this is supposed to be a happy thread, but I can't help but think that many people are still boycotting Chick-Fil-A for reasons surrounding money going toward anti-gay groups. Am I the only one here that sees the irony here? People standing in line to donate blood to people that are likely part of the LGBT community are being given food from a place they may despise? I personally seldom go to CFA anymore because of all the controversy but love their food. I wouldn't decline a box of waffle fries while waiting to donate blood, but I see the whole thing as a bit ironic.

:laugh:

To be fair, to me drivable road trip means physically possible to get there by car within say, a week or whatever. They scratched "day trip" and changed it to "road trip" so I didn't think it was that weird. A relative of mine drove from AL to CA once. It took 3 days. Edited: however, I don't think it would be a wise road trip to try... I have no idea how many days that would take from Maryland! So probably a terrible road trip idea lol.

I've always had trouble with pills, but it's gotten easier. I still would have a pill turn the wrong direction on me sometimes when I was taking some that were a little on the large side (several months ago). I think I once read that being tongue tied could affect my ability to swallow pills easily. That actually gave me some comfort in a weird way, like oh ok, so it's not just me. When I had to take one or two pills before a surgery (wisdom teeth) I was only allowed like a tsp of water and I threw that pill up.

Dh started buying some water at Whole Foods. The bottle says 365 (brand) and says "Electrolyte Water."

It's an app. I have heard about it, but we already have Seterra (on the PC) and another app or two for the states.

Not really. I mean, compared to say, an expensive bottle of wine or other things you might find in the home (the guest didn't ruin an expensive couch or drink an expensive bottle of wine). But on their own I don't look at them as inexpensive. We've opted not to bring nuts home from the grocery store at times because of the price. It wasn't just that the guest used paper towels, I think it was the sheer number (4 sheets at once?). Maybe I'm being petty here, but I would be quite miffed if someone hogged four containers of nuts. I have trouble bringing myself to buy one lol.

I'm super paranoid about sharing bottles with strangers because of things like herpes (cold sores), mono, the common cold. Herpes is for life; I'm not taking risks if I don't have to. I don't think anyone was complaining specifically about using the kitchen sink. That was more a descriptor about the situation probably. I have to get onto my own family about wiping their mouth after brushing teeth with the hand towel. I don't even know why someone would start a habit of using a hand towel* for their face. *I mean one that was specifically set aside for people to dry their hands.

I started because when we moved here I soon discovered the local public schools were not doing well. Teach for America sends teachers here and a couple of them have shared their opinions about the discipline side of things inside the schools. I don't have a particularly good impression of them academically, either. Many people in this area are poor and uneducated. Most of the locals (that work with dh, anyway) either commute to work and send their children to another school district or pay for private school. I decided to try homeschooling since I didn't have a job and we only have one car, anyway. We have done it for a few years and now are looking into b&m school. Most days are a battle with ds, and I'm not calling it a homeschool problem on its own, but it affects homeschooling. Then, there's the toddler and the house. I just can't keep up and ds and I end up butting heads. I think ds really needs an external factor to motivate him into a routine because his parents aren't good at doing that. Right now ds is up watching a digital movie with dh despite the fact that I pointed out it's too late to start a movie. This family lacks structure. And I can't seem to meet his social or extracurricular needs, either. He doesn't usually complain, but I know he needs to get out more.

If you do drink it, consider the colors/dyes. Blue was not friendly to me.

One of my books says sometimes it's better to have TeA every other night because of sperm count. TMI my chart this month was fertile on day 8. Not everyone has dry or obviously infertile periods directly after menstruation. Since I'm not trying to conceive my chart is really annoying lol

According to this list it sounds like the Saxon homeschool editions are not aligned, but their public school versions are?? Depending on edition, anyway. http://hsroadmap.org/master-list-for-s We use MM and the new light blue version is aligned which is the one we use. That was part of the reason I bought it, because I knew we may shift to b&m school later. OP, you may want to visit this site http://hsroadmap.org/common-core-project to see where your materials land on the aligned/not aligned spectrum.

Hmm. My gut reaction is "too big of an age gap." Not that he will necessarily be into partying, but there's just a huge age gap that to me implies the worlds apart thing as a pp said. I found it hard to live with a sibling of mine and I don't know if that was because of our eight year gap, but that probably didn't help lol. My sister needed a roommate in college and my parents made no qualms about telling her no to a male roommate (we knew him, he was closer to my age than hers and they had a completely platonic relationship). So you wouldn't be the first to say no to your college student about their living arrangements. I think I'd be curious if there are girls coming in/out of the apt. a lot or steady girlfriend spending a lot of time there. That would be something I'd consider no matter the age, though. They'd need to make boundaries or expectations known early on. You said they got a list. Is there anyone on the list your ds wants to contact? Maybe he should start doing some contacting of his own and weigh his options. If it turns out this guy is the best option he might not sound so bad. ETA: oh yeah it's not uncommon to work retail WITH a degree. I worked at Best Buy ironically while I had my degree. At the time that is all I could get.

Well it's too late now, but might have been best to find this out earlier or tell her to slow down because there was no hurry. But, it sounds like she would have been bored if she'd slowed down. An issue either way. :/ I kind of accidentally found out that in my area they won't do a placement test or skip ahead until the child is at least second grade level, so if you homeschool for K, you still need to enroll in K if that's what matches your birthday. One lady I knew wanted to homeschool for K and then try to enroll him in first when his birthday would allow enrollment (he wasn't old enough to enroll in K when she wanted him to go), but that wouldn't have worked so I don't know if she did choose to do any homeschooling. My ds is scheduled to take a placement test this month (private school) and dh said if he somehow placed below we wouldn't want him to repeat and we wouldn't enroll him. I said I think if the test results came out like that then I would just ask the school what to do to catch him up rather than refuse to enroll him (because I need a break). In your case, could you ask what specifically she would need to score to skip a grade? Yes, I'm calling it skipping because it's as if she never enrolled in that grade in their eyes. I personally skipped K and went to first (birthday cut off issues after a move. They gave my parents a choice which grade to put me in) and later skipped a math level (went to Alg. instead of pre-Alg. in 8th grade. The rest of my high school math classes I was in a different grade than most if not all of my classmates. I liked it). I was not in any AP classes or gifted programs. Have you said much to the school? Asked the "right" questions? What's the summer reading? What will they be reviewing the first few weeks? (I don't know if those are the right questions, just ideas). Suggest a compromise? As mentioned above, maybe they want to observe her a while first. Tell them that if they will not honor your request it may not be the right place for her? Good luck, keep us posted.

You may have to create a buffer for yourself... "I don't know" "I need to double check, why what's up?" or even flat out say after she makes her suggestion, "oh I don't think that will work. The kids have to get ready for bed after X." I don't typically ask things that way. One time I did recently, just asked a friend if she was going to be out of town for a holiday (didn't ask specific plans) because I was about to invite them to a party. I'd probably say something like, "We should get together soon. Are you busy on X day?" and then let them decide if that day works for them or not and we agree on a time. I don't really have to know what people are busy with. I don't necessarily care, either.

Ergo is famous for knock offs so if there's any chance you got a knock off (buying from a trade site, for example) you would have gotten an inferior product. I borrowed an Ergo and researched it and decided it was a fake. I think that had something to do with my experience with it. It was not comfortable, the padding in the straps was thinner than it should have been. I could tell from the stitching that it was not legit once I stumbled upon a side by side comparison. Ergo has a low back panel. That was never something I wanted for my tall child and she had other issues so that had a lot to do with why I opted for a taller back panel model. The head piece on my Lilebaby is a feature I have never noticed on any other model.

My parents used to use one of those butter keeper things with the water? I guess they got lazy because now they don't keep it in that thing, but they do not store it in the fridge, either. They use a regular butter holder and actually place it in their cupboard lol. We keep ours in the fridge. But I have such little space in the kitchen I don't have much choice. And it's really humid here so I imagine it would melt easily.

I never wore mine around the house to get things done, but I might try that soon. In the beginning I didn't have a carrier I liked (I had the Moby but was pretty clueless about using it and it dragged all over the place every time I attempted to wrap). I have a Lillebaby which we wear for walks and to run errands sometimes. Most Lillebabies do not require an infant insert. My model was purchased in Nov. last year and comes with an infant strap inside if you use with a very small/young baby. Major retailers recently started carrying them in solids. I have one with a print from a baby shop. Can you try on in a local store or a lending library? I will be honest, I did NOT enjoy my fitting in the store and my back hurt the next day. But I've used the carrier a lot lately and it's been pretty good. I wore it for a 40 min. walk recently. My baby is 18 months. We own the "all seasons" model which has a panel you unzip when it's hotter (reveals mesh lining). Some quick info. on the Lillebaby -- higher back panel, more head/neck support in addition to hood; mult. carrying positions; cross straps so you can cross or wear backpack style (I think I should cross straps for best fit, but too lazy to do that most of the time).

I don't know. This article and then a comment or two from Italians below the article leaves it unclear lol. http://www.thekitchn.com/whats-the-deal-with-00-flour-108281

About bread. Taste-wise this flour is yummy. http://www.amazon.com/Antimo-Caputo-Chefs-00-Flour/dp/B0038ZS6PU/ref=sr_1_5_s_it?s=grocery&ie=UTF8&qid=1465093776&sr=1-5&keywords=00+flour

Dh gave me a piece of organic pizza from Whole Foods (made there) the other day. I don't know, but now I'm worried that for me organic cheese=stomach pains. Wonder if that affects the amount of lactose somehow.

I don't even think of makeup immediately when I think of drama. I know it's used, but it just doesn't come to mind right away. Yeah, agree, that if the kit was made for something like bruises, blood, etc. it might seem more welcomed with the avg. boy. Ds got some Halloween makeup to be a zombie last Halloween.

I don't like wine, but I think it's a common thing to bring to a dinner. My only problem is I don't know what to buy/how much to spend and I'd be leaning on dh for the answer to that. They are regular drinkers of wine, so they probably would just buy whatever they like/what is in their budget.

This is what we did and it was like ships passing through the night. It was terrible. I'd come home from work and dh would leave for work. He worked weekends and nights and was also enrolled in online classes so there was very limited family time. Next semester I hope to work a few hours locally with the reasoning being that dh would be home the few hours I work and could watch dd and/or ds (depending on if we homeschool or not). If dh wouldn't be able to watch the kids then I wouldn't have even applied.

Dang, that's strange. My grandma sees one sometimes and she went on a strict diet one time for candida overgrowth. But given her sweet tooth it seemed plausible. I think my dad goes to the woman sometimes as well, but I don't know if he ever got diagnosed with either. He doesn't eat that many sweets and I don't know if he's drank anything other than alkaline water in years.