Meet Me in St Louis might be my favorite one that screams Christmas. Edward Scissorhands and Mean Girls are less obvious!

Since your DD is only 12 and will outgrow these pants, I would balance function and cost and choose - water resistant rather than waterproof - light insulation - roomy enough to wear long underwear underneath - internal gaiters to prevent snow from going up pant legs Expensive brands are worth the extra money - they are harder wearing (especially the cuffs, which get a lot of abuse from ski boots and skis), waterproof, have sturdy zips. However, since she might not wear these for more than one season, I wouldn’t bother. Also, if she is not skiing, then they just need to keep her warm and dry if she sits on the snow for a while. These have a few good reviews https://www.target.com/p/women-s-snow-pants-c9-by-champion-153/-/A-52445594

I've found Brio to be the best quality for tracks, accessories, and trains, with the exception of the motorized trains. All the motorized engine trains drained batteries and struggled to pull trains up inclines. I would stick with the manual kind.

Check www.thedicetower.com for reviews.

I love Splendor but it's a little dry for younger kids. I agree with King of Tokyo (the board only has 2 spots!). Sushi Go is also great (cards only). I also like Karuba, but it does have a lot of little pieces.

Hi Quill, it is obvious you have given this a lot of thought and that it is striking a chord with many members here. As our kids get older, we have to come to a point where we decide whether we allow them to spend time with friends and families that we don't really like. Whether your views of this family are justified or not, they are your views and I don't think any amount of opinions here will change that. I have been on both sides of this equation where I have offered other kids opportunities for trips and experiences that they wouldn't ordinarily have and my kids have had experiences that we would never be able to afford or would choose spend money on, so I can sympathize with both viewpoints. I do think that families who spend more lavishly than us are gracious and do appreciate the smaller outings that we reciprocate with. I also *really hope* that our generous offers to other families are received without resentment. I think it's great you are venting here because I would guess you have had these feeling brewing for quite a while and would never say them to this family. Decide if your son's pleasure and happiness from spending time with this family is enough to bite your tongue and allow him to continue to go on outings. The one attribute you can say about this family is that they are generous with their wallet and their time! And in general, I find that although comparisons are inevitable, thinking too much about what other people have and how they spend it, is a sure way to unhappiness and resentment. There is always someone with more than us, unless we are Jeff Bezos.

The booksleuth forum at abebooks is the most frequented book finding forum that I know of. There are many regulars who love to identify books.

Do you use thebookdepository.co.uk? It's owned by Amazon and has free international shipping. I use it for non American titles. It's listed for under 10 USD. Shipping can take up to 2 weeks, but it's free! https://www.bookdepository.com/search?searchTerm=the%20number%20devil&search=Find+book Btw, we are a few chapters into The Number Devil, and my DD8 likes it.

Instead of wondering how many straws each of us uses per day, it's more useful to think about how many people eat at fast food restaurants a day in the US. McDonald's averages 62 million customers a day. I'll bet that most of them use a straw. Count in all the other fast food restaurants, sit down restaurants, schools, hospitals, movie theaters, sporting venues, etc and there you are.

Something like this? http://www.frontgate.com/essential-ez-bed-inflatable-guest-bed/157070i It is inflatable, but it has raised legs.

My favorite board books all have great rhyme schemes and encourage children to participate in the reading. Board books were often read repeatedly, end on end, so the ones that were easy to read aloud with beautiful language really shone through! Chugga Chugga Choo Choo My First Book of Sushi (newer versions might leave off the last line, avoid those defective copies) Bear Snores On Sheep in a Jeep Is Your Mama a Llama? Monkey Puzzle by Julia Donaldson Freight train - no rhyming here, but the artwork is so simple and captivating! Agree with Sandra Boynton, Jamberry, Allan Ahlberg, and Everywhere Babies I love Julia Donaldson's rhymes but most of her books are too long for a board book and are better as soft or hardcover for older toddlers. Favorites that I didn't like (in case you were curious) We're going on a bear hunt - too long and too repetitive! Little Blue Truck - rhyme scheme seemed amateurish Guess how much I love you - too twee

We just ordered one from NE Kids - will post back once it arrives. https://www.hayneedle.com/product/ne-kids-school-house-twin-over-twin-stairway-bunk-bed-cherry-bunk-bed-only.cfm

OP, I get it about the sheet changing. Have you tried putting her in underpants with pull-ups over them? She will have underpants next to her skin and the pull-up will be like insurance. If she's dry for a couple of weeks, you can lose the pull-up.

Everywhere Babies is a board book with diverse families and lifestyles. https://www.amazon.com/Everywhere-Babies-Susan-Meyers/dp/0152053158

Soapstone is impervious to nearly everything - that's why it is used in chemistry labs. It does scratch, but it's not that noticeable due to the dark color.

The Circus Ship by Chris Van Dusen and Miss Rumphius are both set in Maine. Here is a long list from librarybooklists.org http://librarybooklists.org/mybooklists/setinmainejuv.htm

Try book sleuth on abebooks and make sure you post in the children's book section http://forums.abebooks.com/discussions/AbeBookscom_BookSleuthreg/Childrens/abesleuthcom/2?nav=messages&listMode=13&mobile=y They have some really amazing regulars who must be former librarians or booksellers.

Mental math is important because it encourages the use of number sense and conceptual thinking over procedural thinking. There was an interesting study by Eddie Gray and David Tall that examined the correlation between students' math achievement and their use of memorized math facts, derived math facts, and counting. In a nutshell, higher achieving students mostly used a combination of memorized facts and derived facts while lower achieving students mostly used memorized facts and counting. Higher achieving students used number sense to derive facts - for example, 15 + 8 would be solved by thinking of it as 10 + 5 + 8 = 10 + 13 or 13 + 2 + 8 = 13 + 10 or 15 + 5 + 3 = 20 + 3 The authors argued that using number sense to compose and decompose in arithmetic also carried over to understanding how to compose and decompose in algebraic functions and more complex math. I think of mental math not as a computation tool, but as a way to develop flexible number sense. If remembering numbers and digits are difficult, I would write the problems down horizontally (not stacked) and take turns finding different ways to solve the problem. For example 339 + 494 Method 1: Swap the ones digits 334 + 499 = 333 + 500 Method 2 : Make a 10 333 + 500 Method 3 : Add left to right 700 + 120 + 13 Good luck OP!

Soup by Robert Newton Peck!

I haven't read through all the responses but we might be an outlier because we have a least a dozen sets per kid. Half are short sleeve/shorts and half are long sleeve/long pants. Our kids go to school and they are never allowed to stay in their pajamas past breakfast. We like having fresh sets of pajamas. Also, we travel often, so we like to have enough so that we can have a set to travel with and a clean set when we return. ETA - I just read texasmom33's response. I don't think we have 25 but 12-15 per kid.

You have probably already looked under this stone, but children with allergies and hay fever are prone to enlarged adenoids, that can cause poor sleep. Snoring is one sign of enlarged adenoids.

Wow, that was quite a thread to read through! Reading it reminded me of a few other good points about the Carson Dellosa books. They had a nice section in both workbooks that detailed the learning goals. There were more worked out examples at the beginning of each section (five in Frank Schaffer vs two or three in CWP) There were also suggestions for mental math techniques and reinforcement - for example, 101 x number is explained as 100 x number + number *1 This is followed by several practice problems using this tactic.

I flipped through the preview of both books. I don't think these are as good as the SM books, to be honest. The word problems are simpler in language and there are many more drill type questions than are in the SM books (CWP and IP, I haven't seen the EP books). For grade 3, I judge workbooks by how they handle fractions. I may have missed it, but I didn't see any at all in the Singapore Math Challenge workbook, and there were no word problems on fractions in Singapore Math Level 3. I'm not saying these books are not good, but the SM books are just very well done. In addition, there is much more explicit instruction on how to do the problems in these workbooks - this can be good and bad depending on your preference. There is also much more white space, which is great for students to work out problems. There is very little white space in IP and CWP, which can be annoying, but then again, you get more questions! The Carson Dellosa books are long, but they probably contain equal or fewer number of problems compared to SM. Hope this helps. I am biased because I am such a fan of CWP and IP (especially IP), so go with what works for you.

Allowing him to stay up late is problematic because at some point, he will have to adapt to everyone else's schedule. If he is up past midnight as a 6 year old, it will be 2 am as a 8 year old! It sounds as though 8 hours is not sufficient for him (bed after midnight and needing to be woken up at 830 am), which means he would likely wake on his own at 930/1030. Do you know exactly how much sleep he needs? How many hours would he sleep if he went to bed and woke up and felt rested? Most 6 year olds need 10-11 hours, and the normal range is 9-12. I would find his sleep number, set a wake up time as a goals and gradually step back his bedtime until he is "right", knowing that you will probably have to repeat this process after any holidays or travel that disrupt his sleep. Get him used to enjoying close to a FULL night's sleep and then change the times. Often it is hard to break a pattern of sleep deprivation AND change bedtime/waking time at the same time. For example, say he needs 9 hours and you would like him up at 730 am. If he goes to bed tonight at 1 am, wake him up at 930 am and aim to have him asleep at 1230 am. Then 9 am wake up, 12 am bedtime, etc.

I haven't used them, but I did buy 70 Must Know Word Problems for grade 1, which appears to be related. http://www.carsondellosa.com/products/0768240115--70-Must-Know-Word-Problems-Workbook-0768240115#/?book%20media%20type=f389e45b92884d48844baaf09d49e3c5 I didn't care for the workbook and we ended up not using it at all because the problems were watered down versions of those in CWP 1. The language used in the word problems was very simple and repetitive. Every problem was x more than y or how many were left. There were also no problems about time, money, distance, ordinal numbers or anything other than quantities of balls, cars, etc. Perhaps the other books in the series are better, but this book definitely was inferior to CWP and IP.