A friend of ours from church gave us his old ipdad mini. It seems to work great, but we are totally out of the loop with Apple products (we have none, lol). DH downloaded a game last night for the kids, but what are your best recommendations for using an ipad for children 5 - 7 years old in a homeschool context? Btw I am all for entertainment value too as long as it's not educationally worthless.

nevermind.

Sure you can! (lol) You can agonize over the correct balance of faith/ works and wonder if you're sinning and not knowing it. So fun! I'm sort of joking, but yes, I am quite the introspective, analytical prone-to-depression introvert. I get INFJ on the personality tests. What helped me about faith (I became a Christian as an adult) is not being surprised about things in the world being so far from what they're supposed to be. Understanding that we live in a fallen world has helped me.

This is an example of one of my beefs with feminism. What started as the freedom to do certain things has become an expectation. You end up being shamed and scorned to an extent if you want to opt out. Periods is a good example, because some girls/ women have it much worse than others. They feel the difference between being male and female more intensely, but they're made to feel that they're making excuses. Supposedly there is equal respect for choosing to opt in or out of something that was once male dominated, but in real life there's not. When you opt out you're seen as weak.

Same here. I'm in my mid-thirties and started my period at 12. And still, every single month before AF starts I am deeply convinced that life is desperately cruel, people around me are unbearable, everything is hopeless, I need to yell, and eat and cry. I hope one of these days I can look at my period tracker app and think, hmm, maybe there's a reason you are feeling so distressed. Hasn't happened yet.

Haven't tried breathing or relaxation exercises (I do take magnesium every night though for help sleeping). My cramps are always like the part of labor where you can't talk or do things other than try to endure the pain. I have wondered how normal this level of pain every period is, but even if it is within the range of normal, it's very difficult to carry on doing regular things. It's like being severely ill and injured for several days a month. Popping 12 Advil and Tylenol a day for 3 - 4 days is all I can do right now. Maybe one day I will find help before menopause.

Also, I wonder how valid it is that many seem to see any lack of normalcy and productivity during one's period as an "excuse" or laziness. Why is this?

For someone to say "if" I have cramps is so foreign to me. I have to take Advil and Tylenol both, together round the clock or else I'm incapacitated for at least the first 3 days. My cramps are vicious. Are there others out there who actually don't get cramps sometimes?

I mean aside from marital relations... Most of us have probably seen the feminine product commercials that all have the message: "Don't let your period stop you from doing what you want" etc. But in real life, that is hard to do sometimes. Periods can be awful, painful, require bathroom visits that necessitate extra privacy (hard when out and about with young children). There are times when there are certain outings I just don't want to deal with on day 1 to 3 of menstruation, especially. I am wondering if I am just a wimp or how other gals approach it.

Someone mentioned emotionally bonding with the music and that's totally what it's about for me. I discovered David Bowie's music at an age where music was my everything. Some of his music felt like it belonged to me. It didn't obviously, but it's about being moved, experiencing happiness and beauty in the world at a time where much of the world seemed ugly. It helped that his stuff was unique too.

I can see both sides of it -- pushing vs not pushing. I do agree that a 7 year old cannot possibly know everything that's good for him or whether he'll like something that he hasn't tried. Part of what is hard is having a toddler to drag to and fro, honestly. Well that and my 5 year old too. I guess just that I have all 3 small children under my care, and doing some class, practice or lesson for one will often mean having the other 2 there possibly doing nothing but waiting for it to be over (not fun for any of us except the one in the activity). DH spends about half the year working late nights and weekend overtime so I'm a solo parent during those times for the most part.

I just remembered that he did show interest in rollerskating recently after attending a friend's birthday party at a rink. The rink does offer very cheap lessons once a week and is noncommittal. My only concern is the songs they were playing during the child's party had words like "dat ass", and the place in general was not classy, let's just say that. But I might try the children's lessons one week and see if they hold off on the explicit music. At least I can be there with him to explain whatever unsavory things he is exposed to.

I was wondering what it meant too. Based on the posts it was included in, I thought it might mean "just a whiny moment" or something. LOL.

Yeah, I was wondering if I should try to expose him to youth sports meets in person or... I don't know, sit in on someone's piano lessons (we got him a Casio keyboard at his request for his birthday, so piano lessons was one thought) and try to spark some interest. I may try to expose him to some of those anyway just to see how it goes. But yeah, spending time and our very limited money in the hope that it will be good for him even though he actively hates it... that doesn't seem so good an idea, unless I was convinced that is really is for his greater good, but I don't know. I do like hearing reminders that my son is young (turned 7 two months ago) because sometimes I feel anxious and panicky that he's not involved in enough. A lot of my thinking about this has to do with getting friends for him too. We homeschool, don't do co-op, and live in a poorer area where there's little to no children ever playing outside. He has like one friend right now, from our church.

Spinoff of a spinoff from a few weeks ago. My 7 year old ds has what I believe is a surplus of energy. It comes out in things like bullying his little sister etc. He is homeschooled FYI. Finances are a concern but I know there are (thanks to the suggestions of some of you) reasonably priced ways to get into team sports or lessons. I asked my son today what, if any sport or lesson, would interest him. He said "You already asked me that and I told you, nothing." Ok, so literally nothing interests him in terms of extracurricular activities. Do you push something in this case? For the record, he likes to build wooden tracks for his trains, act out lots of pretend-play, build lego stuff, figure out puzzle type games etc.

I would like to add a bit to my previous comment. I think my experience with college is not the norm. By the time I was 24 and ready to try and get a bachelor's degree, I was an advanced age for a student at my level, was a recovering drug addict, had experienced homelessness as a teen, cohabited with some significant others, been more or less on my own since my teens, worked many (granted low level) jobs and had played in a rock band. Going into a 4 year state university happened shortly after I became a Christian, and made me feel like I was much much less in the real world than before. One of the main things it opened my eyes to was being saddled with crippling debt, so yeah, I'm not the most pro-college person. But I do recognize that it can have benefits and it's part of the game in the career world/ world in general, and hope I can help guide my kids in how to forge their own college path if and when they want to without coming out the other side with crippling debt.

I can't say I know what college is for, but I'm extremely cynical at this point. I mean, who in America can afford the tens to hundreds of thousands of dollars to make themself more well rounded? And what person who wants good career prospects is benefited by the near ubiquitous, life-altering, suffocating mountain of student loan debt that is basically a given at this point? I admire people who are smart enough to not go to college. I don't believe that college makes one smarter in any way. Knowledge and wisdom are not the same thing. I'd rather have wisdom. Just my opinion and experience. I went to college under some abstract sense of bettering myself and took on a mess of student debt to do so. I had a radical change of priorities later and am now a SAHM. I have made basically zero progress on my debt and regret what I did to incur it. My DH never went to college, and is doing well considering, but we are still at a (what is probably for our family size) working-poor class income.

Thank you ladies, this has been eye opening. I foolishly thought that cheap pencils would be ok, but have learned that this is one of those things where you get what you pay for. Even though it didn't used to be that way. It really seems like with more and more everyday items, the quality is going down the toilet... and yet if you have the money to spend, you can buy a decent version of any given item. But then with the cheap items, you end up plowing through them so fast because of the low quality that it would have been more cost effective to get the better one. I could probably go on a big rabbit trail about this but I won't for now. I searched "high quality pencils" on Amazon and the first result was those General cedar pencils. I didn't know about those. I think I'm going to try them.

I feel kinda old but honestly, when I was a kid, I remember it being relatively easy to use and sharpen a pencil without constant breakage. It seems like pencil quality has gone way down. Has anyone else noticed this? (and yes I know pencils have graphite but everyone calls it lead). Do you have to go to the art supply store and buy German made fine art pencils to get decent ones?

I'd like a Fossil Bag for a good balance of quality/ attractiveness and usefulness. Like this one https://www.fossil.com/us/en/bags/womens-handbags/view-all/explorer-hobo-sku-zb5503001c.html For the pure fun of it I'd like a Betsey Johnson bag like this one http://www.betseyjohnson.com/product/HANDBAGS/All-Handbags/KITCH%20TELEPHONE%20CROSSBODY/pc/3903/sc/3983/235752.uts?selectedColor=BLACK It's fun to dream of handbag options.

That's a good one. I want to go a whole day without wiping anyone's butt besides my own. I also like the idea of having a day off from all the tedious tasks like deciding what's for/ making dinner, cleaning, dishes etc. But then getting out of the house later sounds good. I might actually get crazy and request that DH take the kids somewhere so I can be by myself. I am a SAHM but because of my kids ages, and being homeschooled, being in the house by myself is the impossible dream.

I'm trying to get ideas for my bday in a few days. I don't want to get depressed when it comes and goes in a disappointing manner. I want to be proactive.

The input here has been helpful and given some insights. I googled the address of the house we rent and it's estimated value is between $40k - $70k. And I am pretty sure our landlord has owned this place for a long time, so I'm guessing it's paid off and that he doesn't have a mortgage, hence why our rent is so low. Like I said, the home values are so low here for a reason, and I like most people would not live here given a choice. But it makes me realize that it's a blessing to be able to live in a 3 bedroom single family home for what many 1 bedroom apartments are going for.

I can PM you :)

It sounds like a great thing in theory, and I know one family who is making it work, pooling their resources etc. They are like-minded which is hugely important. Like I said in the other thread we have been offered an arrangement with my dad and step mom. But they basically hate everything we do. I think they basically want to have us closer to intervene in what they see as all our myriad poor life choices (like homeschool). So no, I am not signing up for that but I wish it could work.