There's a quote I like. It goes something like this: "People are so worried about what they eat between Christmas and the New Year, when they SHOULD be worried about what they eat between the New Year and Christmas." Eating some cookies around the holidays doesn't negate any of your accomplishments so far. And while you may be "up" on the scale for a couple of days afterward, you'll be able to take it right back off, if you're right back on track. Losing weight and getting healthy isn't about how things go over any one day, or week, or weigh in, or holiday...it's about changes you make to your lifestyle for the long term. And you've been doing that- since July! You should be proud of yourself! :) It's okay to enjoy treats now and then. But if you want to stop enjoying and you're having a hard time doing so, you could try brushing your teeth, keeping gum or a piece of sucking candy in your mouth, drinking ice water, eating a meal so you're not hungry when you start baking, etc.

One of my closest friends beat breast cancer..she wore pretty scarves, and she was matter of fact about it, and her family handled it fine- she's now got a full head of her own hair back, and you will, too! Hugs!

That's wonderful! :)

Woohoo! That's great! And you SHOULD be proud of yourself! (I'm kinda jealous, I've never lost that much in one week...I think my biggest week was 3 point something lbs)! Congrats!! :)

He's been in Afghanistan for over a year, Kyrgyzstan is just a layover. I'm glad he's about to be home with his family soon, his wife been raising their toddler son alone, working full time, taking classes, and maintaining regular visitation with her stepson (my brother's son from a previous marriage, who has special needs on top of it all)... I don't know how she does it all! And she lives like 5 to 6 hours away from me by car so it's not like I could even help out or anything.

He's either already in the air or about to be. Going to Kyrgyzstan for a few days, and then back to the states from there. He should be home with his wife and kids within a week and a half. :)

I did see that, but we're staying with family at their house- we don't want to incur hotel expenses lol. Trying to keep this vacation on the inexpensive side. Driving down instead of flying, staying with family instead of at hotels, only going to one theme park on one day... I wish money was no object, then we'd stay at nice on site hotels and skip all the lines and go to all the parks lol. But for now I have to just try to avoid the worst of the crowds. :D

Love that magazine :) That article was the one that got me to subscribe to it to begin with. Since then, I've had a few articles published in it myself, read every issue from cover to cover, and thoroughly enjoy it!

I have no idea, but that sounds like such a great experience, the traveling and stopping in random places and just experiencing different aspects of life. I wish I could do it! Is there something you can do to volunteer, you and the kids? Then you can start feeling the people you meet out to find out whether there are any homeschool opportunities...you can look on meetup.com, you can use online support, if there's a library, you can ask there, if there's a public school, you can ask them do they have homeschoolers (who would have to report to the public school)... not sure what else to suggest, I've never been in that situation!

I love that idea. I agree with all of it. I think I would also write a series of letters to my children, maybe one that could be given to them each year on their birthday, that would address things that I thought might be relevant to them at each given age and maybe give some motherly guidance and let them know how much I loved them and encouraging them to follow their dreams and to be happy and so on. I would also write down whatever memories I had of THEM (my kids), cute and funny things they said and did, memories we shared and so on, for them to look back on. I would take a lot of pictures of myself, by myself and especially with them, even though I hate the way I look in pictures, because pictures will be all they have. I guess I would talk to them at a level they can understand and be honest with them so it wouldn't come as a shock to them when it did happen, answer their questions, let them know how loved they are- but that I want them to be happy, to live happy lives, even after I am gone, etc. I would ask them what things they really want to be able to do with me- and they'd I'd do as many of those things as I could with them while I was still able and while we still had the time. I would make sure my husband and I had discussed AND MADE LEGAL who would care for the kids if something were to unexpectedly happen to HIM.

I'm not going to vote because my daughter learned at age 5- but I didn't teach her, she learned in public school Kindergarten, and I don't want to skew the results for homeschoolers. My son just turned 5 last month and he recognizes some letters but he's nowhere near the stage of learning to read. I'm going to (re) start Oak Meadow K with him next September, which will focus on learning the upper case letters of the alphabet, and the following year, when he's nearly 7, we'll be starting Oak Meadow 1, which does the upper AND lower case and then starts doing some blending etc, so I'm GUESSING he's going to learn to read somewhere around age 7. We'll see! (If he does suddenly show an interest before then, of course, I will work with him on it. Right now he has no interest in doing anything that seems like 'formal school' though and doesn't like directed activities, not even crafts. Maybe things will change as he gets closer to 6. We'll have to playit by ear).

Have you watched the "America, The Story Of Us" series yet?

Also I haven't looked at any of the links on this page so I don't know what they entail but here's a link to a site that is a "virtual field trip for the 50 states"... then it's broken down by state and each state has a few links (which I haven't checked out) so you might want to see if this is anything useful: http://ces.nwasco.k12.or.us/staff/lhughitt/5thgr/50states/Vfieldtrips.htm

hm I had already posted that my daughter and I like it, but I wasn't very specific. If anyone is interested, I did this write up about it: http://nancextoo.livejournal.com/124221.html

My kids are pretty far apart so I don't combine them for anything. (They are 10 and 5). Other than that I sign them both up for some of the same extracurricular activities, like homeschool bowling league or soccer at the Y. Occasionally if one is doing a craft the other likes to join in, but that's about it.

I didn't even start SOTW until toward the end of third grade with my daughter. We tend to use it in the summer for fun because over the school year we use Oak Meadow, which is a complete curriculum, and I don't want to add things on top of that. So we did SOTW the summer after third grade and the summer after fourth and we'll go back to it this year after fifth. To be quite honest, I found third grade to be a GOOD year for it. Sure I think some of the picture books (which make up SOME of the supplemental reading) and some of the more simple crafts could be enjoyed by younger kids. But overall, I don't think very young kids would get much out of it and that waiting til a kid is like 2nd-3rd grade would be a good time for it. That's just my opinion, I know some others agree, while still others like using it for K and 1st, so it's up to you!

Here, to join Meetings, you pay either: $40.00 the first week (which includes a registration fee and the meeting fee), and then $14.00 a week threeafter. OR you pay $55.00 for a "commitment plan" which gives you five weeks worth of meetings at $11.00 each with no "registration fee." Or you can wait til around New Year's when they will likely have a "no registration fee special" and then you'd just pay the $14.00 per week (or the $55.00 commitment plan, which you can purchase at any time). These fees do not include "online"- the message boards are always free, but if you're talking about etools, that's a separate fee. You can get the price info on the WW website (where you can also find meetings in your area). Or...you can do what I do which is to just go once to get the new plan info and material (more cost-effective around New Year's when there's no registration fee) and then follow the plan at home but use TOPS for your weight loss support/accountability/weigh ins, since TOPS is MUCH cheaper than Weight Watchers- but TOPS is more of a support group than a diet plan. Hence using WW for the diet and TOPS for the support.

It's nice! Seems it would look great with chocolate brown and cream colors (which are in those pillows anyway...which you said you hate... so I don't know lol)

Hmmm. Maybe I'll give it one shot. We'll chat her up next time we see her and see if we can't get her to be nice haha. But if she continues to be unfriendly after that I will prob talk to her supervisor.

Thanks so much! :) I'm going to look into whether I can go a few days earlier and make it there on the 18th; if not, I'll go on the 28th. I'll avoid President's Week like the plague. :D

I've heard that's because your body retains water while your muscles repair themselves. So I don't work out too hard the day before I have my official weigh in!

Oh, you need to pay to check specific dates? Just out of curiosity, can one of you who are members tell me what it says for February 18th 2011? Not sure if I can make it down a few days earlier and go that day instead, but just in case... thank you in advance :)

Ah so that meant that it was a 9 (very crowded) for President's Week... but a 5 (average) on the 28th...? I guess I can deal with a 5! Better than a 9! lol.

They do that at Disney (the fast track thing, when you go back at a certain time) but not at the Universal theme parks, unfortunately. You have to pay much more for those fast track tickets at Universal! Like an absurd amount more!

Wait, I'm confused, what do you mean by this?