luuknam
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Posts posted by luuknam
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On 4/7/2024 at 8:37 PM, KrissiK said:
12 hours people. Nobody is taking this thread seriously.
Honestly, most of the board (K-8, High School, etc) is looking like not many people are taking it seriously. I see an okay number of old-timers but I guess too few new names?
Also, apparently I have an egg allergy (did an elimination diet in Nov/Dec, didn't complete the reintroduction stage because I was too tired of the lack of diversity and having to cook every.single.thing from scratch, but apparently no breakfast burritos for me anymore). Not mysteriously doubling over in pain multiple times a week is nice though.
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2 hours ago, 8filltheheart said:
Is the 13 yr old your oldest child that you are discussing? If so, definitely be flexible in making decisions as you progress. Until you are putting together a college app for your homeschooler, everything is hypothetical. 🙂
Thanks. I've read quite a number of your posts over the years and it seems you do an awesome job with your kids, and I by no means meant that it's wrong to count Alg1 etc as high school credits in middle school or w/e.
The 13yo is my youngest; the other is 16, in 10th grade, and currently taking his first DE course (statistics), because for him the exposure to a classroom environment etc would be good (he's taken high school English I online last year and and is currently taking English II online, but other than that he hasn't been in a classroom or had an outside teacher in years, so with his HFA it seemed prudent for him to start getting some exposure to that, and getting some college credits likely would be a nice thing as well (so far he's adamant he wants to just live at home and commute to the local U after he graduates high school, so since he's taking his DE class in the same U system it's nice to begin to chip away at it and maybe he'll double major, or graduate in 3 years and then do a master's, or who knows... I'm encouraging him to at least consider applying to some other schools to see if any make some great offers, but anyway, he's got a bit of time. Living at home and attending the local U would at least be almost free in this state assuming he maintains a decent GPA)).
The 13yo I think is a lot more likely to be eager to apply to a variety of colleges, but seems to have no interest in high-pressure environments, jumping through a bunch of hoops to look better on an application, etc... which, honestly, the stuff some high schoolers do in order to look good is beyond silly, but those are the kinds of applicants he'd be competing against. So, if his app were to end up looking good, it'd be through a coincidence of pursuing things he likes that would just happen to look good, rather than doing sports, volunteering, playing an instrument, etc just to add it to an app (the house we bought a year ago did come with a piano in the 'saloon', so he's started learning that). But, TBD. 13 is young, and college app season is 3.5 years away or so (other than for DE, which does want to see a high school transcript to apply for DE, hence the original question - we're still undetermined when/what he might take for DE, but there was a class that he currently thinks he wants to take as soon as he's old enough, which is next spring, so... :shrugs:).
New question... if I were to give 8th grade credit for Astronomy and 9th grade for Physics, should I for consistency purposes give 8th grade credit for Integrated Math I in 8th grade while I'm at it (for lack of a better course name... some mishmash of the second half of Alg 1, the first half of Alg 2, some Geometry and Basic Trig)? Next year we'll probably do a mishmash of the second half of Alg 2, the rest of Geometry, and some Logic and/or Discrete Math, so I can't easily just, say, call 8th grade Alg 2 and 9th grade Geometry (though I suppose I could... if they both get finished by the end of 9th grade - math is just hard to predict whether a kid will 'get' it... this kid got stuck on Alg 1 for quite a while). Integrated Math I sounds so wishy-washy to give high school credit in middle school for though.
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On 2/10/2024 at 5:16 PM, SilverMoon said:
Electives: It's an election year so we really should cover some civics and fallacies.
Lol. You're not wrong. We're planning on doing US & Comparative Politics for our entering 9th and 11th graders and mixing logic into their Integrated Math I & III - the politics class was partially on purpose for election year reasons, but I hadn't made the connection with logic yet (that just happened to seem like the best thing to mix into my 11th grader's math next year and I figured I'd throw some in for the 9th grader too).
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18 hours ago, 8filltheheart said:
FWIW, you completely lost me on no 8th grade classes being on the transcript unless there is something like an AP to back it up. I dont "back up" my kids' transcripts. It has never been a problem with any school. Their transcripts have been accepted at face value. But, really, most 8th graders are taking low level high school classes like alg, geo, biology, or a foreign language. There are no "proof" tests. If the only valid 8th grade high school level courses are AP level, then they must have completed all standard 9th/10th/and even 11th grade classes late elementary or early middle school.
I didn't really answer the test thing. Basically, in my mind, having an AP or CLEP or something to back up the class makes it impressive enough to bother listing on a high school transcript even if it's done in 8th grade (plus, colleges would get the test scores anyway, so might as well list a class to go with them). But anything else, is kind of like... it's not like all high school classes are the same level to begin with. My wife says that when she took a regular English class in Junior year in high school (she was fed up with the honors class so dropped it and switched to regular) the teacher covered material that they'd covered in 5th grade in her gifted elementary school. But that doesn't mean that she got English 3 on her high school transcript from 5th grade, kwim? It just means that the high school's regular English class was terrible.
As a public schooler, I could see that if the student actually takes a high school class at the high school while they're in 8th grade, it'd end up on their transcript because that's how the system works. But as a homeschooler it's all more, whatever. I'm sure there are plenty of rigorous schools in the US where plenty of 7th-8th graders take harder classes than plenty of students at shittier schools take in 9th-12th grade (40% of high school seniors can't pass the GED... facepalm). But they don't put it on their transcripts, so why should I?
I hope that makes sense. I also didn't mean to say that every class on a high school transcript needs to be backed up with a test - I don't. I just don't see a point giving high school credit for middle school work unless it's so advanced it's worth mentioning.
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18 hours ago, 8filltheheart said:
I would simply put 1 on the transcript for 8th grade and the other as 1 in 9th. There is no reason to overcomplicate and no one will care if they were split in 2 simultaneously.
FWIW, you completely lost me on no 8th grade classes being on the transcript unless there is something like an AP to back it up. I dont "back up" my kids' transcripts. It has never been a problem with any school. Their transcripts have been accepted at face value. But, really, most 8th graders are taking low level high school classes like alg, geo, biology, or a foreign language. There are no "proof" tests. If the only valid 8th grade high school level courses are AP level, then they must have completed all standard 9th/10th/and even 11th grade classes late elementary or early middle school.
Thanks. I thought most schools don't put Alg 1 or French 1 or w/e taken in 8th grade on the high school transcript, and just leave colleges to infer that if the kid is taking Geometry or French 2 in 9th grade that the kid took Alg 1 or French 1 at some point before that (I haven't heard of kids taking high school bio or geo in middle school, so no clue what they do with that credit wise - are they still expected to take 4 years of science in high school?). I could probably give high school credit for almost all of my 8th grader's current classes, but it'd seem odd to bring a year worth of high school credits from 8th grade into a high school diploma - like, why not call it 9th grade then?
I don't think this kid would be well-served graduating sooner though, and I don't think it'd make the transcript more competitive to list high school credits from 8th grade for things like our mishmash of the last part of Alg1, first half of Alg2, first part of Geometry and basic Trig, French 1(-2?) (doing the first two books of high school French this year), etc. Would they care seeing Astronomy and Western Civ since 1500 in 8th grade? I could just do like you said and list Physics as 9th grade... to me it felt like it might be dishonest to portray it as having been finished in a year when it took two, but I know I am (very) good at overthinking things too.
Btw, so far this kid doesn't seem to have any interest in applying to hypercompetitive schools, but at 13 it's possible that might change... though I doubt it.
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13 hours ago, Nart said:
Thanks for the info.
You're welcome. The reputable organizations really try to match students with host families on a variety of points, so if he/you'd communicate these points as priorities with them they'll do their best (obviously not everything can be matched perfectly, especially if the wish list becomes long, and also dependent on cultural etc realities in the host country - if it's not safe to walk outside at night, you won't be able to find a reasonable host family that'll let your son do that, kwim? - and in some countries kids are more independent at, say, 16 than in others, so that'll affect local expectations).
My knowledge of boarding schools is basically only from books and TV, but it's my understanding that some of them can be rather strict and not leave much freedom of going out or on walks at night etc. I'd imagine that both with boarding schools and host families it's a ymmv thing. Same with academic expectations - it'll vary by school, though it's my impression that Western and East Asian countries are much stricter about expecting lots of academics even if they're not English-speaking than countries in the global south, largely because of their overall cultures. A lot of the country pages on the AFS website also describe the vibe wrt how focused on academics they are. AFS does, btw, expect students to learn the language of the host country, but some countries enforce this a lot more than others - just letting you know, because you can't just go to them and say "hey, place me in Thailand, but I don't plan on learning Thai" - they'll be unhappy, but realistically, a lot of kids didn't learn much, and a lot of schools/host families didn't particularly expect them to learn much (I was placed in an area where even the high school English teachers' English royally sucked, and my Thai was good when I left, but see the whole "matching students with host families" etc... I'd requested that).
My first host family was a pretty good match, btw, and maybe I should've stayed with them the entire year. The language barrier didn't help in resolving issues (and I was not the best at communicating at 17/18yo - I probably have Asperger's). A lot of the communication I did was with my twin 14yo host sisters, and one day I said I was going to bicycle into town and they told me that dad (who only spoke Lao, because this was the Isaan, and who wasn't home much so I didn't talk to him much) had said I wasn't allowed to because it was too dangerous. I later found out that they lied (because they were worried it might be too dangerous, not out of malice), and it destroyed a bunch of trust, especially given that I was so reliant on them (what else might they have lied about?). So, anyway, we didn't successfully resolve that, and I got placed with a different host family.
FWIW, different languages have different difficulty levels to learn for English speakers. If you scroll down on the FSI website, there's a list with difficulty estimates and time to learn different ones to the same level. This would affect both the odds of your son learning to communicate well enough with their host family in a reasonable amount of time, as well as the odds of the host family knowing English to a reasonable extent. Obviously, there are cultural/economic/geographic/historical reasons for learning or not learning English, but in most European countries host families, classmates, etc will know a lot of English, whereas in some countries many fewer or much worse (and in places like Thailand, English is more commonly known in touristy areas or Bangkok, and less in places like the Isaan).
So, anyway, lots of pros and cons to different countries, languages, host family vs boarding school, etc. I'm sure your son will have lots to think about. I'd recommend reaching out to some exchange organization(s) and seeing if he can talk to some people - they might be able to help him figure out what might work best for him too (I'd initially asked about Hong Kong (I'd wanted to go to China but they didn't send there that year from where I was), and they strongly recommended Thailand instead, thinking it'd be a better fit for me), and let him talk to some former exchange students from the US or current exchange students from abroad.
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8 minutes ago, Porridge said:
I don't think you need the "II" -- to me, it's confusing. Are you adding the II because they were done over 2 years?
Do you consider the physics to be equivalent to a full high school physics course? And is the astronomy equivalent to a full high school credit? If so, I would list it as two separate classes, each 1 credit
Yes, because it's a continuation of this year's class - the second half of each book. The thought of simply calling it Physical Science (no I or II) occurred to me, but in the course description it'd seem odd to say "continuation of 8th grade physical science" and list the chapters of the 2nd half of each book but not have "II" in the course name. Kind of like how some people list French II as a 9th grade class without listing 8th grade French I on their high school transcript. Except, of course, who on earth takes two years of physical science? Physical Science II makes it sound like a kind of remedial choice of a course.
The physics is (slightly) lighter than I'm having my 10th grader do (who's doing Giancoli in one year this year - no astronomy), I'm assigning almost no level 3 problems for the 8th grader and a few more level 1 problems, but it could count as a high school physics credit (Giancoli is an alg-based college physics text, and I did some just-in-time teaching of basic trig and logarithms for the 8th grader). Arny is a college astronomy text, but I'm only assigning the test yourself questions and not doing any labs for that, so... odds are it's no worse than what some high school out there is doing but it feels too light for a high school course to me.
I'm not sure it would really matter all that much in the end... this kid is (recently) considering majoring in engineering, so preferably would take calc-based physics in 11th or 12th grade, at which point who'd even care what their 9th grade science is called...? (though also wants to do a year abroad, so not 100% sure there'll be time to get calc-based physics done before graduating).
I'm not a big fan of subject-based transcripts nor of giving high school credit for 8th grade work that doesn't have an AP or something to back it up. That said, I likely have most of a year to decide what to call this (or change my mind about subject-based transcripts). We might consider doing a DE course spring semester of freshman year, not sure yet, but they require a high school transcript to enroll, so I'd need to decide before DE (a subject-based transcript for a 9th grader seems weird to me). The local CCs require you to be at least a freshman and 14, so that won't make the kid eligible for DE until then anyway (Nov birthday).
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10 minutes ago, Porridge said:
though this kid has some DE credits and has done well on AP exams in 8th and 9th (and hopefully 10th),
But it is hard to find community...)
Yeah, that might help (I have no idea). You could try to start a thread about finding community, though depending on your location it could be not-so-easy. If you have a CC nearby you can't possibly be too in-the-middle-of-nowhere that there might not be some options though (hopefully).
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On 3/1/2024 at 2:14 PM, Porridge said:
We are in the midst of our now-annual consideration of moving to school. However, I'm outlining rough plans so we're not scrambling if DC stays home.
I thought that high school is kind of do-or-don't... that moving back to public school after 10th grade almost certainly causes major problems with the school not accepting homeschool credits and the kid being forced to take a ridiculously heavy load + summer classes and/or an extra year of high school or whatnot? I'd be happy to hear though if that's not the case (anymore?). I kind of thought that at this point, if I were to drop dead or whatever he'd basically just take a (light) DE schedule or something.
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On 3/5/2024 at 7:09 PM, Porridge said:
have you been happy with the quality of ASU classes? I have heard of ASU, but worried that the quality would be very low. Are there any that Peter has found particularly good (or, as my DC might put it, "less bad")?
I'm not Wendy (nor Peter), but, assuming we're talking about Arizona State, I graduated last year with plenty of experience at other colleges... ahem. Some profs are good, some are largely absent, some are very easy graders, some are not... it's certainly not the best university in the US, but it's also not the worst. I liked Phil of Sci (McElhoes), and Disaster!. I get the impression some majors have stronger online classes than others too, but I couldn't say for certain (I only took something like 40 credit hours because I had more than enough transfer credit).
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Unrelated question: my 8th grader is taking two years to cover Physics (Giancoli) and Astronomy (Arny) by doing half of each in 8th grade and half in 9th (I figured it'd be lighter by spreading them over two years than doing one in one and the other in another, given how much work Giancoli is). How would I describe that on their high school transcript?
Physics II & Astronomy II
Physics/Astronomy II
Physical Science II
Etc...?
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AFS India says they offer a boarding school option (though I think the student would still spend some time with a host family during school breaks). It's $15,800 for a year (no semester option), so much more affordable (especially considering you won't have to pay for your son's food etc for a year). I did a year in Thailand through AFS a couple of decades ago (but with a host family, not boarding school). Most semester programs I've looked at for my own kids tend to cost almost as much as year-long programs, fwiw.
I found this link for volunteer programs abroad where you can enter a lot of parameters like language and country (you can google a list of English-speaking countries). Something like that would probably be better for a gap year or a summer or something, but ymmv.
Another option is to do a semester or year abroad while in college, either planned through whichever college your son attends at the time or arranged by himself.
Is there a reason he doesn't want to stay with a host family? I did have some issues with my host family and switched partway through the year (and then again right before the end of the year), but there are upsides to a host family as well and I'd happily opt for a host family again if I were to get a do-over.
Also, fwiw (just throwing this out there in case he's unaware), being an exchange student in a non-English speaking country tends to come with widely varying expectations wrt learning the local language - my 8th grader wants to do a year abroad in Switzerland and to be placed in the French-speaking part you need 2 years of French, whereas in Thailand a lot of the other exchange students knew only minimal Thai by the end of the year.
Likewise, the types of classes vary by country etc... I took things like dance, music, drawing, sword fighting, takraw, Thai language, cooking, and only the occasional academic class, whereas in countries like Australia the expectation is to take the same kind of classes as you'd take in the US (I also went right after high school graduation, which was an option for certain countries back then, so basically taking a bunch of fluff for a year worked great for that, but it's my understanding that almost all kids placed in Thailand took a relatively high amount of fluff due to the language barrier).
EDIT: NOLS offers semester abroad outdoorsy things, but they're 18+ (the summer in Alaska one says 17+). I've done wilderness first responder (10 days) through them at a camp in NY and recert in NM, and they seemed solid; no idea about their abroad programs though.
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10 hours ago, Kareni said:
Drain flies - Help!
First sinking kitchens and now flying drains...life is definitely getting exciting!
Regards,
Kareni
See, I thought that the flies were supposed to be drained of blood. I don't have advice for that though.
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So, this is pretty out there, but for some reason it's the thing that popped into my head reading the OP, so... DBT. It helps people be accept/cope/be okay with/function despite extreme emotions. It's been shown to be effective (at least for some people) for a wide range of issues, including anxiety. But, it could very well be that one of the other suggestions above is more appropriate.
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4 hours ago, fairfarmhand said:
We had his hearing tested by an audiologist yesterday and overall it was fine. A tiny bit of impairment in his right ear at higher frequencies. Gonna retest In a few months to make sure nothing is getting worse.
I got diagnosed as having a mild hearing impairment, iirc my doctor (when I was 12) said that my hearing was like that of a 70yo or something (I had ear tubes when I was 10.5yo, which helped, my hearing was really bad before that). I probably do have CAPD, but no diagnosis. Any kind of background noise makes it exponentially harder to understand what people are saying. I watch TV with subtitles on, though that's not necessary for every show - it varies based on how much background noise there is. Most of the videos for my online classes had subtitles, though some were AI-generated, and the ones that didn't at least could be played back to try to figure it out a second, third, etc time or to ask someone else their opinion on what on earth was said (didn't really need to do that last thing).
Having problems with multi-step instructions sounds more like ADHD or language-processing disorder like BandH said or something than CAPD to me, so long as you say them clearly enough (and possibly with enough of a pause between each).
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If you can't make staying with friends/relatives work, could you buy/borrow a cheap used travel trailer and find free/cheap campsites in your area (if your vehicle can't tow that much, do you know anyone who could do that for you)? BLM, state parks, etc have places where you can stay for 2 weeks (or some places more, iirc) before having to move, and you can rotate through them. That way you could rent out the house (fully furnished!) or sell it, because the last thing you want is to foreclose on it, and even if you're motivated to sell it and the buyer is motivated to buy it, it can take a while to actually sell it (after we made an offer it took TWO MONTHS before it was finally ours, ARGH!, and that was despite the fact that the house had already been inspected by the previous person making an offer, who died before completing the purchase (obviously we did have it inspected too, as was required by the mortgage company)). Not saying that all sales take that long, but it sounds like you really need to work on renting or selling it now. On the bright side, I feel like in most places around the country house prices are a bit bubbly, so if you do sell, you might get lucky and be able to purchase another home when prices are lower again.
Has your husband gone to employment agencies like Manpower? What about trying to do some menial jobs (mowing the yard etc) for neighbors? You also mentioned medical costs... if you have substantial out-of-pocket costs for medications, could you try asking your doctor if there are older meds you can try that would be (much) cheaper (that may or may not have more side effects... honestly, I often feel a lot of newer meds that are touted as having fewer side effects simply have a shorter list because they're new and people haven't reported as many yet)?
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6 hours ago, bookbard said:
I agree with that, although I'm still hopeful that Covid can be beaten in the medium to long term. I just read that a quarter of people on a survey in the UK believe that 'covid was a hoax'. I think it's the 'was' that gets me. What part of Covid is in the past? Almost everyone in the UK has had covid and with the numbers of deaths, most people would know someone who has died from it. It is incredible, Orwellian, that people can be so easily led to believe that 'Covid never existed'.
I'm not sure that most people calling it a hoax believe covid never existed; I think a fair number of people think that yes, it exists, but no, it really is just a cold/flu and all the drama was a hoax.
IIRC I don't know anybody who died from it (I've seen a few reports on a game I play of players who died of it, but I didn't ever talk to them), but I also don't know all that many people. A fair number of the people who knew someone who died from it might have known an elderly person who died from it who they might think might have died from the flu a month later if they hadn't gotten covid, kwim?
Not that I believe it was a hoax; the excess deaths numbers are pretty clear, and a large number of deniers are clearly rather ignorant and/or batty. Even after the vaccines were out and it was pretty clear the odds of family or I dying from it were pretty low, it was still scary that hospitals were overwhelmed and people with other conditions sometimes didn't get needed care, which is something that a lot of deniers conveniently chose to ignore too.
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14 hours ago, Wishes said:
Maybe send BGM hard copy of an annual school photo, or pic with Santa, or whatever took over Sears photos. She gets one or two photos she can put on the fridge and look at. She could take a photo of the photo to send to A’s mom but it’s an extra step that she might not follow through with.
Biograndma might not, but she lives with the biodad, who probably is much more likely to (iirc she gave him the pics and then he gave the pics to biomom?).
After the update, my vote is definitely no more photos unless extremely unrecognizable (no face). Part of me is wondering how old biograndma is, whether she's likely to still be alive when your kid is 18, but then the other part of me thinks that even if she isn't (or possibly especially if she isn't) he might like to read the email back-and-forths from her, so it doesn't really matter. But, I'd go super generic.
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1 hour ago, maize said:
That's such a preposterous, incompetently clueless presumption. Most normal females are done growing well before 18. I was my adult height by about age 13, and while I hit puberty a bit on the young side it wasn't early enough to be considered precocious.
This, and I didn't even get my first period until I was 12. My passport (which I first got at 17) even has me listed as 2.5 cm taller than I am because the person at the desk figured that "surely you'll still grow a bit," so they rounded up (and didn't subtract the height of the shoes I was wearing either), because I'm rather short by Dutch standards. I was thinking that it was extremely unlikely I'd still grow since I hadn't grown in years (even from 12 to 13 I only grew like half an inch), but figured it was pretty funny so went with it.
I wonder how the bar association feels about judges lacking, well, judgment. But, it sounds like the judge didn't misinterpret the law but only was grossly incompetent wrt biology and psychology, so... probably another dead end?
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On 6/11/2023 at 6:11 PM, Scarlett said:
She is aware I am upset. Did I even share her text afterwards?
<<<<Hey Scarlett, I know you were trying to be helpful today. You didn’t know I already had a plan to get my stuff home. All is well. We got the small mirrors in the house and <friend> brought the long mirror home.>>>>>
:hugs:
I know you two already texted back and forth since this so it's too late to reply to this, but going to give my idea for possible future use:
"Hey mom, thank you for noticing I was just trying to be helpful. I know it may seem silly, and you probably feel like this text basically was an apology already (it very well might in her head), but it'd make me feel so much better if you were to say "I'm sorry about telling you to shut up in front of everyone" directly. I look forward to seeing how the mirrors look installed! Love you."
And it'd be perfectly reasonable to sit down with her one day and tell her how confused you feel by on the one hand being expected to anticipate needs but on the other hand also being expected to not do things for her she wants to do for herself. Maybe insert some joke about somehow not having come equipped with a mind-reading unit (if you think that's the kind of thing that might help).
Maybe she'll say some things that might be helpful. Maybe she won't. But in case she wasn't aware enough, it'll make her more aware that you're trying and that you're confused about how to balance opposing values she taught you. You might even want to mention that she taught you those values including the ways in which you feel/have experienced they're good values to have - plan ahead to think of examples. Then, after good examples, maybe mention some cases where they tripped you up, and, if she tells you you just "should have known," be firm on "mom, I really wish I would've known, but while I try my best, I can't read minds so I will make mistakes." Maybe this will work great, maybe it won't. If it's not helping, maybe just end on some platitudes about how you wish life and social interactions were easier, but you love her, and give her a hug, and then switch to smalltalk (think of some topic in advance - of course, if she just becomes horrible, leaving is fine too).
Hope that helps.
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Not really. It's basically chaos theory at that point, with sensitive dependence on initial conditions (like the butterfly effect). The furthest I tend to get is "wow, my life would probably be crazy different!" and then imagination fails me. Like, I'm capable of thinking that I might be a successful scientist with a PhD, or dead, or have no kids or many more than I currently do, or living in another country, etc, but it's too open-ended to really even bother. It's complete fantasy, and anything I could imagine could easily be completely different and way worse (well, I guess you can't go much worse than dead, other than maybe tied up in some torturous serial-killer's basement).
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This trailer has the same floor plan as the one we lived in for the past 3 years: https://www.jayco.com/rvs/travel-trailers/2022-jay-flight/32bhds/. It's roughly 300 sq ft inside if the slide-outs are out. If you were to take that floor plan and remove the part with the bunk beds, you could make it a rather livable smaller place for one adult (though I'd be inclined to remove the bunk beds and install bookcases, lol). It doesn't require folding or flipping anything to live there (other than there is storage under the couches surrounding the table and under the big bed, but just don't store stuff there that you want to use regularly). The couches can be converted into beds, but it sleeps 4 people without doing that. We did get a crack in the bottom of the bathtub towards the end and fixed it, but it cracked again not too long after, so I'm not sure about recommending the bathtub they used, but, it was big enough to sit in and take a bath (but not stretch out/lie in, obviously, and if you're tall, sitting in it might not be so great).
Like others have said, check and double-check zoning, permit requirements, etc (you can apply for a zoning variance if necessary... which you might or might not be able to get, but, it's worth a shot). I'd also be hesitant about tiny houses on wheels, since more and more places are making rules against them and might or might not grandfather you in if/when they do.
If, like someone above mentioned, you're not allowed to do a full apartment above the garage (I'm having a really hard time imagining a bathroom isn't allowed, since the US seems bathroom obsessed with houses, but okay), cooking can definitely be done on hotplates, electric wok, electric rice cooker, etc (my first half year in the US we lived in my in-laws' garage apartment and cooked on a shelf we folded down over the toilet (with the toilet lid closed, duh!) in the bathroom). Also, my grandparents' house had sinks in every bedroom other than the attic ones, but only one bathroom in the entire house - you might be able to get away with a sink but no toilet/shower if you somehow aren't allowed to do a 1/2 or full bathroom? Not ideal, of course, but should still be nicer than nothing.
Whether an apartment above the garage or a separate building is preferable probably would depend on too many other details about your property and general surroundings, and might change with demographic, cultural, and building trends too.
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9 hours ago, teachermom2834 said:
I am not surprised that parents ride along here and it is allowed. Parents I know are extremely protective. Like we will be out to dinner with other parents and teens and dd will go to the restroom herself and other parents will send their girls with her or follow her because they are concerned I am letting her go alone. So that is a whole other topic but I am sure a driving school that didn’t allow parents along would not survive here.
That sounds crazy, tbh. I also wouldn't call a 15yo a young teen, just a teen.
If it's common around there for parents to be in the backseat and your daughter wants it, I don't see a big problem with riding along at least the first time, but it seems odd to me... kids that age should be working hard on independence, since the moment they turn 18 they're legally adults and might do whatever and go wherever and it'd be good if they had experience doing things without mom or dad being there. Now, if I had a bad vibe about the instructor and I really didn't have an option to use a different instructor, then that'd be different.
FWIW, when I was 14, once a month I'd bicycle to the train station and take a train to another city, walk to where I needed to go, work on a magazine with others, and then take the 11-something pm train back and then bicycle home (getting home after midnight). I did a year as an exchange student living with a host family in rural Thailand right after graduating high school, when I was 17. I did truck driving school with a male instructor and 5 male classmates when I was 23, and after graduating that the company I was with put me in a truck with a male trainer from some African country who's English sucked and who thought women belonged at home. That didn't work out so I got a new trainer after a week or so, and spent a month with a different male trainer (both were OTR, so, sleeping in the same truck, etc (bunk beds)). I also in various places I've lived have had a bad habit of going for a walk around the block late at night. Nothing bad ever happened to me. I'm almost 5'4", so not big, but I do have enough of a "don't mess with me" vibe that probably helps, though most guys wouldn't want to put their job and freedom at risk over a stupid move on a 15yo (or any age).
Anyway, long story short, if I had a bad vibe or my kid really begged me to ride along I probably would, but in the latter case I'd encourage my kid to try the second lesson without me (again, assuming neither my kid nor I had a bad vibe about the instructor). I need to enroll my 15yo in driving school the moment we get our driver's licenses here (can't get him a learner's permit until we are residents, lol), and the thought of riding along hadn't even crossed my mind (and I don't think it would've had he been a girl).
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Not sure. We just bought a house in NM after traveling around for 3 years, but, I'm not convinced that that's the best option wrt COL and climate change. We lived 8 years in Western NY and it's better on those two counts (climate change will likely make lake effect snow a bit worse though for a decade or two before making it less).
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24 minutes ago, Corraleno said:
Knowing that your child has a mentally unstable BM who will never stop thinking you "stole" her baby and wanting to "get him back," it's a serious security risk for her to know what he looks like as he grows up. She may not have the wherewithal to travel to see him now, but things could certainly change in 5 or 10 years. Who knows what AI capabilities will be like in the future, you could send a photo of your then-10-yr-old son to BGM with what you think is a neutral background only to find that AI can geolocate it, and crazy BM could find out where he is. Safer to just send an occasional email to BGM with generic info and no pictures.
Also, aging software already exists. It probably has limited accuracy since it can't predict what weight a person will be, or what haircut they'll have, but, the shorter into the future it has to project, the more accurate it's likely to be.
I don't know enough about the backstory, but if you send any more pics, it seems they'll definitely need to be happy ones. Personally, I'd maybe be happier seeing more of a mix of a range of emotions, because I wouldn't think a happy pic once a year or w/e proves the kid is happy, but the biomom at least clearly cannot handle less than happy pics. If she's going to end up seeing any pics, at least make it easy for her to believe that her kid might be better off with you, or be okay with you, etc. I'd imagine the doubt of what someone else is doing with your kid could really eat away at people.
Personally (not knowing more background), I might go with the one-more-goof and they're out, and/or just send them the occasional pic of a drawing the kid made.
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Ignore this thread!
in General Education Discussion Board
Posted
Yes, thank you.
Luckily not. I'd probably do the same thing and take my sweet time if that became a thing. And then speed up nice and fast in the wrong gear covering the car behind me in a huge cloud of black smoke (thanks to whomever stole the CAT off our heavy-duty truck).