I would go, answer the door, and stand in the doorway and greet her, and say rather urgently, "hey, I'm really in the middle of something with the kids, and don't want them to break their momentum...can I call you later?" That way you've greeted her personally and put the "rejection" on yourself, not her. When you call her later, then explain how interruptions really throw the kids off and it would be better for you if she didn't visit during school time. hth

very funny...glad to know I'm not alone, but not a lot of people are chiming in here, so we must be the minority! (i knew i was weird)

I like real names for cats, and i LOVE Nigel for a cat! Our new cats are named Jack and Oliver. :-)

Sheep in a Jeep, Sheep out to Eat, Sheep Take a Hike...We loved these. Also, "If you Give a Mouse a Cookie."

I HATE doing crafts with the kids. I read all these cute posts about how the kids made this and sculpted that, and did this diorama and glued these pieces, and I feel so overwhelmed. I love reading, narrating, making art and interacting with the material with my kids, but I hate the planning, doing, and CLEAN UP of crafts. :tongue_smilie: anyone else? What do you do instead of all the cool cutesy crafts the other moms make and make you feel bad for not doing?

I am in Prince William...thanks for that. I was not planning to submit the portfolio directly to the county.

I think I have decided to use an evaluator / portfolio approach to assessment this year. My ds hates testing, as do I, and he is getting more and more spread across the spectrum in terms of his grade level abilities--anywhere from second grade to late third grade. I'm wondering if anyone else here uses an evaluator, and could tell me how to get in touch with one, how this works...Basically, what do I do and what should I expect? tia

Another "no game system family with a Wii" for all the reasons stated above. My kids really don't obsess on it (they will for a couple of days if they get a new game) but really, it's just like any other toy--they get it out, play it for a while, then they're on to the next thing. We also play it as a family, and can actually work up a sweat doing so!

i'm a yankee married to a rebel, and grits are of the devil...that's the real reason they fought the civil war.

REALLY???!!! i thought prismacolor were like, IT!? hmmmm....tell me more, I was going to buy more prismacolor for my son.

I am a bit mystified by my ds 8. Until this year, reading, writing, spelling and phonics have been an absolute misery for us. Meanwhile, this boy can speak and express himself and communicate in ways that are unusual for a child, and people comment on it all the time. As my sister said, we came out of the womb with a book in our hands. I honestly don't remember learning to read. I know I came to K (at age 4 turning 5 in Oct) knowing how to read. My son and I share similar personalities and talents, but for some reason the LA things are only just starting to kick in. Is this because he's a boy? While technically he should be a third grader, in LAs he is in all 2nd grade materials...not that I care, don't get me wrong...just wondering if this is a boy thing? Anyone with experience to share in this area?

We've never "done Santa" in our family, but for some odd reason my dd was going deeper into believing in him and the modern Santa tale. This year, so as not to kill her enjoyment of Santa and yet to be true to the man who was St. Nicholas and keep the focus on advent and Christ at Christmas, we are celebrating St. Nicholas day. We have stuffed stockings and hung them for the kids to find in the morning. It's the first year we're adopting this tradition and I have to admit, it feels a bit odd to be doing this NOW, but I was wondering if anyone else does Dec. 6 as St. Nicholas day and what do you do to celebrate it? tia

WE DO, WE DO! and i made soup, and baked pies, and played Christmas music, and decorated the Christmas tree, and then Norman Rockwell came over and painted our family portrait and we all smiled brightly. :D

:iagree:

We bought "Fun Food" by Williams Sonoma company. My dh and ds like to cook together from it. it's so cute. We've enjoyed all the recipes from it.

I too have taken up photography...my focus is so much more on my children, and I want to document for them the things in their lives that are valuable. I love capturing them on "film" (or pixels, or whatever it is these days). I also realize that there are things that used to be cool and now are just empty. Music, especially music by Sting for example, used to move me, but now...nada. Now I listen to his music and think, "Aw, he's just a really talented, misguided, really smart guy." This is where my faith is coming in more and more--it boils down to faith and family. nothing else really matters, so i find my greatest joy in investing fully in these.

I have a girl who boards with us and she is currently subbing in a local elementary school. It is one of the nicer schools, higher socioeconomic area, etc. But when she comes home and tells me the stuff they're teaching these kids in addition to the stuff they need to learn, it's the educational equivalent of pork-barreling! it's no wonder some people recommend a year of "un-schooling" when you first take your kids out of ps! It's positively ridiculous. I'm thankful that I have her to be the "spy" and let me know what they are or are not missing out on. So far the grass on the other side is dead and dried up compared to the grass on our side. It's an unusual thing to have such a great eye into the ps scene, and up until the time she moved in, I worried about the same thing. Not anymore. If that's what they're missing out on each day, then so be it...

I've been there...so much so that I've even questioned if I believed anymore. The thing that changed for me was prayer. I began to plead with the Lord to teach me how to pray, and got really honest with him about everything. Over the years I've learned that He really is big enough to handle everything I can give him, and He desires and LONGS to carry our burdens for us. When I began to seek him in desperate, thirsty prayer, the Word became alive again. It's not all that simple or formulaic as it sounds here--it's been a winding journey that has taken about three years, complete with a lot of emotional healing, but it all started with prayer. Saying the simplest things such as "Lord I want to hear from you today and know that I've heard from you when I lay my head down tonight," and then believing that he'll answer begins a journey of a lifetime. Mine began with this prayer: "Lord, I don't know who I am. I want to know FROM YOU who I am--I need you to tell me." 3 years ago he began to answer that prayer dramatically, and today i am not the same person who prayed that prayer.

I love to read and write poetry. I love read and write both rhymed and free-verse. They happen as the emotion is released. A poem usually just "occurs" for me--it is there at the right time, in the right moment and I don't have to think too much, just feel it. My kids love Shel Silverstein and other poetry that they are exposed to. We love "Poems for Two Voices"--LOVE THEM. We'll read them and then kind of look at each other in wide-eyed wonder at how beautiful it was. amazing. ahhh. sigh. i like this thread. I'll put myself out there and share a poem I wrote--totally free verse so if you like rhyme don't bother. It's just for fun at this time of year in VA. Please respect the copyright, don't "borrow" it without permission. Where I Live by Kelly Mine © 2007 Where I live, winter is drab, and gray, and bare. it’s not exactly frozen tundra, cross-country skiing, snowman-making country. no—it’s cold, and it’s damp, and it chills the soul right down to the bones. in new england (says Kim), fall is fall, Winter is real, spring is late, Summer is a pleasant notion. in Virginia, Fall is the only real gentleman season. and Summer has no boundaries. she begins her descent in poor spring’s term, like a democrat during a republican administration. she is hot, and humid, and relentlessly inhumane on the misery index. people complain and sweat, and sit indoors, peering outside, cursing mosquitos and dreaming of california, or new england, or antartica. she comes in nicely, just early enough to relieve the blahs of winter, but her true colors show when she begins to fry the pansies too soon. she promises a nice, long growing season, only to turn and mock and withhold the rain for two years out of three so you can never really predict if it’s worth planting or not. supposedly, it’s an agricultural state. you know, Thomas Jefferson, Monticello… we’ll see this year if she decides to be or not. she far outstays her welcome, pressing her flesh into fall’s term as well, like a democrat who is loth to leave office. but like a gentleman, Fall quietly waits for her to leave, and may even bid Winter a late entry, to offset her rudeness. even then, Summer will still raise her head and attempt to get the last word. but once she is gone, oh the glory! the colors! the clearest of clear blue skies! playing outside is the greatest indulgence, and the anticipation of Winter’s onset prompts even the air conditioned cave-dwellers to become outdoorsmen. eventually, sir autumn must give way to the Old Man. Christmas is his redemption, but after that, the only entertainment to be had is to watch the writhings of weathermen and traffic reporters as they attempt to make news of wet and soiled roads, filthy cars piled up on the freeways, salt trucks with nothing much to do, and teenagers who have no school, wreaking havoc in the neighborhood. the presidential snowball thrown for the press corps is big news. tomorrow it will be slush and grime and our sad snowman will be deformed, and we will peer outside, cursing the mush, and dreaming of california, or new england, or antartica.

baby alive ballerina barbie superstar barbie inch worm lemon twist my mom's cabinet of canned stuff that i always had to stock when we came home from the grocery store leg warmers roller rinks with friends (why don't kids skate anymore?) banana bikes climbing the rope in the big yard across the street...even more jumping out of a tree with said rope and swinging like a maniac.

NO. you're never really alone are you? those voices assure me that really--i'm not alone. :lol:

The 7-11 update it's all i've got at 12:30 and after two glasses of wine.

My opinion about the advent season and Santa is this: St. Nick was a bishop who followed Christ's command to "not let your left hand know what your right hand is doing" and gave selflessly and cheerfully to those in need, with no desire of recognition. Advent is the season which is meant to prepare our hearts for the coming of Christ. It has become the season of teaching our children to prepare their hearts for the coming of Santa. To my mind, that is idolatry. We tell the truth to our children about St. Nicholas, and how he was a Godly man who wanted people to know Christ. They know that he is not alive, but is in heaven with Jesus, but we still celebrate and remember him by observing the Feast of St. Nicholas on Dec. 6. We do stockings and if there is a need, a secret gift to someone in need, and then for the rest of advent we focus on Jesus. hth.

I'm going to say something here as someone who receives many Christmas letters from lots of people that i truly care about (and I hope you're not offended)--i cannot stand letters that have too much verbage. In spite of the fact that I do love these people, I don't care to know about the minutiae of their lives. I like letters that make me giggle, highlight a few high points of the year, include a couple of pictures, let me know of any tragedy or major triumphs that I may have missed hearing about and stuff of that nature. One page, short and sweet, bring them to the front of my mind, say a prayer for them, and then on to the next letter (i hope it's not a long one). I don't think I would be offended...it's just that if the whole letter is that wordy I probably wouldn't have made it that far in the letter. hope you're not offended by my honest assessment. If you are, then say to yourself "but she doesn't KNOW me and how great I am." and you'd be right. :001_smile:

I find this very unusual, and extremely risky. I would be insane if my DH had a "best friend" at work who was a woman. The kinds of things that I share with my women friends I would never share with a man, and if a man were seeking that kind of closeness with me I would seriously question his motives. my dh is of the sincere opinion that men and women cannot be longterm bfs. i'm inclined to believe him.