I know much of what you take in a multi vitamin or other pills is found in your pee. But, some of it has to be working, because millions of pregnant women swear life is easier if they take the multi (hair better, more energy, etc). And tons of folk who are anemic benefit from iron supplementation.

So why do all kinds of reports say not to bother? I can see that basing your diet on actually absorbing the full amount listed on the bottle would be silly.

And I certainly don't think anemic folk should skip the steak (ok fine spinach) But I don't understand avoiding all vitamins pills entirely....

That was the best compliment we received last night. One little boy thought the party was so cool he wants invited next time!

We also had a very surprised father say "I had a lot of fun" he seemed to think fun wasn't supposed to happen for the adults or something!

Fortunatly my husband and I (and this fellow) are just plain big kids, so we always have fun!

Though it wouldn't have been nearly as wonderful if it were not for our wonderful friends. One made the icing and managed a wonderful free form dragon on the cake -plus managed to figure out how to make the dragon, One prepped all the fruit and veggies and Snacky stuff -plus kept the kitchen running the whole party and helped everyone figure out the way to difficult craft), while I lazed on the floor making a lego dragon (with help from another friend) and the third took over the grill so my husband could aid in the story telling for the Dragon lair hunt. The lego helper then switched to being the 'minotaur' who wouldn't let anyone into the 'mountains' (JCs room) until it was time - and all the magic words had been found. (They were hidden in GMCs room)

There were a few incidents, boys getting rather rambunctious with balloons and our poor minotaur finally had enough and popped all the balloons. (Can't say as I blame him. he did ask the boys to stop and they were not listening..not sure how to avoid that next year)

My husband not only ate some cake, he had a second slice..he likes my cake, but not my icing so since we had a pro make wonderful icing this year he ate it!

One thing we did different this year, we didn't buy anything we can't eat, so no white buns, just whole wheat (only one kid wouldn't eat em, and he wouldn't eat anything). No yellow mustard (only one kid asked for mustard and he ate spice brown)

So the total cost can be reduced, since we get to eat all the leftovers

No I have to figure out how to make 'Flowers and Fireworks' as much fun (UE and JCs current pick for their party..close together they share - I have time, party in late October/early Novemebr)

Food came to about 45$, burgers dogs, plates and cups, cheese, grapes, carrots, and juice. (yes first time ever we bought paper plates)

"Treasure' came to about $10, coins, necklaces, balloons, and metallic eggs we had with stickers in them.

Craft came to zero, construction paper we already had, a pattern and directions from

here and paper rolls from a friend, plus fasteners that we already had.

Decorations were $2, crepe paper streamers per Gmc's request and signs we made ourselves.

And no dragon eggs , we went to three stores yesterday looking for them, not a single dragon to be found, not stickers, pencils, plastic toys, nothing. (or rather nothing cheap enough to buy a dozen or so of)

cake of course cost supplies to make, but I like baking . Plus some odd condiments that we already have for the burgers and dogs.

so total cost

We have been trying the old underwear method for potty training my youngest at night. (he is fine in the day, fairly good at nap, just can't seem to get nighttime)

So after two weeks of washing the sheets every single night, I gave up, I hunted up an old diaper and put it on him, and added diapers to the list for the store today. At 8 months pregnant, I can barely get the regular laundry done much less one extra load each day. (also he tends to sleep thru peeing, not waking till morning, so he is getting a rash and being wet doesn't seem to be helping)

And wouldn't you know it, he was dry this morning!

Now I don't know, if I should buy diapers or not?

Birthdays are sorta a big deal here, and sorta not.

On the one hand you always get dinner of your choice, and a cake on the day of your birthday, plus a present from mom and dad. (and the family sings)

Generally the next event (Sunday school, music class, scouts, whatever) there are homemade cupcakes, though this year with me feeling so bad we made brownies instead..

Then their usually is a party, with a birthday kid picked theme (we guess for the younger years) cake is decorated to fit, and there are always balloons. The balloons are because my son is certain there aught to be balloons at a birthday. We had them for his and his sisters and so next year..it was a tradition, be careful traditions can start over anything done once!

So for GMC this year, he picked dragons. we have an "Inn of the flaming dragon" sign for the kitchen, we will be making dragons out of tubes and construction paper and fasteners at the party. Hopefully dragon eggs will be 'hatched' from an 'incubator' and then a 'dragon lair' will be found with a mysterious map..one that we made yesterday.

The map is really cool, I am quite proud of it. We used the back of an old roll of wallpaper, happened to be a nice old looking off white. The kids drew different landmarks and I labeled it. Then we took it to a candle and burned it all up. Not enough to ruin the words, but enough to make it look old. I also dumped some of the ash back on it and dripped a bit of candle wax over it. looks very dirty now and dusty, like it has been around for ages rather than freshly made yesterday.

And yesterday making the map I was again reminded of why I like homeschooling..so much more efficient. After a morning covering adding and subtracting mixed numbers, pluralizing Spanish nouns, reviewing capitalization and comma rules, among other things, we still had all the time in the world to make a map.

Every birthday that we actually do crafts we tend to buy double the supplies..just in case, because I have no response negative or affirmative from so many folk!

Now extra food we can use but extra crafts are usually kinda specialized (aprons for the chef, crowns for the princess, dragon eggs for the umm dragon friend?)

I really think a RSVP email is a simple thing that takes just a few minutes and can really make a difference in ones planning (not to mention the budget of the party.

Oh and the extra aprons wen to the scouts to try and keep the paint off the uniforms. (what is so hard about removing a class A shirt..there should be a t-shirt under it!)

But I really don't know what the extra dragon eggs would be for...unless we add them to next years Egg hunt...

So here I am with only 4 days till the party and I have to find, locally, treasure for a dragon lair, fabric to make said lair (brown or gray aught to make a nifty cave draped over some stuff right?)

And we would like to make dragon eggs, so I need dragons that fit into eggs (and eggs for them to be in) I found a recipie that recommends some 'goo' to put in the egg with the dragon so it is more fun than just opening an egg.

Plus some sort of dragon making supplies...I am hoping construction paper and tubes will work. guess I need to pick up some glue.

I have a biking delema. My son decided to grow dramatically from last fall to now. His bike that was just the right size then is way to small, his knees are bent when he is sitting on the seat and his feet are flat on the ground.

I read a couple different places that the proper fit is toes on the ground when sitting, which is almost what we bought him. Maybe half a foot not just toes.

So now less than a year later we are looking at him thinking he is too tall. BUT we tried him on an 18 inch bike...(we think, it was a friends, no measuring tape) and he can't control it, tough his toes do touch.

So is it just that my kid can't handle the transition quickly and he will get it eventually or that he is too young to handle a big bike?

To complicate matters he will be part of a 'Bike Rodeo' with the cub scouts in July..do I let him get the big bike and practice for a month, or do I leave him on the small one so we know he can ride? I would hate to ruin his confidence by being around other boys and barely being able to control his own bike..especially since he worked so hard to learn to ride 'like a big boy' with no training wheels.

First, just so you all know, I mentally pronounced 'Wii' as Why I' because I read about it long before I ever met anyone who had one, and still to this day have never seen or heard a commercial for one. So given the phonetic options of how to pronounce the name I cannot possibly call it a 'wee' because I do not want to play with any ones 'wee' I potty trained my kids rather early to avoid having any extra 'wee' in the house, I most certainly would never pay to play with 'wee'!

So why do I want a Why-I? because it has a yoga board thingie (for me) ...and hockey (for my husband and son) And this cool guitar! (for all of us)...not to mention 'dancing with the stars' if they figured out how to really interpret the dancing of a person and put it on screen I would LOVE to learn to dance at home.

And how did I find out about these cool games? I read an ad..I was sitting at the table at my in laws, my kids were occupied, I was eating, Husband was downstairs playing a basketball game, and the BIL was watching racing..now I am a television addict, I can become engrossed in nearly any TV, just because it is on..but racing? sorry, watching a car drive in circles brings up nightmares of being lost, not entertainment.

So I searched for something to read (no I couldn't possible eat without distraction, though I know it would be good for my weight)..options were: an old report card, (she had all A's but for one B-nothing else to read really) or there in the candy bowl was a magazine advertising different games (don't ask me why mags are stored in the candy bowl, it is husbands family). I figured at least it would have some words.

Well it had mostly pictures and prices, apparently games get sold by price and graphics mostly...one game literally didn't bother to tell you what on earth you did it was just a fancy title and a price. The title was nonspecific as to the game, just another generic fantasy name. So was it fps? or adventure? or the weird non car racing type? I suppose I will never know.

And BTW who cares if there are cool bosses if you have no idea how to defeat said bosses? Are all console games basically the same so that console players already know the type of battles they will be in? considering I have never seen a strategy game or building game for them I guess it may be true (even the various Sim incarnations are imports, and I don't think WOW type games ever make it to consoles? though I could be wrong)

Anyway, having read the entire magazine I still do not know what most of the games can do...but at least it drowned out the racing.

And I still have absolutely no intentions of buying a gaming system for a bazillion dollars. Sorry no ad is that good.

Fire fox told me it had an update to run today, and now I can get to gmail from it!

Yeah!

Ok so small things make my day

I cought a small portion of a PBS health care special. Some guy went traveling to many countries and checked out how they did heath care. Taiwan apparently decided to research first then build 'the perfect plan' but I missed how they did it.

Sweden had some interesting changes to what was very much like America's...they made health care non profit, and insisted all health care companies take everyone. And insisted everyone get health care (govt of course pays for the poor) the premiums are 700 a month for a family..on the one hand not to cheap, but on the other cheaper than I was quoted for a family plan here.

Health care companies are allowed to make a profit on 'riders' or extras like fancier rooms at hospitals and stuff. Not sure how abuse of that works (does the hospital have empty rooms with a waiting list because most do not have the proper rider for the fancy room?)

I missed the other countries, but most of what I heard was a bit different than what our country was proposing last I checked (which wasn't recently so feel free to correct me)

The gist of what was said seemed to be that basic health care cannot be free market. just extras. I am not to sure I disagree..which is surprising for a libertarian to admit.

I can't post on SA, I can't get my gmail, I am totally lost as to why the computer is messed up.

I ran the anti-virus thing. And I had my husband come look at it. Wouldn't you know, it worked fine that night, but the next day is busted again. I tell you there is a sensor they don't tell you about in a computer that makes it run better when a tech geek is around!

Oh and my blog is all...wrong. the words are in the wrong font and wrong size, the top of the screen says:

Warning: mysql_fetch_array(): supplied argument is not a valid MySQL result resource in /www/savingadvice.com/blogs/global.inc.php on line 709

and I hate hate that other browser. I need to figure out why firefox wont work

Gmail wont work for me all morning..I had to call in my info for the scout newsletter! What a royal PIA!

I need email! I use email for everything, half the scout information that I need is actually stored on gmail!

How could they be down!

In general I do not like game shows, but I do have few I enjoyed in the past and one current.

As a kid I loved 'wheel of fortune' partly because I was good at it. Let me rephrase that, I liked seeing the letters appear and trying to guess the answer with as few as possible, I could have done without the whole game show portion (and channel flicked to avoid it)

I only partly enjoyed Jepordy, because I rarely knew the answers....Same reason I hate playing trivial pursuit. don't know, don't care is my general answer to questions like "which former queen of england was known to color her hair with henna?" or "who wrote the musical score to 'Citezin cane'?" Sorry I just don't find it a bad thing that I don't know.

Now I do like 'Are you smarter than a 5th grader'. Though again, I could do without the 'drama' and such, I just enjoy know a good deal of the answers and take (I know it is wrong) pleasure in poking fun at contestants who use a cheat for a first grade question (did you know not all carrots are orange?)

So when it came time to make a trivia game for the scouts I picked 'are you smarter than a Webelos' (Webelos are the top level of cub scouting, before you move on to boy scouts) it just so happens that with bobcat, there are 5 levels of cubs. (bobcat, tiger, wolf, bear, Webelos) and for the million dollar question we will use 'leader questions'.

So having picked the game, and coming up against writers block on the possible questions (I am about half way satisfied with the number) I turned to figuring out the prize structure. I had no idea how hard it could be!

A straight ramp up offers less and less incentive to keep playing as you go on. (risk losing 60% to only gain 10 more..) but if you try to make it 'double' up you are at the max too fast (our max is 100% of their new rank book plus their next rechartering fee). And if you try to cheat and borrow the game show structure, your prize one is 1% off a book...who cares about 1% off a 5 dollar book!

So these are the conundrums that I face in my 'unrewarding' home life

My current best theory is to use only one Q per level (instead of two like the show) and start at 10% working up to 100% for the Webelos Q (5th Q) and then instead of the 'Million Dollar Question' offer 'The Recharter Question'.


1 10%
2 25%
3 50%
4 75%
5 100%
6 Recharter

prolly gonna keep the concept that if you make it to 25% you keep it no matter what.

I must be an anomaly, I do not like housework, but I do feel it is a job that needs done, and checking it off my todo list gives me a sense of accomplishment./

I was speaking to someone out of work who said they wonder the house feeling depressed....because they are not accomplishing anything.

While I would be depressed to not have my kids to take care of I have plenty on my todo list that would give me a sense of accomplishment to do.

Then when I got home I vegged out with a snack trying to stop my brain from thinking and a comedy was on where the mother wanted to go back to work, because she had nothing to talk about but the kids...

Now I do think one sided life is boring..I have other things to talk about besides my kids, but I also take great pride in my youngest learning to pronounce 'th' as well as my oldest latest math feat....not that I did them, but I was the facilitator, like a manager taking pride in a team that works well...my family is my team, I am co manager (with my husband) why wouldn't I take pride in our accomplishments?

Is it so terrible to feel a clean house and well educated kids are worth my time? Am I completely out of touch with what is worthwhile that only I find a full day at home more than enough work? Is it only because if I wanted a paid job I would be a teacher that I find my work here worthwhile? If I was by nature a computer tech would I hate teaching and learning with the kids? Or would I simply teach them more about computers than writing?

I do not understand any desire to spend your whole day at a job for someone else simply to be able to say "I did that" at the end. At the end of the day I may have had a good day, or a bad day, but regardless, I don't need anyone else to say "good job" to feel it was worth trying.

I apologize for being on a pregnant kick here..not exactly financial.

But I was at church Sunday and someone said you look great, barely showing!

I was also in Pa recently and had my mother up, both places I heard from family "you are so big!"

Now no, I do not have rude family, they just have been there for the past 3 pregnancies, and compared to those I am HUGE! Either this is one BIG kid, two small ones, or I am really fat.

I am six foot tall, I have a lot of torso room to store a baby...(I also have hips to match) So while I know that I was showing at 8 weeks, no one else could tell, an inch of 'pooch' looks like nothing to a 5.5 person! Now at 19 inches out (current waist minus old waist) the 'poooch' is a full fledged maternity belly that doesn't fit in most so called maternity shirts but compared to my height..it is rather..small for almost 8 months. At least according to those I see in church. According to those who know me, I aught to have delivered before I got to this size!

I am hoping honestly for two small ones, cause I really think 9lb 1oz is big enough for a kid....though if I can't have two I will settle for being fat..seriously, I can lose weight after the kid is born, but delivery of a huge kid? sorry I just don't want to. For the first time (pregnant) I am dreading labor....

That has to be weird, I didn't dread the first, I figured millions of women have delivered, most without pain meds or even really knowing what was going on. With the advantage of modern science I at least was going into it knowing that each contraction pushed the kid further down the path, and my Doc could even measure how far I had come..so it was all just going to be an unpleasant day (or two) of work. No big.

The second and third were viewed that way too. This one...fear, intense fear. partly because my last kid was short and painful, the pushing was 15 minutes of tearing PAIN.... pain worse than the previous two, And I don't know just exactly what was different to make it so bad..though he was the biggest kid. (first 8lb 13oz, second 8b 1oz, third 9lb 1oz).

The further along I get (currently 31.5 weeks) the less I get done.

As I forced myself to stand long enough to fill the dishwasher (braxton-hicks contractions are only painless when compared to real labor) I realized I would be sunk if washing up consisted of more than 5 minutes of standing! Imagine having to wash dishes after every meal because there wouldn't be any to eat off at the next if you didn't!

I am spoiled, lazy (and tired) and very happy I am in this century not the last!

We don't have an allowance each in our family. But we do spend splurge money these days. We go out to eat, we buy presents for folks, and we buy some junk food for ourselves. We just don't have an 'allowance' of individual splurge money.

After the recent discussion on the boards regarding how much was reasonable, I thought I would look at our spending over the last few months and see how much of it was 'my waste'...and I came up with zero.

Well not exactly zero, I bought a pair of maternity jeans and some hand lotion. with my Christmas/birthday money. But as far as from the house budget, meaning my husbands income, zero.

Now peeking at my husbands spending..he bought some maternity clothes for me and some vending machine pop - out of his Christmas/birthday money. He also bought a few miscellaneous things on Ebay that I don't know what are and don't care as they simply sit in the garage taking up space. but that was with Ebay money (from him selling not his paycheck)

So if I were to make an allowance for myself up...it wouldn't need any money! I am a low upkeep kinda gal though. No fancy hair I leave it natural color and other than a wash and conditioner with occasional olive oil I don't do anything to it. My fancy face scrub is sugar, no makeup. I wear the same necklace and same rings as pre kid, and I am VERY happy with them (well except for my discovery yesterday that my wedding ring had to go on the necklace since my fingers swelled.....) I don't 'go out' with friends (though we have plenty come here) never a movie or eating out without the family...If I wanted to rent a movie I would use the free collection of my brother in law. So what else would I be spending money on anyway?

Am I just too boring for an allowance?

8 graders in detention for buying lunch with pennies

Now don't get me wrong, I have no problem with short lunches, considering how little time is spent eating said lunch 30 minutes is often adequate (depending on how long you are stuck in line)

Of course paying with pennies puts you in that line longer. But detention? For paying with valid US currency? Is that really necessary?

I can't see an 8th grader really wanting to spend his/her lunch in line counting pennies for very long...I imagine after a couple of days (possibly with being pulled aside for office staff to count with them while they are certainly not eating nor talking with friends) most kids would decide making the line longer isn't a useful protest (packing your own lunch might be.....)

Course I don't care one whit how long lunch is...by lunch we are generally done with any 'paper' learning and taking longer cuts just into their play time (time where I am on the computer enjoying 'grownup' work)

I thought Strep came with a fever...but I have two sick kids, one of whom has an aweful looking mouth..really it looks like someone sent his back cheek/throat through a meat grinder added some pus and put it back..boy I hope no one was eating when they read that. He had been complaining of a sore throat about once or twice a day for 4 days.

My daughter just has a few white spots, and in general an occasional complaint, night coughing, but not bad, an ear ache the other day, but only for one day. and when we told her big bro to avoid the little one because he was sick she was adamant that she was sick as well...turns out she was right!

Apparently today you can either get a shot or take meds for 10 days. We opted for the shot..and spent several minutes explaining to the kids how great it would be. one shot, and you are supposed to feel better by evening, and are not contagious after 24 hours. Bad news today is Scout night, good news tomorrow is music. (though I still will be insisting on washing hands frequently and keeping him from extended play with others)

As the doc recoils from my sons horrific looking mouth (really her face was comical when she saw how bad it looks!), he is playing happily..goofing off, barely any less energy than when he isn't sick. The daughter is just the same...my kids don't get sick often (ok they do have plenty of snots) but when they do it is usually bad and yucky...on the inside, on the outside you can barely tell! It is easy to convince a tired sicko worn down to stay home, but a bouncy happy one? Not so easy!

My son was wonderful for the shot, only crying quietly while it went in, and quickly recovered. My daughter on the other hand, she was a bit of a complainer...we are working on her. My youngest was rather upset at the idea he would have to have a shot. (the last 3 or 4 visits have all been shot visits)

But wait theres more! Daddy has spots...not a lot, just a few. So we are banning him from scouts as well, and quarantining the three of them to see if Daddy progresses and needs meds to...in the meantime fluids and gargling salt water will be his plan of attack.