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Post by beaglemom on Jun 23, 2018 21:12:09 GMT
I just wanted to say that I always love reading your posts. I rarely comment on them, but I love reading them!!
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Post by beaglemom on Jun 23, 2018 1:12:05 GMT
I have a friend that is good friends with Hilary Clinton. She offered to get a couple copies of her book "What Happened" autographed/personalized for me. I'm getting one for us, one for my mil, one for a good friend, and then I have one more copy that I haven't decided on yet.
So for my mil I wanted to come up with some ideas for a clever message. My mil was/is a huge Hilary supporter, to the point that she got combative when dh and I said to her we were undecided in the primary between Bernie and Hilary.
For my friend - he is gay, Catholic, Italian, HUGE Hilary fan, very anti-Trump and a fabulous uncle to his sister's son (whose father essentially walked away). I really want to come up with some awesome ideas for this one.
Any and all ideas would be appreciated!!
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Post by beaglemom on Jun 21, 2018 4:05:16 GMT
Okay I finally cancelled my final sub. Now I have more years than I'd like to admit of sc stuff to destash. With 4 little kids I've realized it just isn't going to happen. But it looks like all the destash groups I was on on Facebook are no longer active. Where is the best place to destash?
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Post by beaglemom on Jun 16, 2018 22:32:30 GMT
I did for a handful of really sentimental items, but it is a bit cost prohibitive for every piece of memorabilia. My dream is to get it all digitized when I retire. they currently have the $999.99 package on sale for $339.99. Which is why I'm tempted! |
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Post by beaglemom on Jun 16, 2018 19:01:00 GMT
Has anyone used legacybox to digitize old film, slides and/or photos? I have all my grandparents stuff and need to get it done. And with 4 kids 7 and under home for the summer I didn't have the mental bandwidth to do it myself.
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Post by beaglemom on Jun 16, 2018 18:54:06 GMT
Has anyone used legacybox to digitize old film, slides and/or photos? I have all my grandparents stuff and need to get it done. And with 4 kids 7 and under home for the summer I didn't have the mental bandwidth to do it myself.
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Post by beaglemom on Jun 15, 2018 19:52:23 GMT
I just wrote a check for $6,000 for the staging of our house. We have already moved and the house was empty. I was blown away by how many things she brought to hang on the walls. The difference it made is amazing. It's put together way better than we could have done it and I am 100% sure that it will help the house sell.
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Post by beaglemom on Jun 14, 2018 0:54:05 GMT
I'm curious to know what pay you think is appropriate. I ask because in my area $125 isn't bad. And I agree with the others that this should be happening at their house. I couldn't get childcare for one kid for a day for $125. For kids that age with a highschooler, I would expect to be paying at minimum $10 an hour. |
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Post by beaglemom on Jun 10, 2018 22:20:27 GMT
We do about a week in Yosemite every year for the 4th of July. Every other year we go to Cano with dh's family (his parents, both sisters and their families - 18 people this year) for 2.5-3 weeks at Christmas. The years we don't go instead we do a week in Colorado with dh's family at thanksgiving. And then another 2-4 weeks out there as well. Every other year we do 1-2 weeks just our family in Hawaii.
And the last two years we had season passes to Disneyland so we were down there for 3-5 days 5-7 times a year.
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Post by beaglemom on Jun 7, 2018 20:04:47 GMT
In the last 6 weeks so much has happened and I'm almost at breaking point. I had a friend call me a bad friend ( which in long run its better she's out of my life) My boss died some what unexpectedly. Which has made work chaos. He owned the company. His wife is now signing authority. Then my step sister died ( hadn't saw her in years) but my step family TolD myself and my aunt's that we were not allowed to go to any of the services. Ok then My dad has dementia and my aunt's (his sister's) are battling his wife. Then another co worker had a massive heart attack and died. So made more work for me. I got a call from the DOJ tax office regarding my previous employment 16 years ago and they want me to testify against old boss. It's not really an option not too I have been at my current job for 15 years there is talks of us being sold meeting is on monday. Not sure how this will all effect me. O I think I need to do a few consult with a labour lawyer. My husband is out of work currently and has had some interviews but no sussess yet I'm just done. Hugs! That is a lot in a short amount of time! |
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Post by beaglemom on Jun 7, 2018 0:09:59 GMT
We got married in Yosemite and spent our wedding night at the Ahwahnee (Sunday night), same place my parents spent their wedding night. The next night we stayed at Wawona and then headed back to my parents. Wednesday we boarded a plane to London. We spent the next two months traveling around Europe. We had the first couple days in London booked, we had 4 nights planned 2 weeks in - we did the Marathon du Medoc in Bordeaux with my in-laws, a week in Sicily at the end of September, and a week in Switzerland booked in October. We went to Paris, Nice, Grasse (where the famous perfumeries are), Collioure, the Basque region and the Pyrenees on our way to Bordeaux, Andorra, one night in Spain, Bordeaux, then back through the middle of France, Avignon. Then it was off to Italy - Pisa, Sicily (the resort was something out of a bad movie), Venice, and Rome. Then Switzerland - our favorite!! Then Vienna and Prague. Then back to Paris for a week before heading back to London. Then we flew to New York, went a visited my sister at Princeton, went to a conference in upstate New York, drove out to Niagra Falls, and then finally headed back home to California. Picked up our dogs and stuff from my parents and moved down to LA.
We will have been married 13 years in August. Hoping at some point to live in Europe with our kids!
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Post by beaglemom on Jun 3, 2018 4:20:49 GMT
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Post by beaglemom on Jun 3, 2018 0:26:17 GMT
We lived in northern California. My grandparents lived in Vermont and Santa Barbara. They all came to my sister's high school graduation in 2005. They are all 90 now, so they were 77 and made the trip to see her high school graduation and my college graduation.- They were a week apart. And they all traveled again for my wedding 2 months later.
They all made the trip for my high school graduation 5 years earlier. At 72.
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Post by beaglemom on Jun 1, 2018 17:31:04 GMT
Lordy. So is she mentally ill? Is that what it is? I just do not understand. The "mentally ill" thing has gotten dropped so often recently that it's overwhelming. Please know I'm not attacking you for asking about it, but we need to STOP branding every racist, sexist, ignorant asshole as "mentally ill" and chalking it up to that. Mental illness is real, and extremely varied in terms of specific diagnoses and accompanying behaviors. Racism, sexism and cruelty should not be "excused" or "explained" by labeling someone as mentally ill (with no medical knowledge of them or ability to diagnose). We need to stop this language, because it's damaging to those who truly do suffer from actual mental illnesses, and because we need to stop explaining away hate. This a million times over!!!!! Please don't insult those who actually suffer mental illness by lumping this woman and her hate-filled view with them. Yes, she has issues, but those issues are the fact that she believes it is okay to insult and spew hate about others because their religion/sexuality/nationality/beliefs are different than hers, not because she suffers from mental illness. |
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Post by beaglemom on May 22, 2018 22:06:43 GMT
Yes he is. And I really try to keep my mouth shut around him about how all this makes me feel, because I know that for all their faults he just wants his parents to be proud of him. Interestingly my 5 year old has commented the last couple times we've been over there that he would much rather go to my parents because my fil isn't nice to him. Mil usually does stuff with dd when they are there and didn't really interact with the boys. |
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Post by beaglemom on May 22, 2018 5:52:16 GMT
I have the only kids on my side. My parents are wonderful to them. Dh's older sister is the golden child and her oldest is the golden grandchild. Mil is very obvious about it. Dh's sisters live a mile from each other in a different state. Mil makes sure that she is always with my niece for her birthday. The year after my daughter was born they bought a time share for the week of her birthday, so they are always gone. And now that three of my kid's birthdays are the 17th, 23rd, and 25th off that month they miss 3/4 of their birthdays. Dh's sisters have been invited to join them, but we haven't. But we are local so I'm sure that mil tells stories to the sils that makes it sound like she does way more than she does. She love to tell people that she has 10 grandchildren and that she spends do much time with them. But she spends more time with the grandkids that live out of state than she does with my kids and we live 12ish minutes away. Dh's grandparents (grandma) paid for college for dh, his siblings and cousins. Both of his sisters got private college and advanced degrees (psydoc, md, ma x 2). Dh was in the middle of his PhD when his grandma died, his parents claimed the money was stuck in probate or something like that. So we paid for the rest of his PhD. However his uncle continued to pay for his cousins to finish their degrees. When the golden child graduated from medical school his parents gave her and iPad (it was right after they first came out) and then went to Costa Rica with them for 6 months to watch the golden grandchild while they did doctors without borders. Dh was already working at Google when he finished his PhD, they got him the book ""how to get a job at Google." When mil got a new car she gave her old one to the golden child (this was a couple years ago). Dh bought mil a brand new car. She is giving her current car to the golden child too, since it's an upgrade. We found out because sil wanted to know when mil was getting the car, because she was anxious to get mil's car. Thankfully we are only all together two or three times a year. The rest of the year we just have to hear about how wonderful the golden ones are. I admit to not reacting well. My mom's mom favors my uncle's son (who is 11 years younger than me) and my dad's parents favor my aunt's oldest. So I'm sensitive to it. Both of my parent's siblings were the favorites, so they have been very careful to not treat my sister and I different. Sorry for the rambling.... But it drives me bonkers that dh gets treated so differently. He's very accomplished and is the most successful of the kids and they treat him like crap. Why is your husband buying her a car ? That's an oh hell no in my book. Because at 16 he crashed her Peugeot. At the time he promised that he would buy her a car when he was an adult. And she had held it over him ever since. Her reaction was priceless when we told her we were buying it. She claimed that she never really expected him to. But in the next breath commented how she had said something to my fil when the model 3 was announced that she wondered if dh would buy it for her. They helped us with some creative financing so we could buy our current home before selling our old home. They aren't out any actual money but helped back it. As soon as our other house sells we will be through with obligations (well at least I'll feel like we are). And I don't feel guilty since they bought his sisters a house in the mountains for skiing and pay for a fair amount of stuff for them. |
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Post by beaglemom on May 22, 2018 2:17:51 GMT
I have the only kids on my side. My parents are wonderful to them.
Dh's older sister is the golden child and her oldest is the golden grandchild. Mil is very obvious about it. Dh's sisters live a mile from each other in a different state. Mil makes sure that she is always with my niece for her birthday. The year after my daughter was born they bought a time share for the week of her birthday, so they are always gone. And now that three of my kid's birthdays are the 17th, 23rd, and 25th off that month they miss 3/4 of their birthdays. Dh's sisters have been invited to join them, but we haven't.
But we are local so I'm sure that mil tells stories to the sils that makes it sound like she does way more than she does. She love to tell people that she has 10 grandchildren and that she spends do much time with them. But she spends more time with the grandkids that live out of state than she does with my kids and we live 12ish minutes away.
Dh's grandparents (grandma) paid for college for dh, his siblings and cousins. Both of his sisters got private college and advanced degrees (psydoc, md, ma x 2). Dh was in the middle of his PhD when his grandma died, his parents claimed the money was stuck in probate or something like that. So we paid for the rest of his PhD. However his uncle continued to pay for his cousins to finish their degrees. When the golden child graduated from medical school his parents gave her and iPad (it was right after they first came out) and then went to Costa Rica with them for 6 months to watch the golden grandchild while they did doctors without borders. Dh was already working at Google when he finished his PhD, they got him the book ""how to get a job at Google."
When mil got a new car she gave her old one to the golden child (this was a couple years ago). Dh bought mil a brand new car. She is giving her current car to the golden child too, since it's an upgrade. We found out because sil wanted to know when mil was getting the car, because she was anxious to get mil's car.
Thankfully we are only all together two or three times a year. The rest of the year we just have to hear about how wonderful the golden ones are.
I admit to not reacting well. My mom's mom favors my uncle's son (who is 11 years younger than me) and my dad's parents favor my aunt's oldest. So I'm sensitive to it. Both of my parent's siblings were the favorites, so they have been very careful to not treat my sister and I different.
Sorry for the rambling.... But it drives me bonkers that dh gets treated so differently. He's very accomplished and is the most successful of the kids and they treat him like crap.
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Post by beaglemom on May 11, 2018 21:06:45 GMT
That's awesome! I swam and played water polo in that division in high school. That is amazing that he qualified for CCS as a freshman without a diving background. Congratulations!
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Post by beaglemom on May 9, 2018 19:58:06 GMT
For me, Mother's Day is for "active mothers", which I am not. My son is married. I have encouraged him to teach his children to celebrate their "mother", my ddil. I have had my time in the spot-light. This is her time. What What an incredible gift to your dil. For my mil it is still all about her. And since we are the only ones that are local, I lose out every year. Dh's sisters live out of state and post these lovely photos of their days. Ours is always some sort of working out - running/walking. Then she picks the restaurant and posts all over social media pictures of her with my kids. I am so tempted this year to tell dh to take the older 3, leave me home with the baby, and go take her out. She is the last person I want to be spending Mother's Day with and I wish for once I was asked what I wanted. My oldest is 7 and I guarantee that she has put more thought and planning into Mother's Day this year than dh has. He sucks at gift giving, he sucks at planning, but other than that he is a fabulous father and husband. So I try to not let it upset me and focus on the rest of the good the rest of the year. My mom has an approach similar to yours, she has always been very thoughtful toward me now that I have kids. She is having to go out of town to be with my 89-year-old grandmother that isn't doing well. So we are going to celebrate a different time with her. |
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Post by beaglemom on May 4, 2018 2:29:49 GMT
a drop in bobbin and a box of 144 prewound bobbins i never want to have to stop everything and wind a new bobbin my 20+ year old machine finally died and when i replaced it i was thrilled to find that bobbins just drop in and done! amazon shipped me 144 white and 144 black wound bobbins - such a time saver! gina What did you get?? I don't really "need" a new machine, but a girl can dream! |
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Post by beaglemom on Apr 24, 2018 22:05:01 GMT
My mil is that way. Her birthday was at the end of March, they were in Cabo. We haven't "gone out" to celebrate it yet and she whined to dh about it the other day saying we needed to take them out for her birthday and for their (inlaws) anniversary. I get the birthday thing, but the anniversary thing threw me.
She called randomly on Sunday morning and asked if they could come by and see the baby (5 weeks old). She wanted to know when the baby would be awake so they could make sure to see her awake. Because I can control when my infant is sleeping. We told her to come over right away - they live 15 minutes away. But apparently my fil had to shower and as with everything it took them forever and it was over an hour till they arrived. She held the baby for 3 minutes and then passed her off to my fil. Then she grilled us about our plans for the weekend. Dh mentioned that our babysitter was coming over later because we were going to dinner, she pushed and he said that we were going out with my parents. My dad's birthday was Saturday, so we were celebrating that night. She made a face and a snide comment. The difference is that my mom called, told me what nights they were free and wondered when it would work for us to go out. Where my husband suggested a couple different times that didn't work for whatever reason for them and was told we would figure it out later.
Both of dh's sisters live out of state. Since our first was born in 2011 we have spent all but 2 mother's days with his mom. The two we "missed" we went 5 hours away to be with my grandmother, who is too old to travel up to us anymore. And at least one of those we did brunch with grandma and then hopped in the car to drive back to be able to take mil out to dinner. Last year dh and I both did a half IronMan race the day before Mother's day. It was 2ish hours away from home. My mom came with us to watch our 3 kids. We stayed at the hotel that night after the race, had brunch in the morning, and then raced back to take his mom out. On the years we haven't been able to see her (twice) she complained for weeks before and after about how she wasn't going to see any of her kids..blah blah. It always has to be about her. The other 5 years she has picked the restaurant and dictated the day.
I was talking to my mom on Sunday and they are headed down to my grandma's again this year. We can't make the trip, we have a 5 week old plus the other 3 kids. Dh sucks at planning such things, so I'm sure it will be another year all about mil.
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Post by beaglemom on Apr 24, 2018 5:52:32 GMT
Keeping in mind that the max pass is $10 a day per ticket. I would probably use it for Disneyland and just fast pass CA adventure. Although I do believe that the photo pass comes along with the max pass. Someone correct me if I'm wrong. Paint the night parade is back along with the pixar parade. Follow Disneyland daily on facebook, she breaks it down like I've never seen to almost the exact minute. Max Pass is on your ticket for whatever parks your ticket is good for. So if you have park hoppers you can max pass in both parks. We are pass holders and thought Max pass was totally worth it! |
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Post by beaglemom on Apr 23, 2018 6:15:21 GMT
I didn't answer the poll because it's more complicated than that. We moved in December into a 4 bedroom house. Baby #4 arrived in March. Currently ds1 (5 years) and ds2 (2 years) share a room. Dd (7 years) has her own room, it's the smallest room. Dh and I are in the matter along with the baby. She is currently sleeping in the co sleeper next to our bed and naps in her crib in our closet (which is almost as big as dd1's room). The plan is for the baby to stay in our room/closet for at least 1-2 years. The 4th bedroom currently has a queen bedroom set (large dresser, high narrow dresser, two night stands, and queen bed), along with a file cabinet and two tables that have my sewing machines on them. The closet is full of some of my fabric.
We used it as a guest room while we were in the hospital and I was having baby #4 (2 nights). My parents stayed art our house with the other kids. And currently during the week dh is sleeping in there and I'm in our room with the baby. That way he gets a decent night sleep and gets up an hour or so before me to get the other kids ready for school 2-3 days a week. He needs to be well rested for work and if I need to I can nap when the younger two nap while the older ones are at school.
Now the plan is that once the baby is sleeping longer at night dh will come back in and we'll get rid of the bedroom set.
My parents live 25 minutes away, dh's parts live 12 minutes away, my sister and bil currently are living with my parents. Dh's sisters live in Colorado and come out to visit once every couple years. Dh's parents get cranky when they stay with us instead of them - which everyone would rather stay with us since my in-laws house is gross.
I sew a lot and dh claimed the office in this house. After discussing it we decided that I should get to use the room the way I want since I use it in a daily basis. The plan is that once we sell our old house we will start the process of building out our very unfinished basement. The plan is to put a workout room, guest room, media room, wine cellar, sewing/craft room, and possibly something else down there. Then I would move my stuff siren there and we'd shift the kids around upstairs. Currently all bedrooms have bathrooms, the boys have a shower, the rest have showers and bath tubs.
I am in no hurry to have a real guest room, since my mil threatened that they would come live with us when they remodel their house. And my marriage would not survive that.
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Post by beaglemom on Apr 22, 2018 6:12:24 GMT
August will be hot in Yosemite. We are currently building a house in Wawona and we’ll be renting it out through The Redwoods! (Small world!) Expect lots of people in the valley when you go. I'm so jealous!!! Once it is done I would love to know more! We have been disappointed with Wawona since the new company took over. And no matter what it will always be Wawona to us, never Big Tree whatever! We wanted to get married at Wawona, but it wouldn't hold enough people, so we ended up just having our rehearsal dinner there. My grandparents would originally rent through The Redwoods when they went. At some point they switched over to the hotel - but I'm not really sure when. |
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Post by beaglemom on Apr 21, 2018 19:11:39 GMT
It will be warm. But Yosemite is a fabulous place to visit! We go every year for the 4th of July. We stay at Wawona (now called Big Tree Lodge). I would suggest figuring out your itinerary asap and booking. Things book up, we book a year and a day in advance to get the dates and rooms that we want (but we go on a holiday week). It really depends on what you want to see. The waterfalls are going to be hit or miss this year because of the low snowpack. Yosemite Falls has the upper and lower falls, the whole hike is pretty major and will take all day and you need to bring lots of water and snacks. Vernal Falls is a tough hike, but is shorter and very pretty. There are plenty of things that you could see just hanging out in the valley. Traffic can get crazy down on the valley floor. So if you aren't staying in the valley, plan on heading down early to be able to get parking. Last year right before the 4th my husband spent 3 hours trying to find parking on the valley floor.
We have been going to Yosemite since I was a baby - my grandparents took my parents when they started dating in the early 70s. We got married at the Ahwahnee (now the grand majestic or whatever they are calling it). We generally stay up at Wawona and only head down to the valley for a day or two (when we are there for a week).
It is a fabulous place and totally worth visiting. Please let me know if you have any other questions!
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Post by beaglemom on Apr 20, 2018 1:40:00 GMT
We moved into a new home in December. Most of our furniture is stuff we bought before we got married 13 years ago and lived in a 1,200 sq ft condo. We are not design people. We want to hire someone that can come in and help us come up with a design plan for the house. We want to paint and buy furniture. Eventually we are going to want to build out the unfinished basement and some other things. Do we need an interior designer? Decorator?  ? |
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Post by beaglemom on Apr 13, 2018 5:51:00 GMT
I wonder if it's to make sure they know who the rsvps are coming from. We had lots of people that didn't write their names on the reply cards. I had read somewhere the suffering of lightly writing a number on the back of the cards to help keep track.
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Post by beaglemom on Apr 11, 2018 4:03:54 GMT
I have had junk mail addressed to me at MIL’s address. She always saves it and gives it to me. I tell her she can just toss it but she won’t. My mil does this too. It drives me nuts. She always makes a big deal about giving it to us and 99.9% of the time 100% of it goes directly in their recycle bin. She knows we don't want it, but makes sure that it is the first thing she gives us when we walk in the door. She also insists on giving me her read People magazines. I think once 5 years ago I asked to look at one when she was done. They end up in our half bath for people to read for a week or so till the kids pull them down and then they go in the recycle. |
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Post by beaglemom on Apr 10, 2018 21:21:48 GMT
Based on house sales since Zillow is saying our house has gone up $300,000 in value since we bought it in December. The house we are putting on the market on May, we should get double what we paid for it 10 years ago.
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Post by beaglemom on Apr 10, 2018 4:08:41 GMT
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?