Jim and I have always been *that* kind of couple, the kind that checks in with each other a couple of times each day, the kind that connects over dinner and while relaxing in the evening…communicators. His time in the Navy way back in the day was most difficult for us, as it was before the internet and cell phones. When he was out to sea for months at a time, we relied on the rare phone call when he was in port and actual written letters, delivered sporadically on both ends. When he was a civilian again, we were better able to stay in touch during the work day.…
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How To Get Started On A DIY Bathroom Renovation In Thirty Easy Steps
One of the pros of being a fan of DIY is that you can save lots of money. Another pro is that there is a sense of pride and ownership in what you’re doing: it’s a little like sweat equity (Okay, it’s a lot like sweat equity because it IS sweat equity.). One of the cons is that a DIY bathroom renovation can take lots longer than if you hire a professional. We recently got started on our mostly-DIY bathroom renovation and if you were thinking about doing one in your house, here’s how to get started…in thirty easy steps. 1. Buy a house with which you are completely in…
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Mr. and Mrs. DIY
Even though we love to DIY (or would that be DIO*?) around here, we haven’t done much to our house for about four years. There are a couple of good reasons for that: budget and burnout. The burnout happened because we were going gangbusters on home improvements for a few years and then, after being forced to have our foundation repaired because our house was literally cracking up**, we repaired the giant cracks in the walls, repainted half the house, installed crown mouldings and baseboards in the living room and dining room, had our brand-new family room carpeting (which we put in right shortly before we got the foundation repair…
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Pamela Druckerman’s “Bringing Up Bebe” Stirs The Pot On Parenting
There’s been another dust-up in the news this week, and this time the big story is how great the French are at parenting. I mentioned it briefly in yesterday’s vlog, and I really need to expand on it because parenting and its various styles is a topic for which I have endless passion. (If you have no idea what I’m talking about, click here to read the Wall Street Journal essay/excerpt by Pamela Druckerman, author of “Bringing Up Bebe: One American Mother Discovers the Wisdom of French Parenting”.) First, let me give you the disclaimer: I am not ragging on the author OR the book, which I have not read.…
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Mission Accomplished.
When it comes to the stereotypical teenager-parent relationship, it would seem that there is non-stop eye-rolling, sarcasm, and lying on the teens’ part. On the other side of the coin, parents are “supposed to” enjoy embarrassing their teens on a daily basis, intentionally. Jim and I never fed into that. From the time the boys were very little, we have insisted upon mutual respect. MUTUAL respect. When the boys became tweens (11-12 years old) and were influenced a little more by their friends, they both became a little suspicious of us. It seems as though tweens start to talk with their friends about parents’ motives when it comes to everything,…