I agree that I jumped to an unwarranted conclusion as to the reason for the licence not being changed ... but I was thinking more of the unfortunate situation if people were unskilled, rather than being critical of the lady. If she felt that I was being critical of her, I apologize wholeheartedly to her for that. Apart from that, I've been thinking of making this thread for a while. I don't feel a need to alter the main points of my story, though ... and if I implied that I thought that many kids aren't so qualified, I didn't intend that, either. All that I was saying was that I felt that all children should be encouraged and helped to learn how to look after themselves. Also that they should feel a responsibilty to do their share of chores around a household which they inhabited, as they became able to do so. I didn't refer to the money end of it, as I've said quite a lot about that before and wanted to confine this message to one simple, uncomplicated topic ... but I agree that such is a necessary skill, as well. I hope that your children and others that you know grow up developing not only the simple skills of managing their daily lives, as referred to, but also a number of the potential capabilities and skills which lie semi-dormant within their being. One of the wonderful opportunities in being a teacher is to engage with their students and to become sensitive to the talents which each possesses, then to encourage the child and parents to awareness and to develop those potentialities as they are able. And of being a parent, as well, to be sensitive to the potential which each of his/her children possesses and encourage the child to develop their possibilities. ole joyful

Boysnus 2 .. Thanks. The green is a little harder, it's a custom color I mixed up to try to salvage two oops colors I picked. I can tell you the colors I used to achieve it. The first color I picked out was BM Pear Green, which was almost about neon in that small space. Next I picked out SW Shagreen, which was too grayed down to look okay against the clear turquoise color. So I started mixing colors, I used the pear green, mixed it with a liberal amount of decorators white I had hanging around, then added a small 'blop' ( technical term, I know *LOL*) of Shagreen to the mix to tone it down a bit. I just mixed it back and fourth, color splotched, mixed some more, color splotched .. etc .. until I had a basic color I was happy with. Once I had the color right I mixed up the whole gallon so I had extra hanging around to do touch ups with. Here's a pic when I was color splotching, I just kept messing the color values until I was happy :

TOS before defining my post "rants" and writing that i intentionally confuse your answers to scaruso with the answers to my las posts, please read it: my last post begins with : "Finally you answered to MY very simple question: "Would you like somebody collecting porn OF YOUR OWN CHILDREN and his father or stepmother not reporting him ? " Reread my last post and show me where I misquoted you, otherwise I will report you to the boards'adminstrator as somebody advocating not reporting sexual offenders (CHILD PORN COLLECTORS, even of just 2 images of prepubescent girls ARE SEXUAL OFFENDERS). It is time you came out from your moral and legal ambiguity on this point To get this matter absolutely clear, as it concerns the moral position and action to take in view of even the possibility of such an heinous crime like the sexual exploitation of minors, i will cite INTEGRALLY your next to last post. YOU wrote: "She did not say he had a huge collection of CHILD porn. She said he had a large collection of porn, which made her uncomfortable. She did not specify whether she was certain the girls (I assume they were female) were definitely children, whether the pictures were definitely pornographic or were pictures that were just inappropriate or creepy when in the possession of a teenage boy, or whether the pictures were taken by an adult or something that a girl took herself and stupidly posted on myspace. We weren't there so we don't know what was going on. My daughter who is in her mid-twenties was once mistaken for a middle schooler, and that was in person, not just from a photograph. How do we know that the "preteen" she referred to wasn't really 17? For that matter, how does one know that the "18+" pornographic pictures readily available on the Internet are not really of girls younger than that? Obviously no reasonable person wants anyone to take or possess pornographic pictures of their children. I wouldn't want anyone to take or possess any pictures of my children, period, unless there was a good, logical reason for doing so. No, I wouldn't expect his parents to report him to the police, especially if he were a teenager. I would want them to get him help from a mental health professional." This is your original next to last post. About its first statementI i must remind you and the board'administrators that EVEN THE SUSPICION of sexual exploitation of minors must be reported and investigated: if the said photoes are 2 or 100, of 17 year old or a prepubescent-looking 25 year old, according to the law against sexual exploitation of minors, can not and should be left to the judgement of the families and friends of the possible offenders... About the second statement , I see that you don't like the idea of somebody's having any kind of photoes of YOUR OWN children without good reason. So I will ask you for the SECOND TIME (the first was in my last "raving" post) why you find acceptable for somebody to collect naked photoes of somebody's else children, I would like a clear answer from such a moral, quick to judge person like you, always so certain about other people's and particularly step parents'behaviours. About the third statement of your next to last post: finding mental help for a kiddie porn collector is not acceptable in the eyes of the law for the simple reason that, provided that the sexual offender agree to get treated, while his family or friends find the right help, he is free to continue the sexual exploitation of minors. So the choice of reporting this kind of crimes is not given to parents, mates, spouse and not even to maids, cleaners, employees or even to anonymous web users etc..: if you stumble upon even of a dubious (even if it could be of a young 18+ and not a real 14) picture you must report it and if during an investigation comes out that somebody saw such a picture or site and did not report he can be charged with aiding and abetting and rightly so. BTW, if , as you say in your last post: "I have received spam with those words in the subject a couple of times, along with all the spam for enlarging body parts I don't have. Neither you nor I have actually seen the pictures." please report the sites you are receiving such a spam from so the relevant authorities can investigate them and you will not incur in the risk to being possibly aiding and abetting criminals. I don't see how a person like you, so invested in protecting children from any real and perceived ills and from a child-hostile culture , can be so carefree about this and condone even the possibility to be compliciting with children's sexual exploitation. I would expect somebody like you to be up in arms at the first whiff of child porn.. But maybe I am a 44 year old moralistic prude and you are a middle age tolerant and think-the-best-about-anybody-especially-if-a-stepkid lady.... Now, about your last post : - about your precisation in your next -to-last post on the difference between B&D and S&M: as in numerous threeads on this forum you expressed yourself vehemently agaist plain, vanilla dating for divorced and even widowed parents I was just curious about your open attitude on this particular activities, so I wrote (in my last post) : "And you are open and knowledgeable to bondage too, as I see from your last post: "I think "Men dressed in leather having sex with women in bondage" is B&D, not S&M, which involves pain": again would be okay for YOUR OWN ADULT CHILDREN to be involved in BONDAGE & DOMINATION as long it is not SADISM & MASOCHISM, involving pain ? Just let us know with a yes or no please, so we can know where you stand on this ... Maybe you feel that B&D (but maybe not S&M ?) is okay as long it is not adulterous" Really, I was just curious and I see that you answered me right on in your last post: "And why would I care if consenting single/married-to-each-other partners were into B&D, just because I have no interest in it?" So I understood correctly that you are okay with B&D for consenting adults (does this include your adult children ? for them you would approve B&D but not engaging in adultery ? and what about somebody collecting photoes of your adult children engaging in such acts? would it be okay for you once your children are old enough to give their consent ?) but NOT with plain vanilla dating for divorced/widowed parents ? Just let us know CLEARLY your moral opinion on this, you are always so quick to express yourself on any other matter regarding marriage, families and stepfamilies.... About the second statement of your last post: "Scaruso and her husband are in a much better position to judge whether the SS was actually committing a crime than either you or I. " Interesting . If according to you (but not the laws on Minors'Sexual Exploitation) scaruso and her soon to be ex husband are in a much better position than you and me to judge their stepson's porn collection, they are also in a much better position to judge if this young man is mentally ill or not so you had no business in writing in your next to last post (to scaruso) : "Since your H was adopted, he will probably never know the medical history of his parents, which could be relevant to your stepson's behavior. I know you disagree, but there is such a wide range of mental illnesses and behavioral disorders your stepson could be afflicted with. At a minimum, I am relatively certain he could be diagnosed with social anxiety disorder and executive function disorder." So the "incoherency" you accusing me of in your last angry post (you don't like it when somebody does not back off to your prepotence, isn'it) is all yours. Again, as in my last "ranting" post, I must ask you : "are you a trained psychiatrist ? are you licensed to diagnose online ?" Yes or not, please. If not, you are not more qualified than me on discussing this stepson'mental state and anyway, once again scaruso and her soon to be ex husband think he is not mentally ill (as according to you they are the most competent ones). So if scaruso and her soon to be ex are the most competent in ascertaining if this 26 year old is mentally ill and they think he is not, ALL your previous posts on mental illnesses in convicted offenders, serial killers, collectors of child porn -that according to your second to last post, should not be reported but helped by mental health practictioners- DO NOT APPLY HERE: if THIS 26 year old guy is not mentally ill, he can find himself a job, if he is collecting child porn (2 or 1000 photoes makes no difference) he should be in jail and not in a mental hospital... Lastly, i think the majority of posters on this forum see very well that you are ready to embrace any outrageous statement or position just to go against stepparents. I expect your apologies on the "intentional misquoting" (there was no misquoting, intentional or not) and "ranting" otherwise it will be clear to everybody as you are here in bad faith, just to badger and bully people coming on this forum to look for support and advice, kind and polite people that mostly try to ignore you (as I usually do at least when you are not advocating anything illegal, like not reporting the possible sexual exploitation of minors, or dangerous, like getting 8 year old girls sitting on the front seat) or even to be gracious and charitable about your bitterness and scorn.

Dee thank you so much for posting. I love your room! The white with the little pops of bold colors is great for a kids space...but really, an adult would be happy in that cozy land as well. Lav ummm ya, when china land is next clean I'll snap pics lol. I have been so busy setting up stocking city (aka my sewing room) that I kind of let him be a nut...I think he dumped every bin on the floor! Mary Lu, you are right. Being "done"with the whole journey actually brings a great deal of peace to our world. Les, I really can't do trundles in the room because of the way the beds have to sit in the roofline (the room has a gable that juts out where the beds would go. All of the other walls are small, much like dees or have doors that would be blocked. As to tv or computers, right now my mindset is that I don't like them in a Childs bedroom. I may someday change my feelings about that, but for now I don't want young kids surfing where they won't be seen, particularly allowing other parents kids to do in my home without knowing how the parents feel about it. My son has an iPad, and I would imagine that if other kids are one day staying (older) and their parents are ok with that, they'll probably have their own devices for that stuff. I do let ds's friends use mine when supervised but never where we can't sort of monitor what they are doing. But my son is only five. I couldn't have imagined when he was born that he would know how to surf u tube at four lol so I'll reassess as time goes by. As to the bed options...we can always change those options as tine goes on and the kids grow. I can't see the monkeys being my forever decor lol. For the majority of our sons guests, I won't encourage disappearing into the room though. It really is more for sleeping and alone time. We will let the much larger play room grow with the wii etc near a space we hang out so I know what they are up to.