All of you ladies are so right!!! I am so thankful I found this forum, to give me the courage to do what I knew inside I needed to do. After my last post to lilysuzanne last night, I sent him a text message (he was at his mom's with is kids). It was around 2:30am... if course I couldn't sleep. The text said basically I couldn't be in this relationship with him any more & I would talk to him in the mornign when he came home. This morning, we had that conversation. I did break up with him. As bad as I hurt, I feel that much more liberated. He kept saying stuff was about his kids, but as I pointed out to him, nothing he said correlated to his children. It was all about him and his fear(s) of committment, "manning up", and DEMONSTRATING his love for me. He referenced the times less than four that he has attempted to do family oriented things with me and his children. He said his son feels uncomfortable because of tension that he feels, and felt 1 or 2 other times when we were all together and his father and I were upset with one another. I reminded him that we have NEVER argued in front of or around his children; not even when we were all the same house. He said, it was "ONE" time his son flet like we were angry with one another and it made him feel uneasy... Now, everytime I am around he (his son) gets that feeling. My answer to that was: 1. The only way to overcome negative feelings is to be consistently positive, and taling advantage of those moments when the opportunity presents itself. 2. The tension his son felt was the uneasiness that we all have being on pins & needles around each other the less than four times I have been around them. Moreover, my BF does nothing to counteract his son's excuses. 3. He knows just like I know, that if a child hears bad things from BioM for years and dad does nothing to counteract the negativity, then the child will feed off of that. He said he knew that I have never done anything to disrespect or hurt his children. His children would respect me in my presence, BUT he needs to make sure that his realtionship with his kids is guarded. He is concerned about how they "view" him. To me, that was a bunch of mumbo jumbo. Another excuse! His children will always love him. All he has to do is do what is right. We went on and on--- so much was said... but the bottom line was that I told him I just couldn't do this anymore. He agreed that I was a selfLESS person, and had given up a lot. He left the house, but called in 5 minutes trying to confuse me... but I held my ground! He said... "Everytime I think we are making progress in our relationship, and getting closer to the goal of marriage something comes up to step in the way of the plan." I know his goal was to catch me off guard and say to myself, "Self, you are moving too fast. Slow down. He was about to ask you to marry him. Give him a little longer... another chance." Luckily, I could visualize every post on this forum from last night. I almost gagged, that he thought after all we talked about that I should wait one more day to move "closer..." Is he crazy? Wait! Let me answer that... YES! He is CRAZY! 9 years is long enough. THANKS LADIES, and angelz DH (for giving me a man's POV, whiched helps me to seal the deal).

Gadgets, I know what you mean. I tried that when I was working and told them they could donate a $1 a month and it would add up to quite a bit with the number of employees we had. Some donated willingly and others acted like I was robbing them of a huge pile of money, good grief, a dollar!! They spent more than that on sodas each day. I didn't force them just asked it they would like to do so and majority, maybe, gave 4 or 5 dollars for the entire year, and had a couple that made up the difference. Our local Family Services sponsor a Share your Christmas each year for needy families. They accept donations of money, new and good used items. A few weeks before Christmas they put an article in the local paper with about 6 needy families listed weekly, no names, giving ages, sex, sizes and some wants the kids have. Families have to sign up ahead of time. You can adopt a family, which many organzations do and which we did a couple of years until it was like pulling teeth to get a few people to part with a little money. Wal Mart puts up a tree with names and wishes of kids on it and you can take one of the lists, buy the items and turn it in at the service desk and they send it to the Share your Christmas sponsor. I have done that a couple of times and probably will again this year.

I also use recipes interchangeably and haven't found a recipe that doesn't work both in the bread machine and by hand, as I only use the machine for kneading and then shape and bake in the oven. Everything from Grandma's old Farmhouse White to cinnamon rolls to whole wheat and rye loaves, they all work fine both by hand and in the machine. I agree that you need some more liquid/water in that hard to handle dough. I always check the machine and add more liquid if needed, I'd rather have a bit too much than not enough, I can always knead in a bit more flour if necessary. As plllog mentioned, you can add vital wheat gluten to the rye loaves for a bit more "oomph", rye flour is lower in gluten than wheat flour is. Bread is actually very forgiving, and I mess with it at whim. I want big holes I add more water, a dense loaf needs more flour, a tender loaf wants some milk and eggs, and I go by the way the dough "feels" more than anything. The only thing I've been unsuccessful at is a 100% whole wheat loaf with my own home ground flour. The results were consistent, they were all horrible. I finally just stopped, nothing helped that stuff and although I still grind wheat for flour, I use some of my own flour and some King Arthur flour for a passable loaf. Annie

It seems to me that Hollywood only makes three movies these days: The movie about running real fast and engaging in physically impossible acrobatics while things blow up all around. The fart joke movie. The dysfunctional relationships movie, which has two variants: pseudo-inspirational and frankly depressing. Of course, these can be combined, as for instance, in the upcoming remake of Murder on the Orient Express which seems to combine Hercule Poirot, superhero, with the most dreary-looking trainload of miserable people you ever saw. So I just don't go. The suggestion to go to an art house is clearly made by people who live in very major metro areas. I live just north of a major metro area, but still about 90% of the movies I might possibly wish to see do not play within 150 miles of where I live. I see about one movie a year in the theater. Unfortunately, I do keep up with what's current when visiting my brother who has every known streaming service. I'm astounded at how fatiguing it is to try to be entertained.