Deanie - I'm with the keep it inside and love it as is crowd....that little window has survived nearly 100 years of who-knows-what. Think of what a delightful treasure it is and will continue to be for future generations! That being said, I did see a lovely treatment in a magazine several years ago and it may be the solution for you. This homeowner had a rather large oval window fron her grandmother's childhood home. She took mirror squares and attached them to her wall, used molding to create a picture frame and hung her beloved window in front of it. Pat

Are you with your son all the time? Have you left him before? It's not that your son is too young to be left with someone, some people do it right from 6 weeks so they can go back to work and they're kids are fine. What the problem may be is just that he's so used to being with you that he does have to have that time away. My DS is with me all day and even now at almost 3 when I try to run to the store or whatever he'll start bawling and want to go. It's just because I'm such a major part of his life and he's used to Mommy always being there. It actually helps us the more I get out even if it's just for 10 mins. Kids kind of just have to learn that Mommy will be right back and they'll be fine. Also there aren't too many kids from about a few months up that don't get upset when Mommy and Daddy leave them somewhere. They'll cry and tell you not to go but usually as soon as you leave, they're fine. I'll feel so bad about leaving DS with his grandparents so we can do somewhere and you'll call and they'll say he was fine as soon as we got out the door. It's like a test with them. Even my MIL said about when she helped out at the Elementary School years ago that the children there would do the same things. And TREKaren is right. Most times we dont' realize it as mothers but we make the situation worse. We keep hugging the child and saying it's alright and hang around as long as they keep begging us to stay and it becomes a habit or they sense we're upset about leaving them and use that. I guess what I'm saying is that give it time and see if he gets better. Also look at other factors like maybe one of the kids is bullying him? ~Leslie~

I lived in a ballroom for five years. It was part of an 1820 addition to a 1770's coaching inn in New England. The ballroom was 40' long by 20' wide, with a 16' high barrel vaulted ceiling. Lots of windows. Gorgeous honey-brown hemlock floor. Narrow kitchen and bath tucked in on one long side. Massive crown molding where the walls started to curve into the ceiling--made a ledge that my cats would perch on. Fireplace at each end. I loved living there. Watching the sunlight come in the windows at the east end in the morning and stretch all the way to the far wall 40' away, lighting up the floorboards. The mellow old brick wall at one end--originally the exterior of the inn, until the addition was put on. The space. The light. The openness. I'll admit, the first night in such a large space with the ceiling so high overhead was a bit odd. I felt sort of unprotected. But that feeling vanished very quickly. The building was brick, so not drafty. The landlord had put in modern, energy efficient windows and added a ton of insulation to the ceiling, as well as putting in a special energy efficient heating system, so it was not as bad to heat as I was afraid it would be. The big problem was the floor, which was, back in it's early days, some kind of special "sprung" flooring, with a bit of give for dancing. By the time I lived there, it creaked. Everywhere. Even when my cats walked on it. I put down area rugs everywhere, mostly to define living spaces, but also for the benefit of the tenants below me. Not that the rugs helped much. The other apartments were much more chopped up into little rooms, that would have been bedrooms and dining rooms and parlors in the original inn. One had the original kitchen fireplace, big enough for people to stand in, with bread ovens on the side. One had a cute little corner chimney, with shelves built-in over the fireplace. The building was L-shaped, with a kind of a courtyard in the back, where you could barely hear the traffic noise. Coming home after a hectic day's work, it was like entering a quieter time and place. I had always thought that I didn't like open-plan houses. What that apartment taught me was that I did like open-plan living spaces. What I don't like are open-plan kitchens. I loved the fact that the kitchen was in its own room, not visible from the rest of the space. I could leave dishes in the sink without feeling like I had to jump up and clean them. Cooking smells didn't permeate the entire space. I left there when I finished grad school and moved back closer to family. But I still miss it.

Go to your original thread in the computer forum Gillian, linked below Here is a link that might be useful: The thread in the computer forum