[-]Where would be a great place to go skiing with a 6-year old where I can rent a room with a kitchen and not need a car to get to the slopes? Any ideas? TIA.
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Rant about my mother. DH and I were married at City Hall (couldn't afford a wedding at the time) and rent an apartment. My little brother in Oregon just bought a house and his wife's parents paid for their huge, black tie wedding earlier this year. My mother keeps going on and on about how proud she is that they have "done things right." She hates that we rent b/c it's "unstable" and doesn't consider my marriage "real" since we didn't have the big wedding. Ugh. This is really bothering me today.
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[-]Does anyone know any magazines where 9yo dd could submit some poetry? No, I don't think she's a writing genius, but this is the first academic area she has shown interest in and I want to encourage her.
4 replies [ Reply | Watch | Options ]New Moon is a magazine full of girls' submissions. Here's their website: http://www.newmoon.com/
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[-]Cooking moms: Am making a brussels sprout/potato gratin for Thanksgiving. Hostess told us 40 people are coming, so my questions is twofold: 1) should I make this dish for 40 or perhaps less since it's a side dish and 2) can I use a disposable foil-type pan since I don't have a gratin dish that big? Will that still work? Many thanks; I know these seem like dumb questions but I am not a cooking maven by any stretch! TY!!
8 replies [ Reply | Watch | Options ]i happen to love brussel sprouts but doubt all 40 will eat them so make less and use biggest pan(s) poss. maybe 2 more sturdy cake pans (foil is flimsy).
[ Reply | Options ]i would make it for 20, tops. not everyone likes brussels sprouts and presumably there will be tons of sides so even those who do may only take a dollop.
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[-]Who here is considering divorce but have not shared with anyone. I am in this position and wanted to hear similar stories. Why are you considering it? TIA
6 replies [ Reply | Watch | Options ]I am in the middle of a divorce and it's really stressful...if it's something you can resolve with therapy go for it...
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but no abuse or cheating. We've been together almost 20 yrs, married for 15. We just don't get along at all, fight and get on each other's nerves constantly, he gets mad about everything I say and do, we've been to counseling twice, and I just don't know what to do at this point. I don't want to settle for this life, but I would feel terrible about my dd, so I don't know what to do.
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yes.I'm in doubt if I should stay in the right bank (intercontinental le grand hotel, where cafe de la paix is) or close to luxembourg garden in the place de la Sorbonne....what you think? never been..no clue...
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I was there a month ago. We stayed at an expensive hotel and I would definitely recommend that you forgo any luxury hotel and find a nice boutique hotel. There are TONS of them, and it's not worth spending your money on a marble lobby when you can be spending it on good food.
[ Reply | Options ]that's my point also...but for some reason I've got a good deal for the Intercontinental Le Grand (just $100 difference from the boutique one in place de Sorbonne...) so don't know what to do...is the location of the intercontinental (right by the opera) kind of far to walk everywhere else or place the Sorbonne would be closer?
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it's cross the street to 2nd ar, but because my main focus is not shopping, is EATING I'm worried it will be far..
[ Reply | Options ]metro is super easy there. get a 3 or 4 day pass. i would go boutique but intercont would be chi chi and fun. start worrying about what to wear and eat!!
[ Reply | Options ]I have done my research on that already...LOL! i just can't decide on the hotel..the point would be to take advantage of the chi chi but paying price range of boutique anyway...(the intercontinental $1272 for 3 nights/4 days and the boutique one in sorbonne is$1161 includes breakfast (but not sure if would be good to take advantage to eat everyday in a different cafe...) HELP! lol
[ Reply | Options ]Go with the boutique. What time do they stop serving breakfast? Because of the time change, we missed breakfast hours at cafes on many days.
[ Reply | Options ]TIME CHANGE?? it is paris - set your alarm and get going. no time to waste! you can sleep when you get home or on the plane. If you take night flight, try to sleep on plane. then stay up the whole day on arrival - until 9 or so. you will be fine.
[ Reply | Options ]You do have to get some sleep at some point, but we got a good tip from a guy in the elevator when we got there, just take a 2-3 hour nap that first day, even if you didn't sleep on the plane, and that will re-charge you enough so you don't lose that first day.
[ Reply | Options ]well, i go to london 2 times a month for work. i sleep on plane (3-4 hours) and stay up all next day. am fit as a fiddle second day - wake up at normal time as in US. a 2-3 hour nap won't hurt too much i guess, just don't sleep the day away! another good trick is to change your watch while waiting at airport. your brain will start thinking in CET.
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I would pick near Place de la Sorbonne personally. It's a much more interesting area. We stayed across in the Tulleries area and spent absolutely no time in that particular area at all, except to hit the Louvre.
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[-]SO if G&T was created just to bring local kids back to public it sounds to me like a marketing ploy without any substance behind it.
26 replies [ Reply | Watch | Options ]It was at the time. It was created to make UMC white parents feel comfortable sending their dcs to schools that were not performing well and were predominantly filled with kids out of district and catchment. And as more and more kids have gone to the G&Ts and the population of the UWS has changed those schools have changed. 9 and 166 could easily phase out G&T at this point and be fine.
[ Reply | Options ]I don't think that is fair even though I'm not UMC white. I think it's great for smart kids in poor nabes with zoned schools that cannot accommodate these kids. Giving them an opportunity to district G&T is great and often the only option these kids have. The only sad thing is G&T cutoff should be higher and curriculum should be accelerated. With 90% cutoff is ridiculous.
[ Reply | Options ]seems so silly to me, like an entire program created to feed off of the competitive nature of adults with regard to their children but based in nothing real.
[ Reply | Options ]after thinking long and hard about it ita (and we tested and qualified for g&t, so no sour grapes). a school is only as good is its peer group, so the kool-aid drinkers say. nothing else matters. the teachers can suck, the parents can be minimally involved, the fundraising can be below where it chould be, the commute can be 1.5 hours each way but as long as the "peer group" is great, the school is great. the funny thing is that with a 90% cutoff at districtwides the peer group may be virtually the same as that at a top gen ed anyway.
[ Reply | Options ]sounds like you have a good local school and you are only thinking about your particular situation. there are many families who either get a G&T spot or have to move to a decent school district. In our school G&T families are mostly doing all the fund raising an the after school program management. If not for the G&T this school would be another terrible school. Now since the G&T has been there a while it is becoming a decent option for the non G&T classes as well. I believe that the DOE is trying to open G&T programs in new schools to try to get the parents more involved and get these schools to improve.
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my dc is in K in a local g&t on UWS. most parents are very down to earth and the children are more "interested in learning/focused" then most of the children we had in our expensive and popular nursery school.
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I don't think it was a clever marketing scheme, I think it was legislation. Most U.S. states have mandated that school districts MUST provide a G&T program for a certain fixed percentage of kids.
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[-]I am in the process of getting legally separated. Should I wear my wedding band still? I have an 18-month old daughter.
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[-]FYI: All of this tier nonsense you discuss here only gets handed down to your DCs. By the time we were 10 we knew the rankings of each school and which was considered filled with brainiancs and which were filled with just rich kids with the means not to be dumped in public. If you think that will not hurt or in some alter your DCs perception of themselves you are wrong. The cycle and the tiers have existed forever how about you start to break the cycle by growing up?
11 replies [ Reply | Watch | Options ]If the tiers have "existed forever", how would posters' "growing up" change anything?
[ Reply | Options ]I so, so agree. Besides, it is all BS. The best school is the best school for your particular child. People are kidding themselves. It is such a shame that parents in NYC can't get a grip on their social/status anxiety. I actually know parents who make snide comments about the schools their so-called friends kids are applying to. How f--ked up is that?
[ Reply | Options ]I know, we have watched it go on for years and our parents still tell stories about so-and-so saying a,b, or c about this or that school. I understand it is human nature to be competitive but really it is so damaging to the dcs themselves no matter if they are at collegiate or hewitt
[ Reply | Options ]some of the nastiest behavior comes from parents with children at the less competitive schools. When my ds was accepted to Trinity for HS, you should have seen some of the behavior from acquaintances with children at some of the lower tier schools in manhattan. One mom actually went out of her way to be mean to my younger ds. unbelievable.
[ Reply | Options ]Yes I hate to agree with you but I have to that it is very much the standard norm here. I am sure there are a lot of nasty obnoxious moms who want to broadcast that their dc is at a tt, but there are more angry and bitter mothers who did not get a slot for their child who make it their mission to attack the children who did. Sick.
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Actually, even if the parents did not say a word, the kids still figure out on their own. Human nature.
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[-]A modest proposal: Since the MS44 building seems to have a bit of room, Anderson should take non-"gifted" students in one or two additional classrooms on a lottery basis or as 87 overflow. It would become a school with a heralded gifted program, but not an exclusively "gifted" school. That would relieve some of D3 overcrowding, but still allow the programs geared to its students to continue, while also creating opportunities for other students in the region. Doesn't it make sense to use the space for D3 kids? What harm could there be to the school or to present students to have a few classes each grade that are not in the gifted program? (signed, an unaffected parent with child in another school - not 87 or Anderson)
38 replies [ Reply | Watch | Options ]Why would you want tiers in a school which currently doesn't have any? Does that even make sense?
[ Reply | Options ]Not a public mom I think the whole premise of the g&t is for the parents to feel their dcs are special or smarter and to gear their entire learning experience to that premise. To put them in normal classes or put normal kids in their classes would create a lot of hullaballoo from those competitive parents.
[ Reply | Options ]Do you think the same way about parents who have their children in private schools, esp the ones in "TT" schools?
[ Reply | Options ]Think what, that they are all overly competitive? Yes. All parents are about whatever they can find that they feel is better or best for their children.
[ Reply | Options ]Think that they need to feel their dcs are special or smarter and to gear their entire learning experience to that premise.
[ Reply | Options ]Yes,I do. If you took parents from Spence and told them Hewitt would be joining three days a week they would demand a refund from the school
[ Reply | Options ]So then what exactly are you saying? Only parents who send their child to zoned schools all their educational lives (only suburban parents, I guess) are normal?
[ Reply | Options ]It was obvious from the moment I posted, perhaps because I send my dc to private I don't know, that you have been trying to start a fight which I don't understand because I am not making a judgment about public or private I am commenting on the social behavior of parents when it comes to their children.
[ Reply | Options ]Right and my question is - how far does that judgment go? If it extends to every parent in NYC, what's the point?
[ Reply | Options ]Question to me or in general, because I have already stated I am not making a judgment about schools but about social behavior of every parents across the globe. if it isn't school its dance class or piano lessons or baseball teams. Ever parents wants to believe their dc is getting the best or is in a group that is labeled 'best' whether that is a school, a county's best baseball team, lessons with the best dance coach etc.
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LOL. But the Hewitt moms, who would have LOVED for their dds to have been accepted to Spence, would be thrilled and would pay extra.
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How would you know if your dcs don't go to G&Ts? It's like public school parents on UB saying that private school A is full of snobby, entitled kids - how would they know?
[ Reply | Options ]I am making a comment on parents and their capacity to compete when it comes to their children and always wanting their child to be in the group that is positively singled out. Not the school or the program. If you think parents who send their dcs to public want that any less than parents who send dcs to B, S, and C you are kidding yourself.
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They need to put another MS in there. D3 overcrowding is reaching MS very very soon and there aren't enough spaces by a long shot to place all the kids that won't make it to Delta. Or maybe they can expand Computer School.
[ Reply | Options ]There is: West Prep MS started this year. It's going to grow as MS 44 is being phased out. Not sure about it's target enrollment though once all the grades are in place.
[ Reply | Options ]West Prep is very small school, and I don't think they are planning to grow it other than adding higher grades, so there is still net loss of MS seats as IS44 is being phased out. Where are the kids that were to go there going to go for MS?
[ Reply | Options ]MS 44 itself is pretty small at this point in terms of number of children per grade. There have been several newer D3 MS options created in the past few years. The problem is that aside from Center (yes, I know it starts in 5th), Computer, Delta, Mott Hall and the Columbia Secondary School, few feel that the other options offer an acceptable education. Also, relatively few of the options are in the southern end of the District.
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Conservatively, over half of the kids at Anderson are from D3 anyway (so maybe they could just all leave and add to the crowding at their home schools). This meme you people are floating, that Anderson is not a D3 school and should just keep moving like some hobo circus train is going to come back and bite you in the ass. And why does 87 need to bleed across the street? maybe because half the kids in that building are not zoned for it? How about this? no more out-of-catchment kids at PS87 and the Trump buildings go to PS191, like they were supposed to in the first place.
[ Reply | Options ]While I understand your premise on a local level, once you look at it on a citywide or even borough-wide level it doesn't make sense, given that many, many more children qualify for G&T than there are seats available. The bottom line is that there needs to be more elementary school seats across the board than there are at present.
[ Reply | Options ]I think the premise is to add seats where possible as priority, with g & t (which was created initially to bring local families back to public schools) as less of a priority. Look at the hysteria created unnecessarily (NY Times today on test prep). If Anderson were not a citywide school on 77th street, there would be that many more K spots for D3 kids available. The proposal retains the integrity of what Anderson has created for its kids over the decades, but allows the process of allocating school space for local kids.
[ Reply | Options ]I find it amusing but not surprising that no one was looking at OShea last year before Anderson was forced to move. And, again with the "local kids"--if you're talking catchment, half of 87 shouldn't be there either.
[ Reply | Options ]I am so sick of the out of catchement 87 BS. they have so many out of catchment kids because the DOE handed them to 87 without a choice. The current 2nd grade had 65 OOC spots via D3 lottery. The current 1st grade had 36. The current K had none but the principal decided to let in OOC siblings because she believed it was the right thing to do that late in the year. It made one K class. They could've done 8 K classes with 25-26 kids in a class but instead have 9 with 21 kids per class. Some kids get in OOC through the CTT classes or no child left behind and the school has no say in that.
[ Reply | Options ]They happily accepted OOC kids for years, in order to "build" the school. I understand, and sympathize. It's a bit misleading to say the DOE forced them in through the lottery the last couple of years. The lottery was simply to replace the "apply to individual schools and get in because the admin gets to decide which families they are going to give a spot to" method that was in place all over D3 for many many years.
[ Reply | Options ]True. But actually in 2007 the K classes expanded to 7 because the DOE gave PS 87 65 lottery seats rather than the 40 the school thought they could fit. The DOE has grossly underestimated the in catchment surge across lower D3. They also have done no accurate population prediction because they lump the district as a whole. PS 145 is half empty but no one from the W. 80s, 70s or 60s wants to go up there. What they should do is zone the trump buildings for 191 and then see what happens.
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If I may - to redirect conversation to subject-at-hand - True, MS44 space, if it exists, should be considered toward the imminent danger of middleschool chaos once the 2007 K kids reach 6th grade. But also -- the growing hysteria about gifted is just so out-of-whack with reality. And prevents other schools like 191, 84, 9, from really blossoming into the kind of sought-after institution like 199 and 87 (where they don't believe in the idea of "gifted")
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[-]H1N1 weekend clinic report: I went to the Queens clinic, which I realize won't be an option for many on this board, but I wanted to say that the whole process was super smooth/fast. I think it was less than 45 minutes from start to finish, and my the time I left the line was very short. I think a lot of people got there early to get it over with at the start of their day.
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[-]I would love some input from btdt moms to ds. Lately my 4 yr old Ds has been very unkind ot his best friend. Whenever they play eh is bossy and says mean things, to the point where I need to end the playdate. I talk to DS about his behavior and he just shuts down. He only acts this way with this one friend. I don't want to be too intrusive a mother (a problem for me) but I want my child to be kind to his friend. Advice?
6 replies [ Reply | Watch | Options ]my dd had a friend in prek like that, only she was the one who was the recipient of the bossy/mean child. i told her when she would complain about it, that friends dont treat you that way and that she should play with someone else because the kid was not acting like a friend. not sure if it worked to stop the other kids behavior, but it did empower my child. you could say something along the same lines to your kid and remind him that you should treat people how you wish to be treated.
[ Reply | Options ]I think you should keep working with your child, and even perhaps punish your child by withholding playdates for a week, or something like that. My ds was on the receiving end of that behavior. His best friend ended up befriending the "class bully" who was really FAR too socially sophisticated to be in the grade in which he was placed. Through first and second grade my kid was treated badly by this boy he had thought of as "best friend" in pre-k and k. The situation ended badly for the class bully as well as for the boy who was mean to my child. Class bully was counseled out (private), and other child lost his friends (including my ds). I don't know why the parents did not intervene more. We teach the kids reading and math, but somehow expe...
[ Reply | Options ]I know a LOT of 4 yo boys who have gone through this, my own son, included. They do grow out of it, and, in some part, I believe it's because other kids stop putting up with it and start ignoring them. It doesn't mean you shouldn't try to curb it on your own though. I would definitely tell the best friend's mom though before she discovers it on her own and gets pissed- just let he know you're working on it. I told the friend's mom that if he acts this way at their house to please shut it down.
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[-]Dear DH: The reason I am always so frustrated & angry with you is because it's like you're another child for me to take care of. I know that's hard to believe, but it's true. I understand that our 2yo wanted those scissors & you were awfully busy reading the paper, but did it not occur to you that perhaps that was a bad idea? I also understand that you work very hard all day -- I can really commiserate because I also have a job outside the home -- but do you not think getting the kids in bed takes priority over your iPhone? I can see how you thought the housework gets done all by itself because it's always so nice & neat around here, but honestly, the cleaning fairy doesn't really exist. These are hard truths to face, but I think you'r...
11 replies [ Reply | Watch | Options ]I sympathize. I could have written this myself - makes me so resentful and frustrated. I express how I'm feeling all the time, and he improves for about a week, and then it's like Groundhog Day.
[ Reply | Options ]np: I agree! Sometimes I am so angry and resentful bc things just get done for him - I try to leave his clothes on the floor or whatever, but really why should I live in a mess, so I just clean up after him... I complain and he is the best for a while, then back to the same old routine....
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make peace with reality. You probaby aren't going to change your dh, so you're wasting a lot of energy getting angry
[ Reply | Options ]I understand what you're saying in theory - and I do tell myself this, but then I feel like I'm settling, and that upsets me in a different capacity. It's frustrating to be married to someone who doesn't pull his weight, and while making peace with it would be great, in some ways it wouldn't, because then it still leaves me with the bulk of the burden of doing everything.
[ Reply | Options ]OP: ITA! Contributing to the running of the household and actual parenting is required of both parents. I wrote this post because I thought it was a better outlet than just stewing in my anger at my DH this morning. I refuse to be some nagging wife that isn't heard or respected, so the only reality that's needs making peace with is for DH to recognize and understand that this is how it's going to be.
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It's the iphone thing and the reading the paper thing. I don't really mind doing the bulk of the cleaning, I reconciled that a while ago, but I hate hearing half a sentence while he is distracted by his phone or seeing him ignore the children while he reads. I have become the nagging wife though and I am soooo angry all the time. (new poster btw)
[ Reply | Options ]OP: It seems there are many of us with iPhone and reading addicts! Sure, there are worse things, but it's heart breaking and maddening to have Daddy Distracto when we really just want them to interact with the kids and lend a hand once in awhile. I jokingly said to my DH that in case he didn't realize it, the sweaty woman on bended knee scrubbing the floors is actually his wife and did it make him feel good to see her that way? He looked sad for a minute and then took out the garbage.
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