u/irecommendfire

I had a convo with my 7-year-old/second grader earlier today that really cracked me up. She’s multilingual and goes to school in a different language than the ones we speak at home. She reads for school, and sometimes she picks up chapter books in her school language to read on her own, but never in English (the language I speak with her). We do read together in English before bed, and she can read at what I’m assuming is a normal second grade level— she can read things like the Boxcar Children, Nancy Drew, etc. When we read together, we take turns, with me reading one page, then her, etc.

It’s honestly bothered me that she never picks up chapter books in English and reads them by herself. I’ve worried that maybe she struggles more reading English than I realized, or maybe she’s less interested.

Today I just flat-out asked her why she doesn’t read English books on her own. She gave me a surprised look and said, “I always thought you wanted to hear the stories too, so I wait for you.”

I clarified that no, it’s fine for her to read on her own, and she took a chapter book to her room this afternoon and read the whole thing.

It was one of those parenting moments where I realized her view of the situation was so totally different than mine, and it was a great reminder that sometimes you just need to ask. All this time I’d been assuming that making sure she has books available was enough and she’d do it when she wanted to.

This seems like a long shot, but does anyone know of a hotel that can accommodate severe nut allergies? Including understanding cross-contamination. Preferably in Fatih or Beyoglu, but will consider other neighborhoods if they can truly manage it.

This seems like a long shot, but does anyone know of a hotel in Istanbul (preferably close to Fatih, Beyoglu is ok too) that can manage severe nut allergies?

Hallo zusammen, my husband and I are immigrants and we have a kid in second grade in our local Grundschule. Since we’re not German, we don’t really know about the expectations of the German school system, other than the really explicitly stated ones.

Our kid did very well on the standardized test that all the kids took at the beginning of the year, and her teacher had glowing praise for her when we had the mid-year meeting— she said that she’s doing great, and that her reading and writing were especially advanced for her age. She said that you would never know from her work that German isn’t her only/first language.

However, her grades on assignments are mostly 2s (both plus and minus), with the occasional 1-. She almost never gets 1s.

Is it normal to hardly ever get 1s? We’ve asked the teacher and she said there is no specific area to work on, that she’s already doing great.

At home, we make sure she reads every day, and we make sure she does her homework/help her when she needs help. But we don’t do extra practice on anything and we don’t put a lot of pressure on the homework (ie, we aren’t always reviewing it for accuracy unless there is something specific she is struggling with).

Are German parents helping a lot with homework or otherwise doing a lot to make sure their kids get high grades? Is the goal to always get 1s/mostly get 1s, or can a student get mostly 2s and still be considered a good student? Is 1 the standard and everything else considered falling behind, or is it more of a bell curve situation with very few students consistently getting 1s?

My kid (8) has good about independent play inside. And she’s great about playing outside, by herself and with other kids, if she’s at a park or playground.

However, she never plays outside at home for more than maybe fifteen minutes. We have a wooden deck with a table, chairs, and a hammock, and a fairly small yard/green area. We also have a bigger green area behind our house that is sometimes mowed and sometimes not, but when it’s mowed, kids can play there.

What can we buy or do to get her interested in playing outside? When she was younger, we had a water table and a swing, but the swing broke and she’s too old for a water table. Our yard isn’t really big enough to kick or throw balls. She loves building things, if anyone has any ideas for how to transfer that outside.

She will sometimes go outside for a bit and do something like pull weeds, gather flowers, or use chalk, but she’s back inside ten or fifteen minutes later, either to come inside again or to ask us to come outside and play with her.

I obviously don’t mind playing with her outside sometimes, but I’d like for her to get a lot of outdoors time this summer. She does get like two hours of outdoor time in aftercare and we do usually go for a walk or bike ride after dinner, but specifically for weekends, I’d like to see her spend more time outside.

Are there any options for at-home hair removal to target a few specific hairs, that will be permanent/work longer than plucking? I have like four spikey hairs on my chin that drive me crazy, a handful of dark hairs on my stomach, things like that. My hair is otherwise light and fine and I have no interest in getting all the hair removed from those areas.

I did get an epilator but was disappointed that it’s basically no longer lasting than plucking is. Are there other products/devices that can help with this and have the results last longer?

As the title says, I have some hyperpigmentation on my lower back from having acne there when I was younger. No pitting, just discoloration. What are some products I can use to lighten the scars/make them less noticeable?

I’m at the end of a beach vacation and want to continue the vibes for awhile. Any recommendations for women’s fiction-y books that take place at the beach? Bonus points if the beach is in North Carolina or South Carolina. The books don’t have to be mindblowingly well written, just something easy and entertaining for the flight home.

Yes, yes, I know fast food isn’t good for you. But we’re visiting family in the US soon and will be in the car for 6-ish hours one day, and will stop somewhere to eat along the way.

My kid is allergic to peanuts and tree nuts, and needs to avoid cross-contamination. Are there any fast food restaurants that you feel safe eating at with nut allergies? We eat at McDonalds here in Europe on road trips because it’s safe for her— is it also safe in the US? We’ll be in the rural South.

I mostly get books through the library, which means that I sometimes have to wait a long time for new/popular books because there are long waiting times on the holds list— and that’s fine, I don’t mind waiting.

I’m going on vacation soon, including a long flight, and I’m considering buying Yesteryear. For those of you who have read it, what were your honest thoughts? What did you like or not like about it? (Without spoilers, please.)

It seems like something I would love, but there have been multiple times when I’ve waited on like a 6+ month hold for a very popular book only to feel let down when I read it. I can’t even remember all of them that were like this, but I remember being actively disappointed in The House on the Cerulean Sea and feeling very “meh” about Addie LaRue. (I loved like the first 60% of that/the historical parts, did not like the modern romance.)

I’d love to hear some input from people who have read Yesteryear.

I know this is really specific. I’m looking for a nonfiction book, any topic, that focuses on a specific topic or theme in history, is written in a narrative and accessible (not academic) way, and ties it into the same topic or theme happening now. Bonus points if the author has a connection to the theme/topic and brings that in to the book.

As an example, it would be something like a farmer writing about historic sustainable farming practices and how they relate to current sustainable farming practices, and his own experience with sustainable farming practices. But it can be literally any topic. It could also be something like motherhood or education or oil painting or anything else.

Any ideas?

I’m a native English speaker who immigrated to a European country 10+ years ago. My second grader speaks English + an Asian language at home, and the local European language at school. So, she doesn’t get any actual education in English.

She’s doing super well with reading and writing at school, and luckily she was able to pick up reading in English at home without anything more than exposure (ie reading together + making sure she has lots of interesting early reader books around).

However, her English spelling is pretty terrible. Her other two languages are phonetic but English obviously isn’t, and she writes as if it is.

What can I do with her at home, short of giving her assignments or tutoring, to help nudge her along with spelling in English? Any fun games or resources I can use with her that are a little more engaging than worksheets? She already has quite a bit of homework from school and I don’t want to pile on a lot more work.

Hi all, we live in the EU but visit family in the US every year. My daughter has severe nut allergies. In the EU, cross contamination/“may contain” is reliably labeled so it’s fairly easy to buy things for her at the grocery store.

However, I know cross contamination is not required to be labeled in the US and I find it very hard, and very limiting, to grocery shop for her there. Most products don’t have “may contain” labels. We do have a handful of products that have been reliably safe for her, but it’s so difficult to find things we trust and it also means she’s eating separate food from everyone else. There are a lot of things she probably COULD eat that we just don’t know about, so we err on the side of caution. (For instance, my family member asked me recently if she could eat homemade Mac and cheese, since that doesn’t have any nuts in it, and I had to explain how we have to vet each individual ingredient.)

How do those of you in the US handle this? Are there certain kinds of products that are reliably nut free, like crackers or cheese, even if not labeled with “may contain” sections? Are there certain brands that are better than others? It becomes very hard to feed her there when I even have to worry about basic things like olive oil or seasonings.

Also, are there any chain restaurants that you feel safe eating at with nut allergies? In Europe, for instance, McDonalds has a clear and reliable allergy menu so we are able to stop there on road trips, but in the US we always pack her food for road trips and it would be nice for her to eat with her cousins, etc instead of always bring the kid with the packed lunch.