Heather

I'm 40, stay at home mom of 2 under age 6, recently divorced and currently living with parents until I can get back on my feet. Always have had great credit and financially stable - not my ex. I now have a mortgage on a house he was awarded in divorce and he's refusing to make payments. My credit has gone from 817 (per dealership when I bought my car) to around 600 based on the mortgage alone. All other payments are current and have never been late, even though he owes me over $15K from property settlement and is $30K in arrears on child and spousal support.

Here's the deal: I want to purchase a home and start an in-home daycare. The obstacles I'm seeing, other than the obvious stated above, is that I cannot get my permanent daycare license without a home inspection, and I don't see myself getting a home with no daycare business established.

Any ideas or suggestions? As it's looking now, I'm going to be living with my parents for another 3 years minimum until I can get the rest of my debt paid off (assuming he continues his current support payments) and my kids are both in school where I can at least get a part-time job while they're in school. I REALLY don't want to wait that long...

My 16 month old daughter, who is normally a great eater (not picky and eats until her food is gone) has suddenly started not eating much, especially at lunch. Food that she's had in the past and likes she is now rejecting. When she refuses to eat lunch, I just put it in the fridge and reheat it for dinner and she almost always eats it, so it's not because she doesn't like the food. She isn't teething - just cut 2 teeth earlier in the week and we're not expecting more for a while, and she's not sick. Is this just a normal phase babies go through?

When my husband was stationed at Camp Lejeune, NC, one of our absolute favorite places to eat was Mike's Farm. They have the most heavenly Mac and Cheese I've ever had. Does anyone know the ingredients or the recipe for this?

I miss Mike's Farm!

When my husband was stationed at Camp Lejeune, NC, one of our absolute favorite places to eat was Mike's Farm. They have the most heavenly Mac and Cheese I've ever had. Does anyone know the ingredients or the recipe for this?

I miss Mike's Farm!

My 14 month old daughter drinks water from a sippy cup with no problem. I keep one in the living room so she can get a drink whenever she gets thirsty, but I've been trying to get her to drink whole milk with her meals and all she does is play with the cup. She might take a little sip, but then it's back to banging the cup on her highchair tray or dropping it on the floor.

I currently breastfeed twice a day when she goes down for her naps and I want to make sure she's getting enough milk in her diet before I wean her completely. We stopped the bedtime feeding because she takes yogurt about 1/2 hour before bedtime. Once we started this she never missed nursing before bed, so I know weaning her won't be a problem. I just need to make sure she's getting enough milk. I make her cereal in the morning with milk, but I know that and the yogurt aren't enough.

Has anyone else had this problem? Any suggestions on how to get her to take milk in the sippy cup?

Side note: She has never taken a bottle so the sippy cup is the only way she's been given milk directly.

With the economy the way it is, I'm curious how other people tip at a restaurant these days.

Personally, the days of 20% are over for us. Not so much because of money, but because service sucks everywhere we go. If we get excellent service, we now ask to talk to the manager and let them know - same goes for really bad service.

But I don't want her going to bed hungry. She eats dinner at 5:30ish. Any suggestions? She does drink from a sippy cup, but not all at one time (she will go through about a cup over a whole day).