Our youngest is damn close to 18 so we don't do baskets anymore, but we did score a LOT of USA made products from, of all places, The Dollar Tree. Palmer is in Lancaster, PA and that's what almost all of the candy was - all US made. We'll let them divy it up, but we had to get enough to cover seven kids (not all ours). I refuse to buy candy made in China for obvious health reasons.

It's funny. Dollar Tree started as a Chinese product outlet and WalMart started as a "Made in USA" store. They've switched positions. Ironic, eh?

Since I have to go back to work on Monday, spring break being over, I can guarantee that my classroom will be full of candy tucked away into hidden pockets, and that I'll be dealing with highs and crashes all week. No need to shop for any.

And yes, she's expecting a classroom full of completely wired kids on Monday.

I have 90+ students; 3 different classes.

Too much liability for the school. Besides, with all the kids in the house (our own, their friends, their friends friends) those eggs won't last long. We've still got 18 or so fresh ones left for cooking and baking.

years ago, even though I like them for lunches and love deviled eggs.

I get plenty of eggs from my hens, but fresh eggs boiled are so hard to peel it's hardly worth it.

Now, though, I'm thinking about boiled eggs.

Fresh (like just laid) will keep about a 16'th of an inch of white attached to the shell. If they sit in the fridge for a week and THEN you boil them, they usually peel clean.

I don't do any holidays or birthdays and haven't for about 15 years. A couple of years I totally forgot about Christmas day until days later. I think it may be because I've avoided malls for years too because I'm basically avoiding the mass consumerism hypnosis and I watch cable or the movie channels where I fast forward.

It is possible to avoid those things, although it takes a bit of dedication.

I avoid much of it, but I don't usually FORGET them. I have 90+ students to constantly remind me, plus family members for xmas and thanksgiving.

The student's I'm around are college students and I have only my 41 year old son who feels the same way I do. It all started with being from a highly dysfunctional family which made holidays an excruciatingly painful time. One year I just announce I was never going to do holidays of birthdays again. Funny enough, everyone kind of relaxed and decided they wouldn't either. Who knows how many years we it kept going just because we all thought we had to.

Got tickets for ballet, for me and daughter (she's 24, and lives 40 miles from me), not realizing tickets were for Easter Sunday, which is just FINE for me. She loves ballet, and was enthusiastic when I asked if she'd like to go, so I bought the tickets for us. I give her and her sister calendars every Chanukah/Christmas time, as I always have calendar with me, and can't imagine NOT having one. Have to USE it, I guess!

Seems she and her guy may have obligations with his family (parents divorced, so 2 sets of step-parents) tomorrow, so daughter seems somehow not as enthusiastic now about leaving families between noon and 5 tomorrow for ballet. Will get complete facts tomorrow, I guess, and may be reading too much into her silences, but that's life in the industrial age, I guess!