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Ruth
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Hi everyone,
My name is Ruth. I was born in P.R. My family moved to No.Va. when I was 12. My husband and I got married a year after high school. We've been married for a little over 18 years. Our children's ages are 17, 13, 10, 8, 6, and 4. I pray that God will bless us with more, but I know it's all in His time.
We lived in Northern Virginia during our first 6 years of marriage, and then moved about 30 miles south and lived there for 11 years. Last year we moved another 25 miles Southeast. We keep trying to escape traffic.  This county is very small; not much traffic here, but we do have to travel to get to the grocery store.
I used M.F.D.G. curriculum for the first 5 or 6 years of homeschooling, which worked out very well, and when our oldest finished 8th grade, we enrolled her in Seton. It took her 2 years to complete 9th grade and 2 years to do 10th, and she's still not done.  I am weaning the rest of the kids slowly into the Charlotte Mason method.
I have been to Elizabeth Foss' talks and read her colums for many, many years , but I never knew just how to start. Now I'm at the end of my rope with my 17dd. She has struggled so much, and I don't want that for the rest of the kids.
I just bought Real Learning in December and I'm reading it very slowly. I get very overwhelmed with too much information at once. I read about 2 pages at a time. Since joining this board and reading the book, I have learned so much. I feel like we're getting a lot more learning done now, than in the past few years. I have learned so much from all of you. I think the kids have blossomed the past month.
Just twice this week, the boys didn't realize they had done Math and Hitory, because we used real books and lots of fun stuff for Math.
That's my long introduction. This is probably the most I've ever written. My blog posts and posts here are always very short. I am not much of a writer.
Thank you for all your wonderful advice and your friendship. This is a very special place, and definately very real.
B.T.W. Hi, Molly and Tammy. I have been blessed with their friendship since my oldest was about 8. We don't see each other nearly as much as I'd like. 
__________________
Ruth
mom to 7 miracles
My family blog
Loreto Rosaries
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Jen L.
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Molly: I graduated SMA in 1983. As for O'Connell did you know any Mondoros or Hurleys? (ex. Kevin Mondoro,Krista Mondoro,Jody Hurley). I lived in only one house until I moved out after college (I lived at home and went to George Mason) - very close to you in Mill Creek Park (next to Camelot if you know where that is)
NoVa Drivers, the ones who won't/don't drive the beltway or inside it: My sister-in-law grew up and lives in Arlington - she won't drive OUTSIDE the beltway!
JennGM: You know I'd love to meet you (and have that Irish Coffee  )
__________________
Jen
dh Klete,ds (8/95),dd (12/97), dd (11/00), and ^2^ in heaven
"...the best state in which to glorify God is our actual state; the best grace is that of the moment..." St. Peter Eymard
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Maria B.
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alicegunther wrote:
Maria B. wrote:
| I would love to hear from moms who have children with medical issues involving constant MD appts. and how they fit school into the mix of coming and going more than one would like. I have two daughters with scoliosis, my oldest is in weekly therapy, my baby gets PT once a week, and two of my boys need speech therapy. |
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This is a subject that would be extremely useful for us to discuss at length, and I think it would be a blessing to many mothers who are experiencing this. Some of the mothers who could best participate may not be reading this forum [Fireside Chat], but I wonder if we were to begin this subject at "Special Blessings," if it would encourage others to join in. Please let me know if you would like me to begin a thread there--or maybe you would consider posting one. I think this is a common struggle and one felt more keenly by homeschoolers. |
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Alice:
Great idea! I will post it on Special Blessings.
__________________
Maria in VA
Proud Mom to 10 Great kids!
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Maria B.
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Diane wrote:
Okay, I guess I took more than a few minutes. Just a few personal notes...
Maria B. wrote:
| I have lurked here for years ... always wanting to join in, but wondering if I should "start something else". I realize now that this is not "something else", but a circle of friendship that I wish I had joined in earlier. |
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MARIA! It is so wonderful to see you here. I have missed your kind friendship and witness so much. Maria led my beloved TORCH group in NoVa, but back then she only had 9 kids. She is amazing---a sweet, beautiful woman and mother---and I know she will be such a gift to these forums. I'm so happy you joined the conversation, Maria.
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Hi Diane! I can't believe it is you! We have thought about you all so often. My girls would love to correspond with your girls. I can't believe Charlie is 3! Miss all of you!
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Maria in VA
Proud Mom to 10 Great kids!
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Maria B.
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Jen L. wrote:
| As for driving on the beltway, I too did it when I was taking Behind-the-Wheel at Annandale High School (I went to St. Mary's Academy in Alexandria but the public school was where driver's ed was available and free). I still remember the first time because I was shocked that the instructor was sending me on on to the highway so soon. I date myself now by telling you that that was in 1981!! (Note: my big sister BIKED on the beltway before it was opened - we grew up about a mile from it) |
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Jen:
Oh, this is so weird! I graduated from St. Mary's Academy in 1981! I can't place you Jen! What was your married name? My was Maria McMurray. I had several sisters at St. Mary's as well and a brother at Bishop Ireton.
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Maria in VA
Proud Mom to 10 Great kids!
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St. Ann
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I graduated in 1981 too! but from Melbourne Central Catholic in Florida. I dream of meeting someone online who I know from my younger U.S. days! Univ. of FL anyone?
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Stephanie
Wife and mother to Hannah '96, Maria '99, Dorothea '01, Helena '03
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Erica Sanchez
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guitarnan wrote:
| I guess I'm weird. I love to drive. Maybe it's because I grew up in Southern California? I used to love driving along Pacific Coast Highway with the radio blasting. I can't say I love driving on the Beltway, |
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Me too, Nancy! I love driving. PCH with the radio blasting in my convertible Volkswagon...ahh...college days! Now it's just the rather uncool 12-passenger van! :)
Beltway. Beltline. This has got to be a midwest/east coast thing. I don't think they even exist here. The mention of them takes me right to Grand Rapids where my mom is from. Driving on them is nothing compared to L.A. freeways in rush hour - yuck! :)
It's actually chilly here today and all this talk of tea is rather cozy. God bless!
__________________
Have a beautiful and fun day!
Erica in San Diego
(dh)Cash, Emily, Grace, Nicholas, Isabella, Annie, Luke, Max, Peter, 2 little souls ++, and sweet Rose who is legally ours!
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doris
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Hello
I'm jumping in here having lurked with the lurgie for a few days. I'm neither a new girl nor an old hand but count me in. (I'm just over the flu and didn't want to be coughing all over the coffee and cakes.)
I'm bringing along a lovely panettone I was given as a Christmas present. I lived in Italy for a year and panettone has been one of my Christmas traditions ever since!
I'm in London, UK with my 3 children. My eldest went to school for six weeks before we decided that we couldn't put her through it any more. She cried every single day and lost all her confidence, poor little mite. The school were hopeless and did nothing to help. It was a Catholic school, and all the staff were Catholic, but given that only one other child in her class of 32 came from a practising family, it was fairly irrelevant. (She started coming home with some pretty fruity language, for a start.)
So we've been home educating ever since. We moved to London in the summer, and I must admit that I've found the move quite hard. It's difficult to meet people, I've found, if you're not in the school network. There is a home ed network round here, with plenty going on, but lots of the families are home educating for *very* different reasons from me, and we don't have very much in common. Also, lots of the home educated children seem to be pretty wild and have little restraint on them from their parents. I'm not at all a 'spare the rod and spoil the child' sort of person, but I do think that children should at least have a certain respect for others, and that seems to be lacking in lots of local home edders.
Sorry, that sounds really moany. The point I am trying to make is that I'm so grateful for this forum for a place to find kindred spirits. Often, here, I feel uniquely weird! 1% of Uk children are home educated. Catholics are a minority. Yes, I am uniquely weird! (Btw, I pride myself on my spelling, but I can never spell that word. Weird or wierd? It looks wierd either way.)
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Home educating in London, UK with dd (2000) ds (2002), dd (2004), ds (2008) and dd (2011).
Frabjous Days
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Mary Chris
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Erica Sanchez wrote:
Beltway. Beltline. This has got to be a midwest/east coast thing. I don't think they even exist here. The mention of them takes me right to Grand Rapids where my mom is from. Driving on them is nothing compared to L.A. freeways in rush hour - yuck! :)
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This is so funny! When I first moved to Virginia I refered to driving on the freeway (instead of beltway) and people always knew I was from the west coast! I agree driving in L.A. is the pits.
Since I have had three cups of tea already today  , chestnut, candy cane with eggnog (thanks Nicholas!) and cream, I have a big glass of water.
__________________
Blessings, Mary Chris Beardsley
mom to MacKenzie3/95, Carter 12/97 Ronan 3/00 and wife to Jim since 1/92
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theresa-lynn
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Can I pull up a chair too?
My name is Melanie and I live way up in Alberta Canada. I am a convert to catholicism (1998) and have been homeschooling for a few years.
I have 5 children: 6, 3 1/2, 20 months and twins born 3 months ago. The twins were a huge suprise and blessing to us, as we found out we were having twins 12 hours before they were born, and they came so fast that daddy delivered them at home on the bed before the paramedics came!!
Since then, we haven't been doing too much as far as school goes, but I bought Elizabeth's book and have been enjoying it emmensely. My eldest is in grade one right now, so i'm not worrying too much about this year... we are just having fun learning to read and doing sciece and religion. Next year when i have 4 mobile preschoolers will be another story to figure out! 
There are not a ton of catholic homeschoolers up here, and I don't get out too often because it takes too long to get everyone buckled up in their carseats. Three of my five kids are under TWO!! and my 6 yo will be in a booster forever because she's so small.
I really enjoy these forums and everyone's blogs. /they help me not to feel so weird.
uhoh gotta go nurse some babies!
blessings,
Melanie
our lady of tuscany academy
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Lorri
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doris wrote:
Hello
I'm bringing along a lovely panettone I was given as a Christmas present. I lived in Italy for a year and panettone has been one of my Christmas traditions ever since!
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Oh yum! Ours was gone a l-o-n-g time ago!
doris wrote:
| (Btw, I pride myself on my spelling, but I can never spell that word. Weird or wierd? It looks wierd either way.) |
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LOL!!!
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Lorri
mom to   
The Mac and Cheese Chronicles
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Diane
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theresa-lynn wrote:
| I have 5 children: 6, 3 1/2, 20 months and twins born 3 months ago. The twins were a huge suprise and blessing to us, as we found out we were having twins 12 hours before they were born, and they came so fast that daddy delivered them at home on the bed before the paramedics came! |
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Welcome, Melanie! The story of your twins is amazing---you must have been in shock---but what a gift---twice! I'm quite impressed that you are getting any formal schooling done at all. 
It's great to see so many new faces here---welcome! We have so much to learn from each other.
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Peace,
Diane
Mom to five fair lasses and one bonny prince
The Journey of a Mother's Heart
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Lisbet
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Melanie! Your blog is one of my favs! :)
__________________
Lisa, wife to Tony,
Mama to:
Nick, 17
Abby, 15
Gabe, 13
Isaac, 11
Mary, 10
Sam, 9
Henry, 7
Molly, 6
Mark, 5
Greta, 3
Cecilia born 10.29.10
Josephine born 6.11.12
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Natalia
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doris wrote:
I'm bringing along a lovely panettone |
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What does panettone taste like? I was tempted to buy one this year but I was afraid it was too much like fruit cake, is it?
Natalia
Maybe tomorrow I'll bring biscotti...
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JennGM
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Natalia wrote:
doris wrote:
I'm bringing along a lovely panettone |
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What does panettone taste like? I was tempted to buy one this year but I was afraid it was too much like fruit cake, is it? |
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NOTHING like fruitcake. Read Tomie dePaola's book "Tony's Bread" the fictional story of panettone. It's the lightest, bread, with raisins and fruit but just so delicious. I don't like fruit cake, so I promise I'm not steering you wrong.
And Elizabeth, how in the world do you have any left over? We bought 5 panettones over the Christmas seasons and none are left. We sent 2 home with mil because she can't get them in Altoona. She loves it!
__________________
Jennifer G. Miller
Wife to  & ds1 '03 & ds2  '07
Family in Feast and Feria
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Bridget
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theresa-lynn wrote:
Can I pull up a chair too?
My name is Melanie and I live way up in Alberta Canada. I am a convert to catholicism (1998) and have been homeschooling for a few years.
I have 5 children: 6, 3 1/2, 20 months and twins born 3 months ago. The twins were a huge suprise and blessing to us, as we found out we were having twins 12 hours before they were born, and they came so fast that daddy delivered them at home on the bed before the paramedics came!!
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Hi Melanie, I'm glad your chiming in here. Your twin story is amazing and you are really in the thick of it with all those little ones! Beautiful family.
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God Bless,
Bridget, happily married to Kevin, mom to 8 on earth and a small army in heaven
Our Magnum Opus
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alicegunther
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Hello to everyone who has joined this thread--it is so great to see all of you! Honestly, every night, this is the first place I want to visit when the kiddies are tucked up in bed. I haven't had this much fun in a long time!
JodieLyn wrote:
Alice - thank you for the suggestion on the Rosary.. not sure how that would work here.. you see.. my house is pretty small.. not quite 1100sq ft.. but if you could perhaps tell me more? I also am a convert to Catholicism (coming up on 9 years now) and some of the things I see mentioned I haven't had any experience with at all. |
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My first house wasn't much larger than that, but we had a beautiful weekly mother's Rosary. It was actually begun by a friend of mine, but later shared by me as a hostess. There are many ways to go about it. The first would be to seek out younger mothers (possibly at daily Mass)--and by "younger," I mean women who are still raising children--and mention the idea. You would be amazed at how readily women are to take you up on this kind of thing. Meet on Friday mornings or afternoons for a cup of coffee and a Rosary, and you will be richly blessed.
You mentioned that your priest is very supportive. If he is, run it by him and ask for a notice in the bulletin. You'll probably get a good hand full of faithful women who are just dying to pray with you.
JuliaT wrote:
Armed with your encouraging words, I decided yesterday that we would read my dd's book altogether, too. We climbed up on our couch. We just bought a new couch. This couch was made for read alouds. You just sink down in when you sit in it. It is so comfy. Anyway, I put some toys on the floor for my youngest to play with (my ds was away having daddy time) and began The Shakespeare Stealer. By the time we started our second chapter, my youngest was cuddling with us, listening to the story! |
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What a great story, Julia!!!! Sounds perfect!
JennGM wrote:
| First of all, I hope I didn't sound whiney about isolation. I think I used the wrong word, because that sounds like I'm feeling sorry for myself and our situation. I enjoy the female and family friendships but really, my cup is full, it overfloweth. I enjoy these times to just stay at home and be together. |
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You didn't sound whiney at all, Jenn! I only chimed in on that because it reminded me so much of my situation when we first moved here--lots of family and non-homeschooling friends, but we weren't connected to homeschoolers on a regular basis yet. Wouldn't I have loved this group nine years ago?
guitarnan wrote:
So...come along...bring your travel mug for your tea...I'll drive! |
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Nancy, you aren't too far from here, relatively speaking, so I might just take you up on that!
Maria B. wrote:
Great idea! I will post it on Special Blessings. |
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Great, Maria, I think it will make an extremely useful thread. By the way, as we all continue to chat, I am going to try to identify potential threads here and there (and I encourage everyone to do the same as you spot them). This is meant as an orientation and encouragement for newer members. Please know that I am not trying to stifle the conversation here. If you would rather not create a separate thread, please take my suggestions with a grain of salt and keep conversing right here.
Elizabeth wrote:
Sorry, that sounds really moany. The point I am trying to make is that I'm so grateful for this forum for a place to find kindred spirits. |
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It doesn't sound moany to me. I always find it rejuvenating to share things like this with women who will truly understand and even commiserate when necessary!
Melanie wrote:
The twins were a huge suprise and blessing to us, as we found out we were having twins 12 hours before they were born, and they came so fast that daddy delivered them at home on the bed before the paramedics came!! |
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Now why can't things like that happen to me? Not the surprise delivery, but the surprise twins!!!! HOW WONDERFUL!!!!
Melanie wrote:
There are not a ton of catholic homeschoolers up here, and I don't get out too often because it takes too long to get everyone buckled up in their carseats. |
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Boy do I hear you! Between infant seats, baby seats, and booster seats for kids under 75 lbs (law in NY), we have five different gizmos to hook up! Fortunately, the older girls do all of that for me, so it isn't too bad.
Natalia, I love your new photo!
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Love, Alice
mother of seven!
    
Cottage Blessings
Brew yourself a cup of tea, and come for a visit!
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JodieLyn
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You're almost there Melanie.. just in the last oh.. year or year and a half.. my older kids can manage to get everyone else buckled in.. because...
all SEVEN of mine are in some form of carseat. Legally, 3 of them could do without.. but they do NOT fit in the seats so they're just stuck being in boosters.
I frequently tell them that they're going to be in booster seats until they're driving
But it sure nice now that both of my older kids.. sometimes the older 3 can help the younger ones get buckled in and I don't have to climb through the van buckling.
__________________
Jodie, wife to Dave
G-18, B-17, G-15, G-14, B-13, B-11, G-9, B-7, B-5, B-4
All men who have turned out worth anything have had the chief hand in their own education.
-Sir Walter Scott
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JuliaT
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Melanie, I am your neighbour, provincially speaking. We live in the southwest corner of Saskatchewan. I love your twin story! What a wonderful surprise!
Nancy, I love driving, too. It's a good thing, though. We live on the Canadian Prairies. If you want to go anywhere it takes alot of driving to get there. I find driving calms me down. I use that time to pray and think. I have solved many of the world's problems while driving to get groceries. :)
Blessings,
Julia
mom to 3(7,6,4)
http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/Juliainsk
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JodieLyn
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Oh Melanie - I was also going to say my youngest was in quite the hurry as well. We homebirth though.. and I talked to my midwife sure there was no problem with timing and 45 minutes later (about 45 min. before she got here) baby was born.. so anyway.. we had what we needed and just waited for my midwife for anything that didn't need done asap.
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Jodie, wife to Dave
G-18, B-17, G-15, G-14, B-13, B-11, G-9, B-7, B-5, B-4
All men who have turned out worth anything have had the chief hand in their own education.
-Sir Walter Scott
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4Real Forums : Tea and Conversation
Topic: Candleside Chat
