Wellfleet

My mother had 6 kids [3 of each] within 8 years. We girls shared a single room & closet until I was 10, and the boys shared one room until they each moved out after HS. Clothes-sharing was just the most normal thing. It was having our OWN outfits that seemed strange to us. And that didn't really start happening until we starting BUYING our own clothes. In addition, my parents' sibs all had kids a little older or a little younger than us, so all the cousins shared clothes too. I can't remember a single Summer picnic where the mothers in our family weren't going through cardboard boxes of baby, toddler & pre-schooler clothes - trading things, remembering how cute A looked when wearing X etc. Lots of stories!! And I loved it when my aunt [who had 3 girls, all older than me & my sisters] would send down boxes of clothes she had made for them. It was like designer wear. Perfectly-tailored and constructed. She was a master seamstress, could do ANYTHING with a needle, and once made my uncle an overcoat of camel-colored cashmere. Very elegant!

Pretty darned brainwashed - I believe is the answer to your question. I'm sure the overall vibe fundie parents put out on education - the whole time they're homeschooling - is that this is just something we have to get through. A drudgery, a mandatory task. Not something joyous and exciting, which it can be. Kids literally are brainwashed into thinking that education is like cleaning the toilet - it must be done, but we don't have to like it & we don't have to invest a lot of time in it.

Thanks, Marys... I don't know how long this is going to last - this show is SO INCREDIBLY BORING. The little I managed to see was staggeringly dull. I can't believe TLC is still running the Duggars - last Spring I really thought they were over, but there's still 6 months to go in the year I gave them before "Counting On" started so I guess we'll see. If it's on at all in 2017 I'll be very surprised. I think people are pretty much done with the Duggars but who knows? If Trump gets in [God forbid], I guess it's conceivable that the Duggars could go on and on.... ?

So I'm surfing around at 11 pm and see a Duggar face go by. What the ??? I've been away from the forum for several months now - it was getting pretty quiet last Spring - and had NO IDEA the "Counting On" show was back. Can't believe it's back either but hey, this is TLC! Just heard yesterday that one of their newer stars - from that Willis family show I think - has been charged with child rape so I can see nothing much has changed. TLC - the lowest common denominator channel. Of course the Duggars are back! I have some catching-up to do apparently, since this was episode 4. So Jinger is now courting? Or engaged? Has a wedding date been set? Is Josh back? On TV I mean? Are Jill & Derick still in Central America? I'll have to read the comments from the other 3 episodes, becuz I'm not sure I could stomach watching the actual show anymore. As it was, I only caught the last 15 min or so when I happened to see it on the tube tonight.

The Kleins, and most especially Will & Zoey, will absolutely be MUCH better off - off the air. The kids are both right at the starting point of being aware of the show & that most other people DON'T have cameras following them all the time. That the fact that complete strangers are interested in them, come up to the family in public, even that classmates are watching the show at home. No matter how fine a school they attend and how the adults around them handle it, they will "hear about" being on TV from other kids. And I'm not saying it'll be a lot of cruel stuff, but it's unlikely there won't be any. At the very least, they're sure to be subject to some teasing. Even with sympathetic, supportive parents & all that the Kleins can afford to buy, life is going to be tough enough. Those kids, like all kids, deserve to have as normal and private a childhood as they can get.

Yeah Derrick - not sure I'm totally believin' this whole story. Just doesn't ring true.

Spot-on correct. There's no mistaking, IMO, that Me-chelle views Josie in this [twisted] way.

Yes, Sew. You are completely right - nearly ALL regionally-accredited schools in the US require a basic writing requirement in their associate & bachelor degree programs. In fact, at this time most accredited schools are ADDING English and/or writing requirements to core curriculums and have been for at last the past dozen years. All you have to do is to read a few comments anywhere on the Web to see [1] why so many schools feel the need to ratchet up writing instruction and [2] how desperately it's needed in this country. Ppersonally I'm hoping that a small portion of that instruction includes the need for proofreading, because I can't get over how many web comments are rendered basically incomprehensible because of spelling errors and missing words.

This is key to me as well. The Duggar males - I won't refer to them as men - in fact fundie males in general quite probably, haven't Clue One about what to do. Not really. As evidenced by Me-chelle's accidentally-hilarious "It won't take long..." comment to one of her girls a few years back.

Good grief - what an odyssey! Plus - who wants to bet, that when the dust finally settles, some other production company will come along and make a movie out of this mess? Kind of a boring accounting movie, to be sure, but still...

My two cents on the topic.The fact that Zoey's hair has been made more carefree is not at all surprising. For several generations now, it seems children's hairstyles have been becoming shorter and increasingly "fuss-free." Unless they really LIKE fussing and fixing it, most moms nowadays keep things simpler. Possibly because more Dads are now coping with kids' hair, and it's hard to imagine that many men are into that. Mothers have always been busy, but now that the vast majority like Jen also work outside the home, "easy-to-fix" hair is just [duh] - easier. For boys, those no-care-other-than-a-shampoo styles like the "brush" or "buzz" look. For girls, often chin-length or shorter with barrettes, ribbons, hairbands, scrunchies keeping it out of their faces and looking tidy. My own hair was grown from infancy to shoulder-length, which I think was pretty common for the time, but I almost always had braids, pigtails or a ponytail because my parents couldn't stand seeing little kids with wild unkempt "feral" hair in their faces. Then in the 3rd grade or so, my SAHM had had enough of being hairdresser to 3 little girls. My hair was cut to just below chin-length, requiring only a barrette, and my pre-school sisters got pixie cuts [which were adorable and didn't even need the barrette]. Took a lot less time to shampoo us too. But my Mom told me she had ringlets for much of her childhood, which required my grandmother to tie up Mom's hair with rags daily, a process that she made sound fairly labor-intensive.

Sadly, I'm sure this is probably true. But it's not just the South. And they're hillbillies - all of them. No matter what their level of education.

Derrick has got to be one of the shyest and most passive males I've ever seen. IMO, he didn't even choose Jill. I think he had extremely limited social contact with women before "meeting" Jill on Skype. I don't think he dated AT ALL before her. Not that he actually "dated" Jill, of course. He didn't even have to introduce himself to her - in person - at any point. The awkward portion of Derrick's courtship wasn't with Jill - it was with Boob. In my thinking, that says a lot.

Yes, completely agree Zoloft. Having AC everywhere now has undoubtedly been a factor, but you're probably right in stating that Baby Boomer parents [my generation] haven't been nearly as "hands off" as our own parents were able to be. Parents don't simply "parent" any longer; they're expected to be security details too. Whether this is something they feel pressured to do by society - or within themselves - isn't really clear. And I honestly don't know whether this is good or bad. I hope some enterprising sociologists are busy researching this. We'll probably find out in 10-20 years that we did it all wrong too, just like our own parents did. Wry grin...

I don't remember really paying attention to the weather much as a child, other than noticing rain, snow, thunderstorms etc. And I don't EVER remember feeling uncomfortably hot on 90-degree days etc; at least not until I was maybe 9 or 10. My mother dressed us appropriately for whatever the weather was, and we played outside ALL THE TIME. All year long. So did all the other neighborhood kids [Baby Boomers all]. If it was raining we played on our 3-sides-of-the-house wraparound porch or down in someone's basement. This was long before people had AC in their homes. Only movie theaters and grocery stores had AC at that time. But the past 40-50 years have seen AC installed nearly everywhere and I think we're all pretty spoiled by it now.

So true. Hope this means the kiddos will be playing outside more often in the future. At least when Texas dries out - the poor folks there are absolutely being hammered with rain and flooding. First, several years of drought. Now, much more water than they need. Sending ALL good wishes for our friends in Texas. Hang in there, y'all...

I think Will and Zoey have a very healthy & solid sibling relationship overall, especially considering that they haven't been "together" since birth as unadopted siblings usually are. They enjoy each other, they're good company for each other and - no small consideration - they're both going to face the same Little People challenges, so they'll always have that as a common sibling bond too. My guess is that both kids are doing exactly what they want to do right now. Zoey doesn't WANT to join Will's Chinese lion deal because she has ZERO interest in it. Knowing Zoey she may even be a little [understandably] frightened of it. Will is just an extraordinarily enthusiastic child - game for anything - and that's probably why we sometimes see him join Zoey's activities. That will likely change soon since they're approaching that "boys/girls are cooties" period of development pretty quickly. I do not think Will is allowed to do anything and everything he wants all the time - at least I hope he isn't - but I do understand why some viewers have come to this conclusion. Because there's rarely been footage of the kids being denied anything, or being disciplined. It's been 99% plusses and 1% minuses. And Life just isn't that one-sided. We don't need - or want - to see meltdown after meltdown, and of course privacy issues should always be considered. But is it "reality" TV or not? If Jen and Bill really want to portray their regular family life, let's see a few cons along with the Pros. On a personal note, if it were me, I would NEVER want anyone to think of me as such an indulgent parent. I'd be sure to include examples of both, so it would be clear that I was at least trying to teach my kids that everything is not always going to go their way in life. The sooner every child learns that, the better. Looking at you, Donald Trump...

I think it is their house. I found this image online, which seems to show 2 tropical-looking trees in the side yard. Windows, gutters, landscaping are basically the same.

Could be one, both or neither. The current shortness may feel familiar and comfortable to her, especially on hot Texas days. Or she may not care one whit either way. Who knows? IMO, you nailed it, zoloft. Spot-on.

I think the dark blue color is a massive improvement. Looks great! IMO, that island green color made the Klein house stick out like a sore thumb. Beautiful house, but an altogether-wrong color for a middle-to-upper-middle class city neighborhood. If they buy that huge 4-bedroom, 4-bath beach house in Galveston they were looking at, Jen can paint that green. Or her favorite Tiffany blue. I was always surprised they didn't use that for the house originally. Maybe I missed something and Bill vetoed the blue on the basis of "we already have an awful lot of Tiffany blue stuff around..." Something like that.

Right. In addition, I'd be completely stunned if Zoey or any other 4-year old, male or female, has any concept of her hair and what it looks like. Whatsoever. Unless they're unfortunate enough to be involved in those appalling pre-school "beauty pageant" activities, children this young just don't consider how they appear, what they're wearing, how their hair is fixed etc. As long as she's comfortable, how her hair looks is not something Zoey thinks about. Of course this won't last too much longer. Little girls often develop preferences in primary school, especially if on the receiving end of any teasing or hurtful comments from classmates. But four-year olds? No.

Agree 100%. I'm guessing Zoey likes her hair shorter. It was quite short at the time she was adopted and I'm sure kept short by the orphanage staff - easier to care for overall. Maybe the shorter length just feels familiar to Zoey.

Excellent question. To the Duggars, it's probably as simple as meaning someone they've had to pay. Not necessarily trained, qualified and/or accredited for whatever the task at hand was. Just someone they had to pay.

Exactly - has to be Famy.

Wow. Is Josh really selling used cars on the side of the road? If that's true, that's a mighty comedown & mighty fast. I could see that in a couple of years maybe, but this soon? I wonder if Boob is trying to instill some kind of humble lesson and/or dole out some punishment?