I have trouble answering the question because I don't know if you want us to divide the week total by five days? What about if we school year round and hardly take breaks? My dd does more than 8 hours x 180 days but I didn't answer your poll since I don't know how you want it done.

I want to warn you of insurance concerns. When someone mentioned this problem last month, I called my insurance (USAA) and asked what dogs cause them not to insure a home? They answered Pit Bulls, Rottweilers, German Shepherd, Akita, and one other- I think Alaskan but maybe Siberian. Anyway, that is my insurance company's list- yours is likely to be different but I would check. You don't want to risk bankruptcy because of dog misbehavior. Another sign that this may not be the dog for you is you said you are the nice dog lady, not the dog enforcer. Powerful, dominant breeds need dog enforcer types while mild mannered dogs like Labs can be a good match for not so dominant people.

I don't actually know about strawberry greens but there are other reasons other than tastiness why we don't eat some parts of plants. For example, Tomatoes come from the nightshade family. You do not want to eat the leaves since they have the poison. THe tomatoes themselves are fine. Same thing with potatoes. Rhubarb is another one with some parts poisonous. I would research strawberry greens before eating. Orange peels have two parts to them. THe orange part can be eaten but I am not sure if large amounts are okay since it is usually used in very small portions. The white part, while not poisonous, is extremely bitter and I doubt you would want to put that in your smoothie. For the most part, we don't eat some parts of plants for a good reason like bitter taste or bad properties.

I really like the Grapes of Wrath. My girls heard the audio version last year on a long car ride. I like John Steinbeck's books in general. That said, I don't like all classics. I don't like Hemingway's Old MAn and the Sea. I never read Moby Dick. I did like the movie a lot. I also liked the novella Billy Budd.

My family is quite happy not being too specialized. None of us have such narrow interests that we will become outliers and that is really okay because we will all probably be very successful, yet not outstandingly so. My dh was only mildly encourage in his love of science and both economics and other competing interests mean that he isn't at the top of his field. Yet he doesn't think he had the personality to do something like become a Nobel laureate. He likes his family, his hobbies, and generally his leisure. Yes, he works more that 40 hours a week but more like 60, not the 80 or more for the top scientists. Myself, I am even more of a generalist than my husband and I like it like that. My children are all like us. Yes, they have their passions and they work hard on their pursuits but the pursuits change over time and the amount of work they do on a specific passion is not the level that the best pursue. THey have our personalities and similar interests to ours and can't see forgoing so many pleasurable activities for pursuing only one thing.

Oh, I am sorry, I didn't even know there was a St. Pete campus. Since we didn't live in the area, we kind of thought as those two cities together. I think the one that all the kids I know went to had to be the larger campus because of their descriptions.

I believe the books, if mandatory, are tax deductible too. Just the room and board and fees like student activity fees. The thought is that you have lots of college aged students in the country. Why should Joe Smith have to pay taxes on the part of his income from a job that pays his apartment rent and food costs while Susie Smith who goes to college and yet gets a scholarship that covers lodging and food not have to pay. In order to make it equal, they don't let either deduct. The part that is for tuition is deductible in the same way that work supplies and training for a job is deductible.

It is the college that decides who gets grants other than the Pell grant which is dependent on income. I would strongly recommend that she go with the school that has less loans.

You have until May to put in the decision. I don't know anything about Gettysburg either but do think, it can't hurt to ask for more aid. I know that on College Confidential, some students ahve done that at some schools successfully. Go for it.

My severely ADHDer isn't really obsessed with anything but her speech is very repetivitive. In the mornings before her medicine works and in the evening after it is wearing off, we hear "MOm, it's a cat: or some other thing she spies over and over again. She also repeats mainly what my husband, her dad, says, like the last few words. FOr the most part, I ignore. I do try to make sure that dh is not saying anything bad because she repeats it like a parrot. It is particularly bad right before her period. It certainly is one of the reasons she needs to have a single room in college. Her family has learned to live with it most times. Others won't. ALl together it doesn't happen every day but many days it does. It is one reason we have dinner late so she is done with her time of repetetiveness before then and I give her her medicine about an hour before she gets up so it kicks in before she gets downstairs.

Were we talking about us or about any family? I put it down as for us but we have an expensive rental, college tuition, etc. That doesn't mean that I think others can have much lower expenses but ours are high.

Six is the usual courseload. My one daughter had 5.5 her freshman year since she was sick for 7 months. My upcoming ninth grader will have at least 6. It all depends what she chooses for co-op. She will also be coming in with 1.5 credits at least (Algebra 1 and Earth Science).

I love her books. I also like Ruth Rendell. I read mysteries all the time and I read ones that are not thought provoking but very easy reads and then ones that are thought provoking. I consider both PD James and Ruth Rendell in the second category.

I am sorry. Praying for you and your family.

The only math needed for Chemistry is Algebra 1.

Since we are military, we don't know where we will be living when she goes to college so we can't tell her whether we will be near or far. She can't go to a school where the costs aren't covered but that still leaves a lot of schools. (SHe will get the GI Bill and with a good yellow ribbon program, that should cover completely or almost completely all costs at many schools). I do know she wants warm not cold so I take that to mean zone 7 and above since she hated being in Philadelphia in the winter and she hasn;t lived in the winter in any area colder than zone 7 since she was 1. She wants to be pre-law with a major in a popular major like psychology, poly sci or economics. I have found her some colleges but she hasn't even checked them out on the web. I really don't want this to be all my ideas but I just don't know when she will have time. I am really wanting her to start applying later this summer once the applications are out since we may very well have a sudden move. The AF is having more people retire and with the economy the way it is, both dh and I think that people like him are more likely to be retiring since his industry isn't suffering. He won't be retiring (and won't be forced to either) but if people suddenly retire, he may be moved suddenly to take over someone's job. We also have our lease running out mid December and while I think the owner would like to extend it to later SPring in order to sell at a better time, I really can't predict. I want her applications in by late Nov.

My dd is so extremely busy both with her school work, prep for tests, debate, writing a novel (one of her classes), community service, choir, and soccer in a week that she has basically no time to think about college. She visited a few colleges this summer and that is it. SHe knows one that she will definitely be applying to but other than that, she is really unsure and unable to think. NOw in April, debate ends and I can have her not do choir but in May, here comes dual enrollment and the end of May comes dive team. Her community service is here and there right now- she will be helping with a food drive soon and then there is a relay for life in June plus a blanket she is knitting for a 4H service project. I am not sure what to do. Any suggestions?

Oh I will definitely count my dd's hours in a mission trip since she was doing community service, not evangelizing. SHe painted an outdoor wall, cooked a meal for homeless and poor, and took care of children in an afterschool program. In her case, I don't think it makes any difference whether she was sleeping in a church in the evenings or serving the food in the church fellowship hall. THe food was for anyone in the community and not tied to any beliefs. I would also count anyone who volunteers at a soup kitchen,

Wow, that is strange about only one English credit per year. Both of my kids who have been in high school and myself in Public school, ending up with more that 4 English credits since we all used electives to do extra English. My son did public speaking and Sci Fi/Fantasy lit. I did Drama and Journalism. My middle is currently doing Novel writing. This was beyond the normal English classes which were a combination of reading literature and writing.

I am an AF wife and I have to agree with Sebastian. First of all, as she said, the classes you take in ROTC are not classical but rather practical. Secondly, at least with the AF and Navy, more and more of the ROTC scholarships are going to math/science/engineering majors.

We are military and so for our first two kids, we won't be living in the same place from senior year of high school until they gradaute from college. So, no, we don't care about distance since what is close now can be very far away later. I wouldn't want my kids coming home very often anyway unless they really lived very close. I wouldn't want them wasting travelling time while they are supposed to be studying and I don;t see any reason why they would get more studying home than at school.

In my last house, our bathroom only had a shower. I didn't like that at all. I get migraines and sinus infections. I want a bathtub. In this house we have a bathtub/shower. WHile this is better, what I would really want is a separate shower and a separate bathtub.

We are not YE Creationists and we don't go to churches where this is the standard. We do go to a co-op where the church has YE beliefs but most of the participants go to churches that aren't YE in belief. At my current church, there are people who are YE but certainly not most.

My dd took her first CC class just after she turned 15. She was in honors Psychology and had no problems. Since it was an honors class, it was at a good level, and not dopey.

When we lived on the Fl east coast, there were quite a lot of kids in our community who went to Univ. of So. Florida and they lived on campus as it was a 2.5 to 3 hour drive. Now, I don't know if they were the only ones living on campus, but I think you can find out those statistics online.