I shop once a month. I go to 3 different stores (Sam's Club) where I get milk, cheese, butter and freeze it among other things. I get the bulk of my stuff at Aldi's and then go to Target to finish off stuff what I can't find at the other two stores. As far as fruits and veggies, lettuce and tomatoes last almost the whole month as do apples. The stuff that goes faster like banana we eat up first and then wait till the next mont to get more. We then will move on the kiwis or pears that last longer and then apples. So we work through our fruits with the stuff that goes the fastest. You can also do canned fruit towards the end of the month. I find we save a lot of money this way. I just shopped today for the next month and spent under $400 for a family of 5. Some months it is more depending on what I am stocking up on. But our budget is closer to $500-$550 and I don't work hard to keep it at that. I could put more effort in and get it closer to $400. Every couple months I will stretch our shopping out to 5 weeks to use up stuff we already have. Hope this helps :-)

We live in NC and our state doesn't require 180 days but that is what I aim for. We are required to consistently teach for 9 months out of the year (whatever that means...lol). We actually school year around from Jan-Dec. This year, we pretty much school 4 days a week with a week off every term. That allows for errands, appointments and catching up around the house. Still feel so locked in....lol

We school 180 day a year. I have the school days planned out as well as our days off. I have my lessons planned so that I know exactly what we are doing each day and if we miss a day, it throws our schedule off because we have to make that up so that we stick with the 180 days. I feel like our school days are so full that we don't have time for anything else. It is school, chores, meals etc and then the day is over. I have no flexibility. If we want to go to the park, I have to work that into our schedule. I know there are some that school more than 180 days and they just go with the flow. They pick up the next day where they left off the day before. If it takes 12 months to get thru math rather than 9 months, that is fine. But I can't seem to wrap my type A mind around this. How do you gauge if you are on track or behind? How do you keep from getting too lazy and not getting much school done? (I am always afraid of this for myself) How do you do school? 180 days? More? Less? I would love your input because I feel in bondage to my current schedule and I want to be more flexible, I just don't know how. Jessica

I just wanted to thank everyone for their input. Yesterday and today went soooo much better. Thank you, thank you, thank you!!!

We don't actually school all day but after reading the responses, I think it hangs over my head more and it feels more like it than what we actually do. If we have reading from 3 or 4 books for the day (different subjects) and we only get to one, then the others seem to nag me and I get overwhelmed. Not everything fits in a neat 2 hours like I would like. As you can tell, I am very Type A. And I am realizing that I need to be even more flexible than I have become since having children :-)

Thank you for all the responses. Just to clarify something, we do work at the table and one of the chores that they take their time at is cleaning and clearing the table so we can work. I think I just need to take that job back myself. I usually have them unload the dishwasher in the morning but probably need to move that to the afternoon. My 4 yo will be 5 in November and we are taking 1 1/2 to do K so we only school on M, W, F. I think it is so overwhelming because we have only been doing this for a few days. My 4 yo handwriting is learning how to form a letter whether with paper and pencil or a finger in rice or a ziplock bag with colored cornstarch. I probably should not have said handwriting. I think the overwhelming feeling makes things seem much bigger than they really are. After reading the responses, I realize I exaggerated with schooling all day. It just feel like it rather than actually doing it. Because we follow a Charlotte Mason approach so much of the curriculum is reading rather than independent work. So I am needed for much of the reading. We keep each subject only 15 minutes long. So math is only 15 minutes, bible/ history is combined at about 20 minutes and different reading that takes 10-15 minutes. I will definitely have to try more chores in the afternoon and try to get most of the schooling done in the morning. Thank you so much for all the helpful input.

I have a 6 yo in Y1 and a 4 yo that just started K. The youngest will do K for 1 1/2 years so that he can start Y1 when oldest starts Y3. Oldest does mix SCM/AO and youngest does My Fathers World. I am trying to have them do math and handwriting at the same time but am really struggling with the rest. Youngest needs more hands on but oldest needs me for lots of reading. Oldest reads far above his age and I could give him more reading on his own but I have noticed (even after repeated discussions on the subject) he does not read every sentence, paragraph and page. He will skim but he will read it so many times (like library books) that he will tell me the story and I would have no idea how he skips around unless I actually watched his eyes. There are still chores to do. My husband leaves for work at 3:30pm and gets home about 4am. So he sleeps until about 11am. The children and I get up, eat breakfast, some chores and start on school. But it seems I am always trying to hurry them along with chores so we can start school. Then DH gets up about 11-11:30 which breaks up our day. We then try and each lunch as a family. There are naps/quiet times in the afternoon and spending time with DH before he goes to work. I feel like I don't have time to clean, cook or do much of anything. I also don't want to be homeschooling all day. I would greatly appreciate any tips or suggestion on how to handle a situation like this. Many thanks, Jessica

I was reading a thread that talked about how many read alouds you have going on at one time. Majority said less than 4. Now I am second guessing myself. My DS is in 1st grade and we started MFW-K last year but quickly starting stripping away because his reading was advanced and we did cursive writing rather than manuscript. So I started my first year of homeschool modifying our curriculum. This year, I am doing mostly SCM and this is our current curriculum. (5 day/week) Bible Devotional Catechism Scripture Memory Copywork Math-U-See Alpha SCM Genesis Through Deuteronomy (Each 1 day/week) Character Sketches Book of Virtues Hero Tales Scotch Twins Farmyard People Herriot's Treasury Parables from Nature Aesop for Children A Child's Garden of Verse Men of Iron These Happy Golden Years Some of these are short, some are longer, some I read and some are audio. Do you think this is too much for 1st grade? We don't spend more than 15 minutes on any given subject or book. If this is too much, how do you pare down when making your own curriculum? Thanks,

I actually came to post on the same subject and glad I did a search. This was very helpful. I like the poster board idea. I will have to go find those other threads. :bigear:

I will have him tell me what the story is about or turn pages and have him tell me what is going on in the pictures and it appears that he is understanding. He will tell me the names of the characters and in normal conversation, he will rattle off stuff that is going on in his books. He will also try to use words that he has learned from a book in his normal conversation but he will pronounce it wrong. He is my oldest, so I don't know what is normal in this situation. It is sounding like this is rather common. I just didn't want to develop bad habits that would be hard to break later on or diminish his progress in any way. Thank you all for your input and suggestions. I greatly appreciate it.:001_smile:

Thank you Mary!

Thank you Aimee for your advice :001_smile: Anyone else?

We have finished 100EZL and he just finished OPG today.

My son is 5 and is able to read chapter books and stuff. But I have noticed that he will skip pages when reading. He already reads fast because I will watch his eyes but if he looks up and then goes back to reading, he will skip over stuff. I have told him it is ok to just flip through the book for the first time if he wants to see pictures etc. But I have explained that he will need to read every word of every paragraph of every page otherwise he will not get the context or understanding of the story. I have also hold him to ask me if he doesn't know a word. He usually gets close to sounding it out but I know he is not asking how to says words which will effect his comprehension and spelling later on. I have asked him this repeatedly but he continues to do it on his own. I have told him recently that I will just take the books away because I would rather him not read then read the words wrong. He says "Noooooo". He loves reading. So I guess my question is.... How do I get my child to read every page and not skip pages and also to ask me if he doesn't know a word? Thanks for any advice or help, Jessica

Thank you all for your input. I tend to be a very black and white thinker and never thought about the possibility of not doing a curriculum after 100 EZL. You can tell that I don't have the mindset of a homeschooling momma yet. I am still waiting to be told what to do...lol. I am (or was) looking for a curriculum that didn't include handwriting as we are using Abeka cursive and I see that some of these already include handwriting. Is it too early to worry about spelling? Should I wait on that as well?

My son will be 5 in February and we are just about finished with 100 EZL. He is breezing through them and it is very easy for him. When I tried to test him on reading, he is almost at a 3rd grade level. This is my first year homeschooling and I am not sure how to approach this. I have looked at ETC but I think it will be too easy for him and he doesn't need a workbook type program. I think he would rather just read. I also looked at Phonics Pathways which I think he could use some work on the blends and stuff like "ough, aw" etc sounds. And I was reading tonight, there was a suggestion for someone else to work backwards and work on spelling rather than phonics. I am just struggling because we are doing K but don't know where to match him for his phonics. Any suggestions? Thanks, Jessica

I will beginning my first year of homeschooling the beginning of August. We are using MFW K with my 4 1/2 yo. I also have a 2 yo and 8 month baby. My husband leaves for work a little after 3pm and gets home about 2am. So he is home a good part of the day. We try to spend as much family time then as we can. Do anyone have any suggestion for our scheduling. My husband is not a morning person and so we try to move at my husbands pace after he wakes up. My children also take afternoon naps/quiet times. I just feel like we don't have alot of time. But I also know that it doesn't take much more than 1/2 hr with K. But there is so much fun stuff that I want to have time for. Hope this makes sense...lol. I appreciate any input. Thanks, Jessica

I have a 4yr DS, 2yr DS and 7m DD. I would really like to get serious about homeschooling. Due to a single income, I have been doing alot of research to find stuff free online. But that can be overwhelming for me as I am a very organized, black and white thinker. I almost need something that will just tell me what to do rather than me piecing it all together at this point. Maybe I will feel more comfortable with that after I have a couple years under my belt. My 4yr DS has kinda been a hard one to figure out (but it could just be me). He doesn't really like to color, draw or write. He is very slow to process things and you can't push him in anyway. But once he sleeps on it, he usually has it with little practice. He will all of the sudden do something that we worked on months ago with no practice for months. He knows his numbers, letters and quite a few sounds. He has already started reading. I find he is very responsive to reading. He will sit for such a long time if you will read to him. So I think a reading base curriculum will work best for him. After all of that, I guess I am looking for suggestions on curriculum either free or very little cost. I have been looking at OFE and I think he may like that. I want something that is heavily bible based. Something that will help with character issues but if not, I can use stuff from CharacterJournal.com. For my 2yr DS, I was going to use LotW but just heard about a new one today called ABCJesusLovesMe.com. I know this is a little long winded but I would appreciate any help someone would like to offer. This sure can be overwhelming. Thank you!