Before you rule out GAPS, I might suggest getting the book and reading up on it. It has accomplished miraculous outcomes for some people, and could result in you being able to eat dairy and eggs again without problems. Gut health is so important, and your sensitivities are indicative of a poor functioning gut. My dear friend is a nutritional therapist, and she is AWESOME at guiding peopel through these issues. She offers a free consult! (and no, I'm not getting a kick back for the referral...just wanting to offer a good resource. :) Here's her website: http://www.seasonjohnson.com/

Absolutely. And most of all, probably need to retrain my self. Yes. Its so easy to think I do owe more. I actually owe it to my children to give them the peace and consistency that they need.

We've been homeschooling for 7 years now, and you'd think I have figured this one out by now, but apparently not.... I need a plan to more clearly, but tactfully, communicate that I am not a stay-at-home mom with unlimited free time on my hands...and no, you can't just come over and have coffee and chat. I guess I am feeling a little more pressure this year, as my older kids are needing more academic structure, more consistency with everything, and I'm also teaching a small group reading class in my home. And yet...the phone never stops ringing (at least I don't answer that...) and friends and family continue to stop by, or ask to come by...and even my homeschooling friends want my kids to come over, or their kids to come over, in the middle of the week. As a homeschooler, I enjoy my freedom and flexibilty too. However I need a better strategy for saying "no", and for keeping things consistent. Any ideas?

I have a Kindle and an Audible account. However, we really only use our Ipods to listen to audio books. Do you know if these can be downloaded into Itunes, and the put on an Ipod??

Not knowing the nature of your relationship with her, its hard to comment here. But in general, we need to speak the truth in love to one another in the Christian faith. Sometimes this is in the form of reproof and correction, which is hard, especially because in general, the modern Church does not really practice this. I would just say to take your time, pray, and check your heart. Make sure this is not about you and your irritation with her behavior, but rather coming from a desire to see God honored in her life. Check your own eye for planks. And, you mentioned that you are not interested in an on-going mentorship with this young woman, and I'm sure you have your reasons. However, relationships do make it easier to hear and accept the truth. So, I would just encourage you, if there is openness on her part to have a relationship with you, perhaps you will also be open to that.

Hey, thanks everyone. Here's why I ask. We live on a Northern CA farm and have 2 milk cows that we milk for ourselves and allow a few other close friends to come milk. As my husband transitions from his office job to full-time on the farm, we are trying to decide if it makes sense to begin a herdshare here. Problem is, our cost of hay this year was $260 per ton....pretty typical of the West Coast....making our cost of milk about $2.70 per gallon IN THE COW. That is before we do any labor to get it out of the cow, into the jar, market it, etc. So your responses are helpful. I know the cost of production is much less in other parts of the country. On the West Coast, our hay is being exported to China. Those of you who are getting fresh milk for $4 a gallon...wow. Go kiss your farmer. It also seems, from your responses, that milk of all kinds on the West Coast is more expensive. Organic, homogenized, is $4 a half gallon here. Raw milk from the retail store is $8 per half gallon. We will probably need to charge $8-$10 a gallon through our herdshare.

Would you mind sharing: 1. Where do you buy your milk? and 2. How much do you pay? Thanks!

This article is so naive and narrow. My suspicion is that the author knows very little about homeschooling and alternative education. It assumes that public school is "society" and everything else is not? He fails to understand that there are many forms of education, and they all represent various parts of society as a whole. Whether a family does the public school thing does not determine whether or not they are engage with the culture. In our community, "Christian" homeschoolers are just one small slice of the home schooling/alternative education community. The author should check out these boards for a great example of that! I've followed some discussions here about faith, with people of MANY faiths, that I have NEVER experienced elsewhere.:001_smile: Whether or not a family is a positive force in their community is NOT determined by the type of education they choose for their children.

Beck, you are far more patient and gracious than me. For the first time...ever...I am thankful for our laws in California! For all the regulations CA has about EVERYTHING, our state is very liberal in regards to private education and homeschooling. The idea that the State would require ANYTHING of a homeschooling family, who is not using public funds, boils my blood. Our children do not belong to the State. And if we decide that we do not need or want their assistance in educating our children, they need to BUG OFF.

"Other." Phonetic Zoo is awesome. Works great, love how is uses multiple means of memorization. And, it is totally independent. Whoo hoo.

We are small town business owners and are hit up all. the. time. (Well, not so much anymore) Cheerleading camp Ski team Band trip Senior Trip Ballet production ...you name it. My husband says "no" on principle. One, he feels that if our state handled its finances better, wasted less, fired a whole bunch of Ed Department bureaucrats with 6 figure salaries, then schools would have plenty of money to educate. Second, he feels that fundraising for joy-trips perpetuates the entitlement syndrome that we see so prevelantly in kids and parents alike. Alternately, he has a standing offer to hire teens for yard work if they need to earn money. He coached HS baseball for many years, and regularly offered his players manual labor in order to earn money for travel games, new cleats, etc. In many years, he had about 2 takers. Most never responded. Some claimed they didn't have time to work. One kid...I joke not...had his FATHER come and shovel dirt in his stead. It was truly amazing. I'm sure our thinking comes from the fact that both of us were raised in lower-middle class families, and if we couldn't afford to do something, we didn't do it. Neither dh or I participated in ski team, or ballet classes, and we actually turned out all right depite it.

I've been on the phone with VP several times in the last few day regarding registration issues (for other courses).They are swamped with new enrollements and change requests. So I imagine it may take longer than usual to process the group discount.

And...what curriculums do you feel hold their values best? I find that when I am shopping used, I want a pretty deep discount. Why would I buy used VP history cards when for $5 more I can order them new? (Yes, I know...there is the non-monetary value in recycling....) I also find that I sometimes justify buying curriculum that I may not need, because I think "I can always sell this used." Well, maybe not without a pretty big loss. So what do you think...is curriculum kind of like a car? It loses half it's value the second you drive it off the lot?

One of my favorite lines, "I'm sorry, this isn't a good time. But if you will give me your home phone number, I'll call you back when I can talk." I've actually had a few giggle from telemarketers with that one.

I subscribed and unfortunately did not use it. I found it was just one more thing that I had to do everyday...check off all those readings. So, I didn't do it. I do much better planning on paper, and just keeping baskets of books to serve my "just do what's next" nature.

So, I'm thinking after reading these posts, we need to organize a homeschool family house-swap. Mountains for beach anyone? Rural farm for big city? West for East? We'd love to take our family to the East Coast sometime....Boston, New York, DC, Philedelphia.... :)

We live in a rural, mountain recreation/vacation destination on the West Coast. The pace is much slower here, and I never get tired of the views. Our home is an organic farm/homestead and so we are very busy. However, I don't at all feel part of the rat race. I think this has to do with two things. One is that we are far from major centers of commerce, and thus there is little traffic and less urge towards consumerism. And second, we rarely feel the need to leave. We live in the "vacation" spot. Snow sports in the winter, unlimited rivers, lakes, hiking, biking, climbing, rafting, in the summer. We see people here "on vacation", and we often think that their vacation is kind of our life. Of course, we work. But even our work on the farm is what some people like to do for vacation. :)

Ok, 2 more from our homeschool group want to enroll, so is that 10 now? I PM'd you the info. Shawna

Ok, and I'll make 8! Thanks so much! Shawna I just emailed to my local email list to see if there are more takers! Thanks.

My view of marriage is completely born out of my worldview...which is Biblical and Christian. Not everyone shares my worldview, obviously. And I think it shouldn't be surprising that many people have not only shed a traditional view of marriage, but also rejected the need for it at all. Many people believe marriage is a human construct....created by people for our own benefit, or for the benefit of society. And now, that benefit is questionable. With the divorce rate what it is, I might tend to agree with them. I believe marriage is God-made, God-ordained, and therefore important, sacred, and moral. That's MY view, informed by my faith. I'm not saying that people who do not share my faith do not also value marriage. MANY do. But I think as "The-Bible-Says-It-And-I-Believe-It" view of the world declines in our society, we will also see less of a need for marriage. As a Christian, I don't judge those who don't claim the Christian faith for their family choices.

Cooper = trendy Emerson = trendy and unisex Dexter = a little nerdy...and since we are farmer, it is also the name of the kind of beef cattle we raise Benjamin = classic and beautiful. It will never go out of style. Yes...it is common. But no one will wonder if he's a boy or girl, and no one will be able to immediately guess what decade he was born in.

For new readers, we enjoyed: Dr. Seuss and PD Eastman (Go Dog Go, etc.) LIttle Bear Series Frog and Toad Series Billy and Blaze Series Ricka Flicka Dicka Series Snip Snap Snur Series Syd Hoff and Other "I Can Read" Series

The Year at Maple Hill Farm Everything by Eric Carle (for young preschoolers) The Bunnies Book of Seasons The Story of Ping (I think I have literally read this 100 times) Make Way for Ducklings Ox Cart Man We are just leaving this age...so sad. We have SO many favorites, but those are the ones that come to mind as the over-and-over reads.

If you can find grass finished in bulk for less that $6 a pound, that is a screaming deal. Buy it! Grass finished is always going to cost more because: a) it requires more land and better management to ensure the cattle are getting the adequate nutrition solely from grass. Grass-farming is much more complicated that one would think. b) most grass finisheres are limited as to when they can harvest their beef. Beef must be harvested when they are gaining weight, or off flavors will result. That means that grass finished beef must be butchered when there is plenty of grass...which is most temperate climates is for a limited season. Grain finished beef may be harvested anytime, since grain stores and is available year-round. Also, on the humane concern...I"m with you. On-farm butchering is a much more peaceful, conscientious process, and the animals are never stressed. Not so in the slaughterhouse. We say on our farm, our animals live a great life and have one bad day. :)

One thing you want to look for, if you are going to pay the high price, is that the beef is actually "grass finished". That means, the cattle have eaten grass all the way through to butchering. It is the grass diet in the final stages that really effects the nutritional quality of the meat...increasing the omega 3s, decreasing saturated fats, increasing (greatly) the conjugated lineolic acid, one of the most potent anti-cancer substances found in food. A lot of beef will be labeled "grass fed." Let me tell you a secret. ALL beef are grass fed at some point in their lives. But most are shipped off to Concentrated Animal Feeding Operations (CAFOs) as yearlings and are finished on a diet of corn, soy, silage, and who-knows-what-else. So if you're going to pay the big price, make sure it's grass FINISHED.