We've never had any trouble with our herding dog mixes and our chickens. We have two cattle dog mixes (one crossed with pit bull (not a combination I recommend, but her issues are with other dogs; she's great with people and chickens) and the other probably mixed with some kind of smallish terrier). Our newest addition is some kind of big, shaggy herding dog (quite possibly a Bergamasco or Bergamasco cross, but there's no way to know for sure). He occasionally bounds half-heartedly after a chicken if one is running near him, but now that he's outgrown the puppy stage we trust him not to hurt them (I don't think he ever would have hurt them on purpose, but he might have played a bit too roughly, given that he outweighs them by 50 pounds). If it's very important that you can trust the dog around the chickens, I personally wouldn't take a chance on any kind of bird dog unless it had already been around poultry and done fine. That's just me. I know there are plenty of labs, poodles, etc. who do just great with chickens, but with so many dogs in the world to pick from, I'm more comfortable getting one that's not genetically predisposed to kill and eat any members of our household. I adore cattle dogs/mixes, and, at least around here, they're a dime a dozen at shelters. Not easy dogs, exactly (no herding dogs are, I don't think), but very trainable IME and as far I've heard/seen any aggression problems they have are towards other dogs, not toward people. I'd also think about a border collie.

I just checked our ITBS score sheet, and it gives a Lexile range. Not free, I know, but in case you have to/plan to test anyway...

Office Max has a lot of super cheap stuff this week...I think it might vary by region, but here there are 10 pencils for 10 cents, rulers for 5 cents, tiny bottles of purell for 10 cents, binders for 20 cents (I think), and a couple of others.

nope. I've asked DH more than once, at various stages in our with-kid lives, and he's always said he wouldn't want to trade places with me. He's a teacher, so he has a good bit of time at home, seeing what it would be like. We both have work that we find, for the most part, challenging and satisfying.

I'm sure it's been discussed before, but I can't think of an efficient way to search for it (perhaps because I've been staring gloomily at my tentative schedule for the past couple of hours....) So! Is 45 minutes 5 times a week enough time for the Town level of MCT language arts (all of it, including poetry and Caesar's English)? How do you break it down? I'm thinking of reading/discussing 3 days a week and having him spend the other 2 days working on the writing assignments. Oh, I forgot--I was actually including Writing With Ease in the 45 minutes....so, umm, is around 30 minutes 4 days a week plus 45 minutes the 5th day enough?

Charlotte's Web

We had DS tested (WISC) at a university near us for $150. The test was administered by a grad student in the psychology dept.

I did a search and found a few short threads, but not a whole lot of feedback.... Homeschool Buyers Co-op has it, and I'm thinking of getting a subscription for my 2nd and 4th graders to use this year. It's not the same as the streaming (which we already have, free through the state); it has videos plus online activities, virtual labs, quizzes, etc. We are historically not so good about getting science done, so I like the idea of something they can do independently. And when I fail to get around to all the other exciting science plans I come up with, at least some science will happen. Anyway--anyone use/d it? Likes and dislikes?

Would there be money to finish the basement at some point in the relatively near future? How much space would that add? With a garage and a basement, it sounds like there are a good many possibilities for more livable space. Even an unfinished basement could make a good indoor play space in bad weather. I would definitely consider it, at any rate, if moving to a smaller space is the only way to you can buy.

We just stopped in NYC for a couple of days on our trip up the East coast. All the kids LOVED the Statue of Liberty (but were pretty bored with Ellis Island). We also went to the Metropolitan Museum of Art, and they were pretty into that, too, especially the armor and the Greek and Roman stuff.

DH is a teacher. He's very supportive :)

Yeah, I imagine I just got lucky; I know nothing of tweaking, but I put it in and it installed. I didn't read about the compatibility issues until after I ordered it; I wouldn't have taken a chance on it if I'd known!

I didn't read carefully before I bought this (last time they had a super deal on it) a couple of months ago, and it actually runs fine on my windows 7. The only weird thing I've noticed is that it won't save the kids' names from session to session. And my seven year old LOVES it, btw.

Most of my ideas have already been mentioned....also Stuart Little

We have a 99 Toyota Sienna, and it's still going strong with 175,000 miles on it. We just took it on a 2000 mile round trip road trip in fact. We toyed with the idea of getting something smaller next time, but I just don't see how it would work with 3 kids plus assorted dogs, bikes, etc. So we'll probably be looking for another Sienna sometime in the near future.

Historically, I prefer people names for animals, but lately I've developed a fondness for word names. So I'm voting Pirate. Our dogs are Oliver, Lucy, and Gable--oddly, we only named Oliver ourselves, even though I LOVE naming stuff. Lucy and Gable came with good names, so we kept them. Pi (as in 3.14) is the name I'm keeping in mind for the next dog, whenever that may be.

When it first starts getting hot and humid, I sometimes bump the air down as low as 74 just to get it to cut on and dry out the house. I can't stand that sticky hot feeling inside. Now that it's VERY hot, I keep it around 77/78 most of the time, as it will still cut on often enough that way. We have a lot of tree cover, so it rarely gets above 80-82 inside even without the air. Winter we're more stoic. We sleep with the heat at 58, anywhere from 60-65 during the day, depending on how we feel.

We stayed at the HoJo last September and it was fabulous! We stayed in one of the pirate themed kidsuites, and it was all brand new and really nice. About a 10 minute walk from the gates--normally it wouldn't have been bad at all, but there happened to be a crazy heat wave when we were there...so it seemed pretty long (particularly with a 3 year old) when it was 101.

I don't think you can count on them to know immediately not to hurt livestock, but I would think it would at least be easy to train them not to, since you don't have any predisposition toward hunting to work against. I have three herding dog mixes, and we've had no trouble with them and our chickens (none of them encountered chickens, so far as we know, until they were older--between 9 months and 13, depending on the dog). The older ones seemed to immediately get that the chickens were ours and were not to be hurt; when we added in our then 9 month old puppy he wanted to bound after the chickens and harass them at first (I don't think he would have hurt them on purpose), but now he completely ignores them. We were careful to go with a non-hunting breed (we weren't looking specifically for a livestock dog, but I seem to be drawn to them), and it worked out well.

Okay, I just spent 45 minutes playing Plants vs. Zombies. Maybe starting this thread wasn't such a great idea after all....;)

Sure, people change rescue dogs' names all the time. I've heard that some rescue organizations actually recommend changing the dog's name because it helps give him a fresh start.

Thanks! I have an exciting evening ahead of me looking into all of these :) I guess I could also contribute to my own thread and list the stuff we already have and enjoy: Angry birds Froggy Jump Traffic Rush Spin Art Airport Mania Sneezies Mad Libs Yard Sale (we just found this and they LOVE it; it's like an I Spy game; you have to visit "yard sales" and find stuff to decorate your house with) Finger Physics Doodle Buddy Topple

Two of my kids just got touches for their birthdays (and my youngest can borrow my iphone). Most of the reason we agreed to get them for them was our upcoming very long drive up the east coast. I've been loading them up with apps but I need more! They have $60 to spend on itunes from gift cards from the grandparents, so price is no object (well, more or less). What apps do your kids love? Any good podcasts for kids? Stuff I'm not thinking of? Has anyone done the movie rentals from itunes? How do they work? I'm assuming if we rent one we can only play it once, yes? so if they all wanted to watch it they'd either have to huddle around one ipod or we'd have to pay for it again?

Thanks all! We'll check into I, Robot (our library doesn't have it, of course--grr!) and some of the others. I pulled out a book I remember reading when I was a few years older than him--it's short stories that Twilight Zone episodes were based on, so I figured how bad could they be--the Twilight Zone was more hokey than disturbing. But then the first story I looked at was about a kid who could control minds forcing a rat to eat itself. yeah, umm, no thanks.

Oh--maybe All-of-a-Kind Family? I think there are 4 of those.