Totally depends on daily circumstances - the computer is on 24/7, so technically I'm always online, but more often than not, not really - not even close to even near the computer! Some days it's much more than others, some days none at all - it really depends on what's going on. Like yesterday, I was on a lot - DS was at camp, baby-DS slept some good chunks.....everything else was done, so I bounced around online. Today, it's in spurts - 5 here, 5 there - it'll likely be around a total of an hour or so all day....over the weekend, none, I'll be too busy!

:iagree::iagree::iagree:

If you already know you're going to homeschool third grade, and if you're already going to homeschool your 6yo this year, personally, I don't see why not start homeschooling your 7yo now - she's already ahead, she's already bored with the work demands at school (creating her own book club, how cool is that to try to use her time productively at such a young age!) and you'll be able to meet her where she is in each subject and create a well rounded year that challenges her and keeps her interested.

I've done both approaches, not for routine daily life, but for occasions when cooking wasn't going to get done! For 'kit' type approach, when I've traveled with DS (before baby was born) and was going to be gone a couple of weeks, I'd set up dinners in the freezer for DH to have to make each night....all he'd need to do is either A) take out the bag in the AM on his way out to thaw in the refrigerator and heat when he got home, or B) remove and cook the components that needed cooking and heat up what was already cooked. For example, one meal might be steak, green beans and mashed sweet potatoes. Big bag contained a smaller bag with steak in it, another bag with the green beans and a pat of butter, and the last bag with the sweet potatoes - DH would take the big bag out of the freezer in the morning, put it in the refrigerator so the steak could thaw....then when he got home, fire up the grill for his steak and pop the two veggie bags in the microwave. Within 10-minutes he had dinner. When I've traveled I've set him up with however many days I'll be gone worth of meals - it works, he eats and I don't come back to a crazy kitchen since the only thing he needs to get in the dishwasher is his dishes and then remember to run it every few days when it's full. From then on, I know he just keeps living out of the dishwasher for plates, cups, etc. Fully-cooked meals I've done before having the baby - that way, I could (or my mom who was helping us, or DH) just grab the meal and let it thaw and then re-heat. Even when I've set up DH when I've traveled some of the meals were already cooked and just needed to be re-heated. Things like lasagna, chili, stew, spaghetti sauce & meatballs/sausage, etc. all keep well in the freezer and many can be stored in ziploc bags instead of containers.

I haven't read through all the replies, but the big issue for me would be grandma making plans with a child rather than asking me/DH as the parents about it first, without the child present or within earshot. We've had this issue with my MIL and have had to be firm about it - we are the parents, we make the decisions, you come to us to ask and we will discuss....IF you go to DS or ask such things in front of him and place us in a situation where we will either be the good guys or bad guys, we'll be bad guys because the answer will be an automatic NO, no matter how great an idea it is. It took two "no's" for her to realize we were dead serious about it and she no longer tries to go through DS to get her way.

My first suggestion is to review all the options your DH has regarding the type of coverage he opts to go with. Most employers who offer health insurance do it as part of a 'cafeteria plan' where more than one policy type is offered. Compare apples to apples! For your DH and children, coverage will cost (pre-tax) $240 per month, so $2,880 per year for him and the kids. Adding you on increases that to $800 (pre-tax), so total cost of covering the entire family is $9,600 a year - expensive, yes, but compared to the average cost for a family plan, it's less than the norm. You cost the most since you're a female of child-bearing age - your cost is directly related to the *risk* you'll get pregnant and utilize services for having a child. Not fair, I know, but DH's company pays all premiums for employees, so I see the rates each year for renewal and it's the women of child-bearing age who cost the most for premiums. You being added to the plan is going to cost $6,270 a year (pre-tax) - given your pre-existing condition, how much healthcare will you utilize over the course of the year paying without insurance - your doctor visits, labs, prescriptions, etc? Now a couple of things - while $6,270 is A LOT OF MONEY - it is pre-tax - so you'll want to do some math to figure out how that expense being pre-tax effects the taxes you'll pay.....it isn't going to make them go down by much, but it may actually take you down a bracket, so factor in the difference in what you pay now with what you'll pay with the plan. For example, the premiums paid pre-tax may bring your tax burden down by, say hypothetically, $2000....so now you're costing, really, $355 a month - can you find comparable insurance for that on the private market? Then, what to do? Look to see if there is a high-deductible plan and and HSA....that may be a reasonable option for you to consider if overall your utilization of services, as a family, is less than your premiums - that way you can sock away money into the HSA to pay for medical expenses. The other option is if they have an HSA option on the plan he's offered, that CAN be used for your medical expenses even if you are NOT on the insurance plan he has! If you were to go that route, you then could seek a catastrophic plan only and use the HSA money to pay your routine medical expenses (HSA is pre-tax money also).

I personally wouldn't be offended - it's a business affair, so the hostess does not really *know* everyone who will be attending and depending upon the number of guests, that much use of the bathrooms indoors could present some serious issues. As you noted, the guests are longstanding clients of the hosts' COMPANY - while they're acquaintances, they're not necessarily *friends* and some people don't want a lot of people traipsing through their home.

Health insurance has existed since the late 1800's, but wartime (1939-1945) wage freezes imposed by the government accelerated the spread of group health insurance via employers because they were unable (by law) to attract workers by paying higher wages, so employers created benefit packages that included health insurance, paid time off, etc. as a way to attract and keep workers.

I'm not being snarky - I really have to ask - just what do you do with the kids when you're pumping gas, in say, pouring rain? Where do you put them so they're safe if the car catches on fire while you're pumping gas?

Singapore...use the textbook, workbook, IP and CWP. I also supplement with Horizons, any fun worksheets I can find and print out, lots of math based games and verbal math games.

LOL - my mom had the same advice and was absolutely horrified by how much I gained in both pregnancies - she's quite proud that with me she gained only 12-pounds and didn't need maternity clothes and with my sister, just 10-pounds! :001_huh:

With DS I was in at five weeks for a beta hCG since I was late and the HPT's were inconsistent - negative, faint positive, negative - so that was to confirm pregnancy, followed by a second blood draw two days later to confirm the hCG was doubling. Then back again at six weeks for an ultrasound to check for heartbeat, which obviously was there. Then I was part of a trial for fetal nuchal translucency test - so I was in the ten and a half week group and had my ultrasound and blood work at ten and a half weeks. Then it was the routine visit schedule until delivery. With baby-DS, a blood test confirmed the pregnancy, then six weeks for heartbeat ultrasound, we did the nuchal translucency testing at eleven weeks and then (due to my age) the maternal fetal specialist started serial monitoring at 16-weeks (IMO totally unnecessary, but DH agreed with him, so I did that).

I was born in '66 and my mom was apparently going to BF me even though it was definitely not the norm - that was until I was born and she didn't make any milk! She tried for two days to BF in the hospital - and tells me about the "poor lady" next to her with ice packs on her boobs because they hurt so much because she wasn't going to BF...and here mom was, wanting to BF and nothing - no milk, no pain, and her boobs were smaller than before she got pregnant to boot! My mom wasn't a "hippie-type" though - it was just normal in her family for women to BF their babies. Anyway, at first my mother actually considered a wet-nurse, but that was too expensive....so I was fed some type of homemade formula - my mother said at first she made the canned milk-corn syrup-vitamins type, but then her grandmother had her switch me to goat milk (for its higher fat content) and (YIKES) raw egg yolks blended together - which finding goat milk in NYC was a feat unto itself, so she and my dad drove to a farm in NJ to get it each week! My mom also gave me some baby vitamins the doctor had prescribed and had me taking cod liver oil too. I was switched to whole (4% back then) cow milk (wasn't homogenized either) around six months when I started to also eat solid foods....apparently had the cod liver oil daily too - my mom stopped that when I was around seven!

If it helps, I've BTDT....I've switched phonics programs a number of times, in an effort to find the one that would help DS. Now, I do not suggest switching a ton of times - that did lead to us taking longer to get where we are now! But - my honest opinion, HOP is lacking compared to a lot of other programs out there - it was the first one I started with and we did continue with pieces of it since DS liked the DVD's.....but could I recommend it as a base program? Honestly, no. Even the new version which I used (my sister used the version you used so I know what you're talking about). What's going to work is really going to depend on your son's learning style and how intensively you want to be doing the phonics each day. Here is what I've been through: HOP - wasn't getting anywhere quickly, DS did not like it and was likely not really totally ready to be focusing on phonics at the point I was doing it with him. Saxon Phonics - looked good, so I picked it up and we started that - DS hated, hated, hated it and it didn't seem to be doing much, plus was very tedious on a daily basis. OPGTR - we have used this and I still refer to it as we're doing various phonics rules, but to sit with the book and do it daily, that would drive DS nuts, totally not his style. Spell to Write and Read - got it, looked through it, sold it....pretty much knew it wasn't going to work for DS. Teach Your Child to Read in 100 Easy Lessons....thought it sounded great, bought it, looked through it and nope, this wasn't going to be it either. Horizons Phonics - this is the one we ultimately settled in with, that DS likes and isn't running for the hills when I take the book out. It's colorful and the lessons are fairly quick each day and it progresses along at a pace DS could manage...he's a very visual kid and the color in the books is definitely a plus for us! What I did when we finally settled on Horizons - I totally wiped the slate clean as to what we did and started all over again. We'd taken a break from the phonics and reading, so I started with K, again. We worked quickly through the K workbooks and did NOT do the K readers that accompany the workbooks. We did very little reading of phonics readers during this "review" period....this helped DS, I think, by easing us back into getting him on track for reading. For a short period we tried ETC online and Click N Read online - both are okay, but just didn't really didn't do much for DS. We then moved on to the first grade books and slowed down the pace a bit. I spent hours and hours going through all the phonetically controlled readers I've purchased - Nora Gaydos, Bob Books, Starfall Readers, the books that came with HOP, the books that accompany Horizons (which incidentally are NOT phonetically controlled), etc. and figured out exactly when each book I had would apply to a lesson we were doing - made my list and used those books at each point they were relevant to the lesson we were working on. All through the first grade books (there are two of them), we would do the lesson and then he'd practice by reading the books that lined up with the lessons. We'd do sentences I'd made up and he'd draw his pictures. He's ask to watch the HOP DVD's now and then and we would - they're cute - but I didn't worry if they aligned with what we did, whatever the lesson was, it was reinforcement of something we did or we'd do at some point. And then one day, somewhere in the middle of the second first grade book, I realized DS was reading much, much better - improved speed, much more fluency, sounding out words he hadn't seen before with much more ease....and he was reading other things, like signs and things on the TV or the back of packages. For DS it took lots and lots of practice, slow and methodical, step-by-step, one at a time, lather, rinse, repeat....praise....challenge a bit....drop back to what is easy.....praise....practice, practice, practice. And slowly but surely, he's getting it. He is still not a fluent reader, but we've now moved to leveled readers that are not phonetically controlled and it took months and months of practice of seemingly simple reading to get here. I still use some phonetically controlled material with him (Nora Gaydos Level 3 Read It, Write It, Draw It) to give him confidence boosters in with the more difficult reading practice he is working on. I started the whole teaching phonics to DS totally clueless, I made a lot of mistakes a long the way, so I'm not at all claiming I know what I'm doing....I don't....but maybe starting again, pacing through what he knows fairly quickly, and then taking it slowly as he's learning the new phonics rules and such might help?

Have you looked at Singapore Math?

We're doing Horizons Phonics 2 and AAS.

Nope.

Because of DH's work, we don't even have dinner most nights until 7:00-7:30, then he spends time with DS and now the baby....so bedtime isn't until 9:30-10:00 (baby is down around 8:30-8:45 though). I let DS sleep until he wakes on his own - makes for a much happier kid during the day! Most days he wakes around 8:00-8:30....but if he's had a crazy busy day, he has slept in until 10:30!

I don't know how reasonable the price is or not these days, but the Intercontinental is awesome!

Oh, I forgot one that might be fun around Halloween - in Old Town Alexandria there is a haunted tour - it's great (not too scary) and you get a pretty good tour of the area!

Children's Museum in Winchester, VA (Shenandoah Valley CM) Children's Museum in Charlottesville, VA Aquarium in Inner Harbor, Baltimore, MD Newseum in DC Not sure if it's still open, but a children's museum in DC Out by Fredrick, MD there are a couple of working farms (Amish) You could do Ski Liberty (?) in MD in the winter - there is also Wisp Resort in MD Glen Echo Park (Bethesda) is great National Postal Museum US Mint Luray Caverns

I'm not a black and white type person, I do see shades of grey on this one and yes, I've left my six year old in the car unattended in some circumstances - like in our driveway, running back into the house to get my cell phone I forgot or running into the gas station to pay for gas (car off, keys with me, locked). We live in a small town and there are times when it makes more sense to leave him in the car than to have him get out and come with me, like at the gas station or if it's pouring rain and I have to drop a letter in the mailbox and I can't drive up to it, but can park across the street and run back and forth. That said, I wouldn't leave him in a car in NYC (I'm from NYC and know the level of risk is higher there than where we are now), or Chicago, or LA, or even a larger city in my own state. I wouldn't leave him in the car at this age if I couldn't see the car either because, well I'm from NYC and weighing risk/benefit, I probably would err on the side of caution and take him with me if I couldn't see the car (here). I wouldn't leave him, at this age, in a running car - or an unlocked car....but yes, I'll make a judgment call and if I feel it's safe, I will leave him in the car. What's interesting is that our state doesn't have a law regarding the issue - in fact, leaving children alone at home is totally up to the discretion of the parents as there is no law specifying what age a child may be left unattended.

And apparently for up to five minutes under 7!

Interesting....I just googled to see what states have laws on the matter. Here is the list I found: Washington -illegal to leave children under 16 years old unattended in a car that is running, in a public place California - illegal for caregiver to leave a child ages 6 years or younger alone in a vehicle without supervision of person over age of 12 when engine is running or keys are in ignition or there are risky conditions present Florida - illegal to leave child younger than 6 in car with motor running at all; or for more than 15 minutes when car is not running Illinois - illegal to leave child in car unattended for more than 10 minutes Maryland - illegal to leave child under the age of 8 in car unattended if car is out of sight of the responsible adult Michigan - illegal to leave child under the age of 6 for period of time that results in "unreasonable risk of harm or injury to the child." Nevada - illegal to leave child of 7 years or younger unattended by someone over age of 12 if the motor is running or the situation is risky/dangerous. Oklahoma - illegal to leave child 6 years or younger "unattended" - with unattended defined as "beyond a person's direct ability to care for or come to the aid of the unaccompanied person" if conditions (e.g. extreme weather, inadequate ventilation) pose a risk to the safety of the child. Connecticut - illegal to leave child under age of 12 in a place for a "period of time that presents a substantial risk to the child's health or safety ...." Hawaii - illegal to leave child under the age of 9 car alone for more than five minutes. Louisiana - illegal to leave child under age of 6 when car operator is more than 10 feet away from vehicle. Pennsylvania - illegal to leave child under 6 years alone in car when vehicle is "out of the person's sight" and under dangerous circumstances - if they are on public roads and traffic ways, including parking lots. Tennessee - illegal to leave a child under age of 10 alone in car Texas - illegal to leave child under the age of 7 alone in car for more than five minutes

I just noticed this - did you do just the K level with HOP? I ask because if you did only the K kit, there are a lot more phonics to do - there are first grade and second grade kits too (or all in one big kit)! And even those miss a good number of blends, which is why while we still did continue with HOP DVD"s and such, we switched to Horizon's Phonics, which IMO is/was a much deeper program for phonics instruction.