My oldest will be K age next year and we will most likely be homeschooling. I have lurked on this board and seen comments about people not liking HSLDA. Can you please tell me why? Is there something I should know about?

I just don't know what to do! It has to be something that can be done in about a 2 hour time period. UGhhhhhhhh.....

I am in charge of planning a Ladies Night out at church and we have done all sorts of craft and game nights, dinner and movie nights,etc. I was planning on doing a cookie exchange (we have never done that), but have to scrap that since when I told the person who is planning the following month, they told me they were thinking about doing that, (I wish they would of kept it to themselves, but oh well). SO, I need a totally new idea, we have never done a service project for our night out and thought that would be something different. So, does anyone have any good ideas? We have visited nursing homes before, but I Think this would be too late in the evening for that. I thought about maybe doing something for new moms in the hospital??? But I don't know what?? Can anyone help me? Or what is another good idea?? Please help me!!

Thank you for the ideas! You ladies are so quick at responding on this board! What I have figured we would do is I would make appetizers, eat, visit and then give everyone an opportunity to share something bout the cookie they brought (favorite memory, or favorite baking time, whatever) and then do the actual swap. Can anyone think of any other games or ideas? Do I just haev them laid out on the table and say "have at it!" or should I do drawing to see who goes first? I am not really sure how many will come, it could be anywhere from 5 to 25.

I am the November hostesses for our Ladies' night at church and I was thinking about doing a cookie exchange to get ready for the Christmas season. I have never been to one, so I need a little bit of help. Do people mostly bring like 6 dozen cookies or so and have them bagged seperatly (in a dozen) and then you switch?? What do they normally do? What is something good to serve at eat? Eat the cookies? Or should I make some appetizers? ANY advice would be great, I am not the most creative person when it comes to this sort of stuff. Thank you!

I totally agree that children should do chores becuase they are apart of the family, but I also want to instill in them that I am not going to give them money just because they are breathing. We really want them to "earn" it and have money to give, save and spend. I am just clueless on how to set up a chore system for that. Can someone tell me the chores that your 4 year old does?

How much do you pay for each chore?

I really need help making a chore chart for my kids (4,2,1-well, mainly for the 4 year old). We really like the Dave Ramsey concept, "work=getting paid, no work=no pay (we will still make them do the chore though), so does anyone else pay for chores??? I definately agree they should things because they are apart of the family and we told them to, etc, but I also really want to teach them about money and working and saving, giving, and spending. Can anyone share their chore charts? I don't know why I am struggling with this, I really need some help!

Wow! Thanks so much for all the responses! It helps to hear what other people have done. My instinct tells me to keep it light, but the idea of having a "currirculm" really sounds helpful. I am so not into unschooling, so I don't want to do that, but I also know that this is Kindergarten. Thank you again!

Thanks for responding! I am struggling with even doing a box curriculum, or just focus on reading (We are already doing 100 EZ) a little math and lots of field trips and playing. Thanks again everyone!

We will probably be homeschooling next year and I know they have lots of books on the first day of Kindergarten, etc, but does anyone know of any good fiction books for preschoolers about homeschooling? Or one that has a character who is homeschooled??

I will most likely be starting homeschooling next year and I think to not get overwhelmed my first year of homeschooling, we will probably go with a boxed curriculum. Can you reccomend a good one? Has anyone used Covenant Home or Vertias Press?

Alright, to give a quick background, I have been thinking about hsing for a couple months and really think it is something to do for our kids (4, 2, 11m) and I finally spoke to the hubsand about it tonight. I thought I would for sure get an automatic "no" and then that would have to be the end of it, but he said there is a "1 1/2 percent chance that he would go for homeschooling" and that he would think about it. So, I know it doesn't sound like much, but I am happy and encouraged he is at least willing to think about it. He said his main concerns are that all the homeschool kids he knew growing up were weird and didn't know how to act in social situations. Also he says he would be concerned that our kids wouldn't know how to act in a group setting, how not to be the center of attention, participating in sports and music, and that I would get burnt out. He said he also wants to see EVERYTHING, like currirculum and everything and how I would do it. Does anyone have any advice? Any articles (short perferably) that I show him about the benefits? Anyone else been in the same situation? Thanks so much.

Thanks again everyone. It is through our church and I am actually the preacher's wife, so I really do not want to stop going and I want my children to become good friends with other children at church. My daughter is one of the better behaved children, so I don't imagine her being a distruption, but I also don't want other people to be annoyed and not come. We would be the only homeschooling family, so she would be the only one her age I imagine. I definately want to find a homeschool group as well. Thanks again for your advice!

Thanks for the responses. I just don't want my other children not to be able to attend because of homeschooling and am not quite sure what to do. If anyone has any similar experience, I would really appreciate it.

I know I am way overthinking this, but I would like to homeschool my child who will be in Kindergarten next year. (I guess I techinally am currently homeschooling, since I choose not to put her in Pre-K.) Anyways, we are apart of a great playgroup that I created through our church that meets twice a month. Would it be offensive to the other parents to let her come since she will be "school age" next year? Should I make her sit or let her play? In your opinon, would it be better to make other arangements for her (which honestly, I don't see as a possibility). I don't want the younger ones to not be able to go to playgroup and would really like to continue in it and I was just thinking about that today.

Thank you so much for everyone's responses! They have all been very helpful. I don't kid myself that it is going to be A LOT of work and that is a big worry. I use to teach in a private school and we had a few homeschool kids enroll after hsing and they were way behind on stuff and that worries me too. We live in an area that has "great" public schools, but they focus soooo much on testing, they don't hardly even study history and science, there is so much bias in the textbooks, so much time taken to displine students (and that doesn't even work), they maybe do 1 field trip a year, metioning God is a no-no, etc. I could go on and on and that is why I am really considering hsing. I would love the idea to choose high quality faith based curriculum, take lots of field trips, have time to enroll them in neat activities and community service projects, take vacations without having to worry about school, and not my kids constantly bombared with negative influences. Ughhh.. I am praying that God will make it clear to me and especially my husband if hsing would be a good fit for us.

But I am now. I have a 4 year old, 2 year old and 10m old. Lately, I have really been thinking about wanting to homeschool our kids. I use to be a teacher before I had kids and am just overall disappointed in the public schools and private school is too expensive. I currently do not send any of them to a preschool or MDO. So, can you please answer some questions for me? I would really appreciate it. 1. How do you have time to do anything else besides homeschool? How do get time to yourself? I don't have family in town, so that concerns me. What about chores? 2. I haven't even metioned this to my husband yet. In past conversations though, he said there is zero chance he will let me homeschool. He thinks all homeschool kids are social weirdos. Any advice? I know I need to pray and that is what I am doing. 3. Do you get burnt out? What do you do about that? 4. How do you children participate in sports, like football, are there a lot of homeschool teams out there? 5. What is one piece of advice you feel is important for someone to know in my situation? Thanks so much!