It seems to me that this particular talent of yours encompasses several other skills. Your ability to pull together attractive, inexpensive outfits, demonstrates you have an ability to find bargains and combine colors and fabrics nicely, as well as having a sense of style which others appreciate. The skill you have with clothing might translate well into other areas, such as home and/or office decorating. Many fashion designers branch out into other areas of decorating. I don't know what kind of career you are looking for or what amount of time you have available to pursue a career or start a business. You can to contact the owners of the shops where you purchase your finds and help them display their items better to maximize their sales. You could either offer to work for them part time or start up a Fashion Merchandising business. http://jobdescriptions.net/professional/fashion-merchandising/ Somewhere I read that the average salary for fashion merchandising is 32,000-53,000 per year. And even if you do nothing else with these skills beyond what you are doing, they allow your family to live a more pleasant life for less money. A penny saved is a penny earned. :)

I saw this thread referenced on another thread so I came to check it out. :) It definately feels to me like the time of year when doubts about homeschooling creep into the lives of happy homeschoolers as summer wanes and children prepare to head back to school. Oh Elizabeth--based on everything I've read from you here over many years, I think you are providing an amazing education for your son. I can't imagine any teacher caring more or doing more for him than you do. Between your own expertise and the specialists you involve, you have created an incredible environment to foster his growth. Enjoy the rest of your summer. And face the impending school year with the knowledge that you are not alone.

Yes, we have a formal dining room and we use it often for a variety of things. It's become more of a multi-purpose room that can be easily turned back into a formal dining room. It was our first homeschool classroom. It was my bedroom when I was on bedrest with one pregnancy and couldn't easily climb stairs. It was a guestroom when a relative came for an extended stay. It's served as an office, a project center for big projects involving lots of paperwork, a tutoring facility, a walk-in closet, a library, and more. But whatever else it's been, it's been a formal dining room first and foremost.

:grouphug:

Jen-- With the move and all the swim team drama, you really had quite a school year! I hope you enjoy your summer break and get some rest. :) ---- Now that we're official "done" with our school year, I can give some much needed, extra attention to my youngest son's writing. I gave him a lot of "accommodations" by not requiring a lot of writing from him this school year. We'd test and demonstrate knowledge in other ways, like multiple choice and matching and projects. For the past six years I had used remediating types of materials and techniques with him, but this year we didn't use any special education materials, just accommodations with limited writing. I didn't feel good about not working on writing, but writing takes great effort from both of us so it seemed proper to ask him to demonstrate knowledge in other ways. We kept pretty busy. Now, while writing still takes effort, since that's the only academic thing we're working together this summer, we have time to do it well. We're using a book that says it's for grades 4-12 from Memoria Press using a Progymnasmata approach of re-writing fables. My others used Progym at younger ages. This approach seems to be working fairly well at this point. It still takes a lot of work and guidance from me, but he's now able to generate reasonably decent 1-2 paragraph stories. In addition to that, I'm now able to spend more time working daily on Barton with my six year old. I'm glad I have the program already because it seems like the approach she needs for learning to read.

This year, our homeschooling was all done at home, with no outside classes, no online classes, no brick-and-mortar high school (which our three oldest attended for all or part of their high school.) Heathermomster-Thank you for starting this thread and sharing your experience with outside classes. I go back and forth as I plan for next year. I'm an old-time homeschooler now, who generally associates "home schooling" with parents teaching kids at home. While outside classes look tempting, for a variety of reasons I've hesitated to sign up for them. Right now I'm looking at a co-op, and I'd like to sign up for a few classes just so we can have some of the (infamous homeschool buzz-word) "socialization". I'm tempted to sign up for some of the academic subjects, but I like the academics we've pursued on our own. I like the books we use. I generally like the flexible structure we use, which involves math daily, with other subjects rotating. We often cover materials more intensely, finish them and move onto something else, rather than having to juggle numerous subjects. Overall, as the school year comes to an end, I'm generally feeling pretty good about how our school year went. That's how I feel today, anyway. How successful I feel at homeschooling varies by the day. ;)

:hurray:

We have old carpet and two old chairs that are on my list of things to replace. They've been on that list for a few years. In the meantime, I resorted to trying a product that I claims to denature the protein of dust mites. It does something because I feel better after spraying them on the carpet. This one is the "non-staining" formula: http://www.amazon.com/ADMS-Anti-Allergen-Spray-16-oz/dp/B007BR5I66?ie=UTF8&psc=1&redirect=true&ref_=oh_aui_detailpage_o02_s00 This one has tannins that may stain: http://www.amazon.com/ADS-Anti-Allergen-Dust-Spray-oz/dp/B007BQ8OTA?ie=UTF8&psc=1&redirect=true&ref_=oh_aui_detailpage_o02_s00

Add beef broth. Soup often continues to thicken overnight in the refrigerator, so I usually just thin it down with some more broth. Your soup will be fine and maybe even better than it was yesterday. :)

That wouldn't surprise me as the science contained within her essay stood out to me. She demonstrated that she ponders and has understanding of scientific principles as they apply to ordinary experiences like grocery shopping. Strong scientific credentials, along with an ability to demonstrate how science applies to everyday life, may be what stood out to the admission staff.

I've tutored mine with both Barton and Lindamood-Bell. With what you describe with your son having failed the Barton screen, I'd stick with the tutor who's doing LiPS then Barton rather than using a LMB learning center if they won't remediate him with LiPS. If your son is not hearing the sounds in words-- unless he's got an extremely good memory-- spelling will continue to be difficult. LMB would improve his spelling scores and teach him how to spell better. However, as he encounters longer words throughout his education, it's likely that he'll continue to leave off sounds in the middle of words. It might look like faster progress with Seeing Stars, but in the long run I believe LiPS then Barton would serve him better. When I called a LMB center about LiPS after my ds failed the Barton screen, the person on the phone started telling me that my son probably didn't need LiPS. My ds was barely even reading anything at the time. Without even testing him first, they tried to steer me towards Seeing Stars. LiPS requires more training than Seeing Stars. To my understanding, not every staff member at LMB center is trained in LiPS. Since you already have a tutor familiar with teaching LiPs, I'd.stick with her. If you have extra time and money to spend on remediation this summer, maybe see if she has some more time available to tutor your son more frequently.

We did. I read to ds the early years, skipped some of the writing of number words and corrected his math work with his dyslexia in mind. We addressed his reversals and upside-down numbers as slightly different than "math" errors. In the early grades he made mistakes like 6 for 9, E for 3, 12 for 21--which while wrong on paper, he often knew the answer orally, so I addressed to root problem with techniques for dyslexia. He maintained confidence in his math abilities, gradually corrected his place value and reversal errors without getting more confused, and his math no longer reflect dyslexic errors.

Small snack bags of Anne's Bunnies. (They are like Goldfish crackers dressed for Easter.) Rice Krispy treats shaped like eggs or chick's or bunnies. (They are sweet like candy but mostly cereal.) Marshmallows bunnies. Again, sweet like candy but mostly air. Garden seeds packets for carrots, lettuces, etc. Small trowel and garden gloves.

I agree with the person who suggested to keep records to look for patterns. I can't speak to everything you wrote, but I do believe that most normal 3 year olds can and do melt down when hungry and tired. So, I'd look for a pattern to the melt downs. As to wearing pants...there are varying comfort level of the clothing and materials. Sweat pants generally are comfortable while some dress-up pants can be made from itchy/scratchy fabrics with uncomfortable seams. There's something called "sensory processing disorder" which checks off some of the behaviors found on the autism spectrum without having all of them. But at age three, many children have more sensitive skin and may find certain clothing uncomfortable. Bottom line: I don't know. Some of this sounds like it could just be a three year old who's hungry, tired and wearing uncomfortable clothes, (and perhaps coming down with a cold.) That's how three years olds act sometimes. You say he acts like this often, but I can't tell from what you wrote if this is he's just frequently hungry and tired or if he also acts like this during normal daily routines when he's well-rested, well-fed, and wearing comfortable clothes.

FWIW- Students who take AP courses or other college courses in high school shouldn't set the standard ofwhat to expect from average 9th graders.

And when served with a salad, the plate is red, white and green!

I'd look at travel dvd that he can watch to "take" him on hikes and other adventures.

Does he have documented memory issues? Mine did, and repeating phrases and sentences took a while like you describe. You could try working to improve his memory with other materials developed specifically for memory. Barton went a bit faster after we did some memory remediation. But I will also add that (at least in my opinion), Barton IS also memory work. My son's memory for those phrases and sentences improved the further we got through Barton. Beyond memory, has his hearing and auditory processing been evaluated? Again, IMO Barton also provides some remediation for some pieces of those issues. Barton was developed reading program for dyslexia, but other things like memory and auditory processing affect reading, and they often occur along with severe dyslexia. As they are worked on through reading, in my experience those other areas can improve too. I'll also add, that those sessions of Barton gave me insights as to how his brain and memory worked. At first, he could only hold a few words. As he progressed, he'd often substitute similar or related words. By later levels, he'd remember the whole sentence--unless he was coming down with a cold, (in which case the first signs of illness showed up while doing Barton.)

Shopping sales provides real-world application. You could do this in stores or over the internet. "If the item cost $10 originally and is on sale for 30% off, what will it cost, before sales tax?" If sales tax is 7.5% and you buy $100 worth of taxable items, what will the total cost be?" At 13, I'd allow a calculator or calculator app, which makes it far easier to calculate the prices while shopping.

Yes! We have Christmas cookies in the freezer. At least, we did last time I checked.

Maybe, maybe not. We pulled my son from a private school last year. He'd connected there and was doing okay, but the drive was nearly killing me! Literally--we saw some pretty nasty accidents on bad weather days. The hours I spent driving affected the rest of our family and my ability to homeschool the others. The drive wasn't just on school days. There were activities on nights and weekends too, (because activities and friendships don't just take place during the school hours.) On top of that, (or perhaps, in part, because of it, who knows? I'm second guessing but exhaustion likely played a part) he developed some health issues. So then we worried about a child with some rather serious health concerns who was far away from us. Shortly after that, we said enough. He's back to homeschooling again. And I needed this reminder today because it's not always easy to homeschool a child with special needs.

3-D printers should change the gun control debate. On a recent episode of Leverage, a terrorist used a 3-D printer to "print" a gun.

If someone tells you that they're offended when you use the term "micro-aggression" will you stop using that term? Will some of you apologize and stop expressing that you took insult where no insult was intended if someone else says he or she feels insulted that you took offense?

I enjoy the type of exchanges that Jenny mentioned that I quoted. I grew up in different place than from where I currently live. When I encounter someone who comes from somewhere else, I feel a connection with that person regardless of that person's race. Another poster who accused others of micro-aggression mentioned it's about the "effect" of these questions, but some forgot that the effect is often a shared human experience where people can relate to each other and communicate in a friendly manner.

We used several things. We started with LiPS (after he failed the Barton screen.) I got the LiPS vowel training video too for my own training purposes to help me understand that portion of the program most thoroughly. Once through a portion of LiPS, we used Barton. Barton is a reading program for dyslexia, and it introduces vowel sounds very slowly with key words to help differentiate between the vowels. Also, listen closely to your own accent. I came to realize that my accent likely contributed to some of my son's vowel confusion. (edit to add: the year before doing LiPS we tried something called "The Listening Program" at the suggestion of a speech therapist. He still failed the Barton screen the next year.)