Do you have the little board book "Hand Commands"? Such an easy way to learn the Commandments! I'm sure it can be found elsewhere for a reasonable price, but here's a pic: http://www.amazon.com/Hand-Commands-Commandments-Little-Ones/dp/0825424453/ref=tmm_other_title_0?ie=UTF8&qid=1316464965&sr=8-1

I posted a few weeks ago about a memory board I had copied from here: http://halfahundredacrewood.blogspot.com/2011/03/classical-conversations-at-home.html I am LOVING this board! I put 12 weeks worth of CC memory work in each page protector, with another page protector hanging right on top (covering the bottom one). I then moved everything we were currently learning to the top page protector. (So I have one spot for math - the top page protector has the current skip counting facts, and the page protector underneath stores what we aren't using yet. There is another set of 2 page protectors for geography, history, etc. The bottom one with new stuff stored makes it easy to get to so I don't get lazy!) Now, I give each kid a turn to "be the teacher" and review the memory work as a group. Big fun!

Bible 1. Great Things 2. Gloria Patri 3. Father We Adore You 4. Doxology 5. Spirit of the Living God 6. The Lord’s Prayer 7. Be Still And Know That I Am God 8. Old Testament Books 9. New Testament Books 10. 10 Commandments 11. John 1:1-7 Math 12. Yellow is the Sun (RightStart math song) 13. Values of US & Canadian coins (Musical Notebooks) 14. Wk1 – ones & twos (CC music for 1s and skip counting 2s) 15. 2s – the Shepherd Boy and the Stars (One Hundred Sheep song for skip counting 2s) 16. Wk2 – threes & fours (CC music for skip counting 3s and 4s) 17. 3s – Thirty-Three Wonder-filled Years (One Hundred Sheep song for skip counting 3s) 18. 3s Song (Rockin the Standards song for skip counting 3s) 19. 4s – A Healing Touch (One Hundred Sheep song for skip counting 4s) 20. 4s Song (Rockin the Standards song for skip counting 4s) 21. Wk3 – fives & sixes 22. 5s – The Happy Farmer 23. 6s – Martha, Martha 24. 6s Song 25. Wk4 – sevens & eights 26. 7s – The Fisher of Men Catches a Fisherman 27. 7s Song 28. 8s – Zacchaeus Comes Down 29. 8s Song 30. Wk5 – nines & tens 31. 9s – Reapers 32. 9s Song 33. 10s – One Hundred Sheep 34. Wk6 – elevens and twelves Geography 1. Solar System Song 2. Planets & Solar System 3. Continents and Oceans Song 4. US States & Capitals Song 5. Eastern Border US Song 6. Eastern Border Capitals Song 7. Southern Border US Song 8. Southern Border Capitals Song 9. Northern Border US Song 10. Northern Border Capitals Song 11. Middle US Song 12. Middle States Capitals Song 13. Pacific States US Song 14. Honolulu, HI; Juneau, AK Timeline (Veritas Press) 15. Timeline wks 1 & 2 16. Timeline wks 3 & 4 17. Timeline wks 5 & 6 History (CC songs) 18. Wk1 – Columbus 19. Wk2 – Pilgrims 20. Wk3 – Boston Tea party 21. Wk4 – Declaration of Independence 22. Wk5 – George Washington 23. Wk6 – Louisiana Purchase Presidents 24. Presidents Song Foreign Language & Grammar (CC songs) 25. Wk1 – Latin Prepositions 26. Wk2 – Latin Conjunctions 27. Wk3 – Latin Pronouns 28. Wk4 – Latin Verbs 29. Wk5 – Latin Verbs 30. Wk6 – Latin Nouns 31. English Grammar – wks 1-24 Science 32. Scientific Method 33. Intro to the Human Body 34. Wk1 – types of tissue 35. Wk2 – bones of axial skeleton 36. The Skeletal System 37. Bones of the Human Body 38. Wk3 – kinds of muscle 39. The Muscular System 40. Wk4 – parts of the nervous system 41. The Nervous System 42. Wk5 – 5 main senses 43. The Sensory System 44. Wk6 – parts of the digestive system 45. The Digestive System General 46. Thirty Days has September 47. Days and Order of the Months 48. Days of the Week 49. Where do we live? 50. Stopping by Woods – Setting of famous Robert Frost Poem 90% of this is review, but we just keep working it as I have one child who is more of a daisy-picker than a memorizer!! .

HEY! You are our fearless leader!!! You aren't allowed to get bored! :) I am forever trying to come up with ways to have the kids review it without me reviewing every single word. Last weekend, I loaded all the CDs we have with memory work onto my computer, and spent ages renaming every song so that I could easily see what it was. For the items that I didn't have a song, I read them into my husband's Ipad and he put the file on my computer. I then pulled them into categories, and made a memory work CD. (Well, two - wouldn't all fit onto one.) I then updated the "Smarty Pants Notebooks" in the car to include some piece of paper for every song. For example, for the books of the Bible (#s 8 & 9 below), I have a picture of a "Bible Bookcase" with the names of each book. I then wrote the song number on the bottom right hand side of each page. So now when they get lost I can say "turn to page 18!" and they can find it, though they are listening in order so it should be just turning pages one at a time. :) We spend a lot of time in the car, and that has been almost all of our review time lately! I was getting tired of trying to frantically search the floorboard for CDs and constantly changing them out while driving down the highway! (See next post for what we are memorizing.)

THANK YOU!!!

What's your favorite blog that writes about using Five in a Row? Other great FIAR resources / sources of ideas?

I'm sure someone more knowledgeable will chime in with a better answer, but here's the basic thing: The penalty of sin is death. In the Old Testament, animals were sacrificed to "atone" for sin. Christ died for us to pay that penalty, so we wouldn't have to. Check out the videos "What's in the Bible with Buck Denver" - intended for elementary kids, but SOOO enlightening as far as the basics!! I grew up in church, but somehow missed the big picture. I knew all about every parable and Bible story, but had no idea how they all fit together. The videos really helped me understand a LOT.

GREAT point!!! It is SOOOO relaxing to sit right now, b/c there isn't stuff everywhere!! I need to do whatever it takes to keep it this way!!!

My husband isn't that way about church, but is about other things. I have found that he is completely unaware that his attitude is obvious to everyone, and brings everybody else down. So now, when he starts in, I usually just kindly but firmly tell him to stay home so that at least the rest of us have a chance at learning/having fun. "I really want to be able to listen and learn in church. Your negativity toward attending makes DS think it is OK for him to act that way too, and having both of you act so badly makes it impossible for me to get anything out of the service. For now, I think it would be best for me to take the kids by myself on Sunday mornings. Though you won't be attending with us, I do need you to demonstrate a more respectful attitude about church to set a good example for DS. He has to learn that sometimes in life we have to do things we don't like, and we have to do it with our smiley faces on."

Update: I ended up not educating my kids for two days last week, and instead spent hours and hours each day sorting, filing, and purging. It's not perfect, but WOW can you say better??? I can find anything!!! All the flat surfaces are cleared, everything is minimally dusted & vacuumed, etc. I wouldn't be embarrassed for anyone to come in now, and it is honestly such a humungous relief to finally have this mostly done!!! Finishing now is achievable, rather than a totally overwhelming thought. And if I don't finish, it'll be OK. I've gone way above and beyond with schoolwork since June, so now that the house is in shape, I can confidently face anyone with questions. Thanks, mean auntie!!! What you meant for evil has turned out to be a blessing to me and my family!!! Also, I contacted my state-required homeschool accountability person, explained the situation, and she was fine with everything I was doing and basically told me I had no reason to worry!

For everyday stuff, my girls wear plain white tank tops under almost everything. And either leggings or bike shorts or Monkey Bar Buddies. For playclothes, we do Target. For co-op days, we usually wear stuff from the Gymboree Outlet (I try to buy as much as possible off the end-of-season clearance rack for the next year) or Crazy 8s.

I have come up with an excuse that I give everyone. "My kids need vision therapy, and between that and the related therapy homework, we just couldn't do both that and 8 hours of school a day. What are you gonna do - I have to do this so my kids' vision can get fixed! I have no choice but to homeschool!" I haven't come up with an excuse for next year yet, but hopefully by then everyone will know so I won't have to deal with it nearly as much! How pathetic am I?

I have triplets, and when they were maybe 2 years old, they were standing at the gate at the top of the stairs. All three of them were pulling back and forth on the gate, but I didn't think anything of it as the gate was bolted into the wall. They yanked hard and then pushed, and all three rode that gate like a sled down the stairs headfirst. I was like 2 steps behind them the whole way, and just couldn't catch them! Unbelievably, no one was hurt, though the wall required major patching!

Check out Ambleside Online. Or if you really want it all handed to you, you can buy the art cards from Core Knowledge. They are WONDEFUL! 8x10 prints of beautiful art, and the best part is that on the back they give you all the info you need including exactly what the big deal is about this particular piece, age-appropriate questions to ask your kids related to this particular piece, etc. Art now gets done at our house because of them - these are truly art-for-dummies appropriate! (I was a CPA in my former lifetime so had absolutely nothing in the art knowledge category to share with my kids.)

Gotcha. We have CC tomorrow - I'll call during our morning break. Boy am I thankful we do CC! The tutor knows we study! :)

I should be good then. All my kids have actually made better progress than was predicted b/c I am really really vigilant about doing the therapy homework every single day and keeping therapists looped in with swim/dance/gymnastics teachers and so on. I had two kids who, at a year, were not expected to ever walk unassisted. Today, they look a little awkward running, but they do it! They jump, run, skip, hop, gallop and ride bikes! Same with fine motor, sensory, and vision issues - more progress in less time than expected. They are still about a year behind their peers, but the gap is smaller now than it has ever been.

You are right, I can't imagine they would have ANY decent reason to take my kids (other than my messy house!). I am legal. I just honestly don't want to deal with it. And plus you hear those random horror stories of people losing their kids and 10 years later it all turns out to be a mistake and the state apologizes, but by then you have lost 10 years, you know? You are right - I hadn't thought about anybody else jumping on the bandwagon. I think everybody who knows me though understands why we are homeschooling and expects I will do my best job, even if they don't agree with homeschooling in general. I think if anything, they worry I will overdo the whole school thing and burn my kids out.

No, she's never even MET my kids, let alone seen them recently. I have seen her once in maybe the last 5 years, and that was at my grandfather's funeral. Other than Facebook, we are not in contact at all. I tried to let her know as non-confrontationally as possible that I knew the law and was far exceeding the requirements, and I haven't responded other than that. I will go ahead and print out the law and my proof and have that by the front door, as well as printing her FB comments and joining HSLDA. Do I have to let them in if they come? Before now, homeschooling has seemed a little daring as it was going against the flow, but suddenly it seems very scary. I am awed at those who did this 20 years ago and paved the way for the rest of us.

Kindergarten itself is not required, but you have to be educating your kid (in whatever grade) if they turn 6 before Sept 1. So it is required right now for my kids. Who investigates homeschoolers? Is it DSS? Or the education dept?

I hear you. I just don't want to tick her off and tip the scales toward having her do something, you know? Unfortunately, she hasn't said anything outright threatening. If you don't know her, you probably would just shake your head or think she was making an observation. But knowing her, I know what the implication is. Even though I'm NOT doing anything wrong, it still scares me to think of being investigated. And honestly, I just can't take that on right now in addition to homeschooling, dealing with all this therapy for their kids (and the related homework), and running the house on my own with DH working out of the country. I truly can't handle anything else on my plate at the moment. I'm exhausted as is! We have such a boring, normal, white-sheep family except this one!!

The ONLY reason I would have to worry is that my triplets were born prematurely, so they have some delays (which they are in therapy for). But that does mean that they are behind other kids their age. The good thing though is that there are a lot of therapists (and their notes!) in our lives that can vouch that the kids have made great progress even though they are still behind, so clearly we are doing something at home.

I may just stay up all night and get this done. It's has needed doing for a long time. Maybe this is just what I needed. Be a long day tomorrow though...

Ok, that makes me feel better. My bathrooms, kitchen, kids, and clothing are clean. It's just a total mess. Except for at least once a day one of my kids forgets to flush, hence the reason I am constantly cleaning the bathrooms! :)

ETA - update on p7 HELP! My aunt, who lives in across the country from us, is one of those perpetually-unhappy people. A little unstable, and likely to lash out at others to make herself feel better. She STRONGLY disapproves of homeschooling. Strongly might be the understatement of the year. When she first found out that I was considering homeschooling, she began sending these little notes. “A homeschooled kid I know ended up in jail.” Murders, suicides and other major psych issues, etc. Apparently she knows lots of grown homeschoolers, and every single one is causing problems to the rest of society. (Yeah right.) Anyway, she and mom (who is about as different from my aunt as can be) have never been good friends. But my grandfather passed away, and left a fair amount of assets and dividing it up has caused friction like you can’t imagine. Apparently things went WAY south last week, and some horrible things were said, and unfortunately it looks as though their relationship will never be repairable. And all of a sudden, my aunt is posting random things on my Facebook page. A gazillion years ago, she was a social worker in the state where we live now, and she is posting things about how when she worked at DSS, she had a list of children who weren’t attending school, and she jumped at the chance to storm into their homes and remove them from their parents’ care. She didn’t outright say anything threatening, but the underlying message was clear – she is threatening to call and report me to whoever, in order to get back at my mother. I gently but firmly replied saying that things had changed a lot since she worked here – homeschooling was legal now, and telling her exactly what the law required and letting her know that I was confident that I had far exceeded the minimal requirements. (We do not have portfolio reviews or testing requirements here in SC.) I have done EVERYTHING right. I have registered with an accountability association as required (but they don't really do much other than get a signed statement saying we are meeting the requirements). My kids have gotten a LOT more education than they would have gotten if they had gone to public school for kindergarten this year, especially since we started in June and public school has only been in session for a few weeks. And we have been able to continue their vision, speech, and occupational therapy at the necessary pace, rather than scaling back so they could spend 8 hours a day in public kindergarten. BUT, our math program (RightStart) is primarily manipulatives-based. I have nothing in the way of worksheets to show that we have actually done it. (I do have recorded what we did each day “reviewed Lesson 14” and so on.) The reading is the same way – we have been working on it, but as my lessons are tailored to the kids, we are a little stalled out right now. Two kids are supposed to be NOT doing reading lessons per the vision therapist/eye doctor, and the third has kind of plateau’ed and I don’t want to move on until she is comfortable with the material we have already done. So I am doing lessons with her daily, but it’s a constant review until she stops sounding out CCCC-AAAA-TTTT and recognizes that she doesn’t have to sound out the word every single time – she can remember it. So when you look at the phonics book’s table of contents, we haven’t moved forward in like a month. Again, I have recorded “reviewed CVC words”, but that isn’t really much proof. In addition, my husband has been out of town more than half the days of the last month, so I have totally lost control of my house. It is a complete disaster. Laundry is caught up through the drying process, but is heaped on the sofa. Dishes are caught up and counters wiped daily, and the bathrooms get a good going-over very regularly, but otherwise my house is the biggest mess you ever saw. Books and papers and maps and crayons are EVERYWHERE. If someone from the state came tomorrow and saw this house, they might seriously wonder about my ability to raise kids here. (Or they might enter me for the TV show Hoarders.) I’m really trying not to freak. I called my mom, and she thinks it is 50/50 that my aunt will lash out at her by causing trouble for me. Somebody please tell me they can't take my kids. I haven't done anything wrong, but I can't really prove I've done much right either. Now what?

By the way, we had the best opthamologist in the area (large city with good medical care) examine our kids, and after patching & glasses, she said that they would be fine. But I could still see issues, and she kept telling me not to worry. Turned out my kids could all try really hard and force their eyes to work properly for a few minutes in a quick exam, but couldn't hold the focus for long at all. I told the dev optomotrist that I had concerns, but wouldn't tell him what they were until after he examined my kids. I was skeptical, and didn't want to "give him the answers". But watching him testing my kids made it very obvious exactly what the problems were. And his tests completely supported my suspicions. My only regret is not going sooner!