I guess a lot depends on your definition of "Twaddle" I personally hate that word, because in my circles it means something that simply isn't worth the paper it's printed on. It's something that adds nothing to ones learning or life. I don't think this is the case with HP. We are huge Harry Potter fans and after seeing Narnia's first movie I wondered why it was supposedly so much safer for kids. It still has witches in it, so what makes a Narnia witch more appropriate than a Potter witch. It's really a story about good vs. evil and my kids have gotten a lot out of the movies. My dh and I have each read all the books many times over and can't wait to start using them as read alouds for the kids. My biggest issue is why must every thing always be "Great literature" what ever happened to reading for the fun of reading. HP got many kids to enjoy reading books again. To many it was a real turn around in library and bookstore usage. Just my .02

We have the 4 at a time unlimited plan. I then have a profile for myself, dh, oldest ds and dd. This way we each get a movie off our list and we don't have to make the kids send there's back right away. They are 9 and 6.75 so they like to keep their movies for a week or so. When dh is on deployment I either take his movie for myself if there's a lot I'd like to see or get something for my 3 year old. We've been on this plan for about 3 years now and it's wonderful. We've watched so many things and my kids love getting "mail"

I blog but don't have a facebook or myspace thing. The reason I blog is to show my family who all lives 500-2000 miles away what we are doing lately. It's mostly about homeschool. I don't update it much in the summer but during school I do a Weekly Report like many others here. Many in my family think hsing is just an excuse for me to not get up in the morning and take my kids to school so this is a way to show them that we do actually have school time and learn things. I know I shouldn't have to prove anything to them, but I also like that it's just another record to look back on and see what we've done.

You can do this at home and I have heard of some that will take a warm iron to the binding to warm it up first to make it easier. For me it's just easier to take it in. Usually it costs me about $1.50 to remove the binding or less depending on the store. If it's a smallish book (less than an inch think) I'll take it home and 3 hole punch it myself (my punch can handle about 20 pages at a time) if larger I'll have them drill it that way I know it's all lined up nice. Usually that makes it about $3 total. Oh and they do it, this is not a self serve thing. HTH

I take it all apart, if needed I take workbooks like our saxon 1 worksheet books to kinkos or staples and have the binding cut of and 3 hole drilled. I then keep them in a master binder for that subject and take the sheets out to put in their weekly binders as needed. HTH

I was going to ask the same thing :lol:

Our homeschool name is Fawkes Academy. Named after the Phoenix from Harry Potter. Our Motto is "Soaring through Home Education" by this I don't mean we soar through it as in time wise. It was meant as my kids are soaring because we home educate them. I hope that makes sense. The motto was really based on our logo which is a picture of a phoenix. You can see our name, logo and motto on my blog, the link is in my signature line.

We're switching our things over to glass mason jars. I haven't been able to find the big gallon or half gallon ones yet, but I'm keeping my eyes open every time I go out. I also have a foodsaver that I use to seal things like chili, spaghetti sauce etc in before freezing.

This is true, if you have a good commissary. Unfortunately ours is kind of hit or miss, a lot of times what you get there you have to eat in a day or it will mold. I wish ours was better.

I guess I'll be the oddball. I don't see morning lessons being offered as a problem. My kids took HS PE at the Y and it was at 1pm. We didn't rejoin after the first 8 weeks because it screwed everything up. We're not morning schoolers we work better in afternoons so usually here school starts at 1, also I had a toddler that was taking naps as well so 1 is when he would go down for that. My biggest issue is finding things for hsers, here everything is geared toward the after PS market. I would love to sign my dd up for gymnastics but it's 40 minutes away (because of heavy traffic) and starts at 6:30 pm. Well my kids go to bed at 8, so that's out of the questions.

Just a tip on the Dinosaur ride at Animal Kingdom. Unless your kids are really tall they won't be able to go on it anyway. They have to be 42 or 44 inches to ride that one. The other dinosaur stuff is pretty cartoonish and set up like a carnival. Not sure about the time, my kids are disney nuts. They love it there and can't get enough. We used to live in Jacksonville so were only 2 hrs away. We went 6 times in 18 months that we lived there. Just wanted to add after reading some of the other posts again that. I don't think the ages are too young. My kids were 8, 5 and 1 when we first moved to FL and went there. My little guy loved it and was always excited about it. He may not just remember things on his own but if he sees pictures from when we went he'll comment about it. I don't think it's always about remembering things, sometimes it's about living it up in the moment!

It's not an all in one but I LOVE LOVE LOVE My HP 2600n Color Laser Jet. It cost us about $300 and the toner is $84 per color and $79 for black. Each black cartridge will print about 2500 sheets before needing to be replaced. We've owned it about 3 years now and we're on our 3rd black cartridge and our 2nd of each color. The first color ones lasted 2.5 years before we had to replace them. The black lasts about a year. I print out about 18-20 a week just for school and it's also the family printer so there's usually an additional 10 sheets or so a week from the kids doing art with their digital art studio and a few more sheets my dh prints. It's been well worth the investment. PS: I also use it as a copier with our stand alone HP scanner

Mine's up Link in signature

That is so cool!! I wish I had the space I'd pay him to make me one.

Absolutely, my dogs and my cat that now lives with my mom get all their shots. I had a cat once and she caught something even while being an indoor cat. She died a horrible painful death. The only times she went outside was when going to and from the vet for a yearly check up. Even if your cat doesn't get out there is always the chance you could unknowingly bring something home.

I don't really have anything to add, the ppers said what I would have. I will be using it for my 1st grader as well as Year 2 for my 4th grader.

I would have to say, not reasonable. It seems like it would be very time consuming and could end up a big mess since you don't want the stucco painted. I used to live in a stucco house so I know just what your talking about as far as how the wood is imbedded in the stucco and it would be virtually impossible for the painters to tape off the stucco or anything to keep from getting some paint on it. Thus they would have to carefully paint by hand with very tiny brushes, which I'm sure would take a huge amount of time. Just my .02

Our current wall hangings include Pocket chart calendar Multiplication chart cracking the math code chart roman numeral chart laminated world and US maps Exploration of America Weather chart (has things like the water cycle etc on it) Types of clouds chart Money chart (showing the front and back of coins from penny to golden dollar) Pledge of Allegiance Reading my way to 100 books (one for ds and one for read alouds) magnetic white board with "tunneling our way to 100 day" ants poster AAS spelling tile board I also change my history and science posters depending on what we're covering.

I have a HP color laserjet 2600n. It cost us about $300 and the toner is $84 for colors and $79 for black. That may seem like alot but I only change the black once every 12-18 months and since buying the printer in 2005 we're only about halfway through our 2nd set of colors. Each black cartridge can print about 2500 sheets before running out. I love it. I use it with my scanner to work as a copier. I also love that if my pages get wet for any reason they don't bleed or run at all. Definitely worth the money.

I bought some cardboard magazine and book files from www.reallygoodstuff.com They have been great for helping me to organize all of our subjects together.

Julie, No problem I'm glad I could help.

We will start a week from today on Aug 4th. I was going to bump it up to today but after looking things over that would mean we'd have to observe a bacteria experiment while on the road to visit my parents in WI. That's not going to happen so by starting next week we'll actually set up and observe the experiment while at my parents. We always continue school when visiting them. My parents both work during the day so we school while they are at work and visit with them once they get home. We also visit with my grandma when there but she likes us to bring our school work with us. She loves to watch them learn. LOL

Julie, Workbook two is the laid out plans for Year 2 in the WWE text. So it would be what your 1st grader would need next year if you don't want to plan most of your own dictation and narration etc. Unless your fifth grader would need to be moved back to Year 2 you won't need it. For example my son who will be in 4th grade this year will do Year 2 because he's really had no exposure to writing. I was never sure how to teach it. HTH answer your question

Because we do both. We rent and own. We rent the house we are currently in and own the one my brother lives in. We're military and wanted to hold onto the house we bought near my parents but because it's in WI and my dh is in the Navy we most likely won't be back there to live for any length of time until after he retires.

That's correct. If you have the text only you will need to make up most of your own copywork and narrations. If you get the workbook it will all be planned out for you. The text only gives the first week of a given section in that year. For example my ds will be doing year 2 and they give me the first week's copywork and dictation, then for weeks 2-10 they give me a listing of the types of things to look for in the copywork and dictation passages but it's up to me to find them. It then continues in this pattern through the year. We're starting school next week so I'm going to have him use the year 1 workbook with my dd until the year 2 workbook comes out then we'll switch over. Hope this makes sense