The wireless router/modem in our house is supplied by our internet service provider and cannot be configured to filter any content. I have added a Netgear wireless router to serve as the internet gateway and I set up Open DNS to do the filtering before it goes out to our devices. I chose custom filtering where I can exclude specific categories that I want to be blocked. I have tried other "family safety" software programs before that were too restrictive to the point of blocking me from using eBay so I want to pick more specific categories rather than broad sweeps of content. Well, I decided to test things out on my laptop tonight and it is absolutely not working. So can someone explain how to do this right? We have Windows, Android and Apple devices all accessing the internet here and I don't want to configure each device hoping those filters will work properly.

About how many hours would one plan on spending to complete both primary and secondary self-paced courses, specifically Omni III, in a year? I like the idea of G5052's friend doing primary first, followed by secondary.

Two weeks under our belt for ds 9th grade: Biology with labs outsourced Algebra1 outsourced Composition (Lost Tools of Writing 2 online with Leah Lutz) Latin (Henle) Traditional Logic (Memoria) Greek Literature and History (Roman Roads Media) So far so good, except for the scope of our literature/history choice. I picked it for Great Books approach, comprehensive, well-produced program and Wes Callahan is great. Their 4 year sequence is titled "Old Western Culture." Year 1 is The Greeks THE EPICS BOOK LIST: – The Iliad – The Odyssey DRAMA AND LYRIC BOOK LIST: – Aeschylus (The Oresteia) – Sophocles (Oedipus the King and Oedipus at Colonus) – Aristophanes (The Frogs and The Clouds) – Eurpipides (The Medea and The Trojan Women) – Sappho (various poems) – Pindar (collection of Odes) – Theocritus (Idyls I, VI, VII, and XI) – Hesiod (Works and Days) – Quintus of Smyrna (The Fall of Troy) – Apollonius of Rhodes (The Argonautica) THE HISTORIES BOOK LIST: – The Landmark Herodotus: The Histories – The Landmark Thucydides – Xenophon: The Persian Expedition THE PHILOSOPHERS BOOK LIST: – Plato: Six Greek Dialogues – The Basic Works of Aristotle Year 2, The Romans, covers Epics – The Aeneid – Ovid’s Metamorphoses THE HISTORIANS: – Livy: The Early History of Rome, Books I-V – Sallust: Catiline’s War, the Jugurthine War, Histories – Julius Caesar: The Gallic Wars – Tacitus: The Annals of Imperial Rome – Plutarch’s Lives Vol. 1 – Suetonius: The Twelve Caesars – Pliny the Younger: The Letters – Quintillian: The Orator’s Education, Vol. I – Cicero: Selected Works EARLY CHRISTIANITY: – Early Christian Fathers – Eusebius: The Church History NICENE CHRISTIANITY: – Augustine: The City of God – Athanasius: On the Incarnation – Athanasius: Life of St. Anthony – Basil The Great: On the Holy Spirit – Augustine: Confessions – Boethius: The Consolation of Philosophy Year 3 is Christendom and Year 4 is Modern Times. After working exclusively on the Iliad for two weeks according to the schedule in the program, it has sparked a lot of unsatisfied curiosity about the bigger picture of culture, history, religion, literature, art, etc. Listening to Vandiver lectures helped flesh some of that out, and I now see the approach I chose is "deep, not wide." I think it would be better for ds in high school to get a broader sweep of ancient history that kicks it up a notch from just the facts to the bigger ideas of history and literature. If he wants to go deep in college, then great. I'm probably a candidate for a scaled-down version of Tapestry of Grace but I don't know that I would be biting off more than I can chew. Maybe we should do SWB History of the Ancient World and a separate self-developed literature plan. I love to integrate so it seems strange to me to study the ancients while reading Animal Farm, for example. (Then I think...oh, interesting....weave the ideas of authority, submission, primitive groupings and see where that goes! Nah, not this year.) Any ideas for us?

Lori, if you're ever checking in, hope everything is going well. You are missed!

VaKim, I am a raging sugar addict. I buy a plastic container of frosting and I will end up eating spoonfuls if I don't use it on a cake right away. I will down bowls of ice cream until my heart is racing and I feel awful. We in our extended family add additional sugar to lots of non-sweet foods like chili, stuffed peppers, baked beans, creamed cukes, etc. If I haven't had a sugar fix in a few hours and I'm getting antsy, I might grab a little ball of brown sugar out of the bag and let it melt in my mouth. The sheet cakes you mentioned don't have a chance with me in the house, and I will scrape every bit of frosting off the paper liner after the actual cake is gone. Other than that, I'm normal. :laugh: I quit sugar for 6 months a long time ago, but continued to eat refined things like corn chips and high-carb foods which do the same thing to me, so there was really no difference in how I felt. I now have Lyme disease so I need to clean up my act to let my immune system repair. I am concerned about all the inflammation sugar causes, but like an addict, I will ignore my health and mortality to have my "fix." I like Redsquirrel's approach and realize that's how I will have to achieve "sugar sobriety." VaKim, do you want to start a 21-Day Sugar Detox on the buddy system? Anyone else?

Ninth grade ds just started using Teaching Textbooks Algebra 1 and it's working okay so far - the first few lessons are review. My dh, who for 9 years has been fine with whatever curriculum I've chosen, has said he thinks ds should take a live Algebra class (online or in-person) to make sure he gets a good foundation. A local co-op class starts the week after Labor Day and the instructor uses the pre-Common Core Glencoe Algebra I text. Any opinions as I weigh the two options? I am not gifted in high school math, and although dh's degree is in engineering, he has been away from this level of Algebra for too long to be helpful in teaching. Is the live class the much better option in a home like ours than TT? Ds has pretty good aptitude for math, but I don't know if Algebra & Geometry will trip him up.

Jen in NY, now I'm laughing at a new stereotype...."And homeschool moms are always quoting Shakespeare." LOL!

I am in the middle of this book and I agree, it is wonderful!

How do you know your student is ready for AP? Would this add stress to my vision of 4 more lovely years together pursuing truth, beauty and goodness in our homeschool? Is it an economic strategy to have our kids get some college credits in high school to shorten time on campus? I always thought AP was for gifted students. Aren't we already tailoring our kids' courses to their academic abilities? As I type, I guess my question is this: Do AP classes rush a student through the high school academic "experience?" Can you tell I'm a high school newbie mom? 😬

Our iPad 2 contains massive amounts of work-related and treasured family photos & videos. As a result, our iPad memory is maxed out. I have backed up the photos onto an external hard drive through my PC. I have also copied those files onto SD cards. And just to be safe, I have been paying for iCloud storage for automatic backup of the iPad. I always thought I could access the photo files in the cloud, but tonight the Verizon guy told me the purpose of my cloud storage is simply to have a backup which I can download if we buy a new iPad. I can't view the photos in the meantime, he told me. Can anyone give me good guidelines on how to properly archive images like this? I don't want to erase any from the iPad until I am certain I've got a good system and I desperately need to free up memory.

Bump. I've got the same question. Anyone....please??

Looking forward to your return! Blessings, peace and calm to you.

Will MC Mods work on 4GB?

From what I see, the 8GB Air is out of our price range. Please tell me the i5, 4GB would do okay for Minecraft and writing 9th grade papers, spreadsheets, etc. Some web surfing.

Which Macbook do your kids use? DS is interested in the Macbook air as it is the least costly of the Mac product line.

Ds 14 has mowed lots of yards this summer and earned $. He wants to buy a MacBook for school work and to play Minecraft. We are PC users so I have no idea which affordable options exist. Any guidance from the hive?

Jaber Crow by Wendell Berry. Love it

Wow!! Thank you.

Lori D, can you share the list of fantasy lit you used along with 451? I need some good ideas for ds 14

Peter Pan by J.M. Barrie comes to mind. I love many things about the novel, and so many themes can be teased out in your discussions.

This is going deeper than the OP asked for, but since MTHFR has been brought up, I just want to put a plug in for Thorne Research, specifically Methyl-Guard Plus. My natural health nurse practitioner had me tested for the MTHFR genetic mutation because my homocysteine level was up to 14. That put me at very high cardiac risk. I tested double for the genetic mutation, which is not uncommon, and she said to take a Methylated B complex and I picked up a couple bottles of Methyl-Guard Plus and take 1 every day after initially starting out at 3 x day, along with an extra methylated B12 sublingual. In seven months I am now down to 9.7 in my labs and she is beyond thrilled. My Lyme-Literate MD took note of this brand yesterday when he looked at those labs because he said I am proof that the product works. Elevated homocysteine is really bad for risk of cardiac events. I will second the opinions that Douglas Labs and Pure Encapsulations are highly regarded in holistic medical community. I buy my supplements from Pure Formulas online and I think I get free shipping.

If you would like answers to all the of Henle First Year exercises, check out this answer key which we found helpful. The white answer key supplied by the Henle publisher does not provide answers for all exercises. http://www.olvs.org/ShopCart/InvDtl.aspx?InvId=10177&GrdId=&InvCatId= I wish I knew how to link sites better..... If that didn't work, try Our Lady of Victory web page for the answer key.

Any feedback on other Circe LTW teachers? Camille Goldston, Leah Lutz?

Hi Brenda, My friend who is a CC Challenge I tutor explained that the 5th rev. is different enough that it's worth buying. I don't know how long it is used in Challenge I.

I found a post from 2009 that answered my question perfectly. To summarize, Nance is symbolic logic and Cothran is language based logic. The posters from the old conversation had used Traditional after Intro/Intermediate and it seemed to work well for them. I would post a link but I can't find the old post now.