A beloved bookie friend just brought over a stack, including all three volumes of Sigrid Undset's Kristin Lavrandsdatter trilogy, so I'm starting with The Wreath. My 52 books in 2001 Amazon wishlist now has more than 80 books in it. I'm thinking it's going to be an excellent year. :D

Whenever my husband leaves town, it's the Johnny Depp Film Festival around here. ;)

enhance utilize "tenant" for tenet supposably I've had a relative visiting for two weeks who does this, so I'll include my weird peeve about people who are unable to say two consonants together in the middle of a word, so skip the first one and double the last: reckonnize for recognize avvertise for advertise Wahgreens for Walgreens Wahmart for WalMart avvocate for advocate scup-shure for sculpture (this person's internal linguistic rules must get completely overwhelmed by three contiguous consonants) asso for also vayyue for value and on and on and on until I'm quite certain the universe wishes me nothing but ill.

We started the first week of August and are just over half done in most subjects, and well over half in a few. We should be able to finish completely by the end of the first week in May. We'll be done with some subjects by the end of February and will use the extra time on the subjects we have left. I intend to have all my planning and purchasing done before May as well because I NOT spending another summer with my hiney glued to the chair in front of the computer as I try to track down all the history and literature stuff I need. I'm about at the 2/3 point with my planning and purchasing for next year. I'm going to have a summer break this year!

I'm in!

My husband is incredibly challenged in this area. Six years ago, he gave me the only anniversary gift he's given me in more than twenty years of marriage: the Men's Edition of The Five Love Languages. You know, so I'll know how to deal with my wife.

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We're on week 3 of our mummification process. We used a full-sized chicken (4.5 pounds). Just because. I read around a lot before beginning, and saw on Donna Young's site that she recommended soaking the chicken in rubbing alcohol for a while before you put it in the natron. We marinated it in rubbing alcohol for 3 hours or so, and we haven't had a bad smell yet. We'd know it, too, because the only place I could figure to put mine was on top of the refrigerator. We are going through quite a bit of salt, but I'm going to use my empty boxes in a co-op castle-building project, so it all works out. :D

Here's my pro tip: don't try to do it with a paring knife. I thought I could cut DD's Saxon 65 worksheet and test book into manageable pieces and then use my paper cutter to cut the glue and spine off. Even though it appeared that I was cutting straight, I ended up making a diagonal cut through a huge number of the pages. I had to tape them up before I could put them in a binder. :glare:

That's the approach I'm taking this year after two years of math dragging on for hours. It's worked remarkably well. There were tears the first day DD had to do math at the end of the school day, but she's finished in record time every day since. I wish I'd taken this approach early on! Typing Instructor dangles as bait at the end of the day.

Sometimes children see these things much more clearly than we do. I realize now that it was sheer hubris not to provide them with Anubis masks. The last thing I want is some sort of afterlife mishap resulting in chicken zombies (or worse). I don't want to dwell on that too long.

until they were properly equipped. They were uncomfortable because we were getting ready to start and they didn't have Anubis masks. What was I thinking?

My car is the temple of mummified food: chicken nuggets, fries, apple slices... The ancients evidently had nothing on McDonald's because their food just desiccates -- it never rots.

Claire, it is a Greek word. I said I thought it was a Latin word and was pronouncing it that way, but then learned that it was Greek! So I wasn't sure if I was pronouncing it correctly. :)

I thought it was a Latin word, and was pronouncing it that way, with the stress on the next-to-last syllable. I guess if you use classical pronunciation for Latin, you'd have a hard G sound. I use ecclesiastical, so I use the soft version. But it's Greek, so what do you do? I say it ah-poll-ah-GEE-uh.

We're starting this morning. I overslept (never happens), DH decided to leave an hour later than usual, and the dog got out of the yard and had to be chased down. It's been quite a morning and we haven't even begun school! I'm telling myself it's all going to come together. :D

Here! I was told there would be cake.

Watch out for their pronunciation, though -- they seem to mix classical and ecclesiastical on some of the ecclesiastical tracks. Also, they have some flat-out mispronunciations (for instance, pronouncing "discipuli" as dees-chee-pyu-lee, when it should be "dee-shee-pu-lee). I was really disappointed, because I know if I turn my children loose with that CD, that's the way they're going to pronounce it. We won't be using the CD. :glare:

Yup. They put TJ's in more affluent areas, and Aldi in, well, other areas. Like where I live. ;)

Monday, August 2. I could be better prepared and my house could be cleaner, but I'm going for it!

Wow! This was one of the planning chores I'd decided I didn't have time to get done before school starts, and I'd reconciled myself to winging it. Thank you for pointing this out!

Spray and Wash's stain stick usually gets out grease stains for me, including those that have gone through the dryer.

I stumbled on this book at Borders a few weeks back and snapped it up. It's great!

This happens to us every time we move, and we've moved a lot. This time around, I have these calls both on my land line and my prepaid cell phone. The people who last had these numbers did not live exemplary lives. I've gotten calls from endless creditors, three different school districts, and angry personal messages. I have to pay $.20 a minute to listen to the cell calls, at least the first time (before I tag them "do not answer").

We'd been working at our dining room table, but it's not a good height for my DC to write well. Over the summer, I bought adjustable-height school desks with book bins underneath and have ugly school chairs on the way. I figure we can use the desks for writing-intensive tasks and share the table for projects that need lots of room to spread out. We have comfy seating all over the house for reading, so I think we're set.