I got Fergie for a while when she was popular. It was from a native Irish so I believed her.

We got matched with a different child before our daughter. We were open to children with some orthopedic issues because of what our oldest son has gone through. This little girl had what was believed to be hip dislocation. We didn't want two kids in wheelchairs, so we got a doctor's opinion. Thankfully, our son's doctor is one of the best in the world for dealing with orthopedic issues. He looked at this very sketchy, very little information file and determined that even what they were putting down as normal behaviors were other issues this child was having so we turned this little girl down. She was adopted the same day as my daughter and she has a lot more issues than hip dislocation including suspected cerebral palsy, can't communicate all that well, and is currently using a wheelchair to get around. He was right. We didn't consult a doctor for my dd because she had a cleft lip/palate and there are usually no big surprises with it. My friend's contacted a doctor for their daughter with PKU before she arrived. Her condition was made out to be worse than it actually is and her case turned out to be pretty mild. For the more complicated medical conditions, I would consult a doctor with the file. You really want to try and get a handle on what extras to expect. The medical condition may be more or less than the file suggests, but it's always good to get a small grasp on it. Beth

We adopted through CCAI five years ago. She was a special needs child meaning that she had a repaired cleft lip and palate. She was 2 1/2 when she was adopted. The process was very we'll run, but took longer than expected-- even for special needs adoption, the wait was 3 years only due to the number of families the agency was dealing with. My friends who also adopted from China had a much shorter wait. On the other hand, CCAI does quite a bit of work with the children who are left behind and helps new orphanages to register children for adoption. My daughter is a direct result of their work in an under served area. Right now, she is fairly attached but at times we have some issues that come out especially after surgeries she's had to have. The first year and a half was very difficult. I felt like I had ruined my family and did not like my daughter at all. My daughter is fairly strong willed which didn't help the situation. It helped that she was the youngest in the family. It's turning out right now, but I won't lie-- adoption is not for the weak of heart. These kids come with giant holes in their hearts and sometimes love becomes a choice not a feeling. I actually dislike the adoption push some Christian organizations have without having the resources available to help when things get hard. Beth

I don't time the facts tests. Sometimes we don't even do them if dd is having a pencil phobic day. I had a ds who couldn't keep on fast at that age either. I had to sit next to him with every subject and refocus him constantly. If I had left him to complete something on his own, school would have taken all day.

Be sure to get tickets early and book your hotel early - there are not a lot of hotels in town. The Archer house is a nice older hotel in the cutesy downtown area and the country inn is the next best hotel even though it sits right next to the train tracks and a crossing (where they blare the horn long and hard). Beth

I am not of the modesty crowd, but I do like to look feminine. I am also shall we say "expanding" in certain areas of my body due to middle age and skirts just look better sometimes. The skirts for sale here are very cute. Beth

I read an article about the failure of "courting" and how this particular blogger's grandmother dated when she was a teen. Her grandmother was allowed to date, but could not date the same person twice in a row. At that time, it seemed to keep dating as a fun thing - not serious and not exclusive. I don't have to think about that quite yet though.

I used it on my fiberglass shower pan. Did the trick. I had tried everything.

For my restless legs, I gave up gluten. I'm not sure if it is gluten or wheat, but since I gave them up, my legs don't bother me. Previously, I had trouble falling asleep and staying asleep because I had to get my heating pad out to try to keep the legs from "crawling". I didn't answer your question, but the gluten thing really helped my legs. The results were almost instant.

We live in a small town. There are 3 other boys that my son's age who will most likely homeschool high school. Two are involved in a popularly known co-op 45 minutes away. there just aren't a lot of opportunities for us unless I want to drive 30 minutes or more each way twice a week (more often than not through ice and snow) just for classes for only my oldest which would compromise my youngers schooling. We compromise with online classes. It's not the best, but it's "better". Be thankful if you live near a lot of homeschoolers with multiple opportunities. I'm guessing that's how people stick with it more often in the long haul.

I think part of it for me is just the day to day stress of my other "jobs". Having my oldest with severe special needs and my youngest just being an emotional challenge at times is one layer. My husband looking for a job while doing online night classes is another layer. Him being underemployed and us having to try to cut back is another (going now for over 2 years). Homeschooling becomes another stressor in my life. I don't have outside interests and don't have the money or time to afford any outside interests if I did have them. My life seems likes it's in this fine balance of everything needing to work just right in order to work at all. One thing upsets the balance and it just is a much bigger deal in my life because of all my other layers going on. I think if I could get rid of one of my layers, I could handle things better.

My oldest student is almost 14, but my youngest is 7. I wondered sometimes if it was just adding her to the mix that has worn me out, but seeing other moms struggle with homeschooling at this stage in the game makes me realize maybe more is there. My ds has two classes outsourced and is learning on his own for the most part. I'm comfortable with that. It's just having to get some enthusiasm for the other two that is sometimes hard. My middle learner is the "ideal" homeschooler in that he's interested in a lot of things. My youngest has learned to read and I can breathe a little more. I guess part of it is that I want to be able to find out who "I" am again. I've lost myself somewhere along this road and I need to refuel. Beth

I just heard about parental advocacy on public radio today. A school was facing budget cuts and the classroom teachers for the 3rd (?) grade had to be cut from 4 to 3 making the class size much bigger. The parents got together and raised enough funds to hire a teacher with benefits. They presented the check to the principle and he had to turn them down because of some obscure law about fairness or some such nonsense. Tell those parents their voices are heard and they can make a difference in the public school and you'll get a bunch of sarcastic comments in return.

I am finding a lot of my friends who are getting close to the 10 year mark to be in a homeschooling slump of sorts. Before, we were the type of people who ordered curriculum before the previous school year was out and had everything organized by June. Now, it seems like a lot of us are looking at August and going, "Oh yes...homeschool...I guess I better start thinking about that". This post (not mine) sums it up nicely: http://www.twentyshekels.com/family-life/back-to-homeschool/ Anybody else? I've also noticed that this is about the time the oldest starts high school. Then it seems homeschoolers are dropping like flies and running to the public school. Any hope for the future? Does this get better? Beth

I'm speaking as a very pro-life Christian who has a profoundly disabled child. I always say that we are very much living our values. I never had the tests because I would have never terminated. The problem is, we, as Christians encourage women to have children they know are disabled because we value them as humans - children of God. When the child is born and serious financial and physical support is needed though, the church is relatively silent. As my husband has been looking for work in various states, you would be shocked at some of the stories about what is happening with disabled adults whose parents can no longer support them. We're talking the kind of stories that really make you shocked that this is happening in a developed country. And what is the churches response in these particular states (I googled special needs church ministries)? "We offer a volunteer to help with disabled children so they can go to Sunday School!" Or, "Twice a year, we'll watch your moderately disabled child at the church so you can go on a date!" Yay! There is a huge financial cost to many families - a cost even universal health care could not provide. Who is going help to buy the $30,000 ramp van (used with 100K miles on it) or help with the thousands of dollars needed for house adaptations? More than likely, one parent will need to stay home because universal health care will not provide "babysitters" for a 15 year old child. That leaves a large financial stress with a one income family. I had no idea how truly horrible the situation is for many families with disabled children in this country. Universal health care will "help" but not solve this problem at all. The church really needs to step it up and provide financially and physically for these families who are struggling. And every time you see a family with a profoundly disabled child, assume there are struggles. Honestly, I am trying to teach my children that their brother's life is valuable because I see this type of Dawkin's mindset running in many circles. Add that mindset to assisted suicide and the "financial burden" these children are on an already overloaded health care system and I don't see a lot of positive futures for my son. Know that my heart is not to terminate any of these children's lives or suggest that this is an alternative for women. It's just that I do understand why they may do it (I don't agree at all, but understand). I think a mother's heart wants even more to protect a disabled child - it's just a very difficult, very painful road.

I've been homeschooling for 9 years. I've always ordered from RR. Only the past year or two have I ALWAYS had backordered items. Sometimes they have shipped separately, but currently I am waiting for an item that is backordered and I have no idea when it is coming. I could have order it as a download from the publisher, but I had paypal credit and ordered it from RR. If I had known it would take more than two weeks (which is where I'm at now), I would have just bought it as a download item. I wish I had known they didn't have it in stock. Beth

Just an addendum...you will probably at some point, purchase something that you hate or just doesn't work for your child. If this happens, move on, sell it if you can, and don't feel guilty. Consider it a part of your teacher education. After all, you are not spending $10K or more a year to learn how to become a teacher and curriculum specialist. Beth

Go to bookshelfcentral.com and you can filter down the books to just look at literature for the elementary grades to see if it qualifies. You'll probably find the most classic literature in years 3 and 4.

When I was first starting, I came here a lot, looked at samples on the curriculum websites, and printed off the ones that I liked. I have figured out that if it looks interesting to me and something I could teach, I would get it. For example, I chose a spelling curriculum (All About Spelling) that was scripted because I had no idea what to do. For history and science, I went with stuff that looked interesting to me. For brand new homeschoolers, I often will suggest a packaged curriculum because then you have someone else helping you homeschool. You can always figure out things better the next year once you see how it goes. Beth

When my ds#2 would have seasons of making a lot of mistakes on his problem set, I would sit next to him and make sure he was doing each step correctly. There is nothing more discouraging than to do a bunch of problems, get a bunch wrong due to silly mistakes and then have to do the whole problem over. Beth

I've always heard that the placement tests are not for current Saxon users. I have my ds going into 6/5 and there is a LOT of work with fractions. He did not encounter much of that in 5/4. Unless your daughter has done a lot with fractions outside of the Saxon 5/4 book (adding, subtracting, division, multiplication with and without common denominators), I would not skip it. Beth

So, the bread I bake is 100% whole wheat - we've gotten store bread and my kids can go through a two loaves a day if I let them because it doesn't fill them up. I'm liking the suggestion of trying to make enough leftovers from dinner to eat for lunch. I think part of what I have to do is plan for each and every meal - breakfast, lunch, and dinner. I also need to get my children to eat more eggs. Today, I am going to see what whole grain things I can bake for breakfast and snacks. I have a small upright freezer that is pretty full after my Costco runs and gradually gets empty throughout the month so I really don't have any room to hold large quantities of meat. I may try to call around to small town butchers around here and see what their meat prices are. Also, due to the couponing craze that shows people how to get things for free, most stores around here and in the metro area 30 minutes from where I live, have put severe restrictions on coupons. Most don't double much less triple. Some only double a certain amount after you have purchased a certain amount of groceries full price. Fruit is not cheap here either - not even apples despite the fact we have huge orchards everywhere. I have never found apples to be even close to $1 a pound - even if I went to the apple orchard and picked them myself. Same for every berry and fruit farm where you pick yourself. I have raspberry bushes, a couple of apple trees that are small, and blueberry bushes that are struggling. My garden needs some soil help that goes beyond "just put compost on it" so nothing is really doing that great in it. Thanks for all the advice. Now, I need to get busy baking and see where that can take me. Beth

I live in a small town but my husband goes to Aldi's about twice a month to get produce, He used to get chips and crackers there also, but we just can't do that anymore. I buy bulk grains from a natural foods co-op, I buy a ton of groceries at Costco that are cheaper than anywhere else, and I just get incidentals at my neighborhood grocery store. My problem is filling up one of my teen boys. He's a little picky about what he eats. I keep telling him that we are not in the position for him to be picky. He just roams the house being hungry looking for food. He wants chips, sugar and beef. It's not going to help things with him being in a soccer program running through 3000-4000 calories a day or more. I was given around $100 of cheese sticks that are currently in my freezer and no one wants to eat them ( I do and my oldest son). I keep figuring if they get hungry enough they'll eat them. As far as meals, I tend to do one pasta dish, homemade pizza, one breakfast dish (pancakes etc for dinner), a beef dish, a chicken dish, something with beans/rice, something vegetarian at least once every week. I have told my kids that eating peanut butter and jelly every day for lunch is not a big deal because people all over the world eat the same thing for breakfast, lunch, and dinner. They tend to complain a bit - buck up people! We also live in a higher COL so that doesn't help the situation. Sigh... I'm sure I'm not the first in this situation and will not be the last. Beth

Can I even do this? I have figured out our new budget and this is what I can do for food. Breakfast can be pretty cheap, but I have two teen boys and two other children with speedy metabolisms. My 13 year old has figured out that if he wants "special" food (chips, candy - ice cream) he needs to buy it himself. He's hungry constantly. I need suggestions. Meat is a side dish around here, I bake my own bread, and make my own yogurt. We qualify for the food shelf around here, but my husband doesn't want to go there yet. Anything else that can make this budget stretch? Beth

What?!?! What kind of middle class family could afford that? In that school district, I would have had to pay over $6000 just for my kids to attend school - more than 15% of my husband's take home pay. There would have been no way we could afford that when we're just making ends meet. I'm sure there was no resentment on having to pay school property taxes and a fee with that one! Beth