So glad to hear this!:001_smile:

Do you just keep adding bookshelves? I have one 8 foot bookshelf which holds the majority of our books, curriculum and suppplies. I use small plastic bins for the smaller supplies and put them on the shelf. (pencils, erasers, markers, staples, etc.) I added a three foot bookshelf recently to hold games, chapter books and the upcoming kindy student's curriculum. I also have a cheapie three drawer plastic cabinet which holds kid supplies for art - construction paper, scissors, glue sticks, etc. How do you store the tidbits - art supplies, manipulatives, geometric shapes, etc? Small plastic bins (the ones which are 15-18 inches by 8 inches or so...guessing at the size...) I leave off the lids. This works well. I have three of these with various stuff in them. Do you use three-ring binders or hanging file folders for completed years? Three ring binders for each child until they get full and then I move to another one.

For my first grader this year, we used Sonlight history, readers and readalouds, FLL1, copywork, A Reason for Handwriting, Singapore math (he did 1B and 2A), piano lessons, co op science class, Leading Little Ones to God (Bible program) and Sequential Spelling. (Hhe tagged along with his older brother with this one - this program is for a slightly older child.) Have fun!

All of those decisions to contribute will mostly depend on our ability to help and contribute. If we can, I would love to help the kids with college. I would love to pay for a wedding. I would love to help with a downpayment on a house. Time will tell lf this is possible for us financially.

I was open to donating, but that was not available in the hospital I gave birth at. The cost/potential benefit ratio for banking seemed poor so we opted out of banking.

We use SL for history, readers and read alouds. We use FLL and WWE for our grammar and writing. We all disliked SL's LA so this is how we combine the curriculums. We do our own Bible program, as well, not SL's. I just follow SL's history and don't worry that it is not strictly a four year rotation, a la WTM.

I go through the toy pile when they are all out of the house. I throw away trash and give away what is good but no longer played with. I put it all in black trash bags so no one can see. None of them have ever complained about this or really noticed something that was gone that they really wanted to keep. As Mom, I know what is important to them and what is not. We get rid of what is not that is just causing clutter and stress.:001_smile:

It sounds like what you are doing is not working for either of you so feel free to change it.:001_smile: My first grader does four days a week of school. This includes reading scheduled pages from his Sonlight reader (2nd grade because his reading is advanced), a lesson from Singapore math 2A, a lesson from FLL1, a history read aloud, a literature read aloud, a short Bible lesson and a handwriting page. On other days, we do a variety of other lessons and readings, including poetry, science and health and manners. All of that takes between 1 1/2 - 2 hours, four days a week. He has plenty of time for "being a little" kid playing outside or with friends. We go to a homeschool co op on Fridays for fun classes. He does sports seasonally. We go to church on Sun. and Wed. He hangs out with his brother doing boy stuff.:tongue_smilie: I know that soon enough, as the years pass, my boys will be spending much more time on studies. Right now, I prefer that they spend as much time as they can playing and having fun. That is important, too.

Pretty much this. I get support when I need it, in terms of him listening to me talk and saying something supportive. I get no interference, which I appreciate. I explain what I am doing with the kids and their curriculum, not because he has a burning desire to know but because it is important to me. I have recently been on a "math kick" and have been reading a book on teaching math, methodology, conceptual versus algorithm knowledge...all of that stuff.:tongue_smilie: I have been going on about it and he listens. Last night, I was going on about it as we were trying to go to sleep. He nicely listened even though I'm sure he was falling asleep. I told him that I had become a math geek and he agreed.:lol: I know one friend who asked for her dh's input (he travels for work and is gone a lot so is largely uninvolved with the schooling) and he offered suggestions like the fact that the need to finish every single math problem, even if they have the concept down cold. She told me she was sorry she asked because she then felt obliged to respect his wishes.:tongue_smilie:

I am the laundry queen. I am organized and have a good system. It rarely gets away from me. I like that it is one fo the very tiny parts of my life that I can actually control.:tongue_smilie: There are two "dirty" hampers in the laundry room - one for lights and one for darks. There is a large hamper in the laundry room, in addition to those, for clean, non hanging items. I put up two of those metal shelving units covered in white stuff on the wall in the laundry room. The detergent and stain remover goes there. We don't use fabric softener or sheets but rarely. When a basket is full, I wash a load. This means that I wash 1 -2 loads a day. I do it all times of the day, whenever I can fit it in. Right out of the dryer, the hanging clothes are put onto hangers and hung in a specific spot on the shelving unit, depending on whom they belong to. The non hanging items of ds's and littlest dd's go on top of the washer. I put away these items and the hanging items piecemeal here and there as I have time. My teen does her own laundry. We have a hamper for dirty clothes in the master bath and I combine that with the one in the laundry room frequently. I take 1-2 days a week off of laundry. This means that on the other days, I might do 1-3 loads. Since I started hanging items up right out of the dryer, they are not as wrinkled and the clean hamper doesn't pile up horribly as it did before. It is more time efficient, as well. The clean nonhanging hamper gets emptied by me (sometimes dh) and put away when it is full, maybe one a week.

My almost 15 yo says that she thinks about being a teacher. I don't know that she will settle on that, though I'm sure it would suit her. I didn't know "what I wanted to be when I grew up" until I was 19, at the end of my freshman year at college. I don't think most kids really, truly know until later...sometimes, much later, which is why many people have second careers. My friend with a degree in accounting is now, at the age of 43, going to nursing school to be a hospice nurse.:001_smile:

If I had a new baby, I wouldn't feel obliged to do anything beyond the usual reading with/to the other kids.:001_smile: Since I don't have a new baby:tongue_smilie:, we will be doing a great geography curriculum that we don't have time for this year. I will also be working with ds1 on getting caught up with math, which will take all summer. We will be finishing up WWE2 with him the first couple of weeks of summer. Ds2 is ahead of schedule and will likely finish up his math and grammar before summer begins.

I have everything for the three I will be hs'ing except for the SL Core 4 (history, readers for the oldest and readalouds). I suppose that gets me between 50-75%.

I didn't ever get a tremendous amount of opposition from dh about homeschooling, but for him, any lingering doubts have been erased by how very well our children are doing in all areas - socially, academically and emotionally. It is hard to argue with the "proof in the pudding". Any testing which has been done (or informal evaluation) puts my kids above grade level in math and reading. That is hard to argue with. I have one son who struggles in one area (and has a learning disability), but dh points out that he would struggle in this area no matter what schooling option was chosen for him. So true.

This is what I would do, as well. I am a big fan of professional evaluation when needed...it is very hard to treat what you cannot identify. The public school system might do an evaluation (free). This varies a great deal from state to state, but one of my homeschooled kids is currently being evaluated by the school for a learning disability. We will receive a lot of information free of charge, in addition to services such as speech therapy and suggestions on how to address his issues in the home school setting.

My opinion is that unless you have celiac disease, incidental gluten through cross contamination at a restaurant will not negate benefits you reap from being gf at home, unless you eat out every day. If you do notice that you feel ill after eating restaurant food, then you are more sensitive to gluten and that is good information for you to avoid it more strictly. I have narrowed down what restaurants we can eat it fairly safely and be gf (though the risk of cross contamination always exists). If you wonder about a restaurant, then google the name of it followed by the words "gluten free" and you can get helpful information. Several restaurants have specific gluten free menus, such as Outback Steakhouse, Chick Fil A and Chilis. Many items that you think would be gluten free are not, shockingly. I spent most of the first month after we went gluten free googling and reading labels.:tongue_smilie:

Oh, just clued in that you use SS...we use that, too, though not daily, but that is because it seems to get pushed to the bottom of the list when we are short on time. :tongue_smilie:

I have not used the other programs you mention, but my thought off the top of my head is to wait on the IEW, which is pretty teacher intensive, as I understand. The SL dictation will take just a few minutes once a week so I think it can easily be used in conjunction with your other program. :001_smile:

Lovetobehome, I kept the Monday's dictation from SL because that part of it worked for us. The rest of the program did not, so we switched...but maybe you could do the same, just do the one day of dictation along with the R and S.

My kids eat the heck out of homemade salsa with chips. It is canned tomatoes, chopped garlic, onion, fresh cilantro and jalapenos to taste in a food processor. Even the picky child eats it...sometimes for breakfast.:tongue_smilie: They are allowed as much of this as they want since it will "cure what ails ya". I also saute and puree veggies to put in spaghetti sauce and no one is the wiser. Smoothies are a great way to get lots of fun and healthy fruits and veggies in. You can put spinach and tomatoes and avocados in them and no one will know as along as you also toss in a banana and some blueberries.

AFter many years of eating my "weird food" grudgingly, dh is actually liking some of it now. He was raised on white bread, lunch meat, chips, ding dongs and all of those Betty Crocker foods you speak of. I have done it a little at a time, which seems to work best. I have one picky child but the rest of the kids will eat much better variety than dh. He, too, states that he dislikes foods that he has not eaten since he was a wee boy. He recently decided (at the age of 41) to start eating apples. Never ate apples before. DIDN'T LIKE THEM.:tongue_smilie:Eats them all the time now...oh, but they must be green ones.:lol:

Honestly, most of that sounds pretty age appropriate for a child that age. I would choose my battles (such as using a utensil for foods like mashed potatoes) and let most of the rest go. My 4 1/2 year old half stand and half sits, as well. She sits on her knees, etc. She's just not as tall as the rest of us at the big table. I would probably have her practice with a fork putting it in her mouth the correct way. Fear not, though, poor table manners at this tender age doesn't mean that she will have terrible table manners for a lifetime.

Have you considered FLL 1 and 2 for the younger dd? It is a very gentle, mostly oral introduction to grammar. Regarding the math...I wonder if she is balking at the tests. I have a child who is convinced he is a failure if he gets one single problem wrong...and we use Singapore math, a curriculum which is teacher intensive but uses no tests. I can't imagine what he would do with tests... Since she does the other work just fine, I think you have a poor curriculum fit. What works for one child might not work for the next. :grouphug:

I only tried Sonlight's LA program for Core 2 and 3, but it didn't work for us. It jumped around a great deal and required far too much creative writing for my kids. I ditched it, picked up FLL and WWE and never looked back. I'm sure it works for some people, and I cannot speak to what the levels past Core 3 look like, but it was a big ole flop here! (Speaking as someone who really loves the SL history, readers and readaoulds. :001_smile:)

I made a schedule for the subjects that are important to me to get done and follow it, if not daily, at least to see that we get all the week's work done. It keeps me on track, :001_smile: