I kept getting confused when I read the "Hobbit" years ago; thus, didn't care too much about it. So when I was looking for BOT's for dc when they were younger, I figured 'Why not'. The BOT was sooooo much better than the book, to me. And dc were really hooked. Not so with the LOTR, however.

You know, that's a good point. What happens to a kid when they 'resist' the hard work in ps's? For my oldest ds, the answer was that they just shoved him on through the system however they could. His resistance continued and he learned very little. For our next 5 hs'ed kids, however, their attempts at 'resisting' the learning process were futile. It's not as easy to pull that off with your very determined Mom demanding that this work be completed (that would be me, btw ;)), as it is with an exhausted teacher in an overcrowded classroom. Thus, the appearance of 'acceleration' - for some, anyway. With our own 5 hs'ed dc, the two oldest began WTM in their mid-teens. The younger 3 began at the same time at a much younger age. If you only take into account their ages, the younger 3 could appear accelerated and the older 2 could appear slower. But the fact is, the only real difference is the age at which they began. They've all done the same work - just at different ages. FWIW

Great website, Jane. Thanks.

Have a B.S. in Med. Tech. Would do Art and Music.

Dh has a cell. I have a cell. And we got a cheap one at Wal Mart to leave at home for whoever happens to be here. I put the third phone in a Zip Loc bag with an index card with the important phone numbers and the message code on it. I don't think all our dc have all these numbers memorized and wouldn't want to take that chance in an emergency.

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Several times a week. Grating carrots, chopping onions and mushrooms (for Diner Burger recipe), making a bean-based cheese sauce, and so on. When processing nuts, I now try to soak them a short time in water to soften them a little. We've had a couple of processors' blades chip on us. And one actually broke into pieces. No, I don't feel the need to do megabatches when I use it. It sits on the kitchen counter and, after use, we toss it into the dishwasher with all the rest of the dirty dishes. But we're also cooking for 7 people when we cook.

"For God hath not given us the spirit of fear; but of power, and of love, and of a sound mind." 2 Timothy 1:7

Yes, I've ordered from them. Dh orders it online though. I get Madagascar Bourbon Vanilla Powder to sprinkle on top of apple pies. It's expensive and I would buy it locally if I could find it; but I haven't found it yet. You might check other places first, for better prices. I buy King Arthur Flour at Wal Mart. I found grated vanilla bean at our Natural Food Store for much less. Service was great and products I ordered were good quality, though.

We get all ours at "Super Shoes". Not sure if that's a local store or what. I've even found plenty of the snow boots like I used to find up in NH. And they have a discount room in the back where they toss all their out-of-season footwear and cut the prices deeply. We bought our boots one spring/summer. Good quality, name brands. Also, if you find one, be sure to ask for the coupon card thing. After a certain number of purchases, you get a percentage off the last one. Then, you start again. Can't remember all the details.

Examples: spiral program = Saxon math non-spiral program = R&S math It should be obvious if you can view a book from each program. R&S will have, say, an entire chapter on only the Metric System. Saxon will mix a little metric system in, here and there throughout the book. They might cover the exact same material - but in a very different way.

No TV's anywhere. Only 1 computer which we all have to share. A little "Air Card" which dh gets through his work and brings home - where we use it like I'm doing now - when I should be doing some reading to keep up with math and GB's and logic and ..... :blush: ..... well, now you know why we DON'T have all the electronic playtoys. :)

Or they can turn really bad. I had a mother mostly opposite of Nan's; and I was the 'good' child. At 17yo, I eloped with a guy 4 years older than I was to get away from this mother. I remember at one point (about 15 - 16yo??) just thinking to myself 'I'm TIRED of being nice', while my brothers are getting off scot-free being BAD. (One into drugs and other into variety of things not good.) So I found myself some 'bad company' and commenced on my 'not nice' portion of my life. :ack2: It's easy to ignore these kids. They dutifully fulfill what's required of them and stay out of the way. The parents think they're doing fine because they aren't causing any trouble with teachers, neighbors, the law ... . But what they often want is MORE parent involvement - not lists of ways they can spend MORE time - alone. If she were mine, I'd find ways to spend more time with her, trying to draw her out more. There are probably many people here who can help you with that. I suspect many of us on this board were 'good' children. ;)

Our Kroger mails out coupons occassionally. And once or twice a year, we get a '20% off our total order' coupon from them. Dh keeps up with all of it and tells me when to make a big list to reach the amount needed for that particular coupon. (We buy most of our produce from Kroger.) You might ask someone who knows about those things at your local grocery stores. They don't exactly advertise it here. In fact, last month dh and I were going through the Kroger store picking out things which would be cheaper than Wal Mart, using our 20% off everything in the store coupon. We had a couple of buggies full and one of the managers walked by. She stopped, stared at our buggy, glanced at dh (they all know him down there :tongue_smilie:), and walked off. It was hard to tell whether she was annoyed or what. Our Kroger also mails out coupons for produce and such several times a year. I notice we usually get coupons for the specific things we use. I assume it's all computerized and the computer just spits them out, tailored to each family. Our natural food store used to give discounts to members; but they raised the price of membership such that it wasn't worth it for us. We only go there for specific things we can't find cheaper anywhere else. For example, they carry Almond Meal and we used to buy it there. But Kroger started carrying it and we wait until they put it on sale and buy several bags of it for half price. Also, if you keep track of the prices on things like bulk nutritional yeast at your natural food store, you might find it's actually cheaper to buy it in the packages at somewhere like Kroger. Oh. Another great buy is gasoline. Dh keeps track of the amount we spend at Kroger, and when it reaches the maximum discount on their gas, we fill up both cars and many, many gas cans - all at the same time. He saves a LOT of money like that. I've noticed more people doing a couple of cars at the same time when we go down to do ours every month.

No. And when I was growing up, my parents never even told us kids anything about our Dad's income either. We do, however, tell our own dc how much dh earns if they ask. They rarely ask.

You could also send them with your dh to his fellow employees. If they're like the guys my dh works with, their eating habits are horrible and they do appreciate healthy foods now and then. We did the same thing you did, only with shiitake mushrooms. I had bags and bags of them one year. No room in the frig or freezer and they wouldn't keep long outside of there. Dh took them to work and passed them out. He also gave plenty to neighbors.

I would also agree with Pianoplayer about holding off on the spending until you've seen a curriculum. These are some of the ways to view curriculum (not just math): - homeschool conferences - ask other hs'ing moms to let you take a look at their curr.; ask them how they used it; ask them if they liked it and why or why not; etc. - your local hs group might actually have a hs library with many kinds of curr. which you can check out, test, and take your time with - Interlibrary Loan if your library system doesn't already have it - local colleges and universities may actually have some of the stuff you want to view - some cities actually have stores which sell hs curr. - churches sometimes sell hs curr. if they have a bookstore. You don't have to be a member to buy. - If all else fails, you can order it, look at it, and return it for a small fee. At any rate, I'd take my time and view many different curr. before deciding. It takes a while to understand exactly what to look for and exactly what would help you the most. It did me, anyway. And you can avoid wasting an awful lot of money if you take your time and discuss it with others (dh, friends, board, etc.) as you go. Also, you might want to start thinking about HOW you teach math as much as WHAT curr. you will use. In hindsight, the actual process of the teaching was just as important as the curr. itself. Wish I'd figured THAT one out a long time ago. :tongue_smilie: HTH Kathy

They're good in grits. You can make parmesan cheese substitute from this recipe and put them on anything you might usually put parmesan cheese on (spaghetti, pasta dishes, pizza, etc.). Process in food processor: 1 cup nutritional yeast flakes 1 cup almond meal (I buy mine at Kroger or a natural food store.) spices - onion powder, garlic powder, salt, etc. (I also add Creole Seasoning, cayenne pepper, a dash of sugar, and whatever else I feel like at the moment.) Taste as you go to adjust seasonings. Dump into Zip Loc bag and store in frig. I've also stored it in the cabinet in cool weather. (Note the ratio is 1:1. You can make as little or as much as you like.) :)

Coming at it from the other side, I can tell you what clouded my view of a house whenever I, persoally, was househunting. Clutter - I couldn't see if walls were damaged; or water stains under sinks; or damaged floors. I didn't care about the person's personal stuff. I just wanted to see what I would be left with AFTER all their stuff was gone. Owners AND realtors yakking; together, individually, whatever - Couldn't concentrate. Very annoying. Electronic gadgets on - We once looked at a house where the owner was there and had his computer on as if we had interrupted something. (Two different houses, actually.) These guys weren't working from home, btw. It can be as distracting as having a TV blaring at me. Annoying. Owners watching me as I TRIED to look at their house - Inhibiting. Felt I couldn't say what I was thinking unless it was complimentary of their house. Much less ask probing questions. And I have seen owners get very defensive when asked questions. Makes me think they're trying to hide something. (Which, btw, they actually WERE for 2 houses we looked at. :glare:) Dirty house - Makes me think that if they didn't care enough to do basic housekeeping, then they probably didn't do a lot of important basic maintenance either. I'm not thinking of everyday type cleaning which those of us with a houseful of people are familiar with. The other kind. Personal stuff - A slight distraction because I always stop to look at photos which people put out. The other stuff I'm used to. Doesn't bother me. But I definitely don't want to be sitting in this house somewhere down the road and 'seeing' the previous owners in it, too. Creepy. Landscaping - Not my thing. When I see a truly landscaped yard, I see more work for me. The first thing I usually do is go in and rip out everything close to the house. I've lived in houses with termites and seen houses in fire ant country. Growth next to the base of the house grows both pests. Yuk. But that's probably my own personal quirk. I assume most people like landscaping?? Non-neutral colors on walls and carpet - You might love that red wall; but I'm thinking 'I wonder just how much off-white paint it would take to cover up something that ugly!?!'. Anyway, those are a few of the things I could remember from our own househunting trips over the years. HTH Kathy

Our dc were similar. Especially the older ones. Oldest ds was over 2yo before he was saying a lot of words. Now we just wish he'd stop talking. :) All our dc were born weighing 10-11 pounds and on the upper end of the growth scale,btw. Is your dd big for her age?

Same as others, plus remove all animals and animal things like litter boxes, etc. Some people really hate cats or dogs or whatever. Along with the dogs, I also took any kids who weren't working on the house (OUTside) with dh, and went for a drive ... well, we went down the road to a cemetary ... until the realtor was gone. (Cats were tossed outside and disappeared until the people were gone.) If you have a bread machine, almost any kind of bread can be baking. And there's no mess. We painted the inside and the outside of our house. Used one of the cheapest paints we could find - some kind of paint they use to do apartment interiors for the inside. It all looked great. And we only put one coat on. Turned on every light in the house - even though it was daylight outside. Opened every shade, too. If it had been nice weather, I'd have opened windows, probably. But what I think really sold the house was the fact that it was clean and decuttered and freshly painted, inside and outside.:)

25yos was nearby when I clicked on your post. I asked him about it because he loves plays and lit. Here are his suggestions: Having a special interest in literature and theater, I have developed my own methods of reading plays. I have read Greek and Roman, Russian, British, French, American, and Shakespeare plays, and found the Bard to be THE MOST difficult. That's because he's the most brilliiant, though, so whatever you do, DON'T just watch videos of the plays. Admittedly, that's the way the English first saw the plays, but Elizebethan England (and Europe) was steeped in theater and familiar with the speech patterns and vocabulary, so they could keep up with ideas without being bogged down by the format. Not so for us earthlings. So what do I do to understand the Bard? It varies, but usually I get a broad idea of the setting and players, and then read a BASIC outline (I have an old book by an Englishter). The outline provides me with the broad structure in which to place the events, so that I won't have to worry about understanding the plot amidst the complexities of Shakespeare's style, diction, and execution of the events, which is where his brilliance lies (he had very few original plots). I have yet to read a Shakespeare play in one sitting. I can do such with Aeschylus, Sophocles, Aristophanes, Moliere, Plautus, and the later Russians and Americans, but there is too much in Shakespeare to even hope to catch it all that quickly. Most of the time the communication is taking place in innuendo, double-entendres (not the crude kind), and sarcasm! This is the reason that I NEVER watch a movie or reenactment of one of his plays without first reading it: I miss most of the content and practically all of the brilliance. Even if I have read the play, I miss much of the content in the rapid-fire of a reenactment, especially when you consider that Hollywood productions have time limits which require them to either speed through the dialogue or significantly edit it. As to the importance of intonations and tone. It may have once mattered, but no one is absolutely certain what the original speech patterns and tones of the actors were, and in today's retarded Post-Modern world of art, the emphasis is not put on what Shakespeare and his crews originally meant so much as what the modern critics can read into his plays. Ditch all modern criticism. Furthermore, actors have big egos and irrepressible personalities. They don't enter a Shakespeare play thinking, "How can I best represent what the Bard was originally trying to communicate?" They enter thinking, "What new, uniquely ME spin can I put on this character that will make the character profound and fabulous?" And it changes with time according to our culture's speech patterns and attitudes. Orson Welle's MacBeth was gothic and Film-Noir, Elizabeth Taylor's Taming of the Shrew smells of the sixties, and modern renditions of things like As You Like It seem to go overboard on the import of the flashy actors. (Also, many of the modern versions are filled with nudity, and you can bet THAT wasn't on the stage in the time of Puritan England.) The only way to understand best what the original spirit of the play was is to be intimately familiar with the historical context. I won't even suggest that the English are the best representatives of Shakespeare, because they've been living with his plays for so many centuries I think they're getting sick of him (there was recently a series on the BBC called 'Shakespeare Retold,' which looked pretty tacky.) There is a similar spirit in America. I'm not saying to NOT watch a rendition of it. (I actually haven't been to any live ones, so I can't advise against them with any credibility.) I'm just saying to read it--no, study the play first, and then seek live versions. Furthermore, if you want to carefully study the words and how they sound when performed, skip the video and find an audio version in your local library. Then you won't be distracted by the production crew's attempts to put their own spin on the play with unusual sets. (After all, Shakespeare's plays were originally performed on bare stages without special effects, without many props, and without women!) With one of my favorite plays, Midsummer Night's Dream, I did the following: Read it carefully, listened to a versions on tape, read it again, watched a video version, and listened to another version on tape, all over the course of three years. With plays that aren't personal favorites, usually it was enough to read an outline, read the play, and then either find a BOT or a DVD. Even with all of this study, one may still miss much of Shakespeare's brilliance. That's why he's considered one of the most brilliant writers in the history of the literature and theater. His plays are edifices of poetry and theater. So don't feel disappointed if you or your child misses something...or everything.

Here's what I would do for K-12, with the info. available to me at this point: Rod and Staff for K-8, with a variety of problem-solving books thrown in at various times. Frank Allen's Algebra One, with various other things thrown in at various times (NEM, Dolciani, Welchons, Russian Circles, etc.) Moise and Downs' Geometry (with various other geometries, here and there) Frank Allen's Algebra Two, with other algebra 2 books for more varied practice problems (esp. Dolciani). Calculus - same as above - one base program with other problems from a variety of books for extra practice. Haven't decided on base program yet. And a history of math book. We have a few which our dc are required to read. It's up to them to find the time to fit them in. They're also expected to make time to read bio's, etc., now and then. And plenty of mathematical logic books. Our dc just finished Suppes' first book, "First Course in Mathematical Logic". This is a little different than the other logic books recommended in WTM. They did all those more for their language arts skills.

I have a dd who is still making mistakes like that at 21yo. Plus, she's prone to falling asleep at the wheel. I teach all our dc to drive. These help us to avoid near-misses: http://www.vat19.com/dvds/studentdriver.cfm We've avoided quite a few accidents because of these. I put one on each side of the car and one on the rear end. When she makes an error, I just point it out (or grab the wheel). Yelling seems to distract her (and our other dc). She really sound like she needs a good bit more practice though. I guess when they're young like your dd and mine, and have never been in a wreck, they really don't have a sense of just how serious it is when 2 cars collide. Good luck.

Also, my 17yod says that this program is pretty good. She found it in our library system. Here's her quote: "I don't know if I've ever seen another program that explains the pronounciation and has the cassettes that you can listen to." http://www.amazon.com/Pronounce-Russian-Correctly-Tania-Bobrinskoy/dp/084424287X She also says, "A sheet might work better for reading through a text because the idea is that you glance at it and you can go back to reading and you'll still have it in your mind - whereas, if you have to dig through flash cards, you'll forget more easily". HTH Kathy