Thank you for this thread! I have been pondering the question of what to put in the basket this year, too. We don't do much candy due to allergies, and are not fans of filling the landfill with trinkets once the novelty has worn off. We are putting in seeds and kid-sized gardening supplies this year, since the 7 yr old is very interested in gardening. I found a cute lightning bug lantern, and have a few playmobil eggs tucked away from a sale last year. There will be a book, a chocolate bunny, and peeps. And the Whoppers that look like robins' eggs... because I have a serious weakness for them! A Jim Weiss CD is a great idea, too. I am fighting the urge not to go overboard, but there will probably be more as more ideas pour in. :) We hunt for plastic eggs - I recycle them year to year. I've filled them with playmobil pieces (splitting up a kit, like the PP who splits up Lego kits), dice (my guy loves dice), erasers, small art supplies... But now I am thinking that filling them with clues is a good plan for this year.

You are so far ahead of me. Due date is the 27th and I have yet to freeze meals. May I steal your list? Maybe I can just pass it off to DH and beg him to cook??? And now I must also beg for the Dynamite recipe! :)

Just remembered... Before we went gluten free, bean burritos were a hit... I made them ahead in big batches and froze them.

Are you sure the bread you used for the sandwich is not a "may contain"? Labeling practices vary on that topic. My peanut allergic son has had severe reactions to may contains. I email every company, unless the label specifically states that it was manufactured in a dedicated facility. Just a thought, in case it was not the tuna. Lunches around here are generally leftovers, so I'm not much help. We have multiple food allergies, so it's tough to come up with traditional lunches. Sunbutter on apple slices is a favorite part of lunch these days, as is sesame-free hummus with veggies. Soups, gluten free pasta, eggs... Looking forward to reading more ideas!

Yes. Absolutely possible. First - think of glitter, and how difficult it is to clean up. We wash and wash our hands and still find traces... peanut butter can be a bit like that. Very difficult to remove all traces. And - inhalation reactions can be just as bad as ingestion. Your son may have simply breathed in a tiny particle, then ingested that particle... That's all it takes, for someone who is very allergic. Keep your benadryl and epipen on hand, and don't ever hesitate to use them. Err on the side of caution. My son went into ana in a Hershey store last summer. He had touched *nothing* ... eaten *nothing* ... we were being extremely cautious, knowing that there were products containing his allergens in the store. It was frightening, and we are fortunate that he was okay.

Gorgeous! Congratulations!

Right there with you! I would have been happy to have it last week!

Love it! I love seeing pics of other homeschool spaces. We recently moved out of our dedicated room, and it has been a challenge to figure out our new plan. Thanks for the inspiration. (We do all of our marble runs on the floor, now you have me pondering whether we could do them on the table!)

Oh, thank you for posting this thread! I am always on the lookout for snacks like this. Hard boiled eggs, cheese... those do get a bit old. My son is allergic to all nuts and sesame seeds, so many of my go-to items are out now. We don't even keep them in the house for safety reasons. But I love the low carb buns, and can't wait to try them toasted. Yum. And I can make a tahini-free hummus substitute that is passable. If anyone else has nut-free ideas, I would love to hear them also. :bigear:

We have a system similar to blondeviolin's. I am not creative enough to come up with my own, so I ordered the PEGS system from Family Tools, but you could create something on your own. The kids flip their disks over once they finish a chore, and also receive bonuses for good behavior & penalties for bad behavior. I laminated the chart that came with the kit, and it hangs right over our pegboard - I like that it states everything very clearly, so there is no room to argue. Instead of paying for chores - also not something I'd like to do - we offer rewards. Again, I took the easy way out and ordered the Family Tools "Pick A Privilege" jar. For every X number of bonuses that the kids receive, they get to "pick a privilege" from the jar. (We use the age of the child to determine the number of bonuses, so the 7 year old needs 7 bonuses.) The privileges are fairly low cost, or free, so it's easy to dole them out happily. I'm not affiliated with Family Tools in any way, shape, or form. :) Just a happy Mommy. We've been using their system for about a year, and it's the first one to stick! Before this, I'd tried making my own charts and reward systems, but nothing seemed to work for us. Maybe this one works because having spent money on it, I feel more committed? Not sure, but whatever the reason - it's worked.

We are having a baby girl, too. :) We chose a family name, but I love your approach. I adore the name Amelia for Amelia Earhart.

I read this last summer, and couldn't put it down. I picked it up hoping to find a way to help our eldest son, who is adrift - he "failed to launch" and is now living with his Mom (he's my stepson) in a very bad situation. Since he's an adult we are limited in how to help him, and right now he prefers his particular lifestyle. The book did give me insight into him, in fact, it gave me chills. [sigh - just thinking of that makes me sad.] More than that though, the book gave me a lot of ideas for our younger son. We don't have video games in the house (stepson was addicted to Halo, etc, on weekends with his Mom, but we never supported that addiction and did not allow them in the house - too violent). But Sax's book is so much more than that! The sections of Kindergarten and school alone are excellent. Definitely a good library book, although I admit that this is one I have dog-eared, marked, and will keep long-term. Interesting aside... Our eldest son's therapist has this one on his shelf, knows the author, and feels it's an important read. He's a substance abuse specialist, so admittedly he's in a niche - but still nice to have a professional "endorsement"!

I'm not a frequent poster, but have been checking in on this thread - have been so concerned about this situation. It sounds like you are doing the right thing. My heart goes out to you, the baby, and the Mom who needs help. Thank you for helping her find help.

My in-laws mailed me this book when they heard we were considering homeschooling. They love all the "Dummy" books. I read it, and found it helpful - as a brand new homeschooler. I used some of their recommendations to get started on K, and it was her chapter on classical homeschooling that led me to SWB's book and this forum. They have a lot of game recommendations in the book, too - and now I know why! If you've been homeschooling for any length of time, this is more of a library book than one you need to buy, but it could be fun to read just for kicks and fresh ideas.

I will check back in, and thank you so much for pointing me in that direction. My heart is going pitter patter just hearing his excitement!

HWOT suggests that lefties reverse those strokes. That said, my lefty is finishing up first grade, and we have not made great progress with HWOT. We are going to try D'Nealian next as some feel it is easier for lefties. I'm not sure. We'll see. It could be due to my kiddo being a wiggly boy. Overall, I would still try HWOT. It is a great program, and well set up for lefties.

Posting again just to say that I showed my munchkin the D'Nealian font and he is super excited about it! Wow! And even more excited about the cursive. I have *never* seen him get excited about learning a font. Crossing fingers that this will be a great beginning. Thanks for the idea!

That is very interesting! I'd never heard that D'Nealian might be better for lefties, but that makes sense. Anything is worth a shot right now. He fought long and hard about the angling of the paper - but we finally have that down, and it is second nature. I *think* his grip is okay, but I didn't know to have him try holding the pencil farther up. This is good. Thanks for any and all ideas!

Thank you - that is helpful.

My son is really struggling with handwriting. He is in first grade, and we have been using HWOT, and doing the copywork from WWE 1. He's a leftie, and I'm not - but HWOT has been fairly leftie-friendly, so I'm not sure that's the issue. He forms the letters correctly, with a few minor slips which I correct as they occur, but overall... His handwriting does not appear to be any better now than it was at the beginning of first grade! (I am tempted to eat the words, "practice makes perfect" here!) It's not terrible. And it's legible. But it is a far cry from what I expected to see by now. He can draw beautifully, in fact, he could spend entire days with only pencil and paper - happily churning out artwork. Can you give me any tips for helping him? Would changing to cursive be helpful? What about switching to paper with smaller spaces between lines? I have tried to be patient, thinking that it will come with time... he's a boy... he's a leftie... But I am starting to wonder. Any thoughts would be appreciated.

We are also into leprechaun baiting - our 7 year old spends about a week designing and setting his traps, which he baits with gold (glitter) and Irish Soda Bread... The tricky leprechauns always spring the traps and get away, usually leaving behind tiny taunting notes, chocolate coins and some little goodies here and there. Last year the little tricksters turned all of the water in the house green (color tablets inside the faucets - super easy), left a trail of shamrocks from room to room, and pulled out every book we have on fairy folk... apparently they spent some time reading the books, because they left a pile of Irish Soda Bread crumbs on the table in front of the open books. :D

3lilreds beat me to it. :) My kiddo and I had a blast on that site a year or so ago... He desperately wanted a fairy door to appear at our house... Lo and behold... one did! It looks exactly like our front door. Then, when we remodeled, those silly fairies used some of our new paints - and a fairy door appeared in the living room. They decorate for holidays, and once in a while we find signs that they have been out and about [wink, wink]. It is so much fun!

Fun! We have fairy doors at our house (a la Urban Fairy Operations) so this will be a huge hit! Thank you!

We re-purposed our Ikea Trofast shelves and bins for workboxes. Do you have anything you could steal from another area of the house? There are some great blogs out there with a ton of ideas. Magazine holders work well for some, or you can make some out of cereal boxes. Our dollar store often has a good selection of bins, too, and I imagine they would work well on almost any bookshelf. We have been slowly changing our workboxes over to more of a workfolder system. I still store the bulkier materials in the workboxes, but many of our subjects are going into a workfolder, with the numbers velcroed onto the bottom part of the folder.

Coconut oil is yummy in cakes, also! And for grilling chicken breasts on the stove... mmmmmm. You are all making me so envious... My kiddo developed allergies to coconut oil and we don't keep it in the house any more. :(