I've been pregnant, breastfeeding and taking care of pre-schoolers from the time I was 19 until now, I'm turning 40 in a couple of months. My baby is 6. I think it's going to take some time to figure out what to do with myself! Thankfully I'm homeschooling, but sheesh! I thought I'd feel miraculously light, but instead I feel...a bit...lost. Anyone know what I mean? :crying:

There are 4 members of my immediate family that use Paypal regularly and we all have it linked to our bank accounts. We've never had a problem, but that's not saying it couldn't happen. It sure is convenient though, both as a buyer and a seller.

Sent a friend request ;)

Echoing others here. My 19 year old still comes up with ingenious creations using Lego. Years ago, he designed his own fully transformable Optimus Prime Transformer - NOT using a set (it turned from a robot to a truck and back again without removing or replacing pieces). The challenging part is building what the mind sees and knowing which piece to choose to make it do and appear as you've imagined. There is a lot of spatial reckoning involved. Or perhaps he'd like to try making stop motion animation videos using what he's built. The possibilities are endless.

I'm interested to read what others say. I have had 4 children in various levels of the program and none of them so far have been successful in remembering the entire passage by level 4 without a great amount of difficulty. I'm used to not expecting them to be able to do it alI by now, but just repeat it to them sentence by sentence as needed (and sometimes clause by clause). I'm okay with it ;). I seem to remember Susan Wise Bauer posting a video to YouTube of her doing a dictation with her son from the program. It was reassuring.

I print them all up at once and file them in a filing cabinet by week. Then they are put in the child's 3 ring binder when completed. It wrecks the flow of a lesson if I need to stop and print out sheets day by day.

Oh! Thank you, I need to re-subscribe to that one. My phone "forgot" all my subscriptions a while back and I had to try and remember what I had :). The Moth was definitely one of them.

I use the podcast app on my iPhone.

Our local library is equally wretched as far as what's available in audiobook. I can buy a membership from another city about 2 hours away, but I've settled on Scribd for only a few dollars more per year. Scribd has the added advantage of every book being available all the time, unlike a library. It's an excellent value for our large family and for those in the family who fly through audiobooks at an alarming rate ;).

Yes!! We are currently using it on 8 different devices to one account in our family. We LOVE it!

I love podcasts. They fuel my addiction to information :). Here are ones I've subscribed to: This American Life Serial RadioLab Freakonomics 99% Invisible Stuff You Should Know Wiretap Today in Canadian History EarBiscuits (mostly to keep up with my You-Tuber sons) Homeschooling IRL The Memory Palace Radio Diaries Oxford Biographies The History of England Stuff You Missed in History Class Sawbones Read Aloud Revival Criminal The British History Podcast The History Chicks History of English Podcast CirCE Institute Pop Culture Happy Hour Undisclosed Mystery Show (as of today!) Ask Me Another Invisibilia ...and several quilting podcasts. I am not caught up on all of these, but I like a variety to choose from depending on my mood.

We recently discovered Scribd.com for books and audiobooks. You pay $8.99 a month and have unlimited access. The titles can be downloaded to your device for offline listening/reading or listened to online. They have a LOT of titles and we've been able to find almost anything we're looking for. We don't have access to Overdrive from our local library, and it would cost us about the same as a Scribd subscription to get a library card from a nearby big city, but then we'd have to deal with waiting for books to come available when they are in use by others and only being able to check them out for a limited time. Scribd has none of these issues. The downside (compared to Audible) is that with Scribd you don't own the books. So if you discontinue your subscription, I imagine the books you've downloaded disappear.

This is an excellent thread. I, too, "lost" 15 years being either pregnant or nursing non-stop. My second to last pregnancy ended in the stillbirth of my daughter. When I was pregnant with my youngest just months afters my daughter's death, I decided to make a quilt for that baby. And then, I didn't stop making them! In doing so, I found an outlet for myself in my new phase of life at the end of my child-bearing. It's been 6 years and having my "own" passion helped me to wean off being wrapped up in my babies only. I still feel a bit lost not having a small person physically needing me at all times, so I'm still finding out how to be a grownup without that diversion (I had my first baby at age 20, almost 20 years ago). Bless you and all of you "finding yourself". I know what that feels like. (P.S. My signature has the link, but it doesn't show on mobile - I started a blog to record all the quilts I've made. It's at http://coraquilts.blogspot.ca if you want to look!)

My boys play it. In fact, it is the first and only game we let them play. But they only play on Saturdays once chores are done, or on "special" occasions when we allow it. For those who are concerned about the swearing and negative stuff on with YouTube Minecraft players, take a look at my eldest sons' Youtube channel. It's safe and clean and has lots of Minecraft content. They are doing quite well with it: https://www.youtube.com/user/FinsGraphics https://www.youtube.com/user/FinsGames Edited: added the gaming channel link

We have this one: http://shop.nationalgeographic.com/ngs/product/maps/wall-maps/world-maps/world-political-map--earth-toned---enlarged-and-laminated It is very large. We mounted it to plywood so it would stay flat on the wall. I have thought about adding trim like a frame around it but we probably won't get around to it. Anyways, it is on sale and I love the colours, it looks nice in my home.

Thank you, Susan! I have the edition of TWTM published in 2009 which I see is the latest one so I will check there. Thanks for all you do for homeschooling, your work has been so very helpful to me.

I have Susan Wise Bauer's lecture "Science in the Classical Curriculum" which was given several years ago (she mentions her oldest is 12 and her youngest 2 1/2!) In the lecture, she laments the lack of a curriculum that she can point people towards which will walk us through science topics using classical guidelines. Has she started to recommend anything in particular for grammar and logic since then? I've been looking around and see several titles mentioned here on the forums, but I haven't seen anything from SWB specifically. Anyone know?

Moda Bake Shop has lots of cute and free patterns using pre-cuts. I ran a search on their patterns for "twin size" here for a start: http://www.modabakeshop.com/?s=%22Twin+size%22&submit=Search Good luck! And as another poster said, you can adapt any pattern to make it twin size, it's just a matter of math. I've sucessfully changed the sizes of many patterns.

No earth shatteringly helpful reply here, just "I hear you". Two of my 6 boys are like this (and so is my husband). The other 3 can spell (waiting to see on the youngest one).

Thanks for sharing this! I'm not entirely sure we will use them all... but I've looked longingly at the science titles before and the savings was enough that they can be in my maybe file :). I've loved her materials that we have used (Mapping the World with Art).

The Shakespeare Stealer by Gary Blackwood was enjoyed by boys in my house.

Wonderful! Just visited and loaded up my cart. We LOVE our audible account. (And these deals are all available in Canada, if anyone is wondering).

I'm an INTJ too. Not sure what my hubby is, but most likely the OPPOSITE in every area! I think only one of my 6 boys is like me.

That was a very helpful article. I have a boy hovering in between WWE and WWS. Thanks for the recommendations, SWB!

The instructor text explains the basic premise of the program, which you may already be familiar with if you have read the Well Trained Mind or listened to any lectures from SWB on the subject. It can equip you to use the techniques with your students using literature and reading selections you already have (such as from your history or science reading). The workbook is a scripted program with assignments for 4 days a week for 36 weeks. It is all you need if you want something open and go. The lessons you read from are in the front, the student pages in the back (perforated pages with pictures and lines for dictation and narration or copywork pages with the passage readily printed at the top). The student pages are simply the student pages alone from the workbook for people who want to print them off for multiple students/years.