This is SO true in our house. DH could yell out, "Hey, buffalo toast in a fluffy marshmallow sandwich!" and the two olders and I would all answer.

Yes, Mr. Clinkin is very popular around here. We always call him by his full name. Never Mr. Clinkin, or even Habe.

:iagree:Yes, yes, yes! Not just content (not even primarily content, in some cases) but skills and the overarching philosophy of having a sharp and ready mind. This looks different for different students in the same household. At least in our household.

We have so many, I can't even think of them all. But one we all use (dh started it) is that any time anyone asks a question that starts out "Where.." the answer has to be "your left nostril." Examples: Where did I leave my brown shoes? Your left nostril. Where do babies come from? Your left nostril. For some reason, "xyphoid process" and "pancreas" come up a lot, too. :tongue_smilie: We also use words that our kids used when they were little, like duffy=story, mau mau= blanket, Habercram Clinkin = Abe Lincoln, and many more. And the kids have so many nicknames we've lost count. Dh and I have nicknames that started when we were first married and have morphed into others. We never use our real names with each other unless we're in public.

How funny! We did that with the vacuum, blender, food processor...

Butterflies and walking sticks.

Try making cilantro pesto! I can't speak from experience because I can't stand cilantro myself, but I've heard it can be made into a nice pesto for chicken or beef or, in your case, dipping anything into.....?

Our Costco sometimes carries jumbo-traypacks of stuffed grape leaves. I know, I know, they're mass-produced. But I will not confess how quickly I can power through the whole thing. I seriously lose all willpower.

Well, my favorite foods are most people's most-hated foods: peppery greens, beets, mushrooms, asparagus, homegrown raw tomatoes...stuff like that. I have a serious addiction to stuffed grape leaves. I also love really good vanilla/butter flavors, esp. ice cream and shortbread.

If you can watch even some of the Ken Burns doc, it's very good. Even just the visuals helped me imagine the war better, since I've never been to any of the places where the war took place. I seem to remember a sort of "battle-cam" approach, in which the camera man would follow the actual line of approach in the battle, so the viewer could see sort of what the soldier would have seen. Also, there's amazing footage in one of the extras (I think it was an extra, or at the very end?) of Civil War veterans from opposing sides having a peaceful reunion. If you can find any music from the time period, that would also enhance your study. Even the soundtrack of the Ken Burns film.

My mom lived with us half-time for four years after my dad died in 2006 (spent the other half with a friend in AZ), and the full year from September 2010 - Sept 2011 when she died. It was a wonderful arrangement, though in the last year it was extremely stressful for health reasons (Mom's, not mine). However, barring that and speaking of multi-generational living in general, it was a blessing in every way. I would not be able to say this if my mom was not so easy to live with, so non-complaining and easy-going, etc. But she was. She was not able to do too much physically to help me in the house and she wasn't interested in participating in homeschooling (former p.s. teacher, didn't want the responsbility of teaching again) so I can't say it was a help in those ways. But it was fantastic having a grandma around for the girls, to see them build the relationship they had with her. Of course, they had one already because when my dad was alive they lived 30 minutes away and we saw them frequently. But it's different having a person right there with you. There are more chances to serve, and more ways to have a deeper relationship. I miss my mom daily but I'm so glad she was at least able to meet my #3 dd and I wouldn't trade our multi-generational living time for the world. She loved to read with the baby and just have conversations with the other two girls (and dh and me, of course.) When she was away in AZ, she wrote us frequently. If I had the chance house another healthy, easy going extended family member, I would take it in a heartbeat. I was also very blessed to have dh on board with the whole deal, or we wouldn't have been able to make it work.

:lol: Like there were just these two eyeballs floating around in there! Hello there, other eyeball! How are you? Oh, just fine. Float, float, float....

We hardly ever eat Pillsbury (perhaps because of my pop-o-phobia?), but I might just be one of those people who would lobby. With signs.

Wait. WHAT? Did she, um, express the milk herself, or.......?

No. Way. I can't believe I've found someone else who can't open a Pillsbury can. I have to ask a dd to do it and I can't even stay in the room. You are not alone! Are you also afraid of balloons popping? I can barely be in a room with helium balloons. And the covered feet thing.....when I was a little kid, my dad and I watched the original movie of The Blob on our tiny black and white TV, and I was so terrified that the blob was going to come out from under the foot of my bed and engulf me that I slept in socks until I went away to college. Not that I was still scared at that point......not really....:tongue_smilie:

Here is one - a poem, really - that I taught my dd's when they were young: Dear Father, hear and bless Thy beasts and singing birds, And guard with tenderness Small things that have no words. Margaret Wise Brown

I hate chalk and chalky things like Altoids mints. I can barely even touch chalk without getting a full-body shiver. But I'm getting a bit better - I discovered that sidewalk chalk, or basically any fat piece of chalk, isn't so bad. Which is a good thing, because we have a HUGE chalkboard in our entryway (former school chalkboard I got at a thrift store for 98 cents!) and I like to write quotes and other things on it. So, I'm a recovering chalk-o-phobic, but I believe I will always have a problem. I also can't stand to see the seeds from stone fruit (apricots, cherries, olives, etc) on people's plates. As a kid, I would cover these up with napkins on the plates of my family members because it made me feel nauseated to look at them. I love quirky threads like this. :)

We go to several library systems. Most are .25 a day for books, two are $1 a day for DVDs and one is $2 a day for DVDs.

The texture of bananas makes me squeamish. The taste is....okay. I don't hate it and I'll eat one if I have to. But I HATE their texture. ETA: Wow - I thought I was so unique. I posted my answer before reading any of the rest of the thread, and now that I'm reading it I'm seeing that TONS of people hate bananas, just like me! *virtual high five* Interestingly, so many of the foods that get repeated listings are literally my favorite foods - beets, onions, tomatoes, and many more.

Such a hard question! Anything by Peter Spier Anything by Robert McCloskey Anything by Alice and Martin Provensen Anything by Virginia Burton Anything illustrated by Kinuko Craft or Paul O. Zelinsky Roxaboxen by Alice McLerran/Barbara Cooney

I'm sure these are pricier than what your'e looking for, but I've bought tons as baby gifts, and I also have used them with #3. They were excellent burp cloths, and now we use them as "story cloths" where we tell little stories about the pictures on them. And they're excellent cleaning cloths, too! http://www.etsy.com/shop/laundrymonster?ref=ss_profile

Yes! My oldest dd was like this. She struggled with math all the way through. It was always the worst part of our day and she never seemed to really get it. She got the four basic operations down, mostly, but never seemed to have a good "sense" for math, if that makes any sense. Then I found out that a friend of mine (former college math teacher) was teaching math classes to homeschoolers in her home. She agreed to take my dd on even though I considered dd's skills and thinking to be.......sort of weak. Well, lo and behold, she aced algebra and LOVED it. She was 15 at the time. She liked it so much that she took Algebra 2 and geometry concurrently from same friend the next year, and aced both of those. She spent hours a day doing math, which just floored me, and was able to help other kids in the class when they had trouble. I asked her whether the difference was just in having a good teacher who really loves math (I am neither of these things). She said that was part of it, but she also said (and this is my encouragement to you if you're really concerned about your dd) that she really felt like something in her brain just clicked when she turned 15 or so. She said even if she had had our friend as a teacher the year before, she wouldn't have completely understood the math. She really enjoyed the abstractness of algebra and geometry. She loved the visual aspect of it and would often show me her color-coded notes that covered pages and pages. That said, I still feel she doesn't have good common-sense math skills. But that's sort of how she is in everything - away with the concrete, on to the dreamy. So, take heart!

The Borrowers Betsy-Tacy Swallows and Amazons "Magic" series by Edward Eager Wolves Chronicles - Joan Aiken

Stay silent. It doesn't matter if he thinks your silence means that he's right. Someone who starts out with this type of opinion and is brazen enough to demand something from you when you owe him NOTHING will not be convinced. He will continue to argue and ask for more and defend his position. DO NOT ENGAGE!!! Standardized tests indicate nothing but how well the test-takers have been indoctrinated to the test. They have ZERO to do with intelligence or creativity. They are no proof. I haven't read any other posts and others have probably said exactly what I'm saying, but I just wanted you to hear it again. Please don't allow your self to be bullied right out of the starting gate. Do what you want to do for YOUR family - take heart, and learn in freedom!

My dd took two years of Lukeion Latin, did extremely well, and I would say that their estimate is accurate.