Cataloging apps. Huh. I hadn't even considered those. Wow! Now I want them, LOL. I am really boggled by what these little machines can do. :)

Also, the camera on the 2 is not great. I assume the 4 is a lot better. If that's a big factor for you, I'd go for the 4. (But you could also get a pretty good regular camera for the difference in price between the iPads.)

LOL, assure her that it has nothing to do with dolls. It really is an excellent book and should appeal to tomboys and girly-girls both. There's another one, very similar, called The Body Book, by Kelli someone (Dunham, I think), and it's very good too.

I just got an iPad 2, but it does have the iOS 6 upgrade. So far, I've had no complaints, and every app I've tried has worked fine (about 70). Notability is the greatest thing since sliced bread, IMO. I cannot tell you how much I love it and how much easier it is making everything for me. It runs perfectly on the 2. As for resolution, yes, the 4 is better. But the 2 is still very, very good. TV is better on it than on my regular TV or my desktop (and those are both fairly decent screens). I do expect that I will have to replace it in a few years, but for now, I am really pleased with it.

The American Girl book is really great! All the facts, no s*x, and even stuff like menstruation is presented alongside stuff about body odor and general hygiene. No mystery, no drama. I know my DD, and I knew she wouldn't feel comfortable with a big talk, so I gave her the book and suggested that she look through it and ask me if she had any questions. From time to time, she had a specific question, so we talked more. As for bras, Kohl's has some nice ones that are soft and more like a crop top than a bra. Like a short camisole. A good choice for tweens, IMO.

I'd get a Graco Turbobooster if he needs the head support and a Graco backless booster if he doesn't need the head support. If you want a harness, I'd go with the Nautilus or the Evenflo Maestro.

Oh! Gettysburg rocks! It is a lot of fun, even for kids. July 4th is likely to be pretty crowded (and hot); I believe there is usually a big reenactment at that time, and that may be what someone meant about tickets. We haven't been, mainly because we've seen some reenactments and don't want to brave the crowds, the heat, and the ticket cost when we live so close. I would probably choose to visit a different time of the year; May or October would be good (early October has a huge Apple Harvest Festival then), but November is still generally very pleasant around here. Oh, and 2013 is also the 150th anniversary of the Battle of Gettysburg, so there may be some other special events too, especially around early July. This site may have some helpful info: pacivilwar150.com. I don't know about hotel suites, but there are a lot of campgrounds nearby, and some of them have cabins that might work for your family. You may also be able to find a rental house. You should probably plan to see the Visitor's Center and Cyclorama and the (extensive) galleries that accompany those. Easily a full afternoon, depending on how long you spend in the galleries. (Don't buy lunch there; it's super expensive. There's a nice little diner right in town; I forget its name, but it had really good food, and I can look it up for you if you want. For a nice but not super fancy meal, and really good craft beer and root beer, we highly recommend Appalachian Brewing Company. There are multiple great ice cream shops in town too. :) ) Other places we have been: -The Eisenhower house site (couple of hours, and the kids enjoyed it) -Hall of Presidents and First Ladies (couple of hours, fun for kids; something girly for the girls to balance out all the battle stuff.) -Civil War Wax Museum (my kids loved this; it's fairly short). There are often reenacters camped outside. Gettysburgmuseum.com. -Somewhere downtown there's a place where you can get your picture taken with your face inside a cutout of Lincoln. My kids thought that was hilarious. -The cemeteries -- Gettysburg National Cemetery (I think that's the right name) and the one next to it, Evergreen Cemetery -- site of the Gettysburg Address. Evergreen has a statue of Elizabeth Thorn, who dug a bunch of Civil War graves while pregnant; my DD found that pretty inspiring. -The Round Barn just outside of G'burg in Cashtown -- it's not a huge place, but it's kind of fun to visit (and you can buy really good produce there, or a lot of places, around the area; if you come in November, apples will be plentiful and AMAZING). -Mr. Ed's Elephant Museum (and candy store) -- the kids thought it was fun. There was a fire there a while back, but IDK if they've reopened or not. It's just west of G'burg. The battlefields: There are a lot of things to see, monuments, lookouts, cannons. There IS an audio driving tour that you can buy ($22? not sure) that tells you "turn here, go this far, stop and listen," but with a lot of small kids, it might not be your thing. I would look for this book, which gives walking and driving directions, maps (including of the cemeteries), etc.: http://www.amazon.com/Complete-Gettysburg-Guide-Battlefield-ebook/dp/B005AY1KBO/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1357931873&sr=8-2&keywords=walking+tour+gettysburg If you're Catholic, the Elizabeth Seton Shrine is about 20 minutes south of Gettysburg in Emmitsburg. If you head north a bit, there's the Army Heritage and Education Center in Carlisle (less than 30 minutes from G'burg and an easy drive). They have displays from a bunch of American wars, bunkers to go in, stuff like that. The boys really loved that. In Harrisburg (40 minutes from G'burg, but again, an easy ride -- it's very easy to get around this area), the State Museum of PA is very interesting (and has a planetarium). We have not been to the Civil War Museum in Harrisburg yet though. Not far from Harrisburg is Hershey, the amusement park, and assorted chocolate stuff. :) (Free chocolate tour.) If you do go to Philadelphia, you might plan a stop in Lancaster. There's a lot to do there, but the kids would probably enjoy the Landis Valley Museum (it's a working farm). Over a bit in Ephrata, there's also the Cloisters. Heading east from there to Philadelphia, there's the Daniel Boone birthplace in Birdsboro (haven't been there though) and Valley Forge (and the King of Prussia Mall if you like to shop). Philadelphia is about 3 1/2 hours from Gettysburg. If you are planning to see a lot of things, look into the PA Heritage Society membership; I know at least the Landis Valley Museum and the State Museum are included in the membership, though the State Museum is open for free certain days (third Saturday or something). I want to say that the Daniel Boone birthplace is included too, but I'm not sure; you can google Pennsylvania Trails of History. Anyway, here's the site for it: http://www.shoppaheritage.com/collections/state-museum-affiliate-memberships Anyway, that got long, sorry. Hope it helps. Feel free to PM me if I can help any more.

My 10yo spelled it mostly correctly; she's not a great natural speller, but I think by 8th grade she'd have no trouble spelling it. It doesn't seem excessively hard for an 8th grader.

We opted not to get it; I have a kid with some serious allergies, including one to some medication, and I'm really hesitant to get any sort of shot for her, especially since food allergy tests have been iffy for her. We haven't had the flu in years; I had it about ten years ago, just me, and that was without a shot, but none of us have had the shot nor flu in years. However, we're also at low-risk for getting the flu -- we live in the middle of nowhere, are not out and about a lot (no classes), and DH works in a very small office (we're talking a handful of people that he sees regularly). That being said, I have taken a few extra precautions, like wiping down grocery carts, forbidding my children from using any public water fountains, and making them wash their hands after leaving the grocery store. Usually I'm not too paranoid about everyday cold germs. We're also taking cod liver oil and lots of vitamin D. I like the suggestion to drink something hot a lot too -- tea for everyone. If I had an immune compromised child, I might feel differently.

Anyone have a favorite budget app? I would really like something that would let me download debit transactions from my bank and sort them by category in an app, so that I could track how we're spending money each month. I currently use an older version of Quicken on my desktop and like it, but portability would be nice. I want to be able to tell a program "this is how much I want to spend on groceries each month, put this $37.25 transaction under groceries, how am I doing so far for the month?" Quicken lets me do this nicely. I tried the Quicken app, but it requires having a newer version of Quicken on the desktop. Free is nice but not essential.

Yep, C-rods, plus hundreds flats and a thousands cube. And a piece of paper that has the places on it in a row.

That seems a lot for a first grader to do completely independently. My second grader would need a lot of hand-holding on it. (And my fifth grader could do it, but she'd need my permissions/supervision to use the internet.) I think a more reasonable approach would be to discuss the different classes of animals at school and then ask the children to find a picture of an animal that fits each class, discussing them with the parents. Then again, I kind of think that the point of homework in the early grades is to reinforce the concepts discussed in class and to inform the parents of what was taught.

Salt. My homemade broth definitely needs more salt than I expect.

Mine draw. They don't color, but they do like to draw. They do sometimes play with Legos, but that's usually noisier (because of looking through bins) than I want while I'm reading (and it brings Legos into the schoolroom, which is also the baby's safe room, so that's a no go). Playdough/clay or squishy balls would be good too.

I agree with this. I'm. . . undecided. . . about the age of the earth, and honestly, I don't really think it matters. Early cave paintings -- it just doesn't matter if it's a million years ago or a few thousand.

Thank you. I think my question is, which is it more okay NOT to have on the high school transcript -- Algebra II or Geometry? I know the usual sequence when I was in school was Alg. 1, Geometry, Alg. 2, but my program did it Alg. 1, Alg. 2, Geometry, and it worked out fine. In my case, Alg. 2 wasn't on my high school transcript since I did it in eighth grade, but I wasn't sure what was the better option nowadays. I guess if Alg. 2 wasn't on the transcript but Trig was, a college would assume the student had had Alg. 2, but if Geometry wasn't on it, the school might assume the student had hadn't a specific Geometry course. Yeah, I don't know what we'll do for DD after Calc. I can't possibly imagine that her career plans would need a third calculus course, but who knows? I guess we'll cross that bridge when we come to it.

Could someone give me an update on what's expected, in general, on a high school transcript when applying for college? I do have a few years, but I want to make sure we're on the right track. DD is in fifth grade this year, in Saxon 7/6, and doing well with it. I'm really satisfied (and so is she) with how the Saxon approach works *for her* so I'm inclined to stay with it. We're at about Lesson 63, and there's been very little new information thus far. Since she's doing well, I think she's ready for Algebra 1/2 next year, sixth grade. That would put her in Algebra 1 in seventh grade and either Algebra 2 or geometry in eighth. That doesn't seem out of line; I completed both Algebra 1 and 2 in eighth grade myself, and it wasn't an issue that neither of those were on my official high school transcript back in the 90s. How about these days, though? I'm thinking Algebra 2 in eighth, Geometry in 9th, Trig/PreCalc in 10th, and then Calculus in 11th, very possibly at a local college or something. Then, depending on what she needs for college, a second course in Calculus in 12th grade, or some other math -- consumer math, statistics, whatever. Or if she does two college courses in math in 11th grade, no math in 12th, especially if she wants to focus on a different subject more. This child is good in math, but it's not her favorite, so I could see taking a year off from math to allow more time for languages or history, both of which interest her more. My gut feeling is that she's not going to need a ton of advanced math, but I still want her to have 4 math courses in high school -- is that still the right goal for college planning? (I'm very math-comfortable myself, so I'm very confident that, along with the book, I could assist her with calculus as needed.) The other slight issue is that the brother three years younger than DD speaks math, and I'm expecting that he's going to do very well in it. Having been in the position of a younger sib being really extra good in math and being close to "catching up" to me, I absolutely do not want to do that to DD, so slowing her down just for the sake of doing so seems like a not-great plan. (And I really do not think she's being pushed beyond what she's capable of doing; I think she's in the right level for her.) Thoughts?

I wish I could come and just do it all for you -- that would be fun! I like to have the carseat installed by 36 weeks, so it's generally just a matter of deciding what's going where and just telling DH one afternoon, "I need you to do this now, please." Why not set up a little calendar or list and put one or two things per week -- one week, wash and fold clothes, another week, arrange carseats? I've never found out what I was having, so I just wash all the clothes and have them ready. In your case, I'd either use a cheap set of plastic drawers or a couple of laundry baskets and call it good until the baby is actually here. If you use a laundry basket, maybe wrap the clothes in a clean trash bag or blanket first so they don't get dusty. (The downside to this plan is that at some point, you have to put away the clothes that weren't the right ones, and this last time around, even though I was thrilled with my little boy, it was hard to take down clothes that had been DD's and that weren't going to be reused again.)

I just had to say that I had two tests that were distinctly negative at the 3-minute mark, not even a hint of a shadow, nothing. I was absolutely sure both times that I was pregnant -- we'd been trying, and I'd been charting my temps and everything, and I was at 13 dpo. I was so devastated to be wrong. I tossed the tests in the trash and hopped in the shower. Looked at the tests about 20 minutes later -- and there were very, very faint lines, just barely there. The results of those tests will be 8 and 11 this spring and are sleeping in their beds right now. :) (You'd think I'd have learned after DD and not assumed that DS1's test was actually negative. Apparently not. However, I did learn to wait until 14dpo to test for my two little boys, and it was such a relief when DS2's test was positive within a fraction of a second of me taking it. DS3's test looked wonky -- like, half positive. I waited a couple more days until about 16dpo and tested with a different type of test, which, even in the middle of the day, came up positive immediately, so dark that my lousy phone camera was able to take a pic of it and send it to DH, and he could see the positive line clearly.) All that to say, faint can still likely be positive, but I'll be waiting to see what tomorrow's test says!

I don't know, but it is. They score your child as a 3rd, 4th, or 5th grader, so a 3rd grader is not expected to do as well as a 5th grader but still is only scored compared to other 3rd graders.

Thanks for this thread; a friend just asked me if I'd ever heard of it, and I had not. But my quick glancing suggests that it might be perfect for my needs, and since I could use it for both of my older children, that's a fabulous price!

Yes, you need someone else other than a parent to administer the test. Around here, there are some groups that offer testing (and we can also use our local public school), but we prefer to use the online version of the CAT from Christian Liberty Press. All from our own home, the computer administers the test, not the parent, and it's really easy and painless. Just keep in mind that your third grader will take the same test as kids finishing fifth grade, so he/she may not know how to do everything on the test; that's expected, but tell your child not to panic. I have to have my fifth grader tested this year, and I'll probably do it around March or April. I want her to have a bit more math first, since that was her weakest score on the test two years ago; I want to give her the best chance at doing really well that I can. My evaluator likes to do evaluations around April or early May, so I need to do the testing before that (but with the online test, I'll have the scores within minutes of DD finishing the test). Our evaluator sits down with DD and me for about an hour and looks through the portfolio, checking off (on her list) the subjects she sees. She asks DD about her favorite book from the year and other topics, but it's pretty easy and not a big deal. Our evaluator signs a statement that states that we have met the requirements of the law, and then I take that and the portfolio to the school district (and make them sign a receipt saying that they got it all). If I need a more in-depth thing, like suggestions about improvements or whatever, I can pay my evaluator a bit more, and she'll write her recommendations for me. I like our evaluator a lot, but she's also a good friend of mine, so she's familiar with my children and my educational philosophy; we are a good match in terms of philosophy. And talking to our friend is easier on DD than talking with a stranger (DD tends to worry about the evaluation as if she's going to be grilled).

I've spent about half of my grocery budget for the month already, and obviously we still have a few more weeks to go. However, I shouldn't need to purchase meat again this month and probably not many frozen veggies. I should be good on dish soap, toilet paper, and laundry detergent. So it will just be dairy products, eggs, fresh produce, and a few incidentals. I have most of what I need for dinners, except for fresh salad. I think we're in good shape.

Haven't read the rest of the replies, but water safety. If you look for the site for the Army Corps of Engineers, there's an email address for where they will send you a free DVD called "Safe Passage," for elementary school students. It's a little hokey, but it had some really good information, and there are free downloadable PDFs to use as follow-up worksheets. We include prenatal and neonatal growth and development, and I'd include birth and lactation for an older kid too. (I'd have said especially for girls, but y'know, boys should be able to be supportive of their future spouses too.) There's the strict biology, but there's more to it all than that. Fire safety is required here in PA, every year. Firearm safety would also be really important here. Exercise safety -- the importance of stretching, warning signs that you're overdoing it, etc. I'm semi-hesitant to discuss anorexia and bulimia with my kids, because I don't like the idea of putting those things in their heads. I think I'm more inclined to wait until and unless I see any concerns about eating habits. (And the same with suicide.) Younger kids get basic discussions of dental and personal hygiene and nutrition (whatever your family believes about proper nutrition). Tweens get to count discussion of adolescent physical changes. At some point, discussions of safe s*x (whatever that means in your family) should be included. Some of that is hard, because it just comes up naturally as a family -- I mean, I tell my 1yo and 4yo "okay, we're going to brush your teeth to get the sugar bugs off of them," so at some point, I print off a basic worksheet to throw in the portfolio as proof that we covered it. I also would include discussions of safe people. Not necessarily stranger awareness, but how to get help if you get lost in a store, or what to do if someone approaches you or tries to snatch/attack you. I'm going to read this thread more thoroughly and jot down some of the ideas for future reference -- great thread!

DH was pleased with his Civic when he had it, and my mom likes her Accord a lot too. I hear they can last a long time too. DH has also been pleased with his Ford Focus, or, well, he was until its engine died -- at eight years old but with 187,000 miles on it (DH's commute is 90 miles round-trip; he puts on 30K miles a year). But until then, very nice vehicle, very comfortable to drive, even managed to get three kids (including some carseats) in the backseat without it being too tight. It was our family vehicle until baby #4 necessitated a van.