I got one from my ILs' house; it was just sitting there, unused, so I asked if we could borrow it. They were thrilled to do so. It has a few countries that are not accurate any longer (ie it has the USSR), but that's been pretty easy to explain, and it definitely works fine for basic geography and topography. My kids are still pretty young, so that works well. Maybe a grandparent or someone has one you could borrow indefinitely?

I have liked knitting with the washable wool yarn from Knit Picks, Swish. I don't know how well it washes or if it stretches though, as both of the things I knitted were gifts.

I'd probably call it Textile Design or Fiber Arts. I like "Handwork," but if you're creating a transcript and/or have to report it to a school district (like we do here), I think Textile Design or Fiber Arts sounds more official, plus I think it is the right tone if you want the credit to count as a fine arts credit.

Your poor boys! Mine would have been absolutely terrified as well (even my one who's not afraid of much). I can't believe those neighbors -- UGH! Who thinks that kind of thing is funny?!?! However, your sheriff is wonderful! So glad he took it seriously and was able to speak with your boys. If they are still scared, I'd probably call animal control and have them look around the place and then reassure your sons that there is no mountain lion.

The best thing I ever did was to get rid of ALL of the sippy cups. We had a bunch of different ones, and they would get left in the car and everywhere. I ditched them all and got a Foogo straw bottle for each of the kids. I started my (current) youngest child with a regular open mug at home -- I only gave him water in it, and yes, he spilled at first, but he figured it out pretty quickly. The Foogo straw bottle is the only kind of covered cup he's ever used. (And with just one water bottle each, they take care of them, bring them in from the car, etc.) They only put water in them; we don't really do juice or other drinks, and we reserve milk for at home at meals. However, for actual sippy cups, I did like the Take and Toss ones. I don't like the kind with the no-spill valve, because they seem to teach children to suck, rather than to sip, which as a breastfeeding-into-toddlerhood mom, I didn't want. The T and T ones seemed to be a pretty good compromise.

Spaghetti, French toast, pancakes, or burgers. I generally have ground beef in the freezer, and eggs and milk in the fridge (I get those separately from regular groceries, so they're not always on the same "rotation" as everything else). I also currently have lamb cubes and turkey bits in the freezer, and usually have a good selection of frozen veggies, so I could whip up a lamb curry-type dish or a turkey pot pie or some such.

Congratulations! What an adorable baby! The rest of you who are waiting, hang in there! Btdt myself -- the waiting is hard!

I use it for frying sometimes, though I generally use real butter. I use coconut oil mostly for baking, when a recipe calls for shortening. No Crisco in this house! I also use coconut oil when baking for my dairy-allergic FIL; it imparts a pleasant flavor that he particularly liked in chocolate cake. (Convinced MIL to use it too when she was cooking for Thanksgiving, which included my SIL, who was nursing a baby allergic to both dairy and soy -- she'd have used Crisco, but that's all soy.) (And I use coconut oil for moisturizing, and for diaper rashes too. It is antiviral, antibacterial, and antifungal, so it's great for stuff like that.) I get mine from amazon, the Nutiva brand, via the Subscribe and Save program. That's the best price per ounce for that size jar that I've seen. I think some people might get it from a Frontier co-op as well. You might get a better price per ounce if you buy a really big jar, but bulk buying is often out of my budget. Oh, and yes, I use it 1:1. Half cup of shortening = half cup of coconut oil. I've also heard that since it's supposed to be good for speeding up metabolism and therefore weight loss, you can put it in things like hot tea, or just eat a bit before meals. You can also use it if you do oil pulling for your teeth. It's full of lauric acid, IIRC, so it's a good thing for nursing mothers.

I don't believe God makes bad things happen. I don't believe that they are what He wills for us at all. He created a perfect world and wanted only good things for us. However, humans brought sin into His perfect world, and I believe that He does allow bad things to happen sometimes as a result of that. I also believe that regardless of how bad something is, that He can bring good out of it, one way or another -- "And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose," Romans 8:28. The Bible is full of instances where God used some tragic event to reveal His power and to bring people closer to Him (like the man who was blind from birth that Jesus healed -- how many people might have come to believe in Him after witnessing that miracle?). He has a purpose for your nephew's life, even if it has not been revealed yet. I also think it's very sad that someone said such things to you. I don't think your anger with God means you are not a Christian. The times that I've found myself drawing closer to God and growing in my faith are the times when I admit to Him that I'm hurt, angry, confused, whatever. When we are humbled and broken, He can do His greatest work. He is a great big God -- He can take your questions. Don't be afraid to pour all of your feelings out at His feet. :grouphug:

We get Ranger Rick and Big Backyard here. We also get Cobblestone, but while it looks great, we haven't really read too much of it, mainly because we've not been focusing on American history this year -- next year, I think we'll read more of it.

I don't know if it's all discipline or all truly difficult, or a combination, or what, but with my DD, who hates to write, we do limit how much she has to write in a day. Right now we've put copywork on hold in favor of doing a page from the HWOT cursive book every day, but when we go back to copywork, it'll just be a couple of lines a day, most likely. If I have her do a lot of writing in math one day, I might not have her do a written narration for history; if she writes a history narration, math might be all oral. It seems to help her to know that she's not going to have page after page of writing to do every day. (And actually, she's gotten less annoyed about lots of writing recently and seems to accept that she has to do what she has to do, so that's promising.)

I have to keep everything, because my state requires a portfolio at the end of the year. I buy a bunch of those small 3-prong folders at Staples when they're a penny each in the summer, and the kids decorate those for various special subjects -- this year, they've each made one for the Middle Ages, one for butterflies, will make one for birds, etc. So all applicable papers go into those folders. I'll probably keep those folders, at least for a few years (after I temporarily take out a few to put in the portfolio to give to the school district). Then other papers, like grammar sheets, or math sheets, or art projects, or whatever, go into hanging folders by month. At the end of the year, I'll pick a few to go into the portfolio and will probably get rid of most of the rest -- might keep some art projects, but probably not all the math sheets.

Coconut oil, toothbrush heads, and liquid Stevia currently. I never thought about things like toilet paper -- cool! I really like the S&S program.

I really like Clay Clarkson's Heartfelt Discipline, for its philosophy of *why* we choose a particular way of disciplining. It's a little short on the "do X in this situation" sort of thing though, but it really focuses on reaching the heart and not just correcting the behavior. I also like Raising Your Spirited Child and Easy to Love, Difficult to Discipline. I like Dr. Sears's books in general for parenting very young children. For older kids, I think Kevin Leman's books are very good. I don't love every single thing he says, but overall, I've found him to be very much on the practical and reasonable side, common sense, kids are neither always good nor always bad. I think he's a really good compromise between the two major opposing sides of discipline philosophies.

Here is a recent thread that had some great suggestions (I'm too lazy to type my answers again!): http://welltrainedmind.com/forums/showthread.php?t=205971

I have a bit of a less-than-typical situation in that my DD (older and bigger) is much, much more rough-and-tumble than her younger brother (the 5yo, not the 2yo -- the 2yo is pretty typically "all boy"). DS1 is much more likely to avoid rough play in general and is more likely to complain if he gets hurt. In general, he's naturally very protective and giving, like with his little brother. We've given him a few tips about treating ladies specially (and we talk about the things that I do to treat DH specially, and vice versa), and he is definitely a gentleman to me. He insists on holding the door for me if we go somewhere, comes up randomly to tell me he loves me, thanks me for random little stuff I do for him, etc. (He's seriously going to be a catch someday, truly; if nothing else, his dimples will have all the ladies falling for him. The first time he flashed them at me, I was completely gone.) What totally cracks me up is that his sister taught him that he should offer her his hand when they get in the car, and he just went along with it. (It probably helps that she is 95% of the time dressed in some outlandish fancy or historical costume and for all her tomboyish roughness LOVES to play the princess.) But yes, I think it's very reasonable to teach boys to act like gentlemen to ladies. Not all women will appreciate having doors held for them (though I think that's just common courtesy, and I have done it myself when appropriate, male or female), but I think a fair number will like it.

I've seen four chiropractors in the past several years (partly due to moving), and they've all had different protocols. Two of them offered the "pay as you go, come when you need" or "pay up front and get a discount on a large number of visits" plan, and they treated me at the first visit. A third is a drop-in, donation-only chiro; you pay what you can, and the visits are pretty quick, but my DH has found them to be very helpful -- he goes when he needs it and will go back a couple of times in a week if need be (I've only seen that one once myself). The fourth did a bunch of examining and then wanted to set up a treatment/payment plan before any treatment -- sounds like what you're describing. I wasn't comfortable with that, but I don't think it's necessarily shady, just a different approach/belief.

I had good success with Proraps (though I switched to wool, so it's been a few years since I used the Proraps). If he's very wiggly, you can tri-fold the prefolds and lay them in the cover, then make a big stack of that setup, so all you have to do is clean him off and put the whole thing on in one step, just like you would a disposable. Also, Bummis makes a nice little panty-style cover that is very inexpensive -- you put the prefold on with pins or a Snappi clip, and then put the cover on over it, just like you'd put on underwear. No fastener needed on the cover.

I'm sorry that he had to learn the hard way. I have a child who tends to be impulsive and has had to learn the hard way several times; it is heartbreaking as the parent to see that, isn't it?

What a tough situation! I would feel so torn if something like this happened at my DH's work. He gets very few vacation days, and this year, most of them are earmarked for after our baby arrives. Being pressured (either by coworkers or by HR) would be so difficult! IMO, the person in charge (whether it was HR or an individual employee who wanted to suggest it) should have sent around a memo or some such with a polite request, allowing everyone to speak to HR at his/her convenience and donate (or not) in complete privacy. I think a reasonable compromise should have been met first as well -- did the employee use all of her accrued leave, as well as whatever disability she might be able to get? My dad was a teacher for a long time, and I can remember two instances where this sort of thing was suggested. For those who were able to afford it (like my dad, I think -- he was rarely sick, had summers and holidays off anyway, and had a SAH wife to be home when us kids were sick), it seemed like a really nice gesture, but from my current perspective, it would be really hard. I do think, though, that it was a really generous thing your family did, and I think you will be rewarded one way or the other in the end.

Really? Shoot. I was planning to read it myself with my children. I am not fluent in French, but I did study it for several years and am well familiar with basic sentence construction, pronunciation, etc. I looked at the sample pages from L'Art de Lire, and it looks to me like I could totally teach from just that.

I want to get just the first two workbooks for L'Art de Lire, not the CDs and other stuff. Still, since I'm in the US, shipping is pretty high for just the books. I see that you can download the entire package from nallenart.org -- is there a link where I can download (after paying, of course) just the workbooks?

Definitely LWW first! I really think something is lost if you're already familiar with Narnia when you read LWW. It's better (IMO) to see it from the Pevensies' perspective, where they're gradually learning about Narnia. I didn't see TMN as the first in the series; I see LWW as the first, and TMN as a prequel, intended to be read after you read at least LWW. (We see it the same as watching, say, Star Wars: A New Hope before The Phantom Menace -- you're not supposed to know the things that are obvious in TPM and the second and third episodes before you see the three original films.) Also, if I remember correctly, there's something in LWW about none of the children knowing who Aslan was, anymore than the reader did -- which wouldn't be true if you'd read TMN. I really think some of Aslan's magic and majesty comes from the fact that you don't know who or what he is when they talk about him in LWW, until you actually meet him. You would not expect a lion. We read Narnia in this order: -LWW -Prince Caspian -Voyage of the Dawn Treader The Horse and His Boy (DD pointed out that to be truly accurate, we should have stopped LLW before the last few pages and read THaHB, but I hadn't read them myself before that and didn't realize it took place during LWW. But we read it after the other three that had the Pevensies in them, and also reading it then didn't interrupt the flow of the continuing Pevensie story from the first three.) -The Magician's Nephew (Again, we chose not to interrupt the Pevensies' story, plus I wanted to read the final two books one right after the other, as one continual story.) -The Silver Chair -The Last Battle (with tears over the last few pages!)

I often read aloud at bedtime and lunchtime. Usually I finish my lunch first and then read for a while to the children, from a chapter book.

I think I'd opt for some sort of combined rooms, rather than 6 individual rooms. I think you could do a boys room and a girls room pretty well and make it work, but I do like the idea of having three bedrooms -- one for the older boys, one for the older girls, and one for the little ones. I think that gives you the most flexibility in the long run; you'd have larger spaces than you would with 6 individual rooms, and you'd have the option of moving people around if need be. As the little ones get older, and as the big ones go to college/move out, maybe unusual pairings will work (like the middle and youngest girls together, and the oldest in a bedroom by herself), so 3 rooms gives you plenty of options.