Hey, I'm excited about this new board. My family lives in Toney. I am a homeschooling mom of four wonderful kids. We school through Life Christian Academy in Harvest. I love the WTM and classical education in general.

Our favorite has been Meet the Masters. I liked that it gave you information about the artists and their work, plus you did an age appropriate art project that was done in the style of that particular artist. We really enjoyed it.

I try very hard to stay up to date with all these abbreviations, but sometimes it drives me crazy trying to figure out what all these are!

It's not a craft book, but one thing all my kids loved was Stuck on the Presidents. It's a coloring/sticker book with tons of interesting facts about the presidents. We learned alot.

After homeschooling our two oldest for three years we had to place them in public school because of some health issues I was having. After two years we brought them both back home. My oldest was in the 7th grade at the time. He was so angry with us and made me pay for it at home for a while. We knew, however, that it was God's leading and felt sure of our decision. Just make sure your daughter sees and knows that you and your husband are united in this decision and that you feel very sure about it. (That's hard to do sometimes, I know). She's smart enough to know if you're not sure of yourself. Kids are pros at putting mom and dad on guilt trips. Remember, you are the parent, not her. She's still so young. I'm sure she'll readjust soon enough. And NO, I don't believe you're scarring her!!

We switched from R&S to Easy Grammar. I like it because it teaches you to memorize prepositions first, then learn to eliminate the prepositional phrases from the sentence before you pick out any of the other parts of speech. It made it much easier for my kids. I also use DailyGrams.

We used WriteShop 1 and 2 after Wordsmith Apprentice.

My husband and I are not one of those couples that believe that kids have to be with other kids in order to be "socialized". While our kids are involved in many outside activities, I would be much happier if they did less. I believe kids learn character from ADULTS, not other children. The number one goal in our family is to instill character and responsibility into our children. We get alot of grief from my inlaws about this very thing. I'm constantly amazed that some people believe that if you homeschool your kids, that they never leave the house! I had somebody ask me that recently. I think your kids are doing plenty.

Keebler Danish Wedding Cookies

I'm impressed! I was excited today because I finally got 50 posts.

Is your face naturally oily? I use Bare Minerals and had the same problem no matter how much mineral veil I put on. I recently discovered this all natural goat's milk soap with tea tree oil in it. Once I started washing my face beforehand with it the shine disappeared. If you're interested, here's the soap link: www.alabu.com

I love the cooking/baking stones. I've had mine for so long they may have a different name by now. I love the ice cream scoop. The last thing I bought was the chopper, but it wasn't worth the money (in my opinion).

I loved it!

Has your husband ever tried the Breathe Right strips? That sometimes can help with snoring.

The best thing about Apologia is that it's "home friendly" as far as the experiments go. It is hard to implement alot of the ABeka labs because it is written for classrooms and can get a little costly. The Apologia texts are also written to the student. I highly recommend it.

We use LOTS of different publishers.

I'm using WT2 with my youngest and IEW with my other two boys. I love both programs.

My first three kids have all used Apologia. My 8th grader will be using the physical science text this fall. I have found the General Science text on the dry side, but I do think it's thorough. As of yet I haven't seen a better alternative.

I started off this year using Jump In with my 7th grader. We did okay at first, but then it went downhill. Unlike the true classical method, it requires the student to still come up with alot of his own writing material. My child couldn't do it. I ditched it and now have him in IEW. My youngest is in Writing Tales 2.

I'd wait on the WriteShop.

I'd switch to something else. My kids hated Writing Strands.

All three of my boys hate writing. After going through various writing programs that haven't worked, we settled this year on Writing Tales (for my youngest) and IEW for my two older boys. In past years I've stayed constantly paranoid about their inability to write. I really get in trouble when I start comparing my kids' work with others. Not everyone is a natural writer. It has taken a few years to find the right "fit" but I think we're finally on track. My oldest is a junior and this is the first year that I've seen significant improvement in his writing. Just hang in there!

We like Writing Tales. We'll move into CW next year.

We loved Apologia elementary courses.

Has anybody seen this or have any opinons?