My accelerated 9.5 year old is about to finish up Singapore 5B. He's done 1-5 all along and enjoys it. Math comes pretty intuitively for him (several engineers in the family). I've heard that Singapore 6 includes a decent amount of review work and also overlaps somewhat with Pre-Algebra concepts. My question is, did you do Singapore 6, Pre-Algebra, Algebra or skip 6 and do Pre-Algebra, Algebra or Singapore 6, Algebra? I'd especially love to hear from people who used Art of Problem Solving but I'd like to hear from anyone who has gone through Algebra in any program with their accelerated kids too!

Interesting. She does have diabetes in her birth family. Might be worth having the dr run an A1C on her. We did recently clear out the entire room when switching kids’ rooms. So I scrubbed everything, rewashed her clothes, aired out the mattress, etc. it smelled fine after all that. But now just 2 weeks later her room is starting to smell bad again already! It’s crazy!

She’s not quite neurotypical. There’s adhd and overall learning disabilities. I do think she’s been more stressed than usual this year but not to the point of full depression. We are keeping an eye on that though just in case. It’s not so much that she refuses to shower but that she won’t remember/bother unless we remind her. If we remind her she does it happily.

She drinks from her big nalgene water bottle all day (finishes at least one every day) and has a bir of orange juice or milk with no sodas or caffeine so luckily I think we can rule out dehydration.

The big change in the last few months was her trying out public school but that is only since august. She was miserable there and it caused endless stress so she’s home again now. As for shoes she wears flats or boots this time of year. I make her wear socks with all her shoes because that was an issue in the past but she’s pretty good about it now. She has slowly gained weight again lately. She drinks plenty of water thankfully so she’s not dehydrated. But I have wondered if the weight gain (not insane but she is technically overweight again now) is behind increased smell and/or sweating. I do have her shower nightly before bed. She complies, she just is so ADHD that she will forget for days on end if not reminded.

Any idea what types of health issues to have them check for? I had thought maybe athletes foot (she got that once before) and had her use the medication for that for awhile but it didn’t help. I’m thinking it might just be hormones? Though she’s had her period for 7 years now so it seems a bit odd that it’s suddenly an issue.

How do you keep your teen’s room from smelling?! I never had this issue myself as a teen and DD16 did not stink until the last 6-ish months. It’s awful! Like as in it’s affecting the rest of the house bad. Mostly I think her feet are the culprit. I recently tossed out half her shoes because even after cleaning with baking soda, airing out, etc they stunk bad enough to make everyone gag just walking near them. Every item in her closet stinks too though. Her bedding. Everything she touches practically. I have to bug her to brush her teeth so breath is an issue too (brushing teeth has been an issue for 4+ years) and remind her to shower. I even got her nice smelling bath and body stuff, good shampoo, etc to motivate her. So yeah, right now I just need help getting her room smelling decent enough that it doesn’t seep out into the main living areas :P Any ideas? Magical cleaning products?

I enjoy the first day pics too but yes it does get a little insane how many you go through this time of year! Anytime anything becomes too overdone I start getting those rebellious urges to do something weird/mocking in turn :P

Wow, good for you pushing for more testing to get the full picture and a correct diagnosis! I wish doctors listened to mothers more, they usually know when something is wrong. So will this give you a clearer direction in treatment or expectations for her? Does this negate the high functioning autism diagnosis or simply explain the root cause?

DS- 8 weeks (10.5 hours) DS- 12 weeks (11 hours) DD- 6.5 weeks (8+ hours) DD- 10 weeks (9+ hours) These are the times with zero wakings/feedings. With my girls I did a dreamfeed, hence the shorter times, but dropped the dreamfeed around 4-6 months. So they'd sleep 7-10pm, have a quick feed, then slept again 10:30-7am or so. Helped me not be soooo overfull with milk by morning and prevented 5am wake ups.

Yes, I have. but then I had no choice :P Financially/logistically it just wasn't possible for me to travel up for house hunting more than once. We did facetime so I 'saw' the house but had no clue where it was in relation to other things or details. It's interesting driving up to a house for the first time 2 hours before closing. But you do what you've got to do. It's not been great but not awful either. The house is fine, we've cleaned it up a lot. Location still stinks but we didn't have any great options closer to town anyway so I don't feel like it was a bad choice. I figure if you trust a spouse enough to marry them surely they can be trusted to make even major decisions for the family independently in need.

My 15 yo is like this and always has been. Drives. Me. Crazy! I flat out tell her no when she does it, that it's rude. Besides DD15, I've honestly only had 1-2 baby boomer age people try to parent my kids in front of me. And they're always the super awkward types who seem to lack social skills in general. Like the lady at the mall playground who gave my 18 month old a granola bar without asking me! I was livid. I tried to be polite and explain that he had allergies so couldn't eat it and she kept pushing "oh, it doesn't have peanuts" as if that's the only allergy?! I had to explain that no, he was allergic to soy and casein and bananas and I was 100% sure that granola bar had soy in it, because they all do.

Old Navy and Cat & Jack at Target. Old Navy even has cute dresses for teens. You do often need to add a cardigan or jean jacket bit with good layers they're very cute!

We have a similar issue with a 15 yo who is overweight and done growing (puberty was at 9, she topped out on height at 11) and a 9 yo who is very much still growing and thin and active. I hate that I can't tell the 9 yo 'yes' to seconds at dinner without the 15 yo asking for seconds too. If I say 'no' to her I feel like I'm being overly pushy. But if I say yes or even 'if you want' or anything but a firm 'no' she will go get more even if she's not truly hungry. Plus she sits inside all day whereas ds runs around several hours outside. Honestly, I take chances to give DS extra food whenever DD15 isn't around. Also, we do tell DD15 she has to do a sport and that helps. When the sport season ends she gains it all back, but at least during the season she'll drop back into a healthy weight range plus I don't feel as worried about a few extra pounds on an active teen vs a completely inactive one, kwim?

I actually completely agree. Especially with the tiles, why be so strict? I've had trained, certified Orton Gillingham tutors who use similar programs sooooo jealous of my Barton tile board. It really is handy and very well made. Why not let others buy the tiles? Nothing about those could allow someone to plagiarize her curriculum. They're just useful manipulatives. If the true goal is kids learning to read well in the best way possible, I personally would be a lot more generous with my products. Anyway, on a practical note keep checking ebay, people post just the tiles periodically. Or if it's one of the early levels and you're in a pinch try the All About Reading tiles, they are cheaper quality but cover most of the same phonemes as Barton.