You may want to look at Dancing Bears.

I also recommend HighNoonBooks, my son loves these books! I also have my son reading Pathway Readers and doing the workbooks. Climbing to Good English has been a big hit with my son too. It's not a reading program but it goes with Pathway Readers and reinforces what my son has been reading.

I would love to get rid of our landline. We never use the house phone, in fact, we only have one house phone and it's in the master bathroom. I have all of the landline calls forwarded to my cell phone. DH won't let me turn the landline off. :confused:

My 21 year old daughter can't afford a one bedroom apartment. She lives a hour away from us and the current rate for a one bedroom there is about $900 a month. She got together with two other girls she went to high school with and they rent a 3 bedroom apartment for $1,450 a month. It's a GREAT deal, three bedrooms normally go for much more. One girl pays $550 a month (she gets the master) and the other two pay $450 a month each. Garbage is included in the price, the girls pay everything else.

IKEA is cheap.

:iagree::iagree: I have two step daughters (20 & 36). I've been married to their dad for 17 years. I would let this one go.

Here are a few things my 12 year old son does: He keeps his bedroom clean Puts his clean clothes away Feed and water dogs Helps feed the horse, llama, & mini donkeys Helps me move the donkeys Helps his sister with the chickens In the winter he gets a wheel barrel or two full of wood everyday for the wood stove Takes out the kitchen garbage and puts a new bag in the can He takes turns taking the garbage cans to the road on garbage day Helps his sisters mow the lawns He helps me pick up the living room and sometimes sweeps Helps cleaning the porch Helps out in the vegetable garden - last year he did everything himself!

I like it. Your new haircut makes you look younger!

Congrats! My friend told me her mother-in-law was 50 when she had her youngest (which is my friend's DH). The woman (MIL) made it to 99!

Here's a fancy water fountain that's easy to install. I think you want something more like this one? You may read how to install it in this review. The person said it only took $17 and 15 minutes to put together.

Dancing Bears! :001_smile: At the end of last school year my son was in 4th grade. In April 2011, I went to his IEP meeting and his special ed teacher told me he was now reading at a 1st grade level. Keep in mind at this point for six years this same woman had told me over and over that one day my DS's reading would just "click", and he'd take off. Looking back I think my DS was really reading at a Kindergarten level. Over the years he had done all his homework and I had read all the books they send home. Nothing was clicking and I was beginning to think he would never read. I had already found this forum (I had pulled out one of my older kids from high school), and I started reading about all the great resources for homeschoolers. I decided right then that I was going to get this kid reading even if killed me. I decided to assume he knew nothing, so we started out at the beginning with the sounds letters make. Last April I started after schooling him, he started using Click N' Read Phonics. He did a lesson a day, sometimes repeating lessons, until he got stuck (I think lesson 40 something). Click N' Read Phonics taught my DS the sounds letters make, which I don't think he knew before. He was now able to read I See Sam books. :) By this time he was back in public school in the 5th grade. His school reassessed him and they found his reading level had come up to 2.5. In retrospect I think he was really reading at a 1st grade level, but he would now attempt to sound out words which is something he never did before. His teachers had taught him to look around the page for clues as to what the words are. What a horrible habit. I would cover up the pictures and let him see them after he had read the sentence. Next, we tried A Workbook for Dyslexics. That didn't last very long at all, the book moved way to fast for him. Next we tried doing Phonics Pathways, and he didn't get far. He had the worst time blending. During this time he also did Explode the Code Online, which he could do but he didn't like it at all, the site loads really slow. I also made flash cards of all the letters and we went over these everyday. It took a very long time for him to get them down. On Nov 1, 2011, I pulled him out of public school and we started homeschooling him. I had already bought Apples & Pears Book A so we started using that while struggling with Phonics Pathways. Doing A&P actually improved his reading! I was amazed at the progress he was making. He went from knowing how to spell 9 words to being able to spell hundreds in a very short time. Knowing how great A&P was working, I decided to order Dancing Bears. This is the program I credit with teaching my DS how to read! As he was finishing Dancing Bears Book A I realized he needed more practice so I ordered Bear Necessities B. We continued to use the flashcards that came with DB. I can't count how many times I have thought he had the flashcards down only to find out he had forgot some. Knowing what I know now, if I had to do it all over again, I would only use Bear Necessities A & B (it's the industrial strength version of Dancing Bears A) and Apples & Pears. I'd skip all the rest of the stuff. Now I have my DS doing Dancing Bears B (he does each page two days), and Pathway Readers with the workbooks. Pathway Readers are helping to build up his reading fluency. He's taking a break from A&P, which may be a huge mistake. :confused: One thing I've noticed with my son is we can't take off more than three days off in a row or his reading suffers.

I love my shampoo bar!

I use a bar of soap and a fresh wash cloth. I also use a fresh towel. No reruns.

My DH gets me something for Mother's Day every year. We have four girls, 21, 16, and 14. There's no way they would let DH get away with not getting me something. When my birthday get's close, they all meet up and tell my DH what he's buying me. They even go to the mall with him and pick it out. Last year, I got an iPad for my birthday. My girls are good! :D

:iagree::iagree:

I have both SS and Apples and Pears. My opinion is Apples & Pears is FAR better than SS! My son finished Book A of A&P and had started Book B when he just got sick of it. We tried doing half a lesson a day and it was just too much for him. He likes the first half of the lesson but the sentences at the end of the lesson seem to be too much for him to handle right now so we made the switch to SS. I'm not sure if SS works for my son or not. He just did Day 19 today and he's trying really hard to get the spelling down but honestly I think A&P is far more effective. What he really likes about SS is that HE corrects his own work as we go. I think we will continue on with SS through the summer and if I feel it's not working out I'll switch him back to A&P and let him do the correcting as we go just like we do with SS. ETA: My son is 12 and has severe dyslexia.

My DD14 is a red head and has always had a few gray hairs. My niece (13) is also a red head, and she has a few grays too.

My DD's 14 & 16 each have an old Nook. We got them each a Kindle Fire for Christmas. Since they got their Fire's they haven't touched their old Nooks. They LOVE their Kindle Fires. My oldest DD21, carries her Fire with her everywhere! My vote is for a Kindle Fire. :)

Last week I got this Kindle Case for my DD14. It's less than $17 and it's nice! The only thing it's missing is a strap to put your hand in when reading in bed. My DD16 bought herself this nice green kindle case. She loves it. My DD21 has a similar one in pink and she loves her case too. The nicest Kindle case I've ever seen is the one I got my DH for Christmas. This case is beautiful! It also has the handle, which makes it very easy to hold while reading in bed. If I had to buy a Kindle case for myself, this is the case I would get!

:iagree: It's not an easy decision. We had a 14 year old McNabb (Border Collie) we had to put down. He was going blind and deaf and started snapping at the kids. Up until he was about 13 he adored the kids, this behavior wasn't him.

My periods have changed as I've gotten older. At around 35 is when the changes started. I would be fine one minute and then all the sudden it felt like I was being stabbed in the belly with a knife, and I'd double over in pain. For me the pain stopped after I stopped wearing tampons. That doesn't even make sense to me but it's true. My periods have gotten really heavy for the first two days too. I get sudden floods, the flow is horrible and often defies gravity. Nothing can absorb a flood like that. I just try and stay home the first two days.

I plan on having my son do American School or Keystone for high school. Here are some threads about American School: http://www.welltrainedmind.com/forums/showthread.php?t=119655 http://www.welltrainedmind.com/forums/showthread.php?t=358490 http://www.welltrainedmind.com/forums/showthread.php?t=305160 http://www.welltrainedmind.com/forums/showthread.php?t=302342 http://www.welltrainedmind.com/forums/showthread.php?t=302535 http://www.welltrainedmind.com/forums/showthread.php?t=230844 http://www.welltrainedmind.com/forums/showthread.php?t=322655 Here are some more accredited online high schools below. None are as affordable as American School. Indiana University High School BYU Independent Study High School University of Missouri High School Texas Tech University Independent High School.

I really need to declutter. I've been trying to declutter for years, but when I look around I still see clutter. I have a big garbage and a big recycle can, and I always make sure they are full. If the cans aren't full the kids and I walk around trying to find things to fill them up. I also donate to my local Hospice thrift shop every couple of months. I try not to bring stuff into the house, but we still have clutter. Clutter is a never ending battle and it drives me nuts.

We saw results in less than two weeks.

:D I like this!