Hmmm, I was wondering how to wrap up our Viking study. Now I know what we will NOT be doing.

Venerable Lady Gail the Undulant of Londinium-le-Thames I'm hoping that's "undulant" as in wavy, and not as in "undulant fever". No telling here in Londinium, where the Thames looks wavy but OTOH we have some fine plagues.

We made the constellation Orion using the relative distances of the various stars, so that from below it looked like regular Orion, but from the side you could see that it was quite different. Here is our finished product. Unfortunately, I have no memory of where we got this idea, which would provide a clue as to how we knew the distance of the various stars. Doing the relative size and distances of the planets (as mentioned in previous posts) is a fantastic idea. It made a huge impression on my kids. Scout badge books also have some neat, simple, doable ideas. Well, Brownies and Junior Girl Scouts do, and those are the only scout badge books I've read, but probably others do, too.

I don't use their mop. The guys who sold and installed our floor said they really didn't think it was worth it to buy their special mop, and that if I had a similar one already to just use it. And I have microfiber cloths from Walmart. So, I just buy the spray. I appreciate reading that Amazon has the best deal, as I need to get a new bottle.

Monday -- tacos. Younger dd has swim class, so I prepare the meat early. While we're at class, older dd sets the table and gets everything else prepared so we're ready to eat when everyone arrives home. Tuesday -- roast chicken, or possibly crockpot chicken. We have piano, so the chicken goes in early, the potatoes and carrots right before we leave for piano, the table is set before we leave. When we get home I fix green beans. Wednesday -- potluck. Dance classes, and people running in and out all over the place. I may put in some sweet potatoes to bake. Thursday -- gluten-free pasta with chicken, tomato sauce, and spinach. We don't have to be anywhere in late afternoon, btw. Friday -- homemade pizza. This is the one meal that has remained constant for about 15 years. Even before we had kids we made pizza every Friday. Over the years the kids have learned to grind the flour and knead the dough, so sometimes it's been a big family affair we all work on together. And sometimes it's just me slapping it together. Weekends are pretty unplanned.

The first time through we did tons of activities -- including the mummified chicken,by golly. With child #2 I handed the kids the CD set, and said, "Here, go listen to this." And, yes, I do feel vaguely guilty about this. I keep meaning to buy a chicken and a boatload of salt, as a matter of fact, but it never seems to happen.

Slow here. The other day I kept getting a "Server busy" message, and couldn't even get on. I ended up doing math with my child instead, :blink: eek!

I updated my edit to clarify that everything up to the point of the link I posted was written in good faith by people seriously discussing and considering pros and cons of TT. I hope that helps, and apologize for any confusion. I'm okay editing out everything I wrote from that point on if asked by the Powers That Be. I'm not sure if Powers That Be can pull part of a thread (where it slid into an April Fool's prank). I do think the posts up until that point were interesting, and it would be a shame to lose the first few pages of this discussion.

Doh, it never occurred to me that I could re-set my options to get an email or pop up (thwacks head). I've just been checking the number up in the corner, since that's the default. I know I've sent one that the person didn't reply to for a couple of days because she didn't notice it -- I don't think she realized PMs exist. If the default setting were a pop up or email it might grab people's attention more.

Thanks, Kelli, for covering for me. I had a panic when I read her first message after mine, and thought she was mad at me. That's where that "edited" message came from. I was thinking others would possibly be mad at linking to that INCREDIBLY LOUD video -- sheesh, everyone in the house jumped the 1st time I clicked on it, I could picture young children starting to scream, mothers upset that I linked it, me ending up banned from the website for ANNOYING LINKS that really weren't my fault (Myrtle made me do it). But mostly I was really looking forward to seeing the video of Charon, darn it all.

Edited to warn future readers: The following link was an April Fool's prank. The link in this message has nothing to do with TT; we were rickrolling Charon in this precise message, not including any messages up until this time. Posts up until this point were written in good faith and made thoughtfully and seriously. If you're here researching TT, the next several messages really have nothing to do with this thread's subject of TT. As a matter of fact, we may have permanently derailed this thread. I have left the link in to satisfy curiosity regarding the comments that followed. I know I tend to be "late to the party" and always end up wondering what all of the fuss was about. In this case, the fuss was about this: Charon, I did manage to find some studies regarding TT that you might be interested in:

I was on the boards years ago, at one time as Gail in Ohio -- I think I'd been GailV earlier, but I thought it was too like Gail in Va (sometimes I got us confused:blushing:). Then I stopped visiting for a couple of years or so because I didn't like the board format. Now that it's vBulletin I'm back. I'm addicted to those little email subscription notices on the vBulletin boards. I have my email program open even as I type this, and am listening for the little "ding" that tells me that one of my other posts might have been answered.

Charon, I wasn't disagreeing with what you said, or thinking that you weren't rigorous enough in your method of evaluation. Yours was simply a quote that had my mind wandering down different paths of "I wonder if anyone's ever done something like compile statistics ... hmmm ... 'lies, **** lies, statistics', should I even care about statistics?" I tend to wander off the subject a lot in my thought processes. I'm likely to follow up this discussion with reading a book on statistics, which will lead me to a new interest in, well, who knows what, maybe medical research or traffic patterns. I think that your follow up answered my question (is there anything like this? not to your knowledge) but I wanted to clear up that I wasn't posing the question in order to pick nits. And I wasn't posing my question simply to you, but to the hive mind in general. So don't feel the burden is on you to come up with the definitive answer.

.... WARNING: OFF TOPIC! This is a digresssion from the topic at hand (directly discussing TT), so if you just want to read about that subject, don't bother reading this post. I keep thinking about this quote. I sort of like to read anecdotal evidence, since it tells me what's possible. It doesn't tell me what's probable, of course. But I can read the anecdotes and think "what if...." Anyway, I started wondering why Singapore seems to have more of these stories associated with it. Do Singapore users tend to self-select -- that is, are the people who are going to do well on the later testing situations for future programs -- regardless of program they used in high school -- also the people more likely to continue in Singapore (implying the rest tend to go with other, easier programs)? Or maybe Singapore users tend to hang out in places (blogs, message boards) where they have more opportunity to read Singapore success stories (I know I fall into this category -- I love to read success stories about products I've chosen, but am less enchanted with success stories about products I've rejected). Or maybe there are just more Singapore users than, say, Dolciani, or for that matter TT. Has anyone come up with statistics? I don't think statistics would necessarily prove any point -- I think there'd be too much variability in how the programs are presented to various classes and homeschool kids (that is, how I present any given math lesson is likely to be different that how anyone else does). But I still think it would be interesting. ETA: THis probably should've been a spin off thread, shouldn't it. Sorry I didn't think of that until I posted. And now the kids are up, so I have to actually interact with them instead of just theorizing about homeschool.

I also don't see the author of TT coming on here telling people to stop talking negatively about his product. I see the author of TT sending a form letter to someone here who then posted the letter. The brouhaha about whether we should criticize TT seems to be coming from people here (not that I see anyone here wringing their hands and crying "Oh waily wailly waily! Stop dissing my program!" -- I've seen that done very bluntly on other boards, and it doesn't look like what's happening here). Said brouhaha doesn't seem to me to be coming from the author. So I"m not sure what point you're trying to make here, since I don't see that we're making an apples to apples comparison.

Oh, I'm so jealous! If we had anything like that in our garden the deer would be munching away -- they come right up onto the porch to eat out of our tubs. So, when are you having us garden-deprived types over for dinner?

Umm, sorry, I just don't see this in the letter. It isn't clear at all to me that he means that. I'm just sayin'. I'm not planning on using TT, and don't have an emotional investment in this issue. I think some of the discussion has been interesting -- I particularly like the way Charon went through the letter and discussed various points, btw. I'm okay with y'all using TT or not, and I'm okay with y'all hating my personal choices for math and verbally flogging me on a public message board for choosing something different than you (been there, done that). But I really don't get the impression that this guy thinks I don't know what I'm talking about, at least not based on what he's said in this letter. I just can't take this letter as a personal attack on my ability to choose a math program.

Dh buys his from Walgreens when they have sales, in capsules, the store brand. He also gets liquid Carlson's that he keeps in the fridge, since some mornings it's just as fast to take a spoonful as to try to take a handful of pills. We bought a bunch of bottles from iHerb since it was cheaper to get that brand that way. His doctor had recommended the Carlson's brand. I buy mine (which is actually cod liver oil) somewhere super-fancy and expensive in liquid that's been flavored -- Blue Ice brand from Green Pastures. Again, since it's liquid I keep it in the fridge. When you start buying CLO you get into all sorts of discussions about origin of the fish, whether the vit. D and A are synthetic, and on and on, and, well, that's the brand I decided to use. We find it easier to get the liquid down the kids. I can't say that when I take it the heavens open and a beam of light shines down on me, but I can tell a difference. My skin is much better, and I'm calmer. Dh has MS, and it helps with symptoms.

I peel really ripe bananas, break them into chunks and freeze them. Then I put them through a Champion Juicer with the blank plate (except I lost the blank plate so I just leave it off, but don't tell Champion because they say not to run it without a plate). You could also put it in a food processor. Anyway, grind it up, and it's the texture of ice cream. You can add other frozen fruit, too. Eat right away -- it gets sort of weird if you try to keep it in the freezer. It turns brown and gets really really hard due, I suppose, to lack of fat. I know people make ice cream with coconut milk, although I never paid much attention. I imagine you could google that. I make popsicles out of frozen juice concentrate. I don't add in as much water as they say to make it into juice -- about 2/3 to 3/4 of that.

According to Melissa Wiley's webpage here, you'll still be able to get hardbacks with the illustrations.

After dd finished RS Geometry she took the online placement test for Teaching Textbooks, and decided that she need more practice in fractions, decimals and percents before she went into any pre-Algebra course. I got the Key to ... series for those subjects, which she really likes. She's whipping through these, and I really don't have a firm plan in place after that. I'm thinking Jacobs. The reviews that I've read of VideoText seem like it wouldn't be something she/we would deal with well.

I'm working on the Sock of Death, which has killed all interest I have in knitting. It seemed like such an innocent sock when I cast on. Who knew that it would bring all my knitting to a screeching halt?

At lunch I read whatever Little House on the Prairie book we're currently slogging through (right now it's The Long Winter) while a Suzuki piano CD (vol.1 or 2) plays in the background. At the evening meal we chit-chat and sneak food to the cat. You know that scene in National Velvet where they're all talking about this and that, and giving food to the dog? That's us, except with fewer people and with a cat instead of a dog. Other than my read alouds, house rules are no reading at the table. Also, no singing at the table, although I don't quite recall how that one came about.

For Jean, from my mom: Pat-in-Pan Pie Dough for 2 9 inch Pie shells Mix in bowl: 2 c. all-purpose flour 1 1/4 t. salt Mix in a cup until creamy: 2/3 c. cooking oil 3 Tblsp. cold milk Pour the liquid mixture over the flour all at once. Stir these ingredients lightly with a fork until blended. Form into a crust right in the pan, patting it into shape. Or roll out between sheets of waxed paper. (I never tried to roll this out, partially because I hate rolling things out.) Regarding NAET: My friend who used the lard got NAET treatments for her sons. For whatever reason, they tended to "wear off" -- over time they needed to be re-treated. And for whatever reason, the mom didn't want to learn how to do the treatments herself, although the doctor kept suggesting it (really, it isn't rocket science once you have the vials and have a practitioner show you what to do). We moved from there, though, so I don't know how their life is turning out. BTW, I'm not trying to hi-jack the thread with a pros-and-cons discussion of NAET. I was just ruminating on people I know with lots of allergies -- sort of a "hey, I know about that!" when I read buddhabelly's reply. I have the impression that the NAET treatments have been refined over the years to be less likely to wear off.

:hurray: Hurray for you! Swimming is such a great life skill, and a great lifetime sport. Good for you for getting your kids involved, even if it meant donning an ancient swimsuit yourself. And how cool that you used to swim competitively! I was never that good ... and after a few years of not swimming I thought I was going to DIE after a single lap.