It feels like an accomplishment, doesn't it. Overdrive is one of the worst-designed apps I use regularly, but it is great to get those library audio books! (We can get the regular overdrive ebooks via our library website and have them sent to the kindles via Amazon, but the audiobooks have to run through the app, at least at our library.)

DD uses one of these type of planners from Target every year and really likes it. We just saw the display of next year's planners at the store. I suggested to DD that we buy one, but she just looked really exasperated and told me we couldn't buy a new planner until we at least had a couple weeks of summer break. ;-)

On an ongoing basis, my older two kids do guitar lessons and the two boys (along with DH) do Tae Kwon Do. DD has youth group and a book club. For "short term" or seasonal things, various of the kids have done a running club, pottery classes, Jr. First Lego league, tennis class, swimming lessons, and various camps in the summer. DD dabbled in gymnastics a few times over the years and DS9 took a season of rec gymnastics too, but that didn't turn out to be a long term passion for either. DS7 took an amazing boys Hip Hop Dance class last spring, but the studio folded where he took the class, and we couldn't find another studio offering a class for boys his age at a time that didn't conflict with other things we were already committed to. He might try that again when he is a bit older and there are more class options. We also tried 4-H for a year but the club we tried wasn't a good fit for what we were looking for.

Hi! We live in south Minneapolis. Welcome to the area! We had a thread going on the chat board recently... http://forums.welltrainedmind.com/topic/606141-is-anyone-interested-in-a-twin-cities-meet-up/ It sounds (in that thread) like more people maybe want to do a fall meet-up, but I have still been thinking about the idea of setting out a date for a meetup in the first two weeks of June sometime! A great resource for twin cities activities is Homeschool Adventures. Be sure to join the Yahoo group mailing list too! Feel free to PM me if you want to let me know what part of the metro area you are in and if there is a date in early June you are interested in a meet-up (If I was going to organize something I want to do it before my kids start more of their summer activities, since we are going to be a bit crazy after that). I was kind of nervous with the idea of setting up a board meet-up and then having no one show up, but at least if I plan something that works for the two of us, then I know at least one other person will be there. ;-)

Miquon is cheap and only uses the cusinaire rods as manipulatives, but can be not so "simple" to implement. I think some kids love it and some don't (I used it for six months or so with my DS7 at the end of K and beginning of 1st grade. He really liked it for a while, then got frustrated with the discovery element of it). For lots of fun and less writing, I really like Right Start, which I have used to one extent or another with all three of my older kids. But it isn't cheap and it works best if you use their manipulatives. You could use something like Singapore and Math Mammoth and do some of the scribing for your DS. I do about half the math writing for my DS7, because his writing is pretty slow and we can get through a lot more math problems if I scribe. You can add whatever manipulatives you would like to those programs. I think not killing the love of math has a lot to do with not overdoing it (stop while it is still fun each day!), adding in variety of topics even if your curriculum isn't doing that (We skip around if it seems like DS7 is getting bored, or play games, or I search for practice pages on a topic if DS7 is curious about something). Doing fun stuff like reading math picture books and playing games. DS7 really wanted to learn about negative numbers and do math with negative numbers, so we paused on RightStart this week and I bought the little Math Mammoth ebook on integers and we've been doing a few pages of that. He really wants to learn and is curious, so he can do it no problem, even though 1st graders aren't "supposed" to be learning about negative numbers...LOL!

My library doesn't even own it! So, I already made an impulsive amazon purchase...LOL The deciding factor was I read the table of contents to DS9, and he said it sounded awesome. :-)

That looks really cool!

I'm sure some of it is a "nine year old boy" thing...but in general he seems to like to work hard when he has a clear idea of the purpose in mind. We've done a mix of things in the past two years, and while most of it wasn't creative writing per se, most elementary writing curricula/assignments tend to come more from the humanities than the STEM fields (summarize this story, do copywork from this literature or history reading, use this outline of a story to write a paragraph, etc). I'm not trying to cut out all those kinds of assignments by any means...he just doesn't see the connection to "real world" writing in these types of assignments. I know I could just sat "suck it up" and do it anyway, but I would rather find ways to make connections between what he is doing now, and the things he is actually interested in or what types of writing is actually done by adults.

It's his dream job du jour, but last month the dream job was herpetologist, so who knows what it will be next month. ;-) I wonder if I could actually find examples of things like this if it would motivate DS or if it would just make the kind of writing he is assigned now as a kid seem even less relevant...I don't know! At least it would satisfy his curiosity. My DH writes stuff like this too, but can't really show it to us due to confidentiality. I suppose that might be the case for a lot of "real life" examples of what scientists and engineers are doing.

Do you have any suggestions of where to look to find something that he can comprehend a bit? His reading ability is a just bit above grade level (maybe 5th - 6th grade level at best) for a rising 4th grader. DH does work in a STEM related job, but wasn't able to show DS examples of the things he writes for work due to confidentiality. He summarized it as most of the writing he does now is about telling his boss what he got done this week and emails discussing why certain ideas worked or didn't work on the project they are working on. ;-). I'm not sure that was helpful in trying to convince DS why good writing is important. (To be fair, DH did a lot of academic writing in grad school, but it is technical enough that I can't even understand most of it, much less DS).

So, my ever-logical nine year old keeps asking me about what kinds of writing adults REALLY need to do in their jobs or day to day life. He's a very STEM oriented kid so he is wondering what scientists, mathematicians, engineers, etc are doing. But I don't think he is quite up to reading scientific journals yet...LOL! What would you show him/tell him? He has a really hard time being motivated to improve his writing when he just doesn't see the "point" of most things we've tried for writing. He has grudgingly done things like the first two parts of treasured conversations or copywork or summarizing history readings. But he really doesn't see how could possibly connect to any reports he might be writing in his future dream career designing rockets or whatever. ;-) I think he'll like the third part of TC a little better when we tackle that in the fall... But I am just wondering what I could expose him to now or over the summer to increase his motivation level a bit. :-).

I have my kids read and do just a bit of math in the summer. My DD would read whether I asked her to or not, but I motivate the boys with summer library/bookstore reading programs. We tried doing no math in the summers a couple times, but we usually regretted it. We just do review/practice for math over the summer and keep it fun with things like math games, life of Fred, iPad math games or games on the computer like prodigy, etc. Sometimes I have given the kids a packet of practice problems (for example, DD had a long division packet last summer), with some kind of reward when they finish.

Projects/crafts from Pinterest Projects and challenges from DIY.org Bike rides (I let DD who just turned 12 go on longer bike rides if she is with a friend) Cooking Weeding in the garden My kids will also spend a lot of time playing with neighbor kids once everyone is out of school. We also do a neighborhood tennis program that super cheap for five weeks of class, five days a week. It's a great start to the day because it gets the kids out at 8 am for an hour of exercise! The park is within close walking distance, so the kids can go there fairly independently now.

Along a similar line to the Lemoncello books is Book Scavenger by Jennifer Chambliss Bertram: http://amzn.com/1250079802 My DD who adores all puzzle/mystery books says this one is her current favorite. Only one out so far, with another one due next January. We haven't read this one yet, but The Puzzling World of Winston Breen by Eric Berlin (http://amzn.com/0142413887) is another puzzle/treasure hunt sort of book that sounds good to us, and DD plans to read it soon.

If you are having trouble on a PC, maybe try a different browser? On our computers, it works in Chrome but not Firefox for some reason!

My DD started at age 9.5 and then DS at about 8.5. Even with a three-quarter size guitar (regular acoustic, not classical guitar), DS couldn't properly press down the strings until that age. We've studied with three different teachers now for various reasons. The first one really pushed chords and DD could play and sing a lot of pop songs with chords, but didn't learn a lot of note reading or musicianship. The second and third teachers have worked a lot more on note reading/playing and music theory. It would depend on what you are looking for, but I would just ask potential instructors what they emphasize. At the first studio where DD started, they typically recommend starting younger students (5-8 year olds) on ukulele instead of guitar due to the small size. ETA: We've done lessons at a music store/studio, with an independent instructor who taught in her home, and with a music studio that specializes in in-home lessons. One of the biggest differences with an independent instructor vs some kind of school/studio/store is that an independent instructor might not offer recital or performance opportunities, especially if he/she just has a handful of students. However, our independent instructor was also the cheapest because she didn't have overhead or mileage.

My DS7 is similar - we have had a lot of problems with impulsively hitting siblings and other kids when things don't go the way he likes. We started medication and it has been super helpful for him. We are doing a non-stimulant, and he has next to no side effects. He is still working on developing/practicing better skills to help when he is frustrated, but my impression is that the medication is giving him that "delay" time to engage in using those skills. Like we can actually use the pause button Geodob was talking about. Just the medication would not have been enough, as he still has to take the steps he has learned about in therapy and in a class he is doing right now that focuses on mindfulness and self-calming techniques. The therapist who runs the class uses SuperFlex as a big part of the class even though she has first and second graders in the class and my DS7 seems to be getting a lot out of it - I'm sure she is bringing her experiences to bear in making the material work with that age group, but if you have an opportunity to borrow SuperFlex or buy it cheap or something like that, I wouldn't rule it out.

I put mine out for the first time last night and it didn't get any! I am not sure if it is in the right spot though. I'm going to try a different bait tonight and then move it tomorrow morning if I don't get any overnight.

He dislikes indoor dogs too. I knew this before we got married, so it has never been a big deal to me...except now when a pet might be nice to ward off mice. We put out a bunch of brand new snap traps and a "rat zapper" last night. No dice! I'm not sure the zapper is in the best spot though.

We actually tried the "borrow a cat" thing a couple years ago...the friends assured us this cat knew how to catch mice, but wouldn't you know it, this cat would catch none for us. And it just made DH hate indoor cats all the worse, because this cat would constantly try to cuddle in his lap...lol. He totally hated the experience and couldn't wait to give the cat back. I see the mice pretty often in the evening so I know that's what we are dealing with....thank goodness! Eeeek! Bears would defintiely be worse. I also have had a bit of peace with the mice for the past year or so as long as they mostly stayed out of my way. I knew we had a few, but I rarely saw them and they weren't getting into much. But last week they suddenly found my pantry and in two days somehow destroyed a bunch of stuff. When our food comes into play, that means war on the mice for me!

I just read over a dozen threads asking this same question, but feel no better off in making my decision since just about any and every program is recommended. This is for DS9, rising 4th grader next year (but generally working ahead of grade level). I don't need something independent as I want to work alongside him and keep learning Latin myself. I don't really want to do a video format. He's not big on word puzzles, so I don't want anything that relies on lots of crosswords, word searches or anything like that. Short lessons or something easily broken up into shorter segments is a plus (we like that we can finish a lesson of GSWL in 10 minutes or so most days). Given those parameters, what would you suggest?

DH is really against having indoor pets, so no cats in our future. I would love it! We've regularly filled holes in the foundation and need to do it again now that winter is past. That is DH's job, but I need to figure out a better game plan for catching the mice that are already in.

Wow, that is something I've not heard before! I might run out and buy new traps today! (Maybe I'll try a zapper too). A few people have suggested the peppermint as a deterrent but I think need to kill the mice that are in the house now first...Even if I fill my house to the brim with peppermint I doubt they are going to just go running from the house. ;-)

We are getting really frustrated with the mice issues in our nearly-100-year-old house. Even though it is the "wrong" time of year for it, things got worse in the last couple weeks and we've caught all of one mouse despite putting out many of all different kinds of traps. We used to always be able to deal with it with old fashioned snap traps, but this time around they seem to be smart enough to ignore them. Ugh. Anyone have any experiences to share with hiring a professional pest service of some sort to help deal with mice? Was it worth the cost?