As others have said, it will depend in large part on the grandparent. When we moved overseas 15 yrs ago we established a routine of once a week video group chats with my parents and brother, which we have pretty much stuck to all these years. My parents (and brother) are super invested in my kids, what they're interested in, into, etc. etc. with no judgments (maybe teasing lol). My kids look forward to our weekly chats, which generally last a couple of hours with them cycling in and out during, although generally they stay in the room even if not actively participating. With my in-laws, the cultural dynamic is different in that the younger is expected to make the effort in deference to the elder, which as you can imagine does not always happen naturally. We do encourage them to call, etc., but it's more of an effort.. it's actually easier I believe if there is a set routine, at least that's been my experience. Edited to add: Now that I'm thinking about it more, this once-a-week thing was something my mom started when my brother and I first moved away, respectively, for university.. weekly Sunday chats... of course back then (pre-internet 😳) it was a phone call..

This is how I first registered to vote, and it was also how I ended up being called for jury duty in the town where I went to univ in my first semester there 😳.

Thanks! My father actually graduated from there back in 1961(!), so it would be fun for my parents to have ds at that school (they are still in Louisville). My boy's area of interest is communications/public speaking, they are supposed to have an excellent program for that, so fingers crossed... (my dad was also on their debate team.. hmm, seeing lots of parallels here 😉 )

Yes, the FAFSA is done 😉 (we are all -- myself, hubby and kids -- US citizens). He applied to Bellarmine early, so we didn't have the FAFSA done by then; in their award letter they said he should complete the FAFSA so he can be considered for more aid. Everything is done (he's applied to five schools in all), it's a waiting game, although I'm encouraging him to still look at other opportunities -- not everyone has a deadline of Dec 1... and my hubby really wants him to apply to a couple of schools here; I was dubious as to the possibilities of financial aid for him, and costs are comparable to schools in the US, but it doesn't hurt to check it out..

My middle ds got an acceptance letter from Bellarmine Univ a couple of weeks ago, including a merit-based scholarship, but we still need to see what further aid is offered.. being overseas residents means any school he applies to he is considered out-of-state, so we are really dependent on what we can finagle financial-aid wise. He has a few more schools in the application pipeline, now it's a matter I guess of waiting to hear, but Bellarmine is his first choice.. hope it works out for him!

Sorry you are going through this.. I also have had many, many years of dealing with insomnia, although without RLS. I never had anything checked until I started having "panic attacks" even when I was asleep.. I was put on BP meds and I take Xanax at night so I can sleep. I really balked at the Xanax, but after going through episodes of 3 days continuous with virtually no sleep, I caved. My vitamin levels are all over the place, I still haven't managed to get that all straightened out.. it's like I hit my forties and everything went haywire. Don't know if that helps, but I can empathize with the struggle with insomnia.. ?

Also agreed. I'm a white southerner married to a man from India for 20+ years.. I cook Indian food, and wore a sari to a wedding I went to not long ago (not an Indian wedding); maybe I got the side-eye from some folks, but I've been living with the Indian culture for years, the sari was a gift from my sister-in-law and I think I look good in it (if I do say so myself ??), so... Maybe it has more to do with negative intentions and stereotypes..

I met a lovely woman and her daughter a few years ago who travel the world by house sitting. Apparently there is a whole formalized network/websites for arranging this, so they go from place to place and spend a decent amount of time in each spot -- usually a month+ from what I can see. I met her when they came to Dubai to house-sit for a few weeks and posted in one of our homeschooling network groups -- her daughter is the same age as mine, so the four of us met up.. I really enjoyed hearing about her travels, I had never known something like that existed..

I don't have much advice, but commiseration. My middle boy is also very bright, good reader, would score in the 80s-90s in virtually all areas on standardized tests except spelling.. he took the Terra Nova every year (grades 1-11) and would have high scores in all areas except spelling, which was always in the teens or twenties. Always. We tried many programs, at the time I never considered a disability per se, although now I think he probably has some form of dysgraphia (his handwriting is also horrible). However, he's going to be a high school senior this year, he took the SAT last spring, and he did well in the English section. The results didn't break it down so finely so he could see where he lost points, but I feel that overall he does so well with reading and all other elements that if there were problems with spelling, they were balanced out. Not much help for the day-to-day, but what it has developed in my ds is that he is aware (and not ashamed) of his issues with spelling, he has no shyness to ask about how something is spelled, even if he knows but wants to be sure, and when he focuses his handwriting is ok. I'm debating about possible spelling programs just as a final year run-through; I don't want to say I've given up with him and spelling, but I think it's more he knows this is an area where he needs to focus as he writes (and he does write well, conceptually speaking) and have the patience to go back through what he writes (he blogs) to check for spelling.

Here they have "office boys." Jobs held by men, they do odd-jobs around the office -- delivering papers, making copies, getting tea for people, etc. And they are called the office boy. I can't do it, it feels wrong and offensive to me to call a grown man "boy", although it does not have that connotation here.

FYI in the article that's linked above there's a picture of the van in front of shop windows with some ads; the one with Arabic script is Farsi and says "Tehran exchange" .. like a money/currency exchange...

There was a plane that caught fire after it landed here a couple of years ago.. there's video footage of passengers on board trying to get their stuff from the overhead bins before jumping onto those emergency exit inflatable slides, the crew shouting at them to leave it. I can understand the panic, especially if you have irreplaceable documents and things, but if it's between that and your life... fortunately they got everyone out..

I don't know how feasible this would be for you, but after I had my youngest and she was close to the age of yours... maybe 7 mos, so the other two were maybe 3 yrs and 7 yrs, when dh came home at night I would leave the kids with him and go swimming for 45 min or so... It was.. magical, lol.. we got a discount rate for me at a local club, so swimming outside at night, not many people in the pool, the radio playing softly.. it was very therapeutic.

I have not done a definitive study. I started taking it in conjunction with several other dietary changes, and altogether it has helped with my issues; I will mention that when I was traveling I tried using probiotic pills as a substitute and my symptoms returned.. also, I switched vitamin brands (went with a cheaper one) a while ago for a vitamin that I take for a deficiency, but after a while my deficiency symptoms came back; after investigating I discovered the more expensive vitamin is naturally-sourced while the cheaper one is a synthetic "clone". All that to say, if you decide to try it, I recommend making it yourself over buying it ready-made... and same with vitamins or other supplements -- be careful as to source, etc.

I'm using Singapore's Discovering Mathematics with my 7th grader -- I think this is the one that has been discontinued, I used them with an older child and can't seem to get rid of anything (hoarder?) so had all the books still. It does not follow a typical US math sequence (instead of Algebra 1, Geometry, Algebra 2, it blends the topics of all three together -- I think I saw a chart that spelled it all out somewhere). I used the program with my oldest, through a few years of highschool, and on his transcript labelled it "Integrated Math 1, Integrated Math 2," etc. I personally did not notice any trouble with college applications, or standardized tests, but that may be something to consider (he's in his second year of college). My 7th grader really likes the program so far. We had switched last year to something other than Singapore and it was a complete dud for her, so I'm happy we've found something that is less painful ;) She's big on the "why do I have to learn this?" "I can't see how I would ever use this in life" sort of thing, so it's good that DM has a lot of "real-world" problems so she can see practical uses. That's something that I found appealing about Singapore math programs in general.

We use Houghton Mifflin's iBook for world history; it's meant for one year, but I stretch it across three years and use a lot of supplements -- Great Course lectures, books, magazines, documentaries, projects etc. and tie it into English with correlating literature readings. https://itunes.apple.com/us/book/world-history/id542387424?mt=13

I actually feel somewhat sorry for my kids, so many cultural norms for them to acquire and to know when to do what... and to not form impressions based on different actions from people who may have different customs. I myself am not comfortable with all the ones I come into contact with here. We don't have lessons, pretty much stick to modelling.. and the occasional discussion afterwards if there was something amiss. I'm still so awkward with one of the local greetings here that involves touching noses, my most memorable instance being greeted by an older local lady (wearing the local mask) who leaned forward to bump noses, she was a good foot shorter than me. And she was standing too close for me to start a graceful lean to reach her nose with mine, I couldn't figure if I was supposed to crouch down a bit or what, lol. I'm afraid that was not one of my finer cross-cultural moments. :blushing:

Thanks to everyone for your comments. I will discuss them all with ds and encourage him to decide how he would like to handle this, it's been a goal of mine with this course to ease him into taking responsibility. Thanks again..

Ds is in week five of his chemistry class at the university, and it seems to be going well! However, today after his lab class he mentioned that as he turned in his lab report he noticed that another person in his class had, like, a five-page report (as opposed to the three pages he used) and had pictures. Like pictures of the equipment in the Materials section. I asked him if anyone took pictures during the lab and he said no, so these must be pictures from the internet. It has been a long time since I have written a formal lab report for a class, meaning high school. We didn't have the internet way back then, nor word processors, nor digital cameras, so even if you wanted to insert a picture in a report that would have been a laborious process involving scissors and glue, lol. I can't really see the point in it, unless they were pictures you took of your actual equipment and/or experiment. This professor has not returned or given evaluations of any of the lab reports given; ds specifically asked her this morning if perhaps she had posted comments on the student network (they did not give him access to this) and she said no. So no one has gotten any feedback. I don't know if he's supposed to be putting pictures, but I can't imagine using internet pictures in a lab report, except in certain specific circumstances. Am I behind the times here?

yes, he definitely "earns his keep," lol. He didn't know what to do with it, he just carried it around for a while then left it.

The shelter fixed him before they released him to us, I believe part of the adoption fees goes towards that. They were estimating three years, I am a bit confused I guess because of the weight gain. He's now over 10 pounds, which the vet said is a good weight for him. Maybe he was more emaciated before than we thought? Three and a half pounds just seemed like a lot to gain in five months, I wasn't sure I could chalk it all up to recovery and none to normal growth, kwim? Maybe not.

We adopted a cat in April. My boys had walked to a neighborhood mosque, and when they came out this cat came up to them. He was friendly, but looked a little worse for wear, so they took a picture with their phone and sent it to me to ask what to do. I told them to bring him home, and we took him to our local shelter. They kept him for two weeks. I posted the picture and a notice on our community boards but there was no response, and he had no microchip. He was thin, and had mats, and scabs on his foot pads from walking around outside in this heat. He also had scabs and missing patches of fur in the head and neck areas, likely from fighting. Otherwise he was healthy, so after two weeks (and neutering) we brought him home. Last week we took him in for a check-up, he's gained over three pounds! I never really noticed or thought about how much he must have changed until then, but when I got home I put together before and after pictures and was really surprised. The "before" picture is the one my boys took of him on the street, the "after" is from a couple of weeks ago. He is such a sweet cat (not to mice). I've had a number of people ask if he is a Maine Coon. I don't think there's any way to know for sure. He has some of the common traits, but the shape of his face doesn't look exactly like what I've seen for Maine Coons online. I also don't know for sure how old he is, is he done growing? We are just enjoying having him around, although I often wonder about his earlier life, and how he came to be on the street...

So happy to hear that, because I am a huge fan of Arabic! ;) Out of curiosity, how long are they taking to cover Alif Baa? My oldest (16) is using the same series, we skipped Alif Baa because he was already beyond that point when we started high school, he started with al-Kitab level 1. He finished level 1 in 1.5 years, and now as a highschool junior will hopefully be finishing up level 2. Ideally he would complete the program in his senior year by getting all the way through level 3, I'm not sure how practical that is. Going in, I was hoping he would finish a level a year, but it hasn't worked out like that. We're not able to do dual enrollment here, I was more thinking he might be able to test out of some levels, or test for credit, or something... Let me know if your dd is interested in additional resources, I'd be happy to try and help out...

I personally don't think it will lead to world war, unless people are thinking Russia will side with ISIS.. I'm already hearing some grumblings from that area, but don't think it will reach that point. I believe ISIS would like to make this a " clash of civilizations," and I think there are certain entities on the other side who play up that line as well, I guess for ratings or fear/power or honest misguidedness or what I don't know. For the record, I find ISIS disgusting and alarming, and they would likely be as eager to kill me as anybody else. If people would like to ask me questions about my perspective, I'm not sure I'd have any answers but I'm happy to give it a try via pm. :)

I was dealing with this this morning for my junior ds. There are no schools in my city that offer the PSAT (not a huge surprise given there are only a handful anyway), so I looked at the College Board website and started searching radially. Closest is going to be Dubai, I started calling the schools on the list but the only answer I'm getting so far is "yes, we offer the test, but your son can't take it." Like so many things here, I guess in order to have it work out I'll have to come up with wasta (influence, or clout); I had asked around the expat websites as to where he could take it, and the responses I got were largely "he doesn't need to take the PSAT." Well that wasn't my question. So I'm hoping, but not hopeful. Otherwise I guess he'll just have to miss it and perhaps take the SAT in the spring.