My husband is on board so we will give it a go. How long does the trial need to be to determine whether it's going to help or not? And, if we go gluten free but keep dairy in, is that a bad idea? Michelle

Thanks for the info! I'm going to have to talk this over with my husband... Michelle

We did a year of it and read books from the book lists about the time period. But for me, with little memory for history, the commentary didn't cut it. I had to use a different book for a spine to tie things together in my mind. Michelle

Agreed. When I went through this with my first I was positive that something was wrong with him. But then it happened again and again with each child. We can go over the same letter what feels like 100 times and then still, the child has no recollection of the letter's name or sound! But eventually it DOES come! Michelle

I haven't noticed an increase in cheese prices yet. The 1 pound blocks are 3/$5 here. Michelle

I'd say puberty is a good cut off. Michelle

My children use the computer, play video games, and watch tv. They have a limit of one hour per day per child, BUT when one child is using their time the others usually sit and watch. This adds up to a LOT of time spent on fruitless activity each day. Is there anyone here who has gone from allowing these things to eliminating them entirely? How did you go about it, and did your children live through it? ;-) Michelle

Yes, and last time I bought black underwear to take along instead of wearing those weird fishnet panty things. I'll definitely do that again if we have another. Michelle

Agreed. :-) Michelle

I research, but when it comes down to it it's been trial and error. We're entering our 10 year of homeschooling now and at this point I'm a lot better at weeding out what will and will not work for us. But I have stacks upon stacks of barely used books to prove that it took a long while to get there. Michelle

My kids were the same. I continued through a whole year of it, but it just didn't work. You have to do what's best for your family, even if it's shelving something that the majority loves. :-) Michelle

When my older kids were at the 2nd grade level, I spent a lot of time tearing my hair out about science. Now with my younger kids I don't even bother starting it until 3rd grade unless they specifically request it. Michelle

I would like to make the whole household gluten free if I thought I could do it without increasing the grocery budget. (There are 8 of us so we're spending a huge amount on groceries as it is.) Is that possible? Michelle

If you have a good working knowledge of history yourself, then maybe. If not, then I would say no. As someone who has little memory of the history I studied in hs and college, the TQ guides didn't compute for me. Michelle