A couple of tips: (1) When you fill a trash or donate box, get it out of your house immediately. Take it to the car or the trash can right away. (2) If your house is as cluttered as most people's, it's going to take a significant time commitment to get it in shape. It's not something you can do in a weekend, so be realistic (and gentle with yourself!). It took me 6 months to do the first round of decluttering - which included things I'd inherited from my mom - and another year or so to get to the point where our home had "a place for everything and everything in its place." I do a maintenance declutter at least once a month. Stuff breeds! (3) For most people, there is a huge emotional component to decluttering. You'll run into heaps of memories amid the heaps of stuff, and those memories (even the bad ones!) can keep you attached to the stuff. It helps to remind yourself that you can keep memories without keeping objects that evoke them. Take photos, if necessary, or write out the memories in a journal. (4) Decluttering goes in waves. Typically you'll do a big declutter and then a few weeks or months later, you'll realize you're ready to get rid of things that seemed like keepers during the first decluttering round. Each time you'll get a little more streamlined until you can do a fast monthly declutter as part of your regular cleaning routine. (5) Set limits for yourself for items you tend to collect: books, linens, T-shirts, yarn, whatever. Hope this helps!

Toss the cords. For sentimental items, consider taking a photo of the things, then passing them on to someone who will use/display them. If they're just going to sit in a box, what's the point of keeping them? :)

Core Knowledge is geared toward schools - public and private. That said, it's a very solid program, but not what I would call classical (no specifically classical subjects such as Latin). You can download the entire Sequence as a PDF from coreknowledge.org. I use it as a guide for what a rigorous brick-and-mortar school might teach at each grade level.

I pay $10 for any type of unlined pants.

Thinking of you!

We used HWT in 2nd grade and Cursive First in 3rd. Dd's handwriting is much closer to Cursive First at this point (5th grade).

:bigear:

I hope my dd will want to stay human. ;) What she wants to do with her time, professionally or otherwise, is a different story. The days of getting a job out of college and working in that job for 50 years are long gone. As of 2008, only 10% of Americans had been with the same employer for 20 years or more. (source) The job my wife does didn't exist 20 years ago, and the technology she currently uses has only been around since 2005. None of this, I might add, has anything to do with what she studied in college. Students need to start thinking about goals before they begin high school so their academic program will prepare them for the next step - college, job, vocational training, military service, etc. But those goals should not be so narrow that they exclude other possibilities, either in the near or more distant future. There's a reason that the core high school academic subjects don't change much; English composition and literature, math, science, history, and a foreign language form a solid base for most any step a young person can take after high school. Specific interests and goals should build on that core rather than replace it.

This is my experience as well. I have practiced many religious traditions in my life. In every case, I felt as if I had to studiously ignore certain aspects of reality in order to maintain my beliefs. At a certain point, I chose not to do that anymore, but to examine the world from as neutral a position as I could. The result was that I could no longer believe in the supernatural; the cognitive dissonance was too great. I see belief in the supernatural as a function of our biology, specifically the way our brain tends to create patterns and attribute agency to phenomena in our environment. Michael Shermer has an excellent book on this: The Believing Brain. He deals with subjects other than religious belief but explains, in detail, how our brains attempt to order sensory input to make sense of the world. It's a fascinating and enlightening read.

I'm certainly concerned if my wife is unhappy, but since we all live/work/school at home, any family member's distress can make the household feel off-kilter. No one person's mood sets the tone; we all do.

My dw has worked at home since before our dd was born, and I love our home-centered lifestyle. I wouldn't have it any other way.

:iagree: I don't usually say that I'm "sending" thoughts, since I don't believe my thoughts "go" anywhere or have any influence on events. It's just a way of expressing care and hope for a good outcome without reference to anything supernatural.

Yes, that was exactly my point. The comparison with modern languages doesn't hold, because there are no native speakers of Latin today. Everyone who speaks the language has learned it as a "foreigner" (barbarus) from other "foreigners." That doesn't mean you can speak Latin any old way, but it does mean that stressing out over the choice between classical vs. ecclesiastical or about regional accents is largely wasted energy. I was also trying to get across the importance of speaking even though you will make mistakes. That's how you learn to speak any language, including your mother tongue.

What part about the pronunciation? :bigear:

Everyone in my family wears glasses, and we've been buying from 39dollarglasses.com for the last bunch of years. We get the whole package - frames and lenses. They even called us last time to verify dd's prescription because it is unusual and they wanted to make sure they had everything right. I've been very happy with their service and will continue to use them.

No PayPal, but you can pay with a bank transfer.

We started today as well, and things went smoothly. I implemented a workbox system for the first time, and that kept things moving along nicely. The system is helping me be more creative and flexible with dd's lessons. I thrive on order and routine, but she's a mix-it-up kind of kid. The workboxes force me to break things down into manageable pieces and to add some variety to our schedule. Tomorrow will be the real test: I have an appointment at 9 a.m., so dd will need to work independently until I come home. We'll see how it goes!

This. :iagree:

My solution was to send the child to bathroom every. single. time. with a request to use a tissue and then wash hands with soap. It took a while, but it worked.

I'm #2 of 2, but there is a large age gap - 13 years - between me and #1.

Old Earth. Not religious.

I put a sticky note on the cover with the pages/exercises to be done. You could also put a bookmark in at the correct page. I do that for straightforward reading assignments or books that have lessons with clear beginning and ending points.

Here's another one: What on Earth Wallbook.

The author is coming out with a new series of elementary-level textbooks. :)

At school we used an enzymatic cleanser in the boys' bathrooms. You can get it from janitorial supply companies. The kind meant for pet odors works well too. I agree that those who can't aim should sit, and that beyond a certain age, it's common courtesy to clean up your own messes.