:blink: :lol: Sounds like quite the idea.. thanks!

... especially from those who also tend to over-schedule! I obviously haven't got this sorted out yet. This may be because we really only started using the Classical method in the middle of last year. I read the WTM carefully, and scheduled a beautiful timetable, somehow also fitting in the activities that we did at the time. And then of course life happened and I couldn't keep up; it was very disheartening; I had been so enthusiastic! Maybe I am trying to fit too much into a day, or maybe I am trying to do too many subjects when I've read more than once on here that "English/Language Arts and Math are essential, and the rest is gravy". To complicate matters, we are likely moving at the end of the year, and before that happens we have to mostly prepare our house to rent it out as for various reasons we can't sell it at the moment. This means dealing with the front and back yards, which are in chaos, and a number of DIY jobs around the house and a great deal of painting, etc. etc. And the kids have one activity each (like lots of other kids, I expect) which requires mom's taxi service. So here's the question: if you had to pare your curriculum down to the essentials, what would it include? ie.. what should I make a priority, and what isn't going to be disastrous if we leave it out for a year?

I was never able to lose weight while nursing. On the other hand, a friend of mine loses weight during that time so fast she actually has to stop nursing otherwise it's dangerous to her health. And I guess there are all shades of grey in between - we are all made so different!

I lost 20 pounds last year on a low-carb diet. I recently noticed that a had put a couple pounds back on so I have just started my diet again with the intention of losing another 20 pounds or so. I'll then take another break and continue the cycle until I'm at the weight I want to be. My food tastes great to me and I often find that by cutting out refined sugar all the food I eat has so much more flavor. JMO, I know not everyone agrees with low-carb.

We'll pray for your family :001_smile:

We bought L'art de lire (Nallenart) as well to use this year. I really like the fact that it teaches some basic grammar. :iagree: You should be able to get some from Amazon, or maybe a homeschool resource website. We have 4 "Max et Maxine" story books which come with an Audio CD and a song. I also have - from a long time ago - some translations of the Beatrix Potter stories which are more complex in their language than Max et Maxine. I'm a bit lucky in that my mom is bilingual French-English so she helps me get good resources. We picked up a great song book again with a CD and the kids listen that as much as they do their story CDs. We've had it quite a while and I often hear them singing along. I'm not sure they understand everything they're saying but it'll come!!

Rod and Staff. We use it because it's extremely thorough, and as Christians we like the use of Scripture in it.

Praying for you here too!

What a situation! I'm sorry you have to deal with this. I'll surely be praying for you all. :grouphug:

I've gone through patches of not being able to sleep properly and it's so frustrating. You lie in bed, wide awake for what seems like hours, and then you're totally bushed in the morning when you have to get up to be with the kids. These days I take a herbal tablet when I need it which seems to get me to sleep pretty easily and stay asleep. It's truly changed my life - and the life of my dc as well! I really hope you find something that works because it's very hard to cope with.

Not sure how helpful this is as we're obviously in the UK but.. my folks have a Miele which they (almost!) swear by. It's quiet, well made, and seems to last forever. The only downside is that a new Miele is always expensive. Otherwise.. we have Bosch. Even if it died today, it would have done us proud; we've had it almost since we were married and one of my sisters had it before that for several years. There are no problems with how it washes, unless we forget to put the detergent tablet in!

Snap. I found that a more productive way of dealing with it was to talk to a counsellor, and work on forgiving my parents from the heart.

Oh to have so much free time, to be able to phone anyone multiple times in a morning!! I am usually keen to encourage ppl to respect their dh, but on the other hand I don't think there is anything wrong with expressing how you feel about something. Maybe you could turn the ringer off on your phone or pull it right out, and switch your cell phone off? Perhaps that is a little drastic - and not respectful? :confused: We ignore the phone - or turn the ringer off if I remember - whenever we are doing actual schoolwork (I have a slightly flexible schedule so this isn't always at the exact same time every day). People who I know well have my cell phone number and if I don't pick that up because we are too busy, they know to text me. As for people knocking on the door.. we have a GSD who goes mental if she hears someone knocking or even the letterbox snapping shut. If it's a delivery I'll shut her in the house and answer the door. If it's a salesman she comes with me to the door :D and makes a heck of a noise.. 35kg of shaggy GSD barking for England usually puts people off :lol: :lol::smilielol5:

I think this would be a sticking point for me. We have 4dc, two with Bible names and two with Bible middle-names (the other bits of the names, not). I wonder if your little EmmaLeigh would feel a little left out when she got older, being the only one with a non-Bible first name?? Maybe switching the names around solves the problem, if you like Ruth well enough for a first name? EmmaLeigh is very sweet and it's a lovely idea to honor your friends by naming your dd after them.

No.. I don't think it's a bad idea. My MIL lost her husband around 14yrs ago and she has always said that the worst thing was if people talked to her or wrote her without mentioning the fact that her husband had recently passed away. She was much hurt, for example, by the fact that one person in her church had phoned her every day during her husband's illness to see how he was, but the day he died, she received no more phone calls from this person - when she needed them the most. Just after the 1st anniversary mark of her husband's death, she was in conversation with a local lady and as usual there was no mention of my MIL's dh. So my MIL said, did you know, it was the anniversary of -X-'s death last week, and the lady responded, yes - we did know that. We were going to send you some flowers, but then we didn't because we didn't want to remind you of it. My MIL was quite shocked and said, how could you "remind" me of something I think about several times in every day? So.. I don't actually have any bright ideas about wording, as I'm not great at that. But do send the card, however simply you express yourself. It will comfort the gentleman to know that you were thinking of him.

That is a wonderful story of outreach in your church. It is so totally what I think Christianity should be about. God bless you! I hope this poor lady and her kids are ok. Praying here. :001_smile:

:001_smile: I confess.. this was one of the reasons we bought a new house last time around.. neutral colors!

Aw.. poor girl. We have a 9yr old GSD and we love her to bits too. I would be devastated if she had to be pts and I'm sure I would try and get her pain free for a little bit at least. I think others are right, you should get a second opinion.

Well they call the whole school a Steiner Kindergarten and they take children from 3-7yrs in two groups. Ds would be in the older group but one of the youngest in that group. It seems to be almost entirely play oriented but it's hard to tell from a brief visit.

:grouphug: Lots of sympathy from over here. It's not my MIL that's the problem, as she HS'd my dh herself - she's fab. It's my family.. ALL of them.. dad, mum, two sisters, two BILs, and four copying nieces and nephews. Guilt trips and emotional blackmail is their language, the passive aggressive approach seems to be the only way they operate, criticism about anything they don't agree with including our decision to get a dog. :blink: After 12 yrs of marriage and an equal amount of time on the receiving end of the above, we've come to the conclusion that we're better off keeping them at a distance. I guess the difference for you right now is that your dh isn't understanding why you don't like what your MIL is doing. It can be very draining having family who do things like that, so I really hope you can work something out.

Praying here. :grouphug:

My 5yo ds has an opportunity to attend a Steiner school, part time, for a year. Does anyone know anything about what this is in practice (not too concerned about it's origin tbh), and whether it would dovetail with a classical education? Looking forward to hearing your thoughts.

Congratulations! Tbh.. I've given myself a 3 month break to start with and taken things real slow. A cleaning service sure helps if you can afford it. But I agree with a few of the other posts.. pop the bubba in a sling and do as normal.. complete with your high heels! :D Sounds wonderful - I hope you do get that second time around! :iagree:

Indeed. So what is your reason for not giving me the benefit of the doubt? I'd also like to say that I feel you have slightly twisted even my original words, and that was before I came back to the original post and edited it in a calmer frame of mind. The argument doesn't seem to me to be productive, in any case. You either understand, or you don't. I'm not offended that you disagree with me, but ultimately everyone's lives are considerably more complex than any of us could ever explain on a forum and I could not possibly go through my entire thought process which lead me to feel that I was not able to accept the invitation I was sent. I was simply asking for some help in formulating a polite refusal. I'm sorry if you misunderstood this.

You're not alone at all. :001_smile: We found that whenever our dc either watched a movie or played computer games they would start arguing or scrapping as soon as it was finished. I'm really not sure why this happened although I did wonder whether it was a question of pent up adrenaline which they needed to release. It was much worse with my ds than with my dds. So.. we have a rule in our house that there are no movies or computer games during the week. At the weekend they are allowed one movie (for everyone) or one game (each) and when it's done, that's it. We then immediately do some kind of physical activity. So far it seems to have worked, and in addition, the kids look forward to it as a really special treat.