Trying to revamp our read aloud time, so I'm curious to know what you do during your read aloud time. What do you permit the kids to do while you read? What is not allowed? What do you do if they start acting up?

I love the idea of projects, hands on, something more than read this than that. But read this than that gets done and things are learned while fun stuff takes too much time to hunt down, to do, and get done. So we are sticking with the not so fun, but would like to hear how to make things a tad more fun. if it helps we are currently plugging away at: Story of the World: Ancients- down to the bare bones of read the chapter, ask the questions from the activity book, and dictate a summary. Science based on what is described in WTM First Language Lessons and Writing with Ease Math Mammoth My son likes to cut and glue, but not so much on the coloring pages

We liked the I Love America Curriculum more than the Adventures in America.

My eldest learned his letters and their sounds really early on (2 years old), but it took him years (around the age of 4.5) before he was able to blend them together. I would recommend around the age of 3 or 3.5 to try Plaid Phonics kindergarten workbook. (We used a set of alphabet stamps when ever writing was necessary)

If a new car sounds to pricey look into different car seats. We have a Toyota seinna and our main car seats are all Britax which are big and huge. However we have a very narrow Radian convertible carset and another very narrow harnesses booster whose name escapes me that was really inexpensive from kmart for when we randomly bring home the kids' friends from the park.

Dh and I were putting the finishing touches to the gifts at midnight, when we got hit with a parade of emergency vehicles. Four houses down had a small kitchen fire. Everyone and thing is okay, but man what a way to start Christmas.

I second camelcamelcamel.

I was going to suggest dropbox, but a joint shutterfly account sounds better.

There is a lapbook that goes with SOTW3, maybe worth a try? http://brendajohnston.blogspot.com/2013/08/story-of-world-volume-3-lapbook.html

We share our prime account with family. (you can share it with up to three other people and they don't have to be related to you, both parties just need to know the other persons email address and birthday. However only the main e-mail address can have access to the kindle library and amazon prime streaming)) DH teases me that if I we don't get at least two parcels a week I must be feeling sick. Thanks for reminding me I have to check out. I have a set of crochet needles that according to camelcamelcamel.com is at an all time low price. bought diapers, more diapers, ink, and dress up hats through out the week

Our three year old hardly talks. Early Intervention isn't an option (The state we live in Early intervention is only up the the age of thee. After that it goes to the Department of Education. DOE wont accept him because he only has the one issue. Have to have two issues in order to qualify.) He's hearing is fine. What can we do to get him to talk more?

Having gone from living in the same state as their warehouse to cross country to Hawaii, I think it has less to do with Amazonand more to do with who they shipped it with. Being in Hawaii they can't honor their 2 day shipping, however their prices are so low including shipping then anywhere else so I use them all the time. If the item gets shipped FedEx or UPS, then it takes about a week. USPS can sometimes take a week, but has taken as long as 3 weeks.

I have a really really really expensive lens prescription. When my littlest broke my frame I researched to find the exact frame again so i could just swap out the lenses. Most sites had the lenses for over $100, but i managed to find them at www.youropticalshop.com for $30. Shipping was steep, but power in numbers brought the cost down. I ordered five frames because I figured by the time the little ones broke them all it would be time to get new lenses.

When DH had a kidney stone the unofficial there is no backing to go with it but sound like an idea worth try was a 6 pack of beer and lots of water to stay hydrated the whole time.

how about a world map shower curtain?

We used them. Last time we moved we spent 45 days visiting family, flew to our new city, and then spent 45 days in a hotel waiting on our house. We bought four sets one for each person. The kids (2 and 5 at the time) got the small medium of their colors. I put a dozen sets of tshirt/shorts into the medium and their socks, underpants, swim trunks, etc into the smalls. For mine I put my day clothes into the large, night clothes into the medium, and undergarments and such into the small. Haven't the foggiest how hubby packed his cubes. The two extra large cubes: one held farm clothes (we were stopping at the in laws who live on a farm) and the other held church clothes. What was awesome about having the cubes was since everything was in one bag, if I needed to find something I knew where to look and didn't have to completely disrupt the entire bag. If littlest son needed a new shirt I could tell hubby which cube to pull out and not have to worry that the next time I saw the duffel it would be in shambles and would need repacking. I don't think packing cubes are necessary if each person has their own bag. Helpful but not necessary. However when you have two or more living out of one bag I feel becomes necessary. Any who I attached pics, I was rather proud of how much I got into the duffel. Currently I use the smalls in my diaper bag: ones for snacks, the other is for clean clothes, and the other for diapering stuff. The medium cubes are currently being used to hold crochet projects.

Layers of learning http://www.layers-of-learning.com

Did he try disney? http://disneycareers.com/en/search-jobs/advanced-search/ A search under: science/horticulture/zoology turns up a job for the animal kingdom I had a couple friend who did internships wih disney business majors the jobs were retail based but one friend had a more niche theatre degree and she had a blast working in costumes

We always bring a rice cooker, but then again my boys would live off rice and cheese if I let them. For on the road we like to heat up hotdogs and stick them in a thermos and then they are nice a warm at the rest stop. We always pack things to make pj and j as well. We've done crock pot cooking in a hotel once but the room was an extended stay and had a stove top. So we didn't have to rely soly on the crock pot

I'm due in August and I had heard everyone say they were given Zofran for morning sickness. Well the doc informs me that Zofran is no longer an option linked with too many cases of something. Instead I was given Reglan and B6. Of the two the B6 seemed to work the best for me.

This might be a helpful site for you http://www.legoengineering.com

When you download a digital file ie PDF version of Story of the World and the activity books or when scholastic has it's dollar days what do you do with the file? Is it saved only once or do you save it multiple times in various places? Do you eventually burn a cd? External hard drive? Thumb drive?

I think instead of having them together in the playyard for the entire 2 - 2.5 hours, put one in a pack n play and the other in the play yard have set toys in both. Then at some point switch who is where. then towards the end put them both in the bigger play yard with a new set of toys. Make a list of all the toys you own. put three toys in each area plus some board books. Go down the list each morning to change things up. If they toss the toys out of the area too bad.

We have books, lots and lots of books, and we haven't even started buying books for homeschooling. We decided to enact a limit of how many books we own to the number of bookcases we currently own. We currently have a bookcase (or two) worth of books over said limit. All the books we have are books that came from DH and I growing up. How do I evaluate the books form our past to figure out if we will actually use them for homeschooling. Would we be better off just getting rid of all of them and starting fresh versus trying to make what we have work? I wouldn't exactly call what we own great works.

We are planning on doing Story of the World next year. I have the text books, audio cds, and activity guide already. I'm looking to make a list of books to purchase to add in. The activity guide has tons of recommendations, its overwhelming. We don't have a lot to spend on extra books and we don't use the library. When you went through Story of the World Ancients, were there any books that seem to stand out more than others?