Your son will remember it forever. I still remember my letter from President Reagan like it was yesterday!

My big picture plan is to eventually do both. But we're starting with Spanish. I struggled with the choice because I think French is so beautiful (Spanish is too) and I also see it as a preservation somewhat of our heritage (Cajun). But I think in the big picture Spanish is more important. So we're doing Spanish -- we actually started Rosetta Stone today! My hope is that they'll be able to pick up a third language quickly after becoming fluent in a second.

Thank you for your responses :)

One more question. We have a local homeschool cottage that has items on consignment. They have a set of math manipulatives made by Houghton Mifflin (Math Central). Are all math manipulatives basically the same?

Does anyone know where I can purchase just part one of the Saxon 1 workbooks? (I have the Teacher's Manual, Part II workbook and flashcards. So I *think* I'm just missing Part I and the meeting book, is this correct?) Also, does anyone think the meeting book is an absolute necessity?

I shop according to what's on sale. I hit up three grocery stores (Albertsons, Winn Dixie and Super 1 Foods) and manage to keep it to $400 a month for a family of five. Like, for instance, roma tomatoes are on sale this week because of Cinco de Mayo (along with onions, jalapenos, etc) so I'm making homemade salsa, homemade pizza and anything else that I can use roma tomatoes for. When meat's on sale, I stock up and freeze it. Winn Dixie is really good about Buy 1 Get 1 Free sales on all their meats and chicken. I could go on and on about how I do it, but I won't bore you to tears LOL

Oooh, could you tell me more about free books? Are they audio?

I saw that in the catalog and drooled over it! I'm a curriculum junkie :(

http://www.retailmenot.com I use that one the most ...

shameless bump

And I just finished the course on this and it was really good! It's definitely going to help me stay centered on making sure we're (the family) heading in a good direction. On my list: Hypnobabies Homestudy Charlotte Mason Companion Anam Cara Breastfeeding Made Simple: Seven Natural Laws for Nursing Mothers (I've nursed three already, but this book came highly recommended by a friend so I thought I'd give it a shot) Remember Me? by Sophie Kinsella (love, love, love her fluff books) A Mother's Rule of Life (have started this but need to get through all the P's) The Third Jesus [the Christ we cannot ignore] Certain Girls by Jennifer Weiner (more fluff) Left to Tell that's of course assuming I have time for all this ... :001_huh:

I just finished this on audio book and absolutely loved it. She's a very humorous writer.

Yeah, I should add that I use Sygate Personal Firewall. I think a combination of anti-virus software and a good firewall is important. And not the windows firewall, IMO. I try to stay away from Microsoft products because I have a deep mistrust of the company, but it's not entirely irrational as I do use Word, Excel, Publisher, etc. LOL It's Firefox and Thunderbird for us as far as browser and email applications are concerned.

I'm a sucker and pretty much following TWTM to a "T". Except for handwriting. DS is already in K at a Catholic School and they learned D'Nealian so I'm just continuing with that ...

Jami, you are a perfect candidate for VBAC. Seriously. Have you done any reading at all? May I suggest some? Ina May's Guide to Childbirth The Thinking Woman's Guide to a Better Birth Pushed The VBAC Companion Birthing from Within (those are just a few off the top of my head) Also, if you haven't seen it yet, The Business of Being Born is an exceptional documentary. You can watch it for free online at: http://quicksilverscreen.com/watch?video=45525 And of course if you have any questions (not that I'm an expert, just a good researcher!), I'd be more than happy to answer anything for you.