I might wait until a little older for guitar..... it takes some fine motor skills that are different than piano in my eyes, and I would hate to see your child lose interest in the long run if guitar is too hard now. I'm not saying not to do it....just telling you that I helped "defer" my one daughter's interest when she was about nine and trying mine out. She was quite frustrated. I suggested violin instead...she is now 14 and picked the guitar up this summer for fun and is playing quite nicely. for this child, waiting, was a good idea.

I did the same thing- -- sent my child to PS because they had an autism specialist and I thought it would be better for him, since he wasn't self-driven to do anything. I mean anything. He won't play with a toy for more than the first two minutes it takes to explore it. Won't read on his own, not curious about anything. We have to orchestrate every single experience for the child or else he will just swing on a swing, follow me around the house, or ask to watch television or go on the computer. When we orchestrate, it's okay. He helps my husband work on cars, and if we tell him to, he will take apart old electronics or something. I wasn't thinking of homeschooling in terms of what he would be like after learning at home until age 18, I was thinking of having to "prove it" to others that HSing was the right thing for him. Family pressure. I felt like my mistake was to expect something those first two years. What he "could produce" to show that he was "working," in a way. And I had to let a lot of things slide and he worked at a lower level than others. That's when I worried and sent him back to school. (Plus I got sick). Not looking at the big picture was a mistake. Now we are working on what to do for this fall.....

Thank you for this thread! I will be visiting many of these links. I am all but giving up on classical education for two of my kids -- as one has Asperger's syndrome and has very concrete thinking skills -- abstracts seem to not exist for him, and for my daughter who has visual processing problems and is a poor reader. I wish I had something to offer, but I don't yet. I just wanted to say thank you.

Spelling keeps coming up in new threads. I already wrote this on another spelling thread, but I'll do it one more time because it worked very well for my three different spellers. I have relaxed from the workbooks at this point. We used Spelling Workout until my last child. He has some LD issues and couldn't do workbooks at one point, so I started going to a (free) website called Spelling City and plugged his words into a list. He can type them, play different games with them, and get tested on them. It has auditory component, so he hears the words, and types them. We put on our Spelling Workout words at first, now we have relaxed and put in words that relate to what he is learning about. We do all other subjects, esp. words from lit he is reading. I think he learns the words faster, and something about the drudgery of writing them all out over and over has lifted. His older siblings use it to put in their vocabulary lists. We also take whatever words we have used for the week and do oral "fun quizzes" in the car. Yes, they actually think it is fun and ask for it. I think oral component of spelling out loud is very helpful, too. Cross-training the brain, perhaps?

I loved handwriting as a child. I remember getting the cursive worksheets. Even remember how the dittos smelled! I love writing in cursive. It was rather a let-down to learn that none of my children enjoy it. I bought some old Spencerian workbooks and thought, "This is gonna be great! We can all sit around and do Spencerian together!" No one wants to do it. And two of my children have dysgraphic issues -- one formally diagnosed. He did Handwriting Without Tears and perhaps I will start the Handwriting Without Tears cursive when he is in fifth grade, even though I think it is an ugly cursive. Handwriting Without Tears is wonderful. It worked. I just had the girls do D'Nealian and they did copywork. Maybe I'll have a grandchild someday who will like cursive styles.

My mom loves ketchup on fried spaghetti. Sounds bad but tastes okay. I think it was what we ate when dough was low, as a child, or when she couldn't get up the energy to cook. My mom's sister ate stuffing sandwiches before she lost weight. So, that is bread, with chopped buttered bread inside. My family's version of fried spaghetti and ketchup is a nasty dish with Korean potato noodles ( cheap and gluten free at the Asian grocer's). They are a slippery grey/lavender see-though noodle that I boil and serve with soy sauce and chopped Spam. Yes, Spam. It's nasty. Terrible and wonderful at the same time.

I would do 45 minutes of German, 30 minutes of banjo, and 45 minutes of Latin. I already make time for bible study, and carve out writing time when I can. I also want to learn Hebrew.... can I have two and a half hours a day?

My girls did English For the Thoughtful Child. I thought it was nice, because they were at a point where they didn't want to do anything that was prompted by me, personally,so they just used the book. Thankfully, we are over that -- I think it was just a pre-teen phase. Anyway, it had descriptive writing exercises, that my girls responded well to. 8 IS young. Something else I did when they were on the younger side,is a little Charlotte Mason-y. I had them dictate stories into a tape recorder. Two of my kids loved it. I gave them prompts when they needed it. The could read prompts/transitions from a page, and learned to think their ideas through and state them in an order that made sense. It was fun. Not a huge component of what we did, but we did it for a while.

I think I said this on another spelling thread. Go to spellingcity.com for free. Use whatever lists she has and she can practice her words with some games, some printable lists (it can do cursive tracables, and even sign language signs), and free tests, using your own lists. I think this would be a good way to go for non-natural spellers. Of my remaining three, two are not natural spellers and really to go over their words. My one with the disability spells very well, but he can't write well at all, and has become workbook...frozen. They can all use SpellingCity, and they are at three different educational levels. This might save you from having to buy another curriculum. Stick with what you already have and attack the practicing/drilling of the words a little differently, that's all. Add some spice into it, if you can add "spice" into a spelling program, that is!

It works for me and for my son. We both have ADD behaviors. Just one cup (each).

Apple Cider Vinegar rinse, not just apple cider.... sorrry

Ouidad is too pricy for me. I have gone totally natural and my hair thanks me for it. No shampoo. Condition ends, Doc Bronners soap on scalp. Rinse soap and conditioner out. I use Whole Foods' 365 in Mint. It's under four dollars for huge bottle ( 24 ounces?). Then condition again with conditioner. When damp, put a teeny bit of Vatika hair oil on ends. Some Aloe Vera once in a while. Apple cider rinse about once a month. That's about it. Very cheap,and the ball of puff on my head is now nearly ringlets. Very nice.

Shephard's Pie Pigs in a Blanket Curried chicken or fish with coconut milk over rice Pasta with protein in red sauce ( chicken or meat sauce) Tacos or quesadillas Fish-n-grits-n-salad I have regularly cooked for seven on a budget. Now cooking for five, but we still have budget! And dietary restrictions. Shephard's pie -- use Joy of cooking recipe. Double or triple the recipe. When you make mashed potatoes, boil an extra batch to make potato salad while you are at it. My kids snack on that! Freeze 1 or 2 extra pies. Pigs in a blanket with meat, rice, cabbage, and tomato sauce. Freezes GREAT, although it is kind of a pain to make in the beginning. Make huge batches and freeze. Use Joy of Cooking recipe. Pan fry some chicken or fish, light oil, no breading, then pour a can of coconut milk over it ( cheaper at Asian store) add curry spices ( which you can get in grocery for cheap if you don't mix your own), serve over white rice with a side veggie, like sauteed onions and bok choy( cheap and healthy). Make a triple batch of red sauce with some meat -- use ground turkey if you don't eat red meat. Freeze two meals worth of sauce in separate containers. Serve over pasta ( we use gluten free) and with a side salad, or some fresh green beans sauteed in olive oil and garlic. TAcos are easy, ditto on the quesadillas ( we use corn tortillas to avoid wheat) -- cook a pound or two of extra ground meat and freeze in separate containers, so you can pull it out for future meals. Fish in a pan. Fry them. Serve with grits and butter and salt and pepper.Serve a big fat salad with all kinds of leftovers in it -- bits of meat, leftover green beans, blueberries, crumpled feta, whatever. Put out a few choices of dressings. Let the kids make their own dressings! Leftover grits are good with fried egg and hot sauce in the morning. I leave meals open, as I cook by how I feel, and the weather, and such. Keeps things creative. I will plan for a week, but not decide until that day which meal I will be serving. Some meals take more prep. and I may be tired or busy. I plan for six meals, one that I don't need fresh stuff for ( like canned salmon croquettes with a frozen veggie). I usually use five meals and one leftover night, and one impromptu night. I always have something I can whip together if I buy for six meals. I freeze snacks -- as I bake everything gluten free. I bake in bulk and put in baggies in freezer so kids can take one at a time. Breakfasts : same ffew things over and over, or leftover supper. Rice cakes with almond butter and honey, egg on toast, deviled eggs, yoghurt, cheese on toast, side of fruit, egg and bacon sandwich, egg and grits, egg bacon and grits, eggs bacon and spam ,span sausage and spam...spam spam spam....uh oh. Turning into a Monty Python skit! Anyway, you get the breakfast picture. We don't eat breakfast cereal Hope this helps. I have hundreds of menu ideas, seriously. I'd be happy to give you more of a boost if you need it. Robin

Every child is different. We used Spelling Workout for a long while for our older kids, and did well with it, but our last child has dysgraphia and he started to really hate the sight of a workbook. Started letting him type his Spelling Workout words into http://www.spellingcity.com -- a free site, and he loved it. We soon found out that he needed very little repetition to master his words. For him, the workbook work was overkill and he was getting frustrated, and kind of shutting down (we have since found other learning disabilities which explains a lot, and we need to adapt classical ed. for him -- as it is not working well. This is why I joined the forum, btw). Anyway, we ended up leaving the workbook lists and making our own based on books we are reading or activities he is into. I keep track of words we do, for my peace of mind. It's working. He is learning easily and is quite happy. That's my two cents.