Kareni :lol: :lol: :lol: Yes, I couldn't resist and looked! I am next on the holds list for Trade Me and will let you know if it's a first for me. I finally finished John Verdon's Peter Pan Must Die and really enjoyed it. His first book Pick a Number had a solution that appealed to me more for it's cleverness but this one really would have kept me turning the pages if I had the time! :lol: My uninterrupted reading time last night ended up being dinner for two with dh at a nearby carvery so finished the book this morning. Not sure what I will read next but it will be fluffy. I think I might be done with historical romances for awhile. I have several ready to read and can't seem to start them. I know that I am definitely going to pass on Dante for now....I read it once in college and just not enough time right now.

We did it as a supplement to LC when they were in the 8 to 10 year old range. We just had the student books and enjoyed them. Agree with Laura, it was a fun course designed as an easy introduction to Latin. They designed it as an introduction to Cambridge Latin which we have also used.

:grouphug: Praying for you and Caden to have several more uneventful weeks. You have done a great job getting to 28 weeks. It was a really magic number back when ds kept trying to appear early. I hope all your other worries are resolved soon. :grouphug:

We have used Coursera quite a bit to explore different interests and to improve the level of understanding my dc's have. Sometimes it is hard to tell from the description, especially the computer related ones, just how good of a fit they will be. My kids have tried the first week or two of many classes they decided not to complete. Both kids have done their economics and calculus via Coursera. Great experiences overall. Dd is going to take the AP in Calculus next week after doing Coursera's reveiw class.....she finished Calculus over a year ago. They have both done some other finance related classes.....these have been useful for determining where their interests really lie. Dd definitely enjoys finance and is planning on a career in that field. Dd has done a couple of literature classes. U of M's Fantasy/Sci Fi was one. One tough class, peer graded papers were a bit brutal in her session. She is very proud to have survived with a certificate. Not sure how many made it to the end with the necessary scores. University of Singapore has a Forensic Science class that was fascinating. Also a good dinosaur class from a Canadian University. The Duke Chemistry class was great. I really can't say enough about how much Coursera has enriched my kids lives. Currently ds is doing a Bioinformatics computer class. Absolutely fascinating.....combines programming skills with a bit of biology. He is reaching really far ahead of himself to do this course and loving it. He has always wanted to program games, now he is searching DNA sequences witg his code looking for the SARS virus and is fascinated.....no way could I provide this experience any other way. A normal school couldn't either. He found it on Corsera all by himself.

My library had this one on overdrive so I will give it a try. I have never read any of Singh's paranormal books so this will be completely new. I haven't had much uninterrupted reading time the last few days and very few free moments so making little progress. I am supposed to have serveral peaceful hours this afternoon while the kids are at bell practice at a new tower. I wonder what I will find myself doing instead of reading? The other night I ended up climbing the tower (way over 100 steps) to see the view, after learning that there were actually seats in the tower. The view was nice but the stone stairway was frightening and really steep. My legs still feel odd! Bells were great, they were ringing to celebrate St. George's Day. For the new people here, my kids are on a Church Bell ringing team which seems to mean a lot of travel this year because their previous mentor passed away unexpectedly. Many kind people are inviting them to their events which is lovely.

Reading has been gaining slowly for me considering I am just reading light fluffy books. Finally finished The MacGregor's Lady by Grace Burrowes. This has been a fun historical series so far. I read quite an amazing amount of my Rusk University book, All Broke Down, by Cora Carmack today while sitting in the car waiting for family members. I read over 40 percent of a book sitting and waiting......made me really appreciate all the waiting my mom did for me.

Abeka offers both economics and government.

First time for both dc's Saturday. Both finished everything. Dd just finished science barely, with no time to check. On practice tests she had been finishing with time to spare. Ds had no problems, finished science 10minutes early -- Not sure who to worry about!

I am pretty much posting to mark the thread for tomorrow. I did finally finish Prudence by Gail Carriger. I enjoyed it in the end but it somehow was lacking something that is hard to identify.....maybe the sense of fun. Not sure what to call it in literary terms but the book wasn't as entertaining as the previous series. Imo I have been reading the last book in Graces Burrow's MacGregor series today.

I had wondered what was going to happen at Target when the line was released. We just got back from a visit to the US and left before the line was released. A few years ago I promised Dd a Lily sundress when her size became fairly consistent- the thought of that much money for one season wasn't something I could justify. I started researching which stores to go to because this was to be the year and ran into the Target line. No longer wanted to buy this year after that discovery. Maybe next trip at Target....hopefully much cheaper!

Nan-- I have to ask because Google didn't really answer and I am curious....Are chowder crackers different from oyster crackers? Looked like maybe a shape issue. Obviously there is one beloved brand that calls itself a chowder cracker, but other then that do people just use oyster crackers? Homemade?

Now I have yhe Bananas in Pajamas theme running through my tired brainhttp://m.youtube.com/watch?v=CJkPWMaNaIM. The link is to the cartoon... the kids watched two guys dressed like bananas. The kids think it went reasonably well except dd was really tired for the science section (last part) so we shall see. SAT subject exams in two weeks and the motorway will be closed again I suspect. grrrrr

Thanks Kareni, The first linked freebie, Lost Library series, also has a free short story. I am still working on getting through Prudence by Gail Carriger. I have decided that I like it but we are busy and exhausted. I found it hard to get used to the babies from the Soulless series all grown up. Now to entertain Stacia.....My kids taking the ACT exam this morning. First I have spent a lot of time accumulating books and waiting for Amazon since returning home so they would have some idea what they were going to do. I literally walked into the ACT with my pencil and read the prep book while waiting for the exam to start and wanted them to be familiar. Our whole family has adjusted our sleep patterns nine hours in the past week in order to be on the road to the testing location early this morning. Thursday night we discover the motorway will be closed all weekend requiring an extra hour travel time.....gave up and booked a room. Hadn't wanted to because my really tall Ds doesn't sleep well on short beds. When I dropped them this morning the councillor was waiting for everyone at the door to let the parents know about the power outage....did we want them to go ahead and take the exam? Others who lived closer (everyone else!) Stood there trying to decide. My kids were busy grabbing window seats....wanted desperately to be done! :lol:

Sorry

GCSE exams are taken at the end of what an American would call sophomore year traditionally. So would indicate 2years language study imo. Technically they can be taken at other times if needed for a qualification, know adults who have done a GCSE. FYI. The kids I know in real life taking their first language GCSE do it a year or two early in order to get it out of the way because they are doing 13 or 14 GCSE's at school, so age 16.

Robin, Since you asked..... John Verdon's Peter Pan Must Die is the one I am reading first. He is the author of one of my all time favourite thrillers. Think of a Number is a book I found to be really clever. I absolutely loved the concept behind the title and it was action packed. I will be honest and say the other person I convinced to read it did not love it, though it was a bit like an episode of Castle. :lol: I have gone on to read his other books, and enjoyed them, so finding a new one was a bit of a thrill!http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/07/25/AR2010072502460.html Meg Gardiner's Phantom Instinct, a stand alone apparently. She is the author of a series of books that I call China Lake, really has another name which I will link after I post the bulk of this. I was downright obsessive about the China Lake https://www.goodreads.com/series/41155-evan-delaney several years ago so a new to me one by that author is a good thing. Erica Spindler's Bone Cold. Simply a doesn't sound like I have read it and normally like her books. Val McDermid's Report for Murder. https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/634419.Report_For_Murder She is an author that I have recently found and like. What I have read so far have been superior. This is simply the first in an older series by her that is completely available at my overdrive library. I started my book search hunting for another of hers that I picked up in hardcover yesterday. I will edit that one in. It is called Vanishing Point https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/13590744-the-vanishing-point Angel, just wanted to say that I am sorry. I still love Narnia (all of them) and I really really prefer the LotR books to movies. I read and watched close together way back when, my frustration with the good bits almost all missing when the cinema version was huge. Overall I liked OoaSP, just not nearly as much as Narnia which is what I wanted it to be. I have started Perelandra and so far am enjoying it. Not sure if I will continue or wait for you, at this point it can stay beside my bed.

I was going to happily report that the book is still free and my download worked great this morning, then I realized that in real time I downloaded it ten minutes after you posted. :lol:

Maybe they do GCSE in that language. I know it is not the same as an A level but they do test many languages. Most students here that have an other than English family first language take a GCSE and receive credit for it, pretty broad range from what I have heard. No idea where to look and no time to Google....just know from my kid's friends. Good luck.

Welcome Junie! :) Momto2n's :grouphug: ouch! Loesje -- Your mention of Peretti made me feel like I should be reading thrillers last night. Since I couldn't find your recommendation on overdrive I ended up checking out several others. Like I really needed more books in my stack, even if it is a virtual stack! :lol:

Rose, Curiosity might just get me through all three now! :lol:

Double post. I feel like I should say something! :lol: I am trying to read Gail Carriger's Prudence. Not sure what I think of it.

We never made it beyond Wind in the Willows....... Are the sequels as enjoyable in your opinion? Dd and I like the first quite a bit but Ds did not, because I needed to buy the sequels we went on to others.

We did Sonlight for many years when the dc's were young. I originally ordered it for my son because he was obviously not going to do well with dd's A Beka type workbooks. I ordered what was then K with only him in mind but quickly realized that Dd was not going to be left out of the fun. My son tended to leave the lessons totally on target for expectations but Dd generally took things a bit further with other materials we had in our home. Sonlight is easy to supplement up to higher ages using library materials or books from Veritas press, Story of the World, and many others. Science worked well as a group exercise. Frequently I just left them to read and do, then show and tell what they learned. We moved to England so quit Sonlight for the American History years. I self designed our own using library books and other resources. I only have two children and only ran one core at a time successfully. We did revisit Sonlight with older dc's and attempted 2 cores at one time. Let's just say we have some nice books on our shelves that make good reference material. Neither child liked being by themselves and before I new it I was back to self designing. My friends with more children always seem to burn out with more than two cores. In summary what I am trying to say is I would buy 1 core. Not necessarily to your oldest child's level but one that you will enjoy doing. I consider the first year of Sonlight to be a training period for mom. :lol: As you become comfortable with the schedule you will start to see ways you might tweak it to fit your kids needs which will make it far easier to do one core with more than one child.

I have to admit that I am not feeling an urgent need to read the copy of Perelandra sitting beside me on my nightstand. I loved my visits to Narnia. I didn't mind the world Lewis created in Out of a Silent Planet but was not drawn into it either. I really need to start reading it but not tonight...currently it is lights off for everyone so the dc's can get adjusted time zone wise, need to be up and alert at 6 am this weekend. Glad I have a kindle. Jennifer, your vacation sounds lovely. I love San Francisco but haven't been in years. I just finished my last book in Julia Quinn's Bridgerton series. Enjoyed it but something was off with the order.....I wish it hadn't started with an attempt to end the wedding which was also almost the ending. I really didn't enjoy knowing where the story was heading. I also wish I had started some notes on the minor characters used in all her books when I started reading this author. The same ones keep popping up and I am struggling to remember them.

I totally agree. It wasn't as compelling as most of her other books. It was enjoyable by virtue of association with the Smith/Smythes. As I remember the second half of the book was a bit boring. Stacia, I love your picture. I hope you have a lovely anniversary week. I love azaleas so I think you picked the perfect week to be married in, especially outdoors. VC, When I read about your dd saving the rat snake I had to laugh. I don't think my creature saving daughter could deal with a snake no matter how much she wanted to. Lizards and spiders, no problem, but snakes....ick! Brave girl!