Praying for you.

Eliana -- Just wanted to send you some :grouphug:. I also wanted to tell you I appreciated your review of the Connie Willis books. I plan to start her time travel series as soon as my ebook/library book accounts are availiable again. I have both dh's and my holds list filled up and am first on all of the books. I am going to be busy!

The Iron Druid series was a really odd experience for me each book took me almost a week to make it past the first 75 to 100 pages then it would grab me and there I would be picking it up ever two minutes. I really liked them but I had to be persistent!

Looking forward to your review! My list just keeps getting longer but this one will be added. This group has been great for me. I have really been branching out quite a bit more. Thank you!

I finished Moonspinners by Mary Stewart and really enjoyed it. I really want to visit Crete now. :) I have the first ones in her Arthur/Merlin series checked out of the library. I hope to start them soon. I absolutely loved Bellwether by Connie Willis. It was one of those books that you enjoy so much you don't want to put down. As I read it I simply enjoyed the story interwoven with fascinating tidbits about fads and how they happen. The main character, a researcher in that field, reached some conclusions that I found rather intriguing. For those of you who have read it I adored the sheep. Made me laugh a lot. :)

We love ours others won't agree but one of our best purchases. We have had it 12 years w/ no problems. We have the middle model which I like best. My back is so much better with a sleep number. We actually bought both dc's factory refurbished beds soon after (they needed real mattresses and we had none) they have the cheap models and they love them. Ours is better but......they sleep so much better on those beds. We just hauled them to the UK in our luggage this year (another big advantage) and both dc's seem much better rested here. Probably my imagination but my ds is a very restless sleeper and much better with that bed.

I am currently reading Moonspinners, only 50 or so pages in. Enjoying it so far. It was the first book I remember reading from the adult section at the library way back when. Amazed at how well I remember it compared to some of the other rereads I have been doing. Finished The Well of Lost plots by Jasper Fforde this morming. Not as good as the others imo but fun. I found the reference to a book that can only be read three times then never opened again very disturbing. It was a technology that would create the ultimate reading experience! Sad and possible. It goes with my current kindle book Bellwether, where the main character checks classics out of the library so they won't be discarded!

Just wanted to say thank you! Just printed India partitioning lesson. It was already our subject for today so we now have turned it into something more substantial.;)

Double post!

We have always schooled year around so that we could take days off just because it is nice out. If I don't have my new curriculum purchased ideally I hit the library fairly hard. I leave the kids home with dh and spend about three hours browsing the shelves for ideas that we haven't done or a particully fun/interesting book. I pull a few that appeal and try to build a bit from there. Since you are new to LV maybe a desert theme. Science could be a study of desert plants and animals. For history gold rush. Should be able to find some math puzzle books to go along with basic worksheets found online to keep skills. The library always has interesting art books, both artist study and projects. Your choices in books will determine how long your studies will take. We use the library to bridge a couple week gap frequently sometimes longer. When we first came to the UK history and science all from the library for the first year. I like to stagger the start of new subjects. With textbooks the first weeks are always the easiest and least time consuming. I prefer different courses at different stages. Since we go all year it is fine. Not sure what your obligations with Seton are. Obviously if they grade the work you need to stick to their schedule. My kids love library school. This year we spent most of our time in the US with library books by choice. I had planned to start our new curriclum as soon as it arrived but they liked their library selections so I let them continue. Dd did french, german, and latin with a variety of books and expanded her vocab greatly. Both found a Lials math book they liked (dd came back with her own copy). History we continued our Modern History studies with books from that library. We did some chemistry and economics too. Ds read a big stack of computer programming books. So it can work short term with older kids too. They just help pick the books. :) I hope this helps

Sorry about your kindle.:( I love my kindle keyboard but am curious about the paperwhite myself. You need to give us a review/comparison. I have the pageturning fear myself. Whenever I fall asleep with my fire I end up on a different page! Thanks for the picture, it ended up as a teaching tool. I keep telling my kids that kindles are not indestructible, hopefully they are starting to believe me.

Most college textbooks are going to be more from more the Keynesian point of view I would imagine. More government control of the money supply being desirable . Austrians are more market driven economy. Individual determining the result. It will depend on the school. So much controversy over all of this right now ... I went to a small, fairly conservative school where the Professors all had at least one degree from the University of Chicago so my background is more Thomas Sowell and his Basic Economics book (would also be a great choice just not free ;)). Thomas Sowell is closely aligned with the Austrians--they quote him frequently :). You should teach what you believe in because econ is not concrete like math. The young economist book simply has some great easy to understand examples which we enjoyed that do illustrate basic supply and demand theory etc well. Not overly math based which made it easy for my son to grasp the concepts. Good intro imo.

I am not sure how helpful this will be but will post because dd has been doing Calcilus lite for the past year. For her it is a bridge to other things but this might give you some ideas. Dd14 has done LOF Calculus and in enjoyed it. Good on concepts not enogh problems for AP. She did pair it with a a calculus for Dummies book because she wanted a better explanation then LoF gave at times. I am sure the other recommended books would do the same thing with a better title. We just ended up with most of the Dummies books when a bookstore closed so they are our first stop reference. Hate the name but really handy. Currently working through Lial's Applications ....because our library had a copy and it interests her. Ended up buying her own for under $10. She loves the text and is learning how math is used in a real world context. Lots of practice problems with the concepts she has already learned and is moving really quickly. She has been studying on her own so dh(he is a math professional) and I haven't had much envolvement other than conversations about what she is doing. Going well so... She plans to move to AP prep eventually.

Praying!

I recently finished Brazen Virtue by Nora Roberts. Basically it was an enjoyable easy read. I just finished Kiss if Midnight: A Midnight Breed novel by Lara Adrian which I know I found on this board. I enjoyed it. It definately had a different vampire then what I am used to. This made the storyline a bit unpredictable beyond the typical hunky vampire meets troubled beautiful woman which are favorite escapes for me. They are Aliens who have lived on our planet for hundreds of years in this series! Not weird just some different customs and no garlic etc. One Holy water scene but quick. I am looking forward to reading more of this series.

I took a look at the book and it appears to be pretty good. It appears to be quite content rich and looks far better then the dummies book which I own. It actually tempts me and I thought I was done purchasing for this subject.;) There is a free pdf book which we have used and enjoyed called Lessons for the Young Economist which I would pair it with to fill things out a bit. Give the facts a bit of narrative content. I do think something like that paired with your book is plenty. If you wanted an easy extension IEW has an economics based writing course which dd is enjoying. It seemed like a good way to get a nice assortment of essays on the topic to add to her class. I managed to look at abeka and one other(cannot remember what company) for high school econ when back in the states. Not bad but more of a consumer finance class for lack of a better description. Not what I wanted. They had already done the work as part of other courses. I was an econ major way back in another life so I ended up with college texts purchased cheap and will do my own.

We are finishing this tomorrow! The cdrom has worked fine. The biggest pro is the fact that as you are reading it you can click the pronounciation of the word the first time you see it. You never get it stuck in your head wrong! You also watch any additional videos riggt as you are reading. It is small and light for travel which was the reason we bought it. The biggest negative does not happen often but as you are reading it can be hard(time consuming) to look at previous material. At those moments a book would be easier. No real regrets. The book would probably be easiier because it is what our family would normally chose but the cdrom works well and the outcome for the dcs is no different then general and physical science when I had the chunky book. I have bought the rest as cdrom. The advanced chem am physics only come as books.:(

My library does have it http://forums.welltrainedmind.com/public/style_emoticons/#EMO_DIR#/smile.gif I was amazed -- now that I read the part of your review about Stephen King and printing part of it in his book I understand why!

I might worry about what you were planning to ask me to do or participate in but not about my child being in any danger!

We also used Draw Write Now for both geography and animal drawings. Lots of library story books. We had a full set of Zoobook magazines which we used for animal studies. We put together amazing notebooks using Galloping the Globe as a base. The activities in Considering Gods Creation impressed the grandparents nicely. We also used Geography Songs with the cd so by the end they could sing the name of every country. On a funny note those songs have stuck. It has been six years and we are doing a geography course again. When I set down to introduce Asia and how we were going to do it both dc's burst into "the middle east has Israel Iran Iraq...." upon learning Israel was our first in depth study!

A few years ago dh gave me a choice of west coast(we were in the midwest) or England. Well I picked England. We ended up in the perfect place logistically for him. I had never set foot in this part of the country although I had visited close to 20 times. So I moved site unseen with the promise of moving on in a couple of years. I should be in Ireland now having already lived in Scotland for 2 years. Somehow we have settled. We moved to a little village and I like it. Knowing everyone is somehow OK now. I left a small town at 18 without many regrets other than leaving my family. I am so grateful for all the modern communication advances we have. Like Laura I worry about being settled for old age. I want to be somewhere I understand most things. Where we are the locals have lots of slang. Dh completely missed a big joke today. Right over his head -- I had to explain it at home.:lol: That is the one thing life here taught me -- foreign countries, even if you speak the language, present something new and interesting most days. Even after several years! All that being said I suspect when the dc's are no longer at home we will have another foreign move or two. This village could end up being the new homebase. The dc's would pack and go tomorrow!

Preface this with not reading other responses. Honestly no. Not homeschooled at time of graduation so they have moved on. No need. They should be made welcome to share their friend's"big day." Invited to the party as a friend but.... Have to admit I find this upsetting and I don't plan to have my dc's participate in a graduation ceremony anywhere so not something I value greatly. But I do value honesty...... Sorry if I am completely off track.

Galloping the Globe recommended Considering Gods Creation by Eagles Wings back when we used it. We loved it. Some of our best science ever. Great projects. I can add more later but on my way out now.

:hurray: Thank you!

I do like them but mine do have some sagging. I also collapsed a shelf this week. That being said I am really hard on bookcases. I tend to cram way more then normal on and they are surviving. 5 years old.