I do pray for your family and your sons. I wish I could do more. Sending hugs.........

Life of Fred is definitely being saved. We only have the books starting with Fractions. I also have a box with logic games like ThinkFun that has already been saved......it actually comes out occasionally.......

So far I have managed to find a set of Considering God’s Creation with the workbook. We loved assembling the solar system model that is in this book. Honestly I wanted it just for that but there are other fun hands on projects too. This book is what started me on my project. Professor B is not your typical elementary math program. The books are scripted and rather hands on 😉 including using your fingers instead of a manipulative. Dd loved these. I bought a set of the first three books on the used market so we have them. These with a white board and printing some worksheets could be an entire math curriculum. The first books title is Mathematics Power Learning for Children. I need to put together a complete set of the original 9 Magic School Bus books. Some have been loaned and never returned. A series of books by Linda Bailey called The Good Times Travel Agency were a huge favorite. The Viking one seems to be out of print so I plan to buy these soon. Murderous Maths ours were from the library. I will buy these.

On the High School Board there is currently a thread regarding cleaning out our masses of curriculum clutter which got me thinking...... Because of a huge clear out when we moved I gave away many things for early elementary especially that I now regret. My kids are college students so no grandkids yet but Dd definitely plans to homeschool. I have been talking to a friend who is preparing to start the journey in a couple of years and discovered some of my favorites are no longer easy to obtain, probably no longer published. but can still be found used. I have actually started rebuying a few of my favorites so I can put together a box of the best. I have room for 1 more box......... What would you put in the box? My eventual plan is an elementary, middle, and high school box so all grades are fair game here. Things that are special and unique. What are you planning to keep just in case? eta.......I just posted this by accident so let’s start!

Unless your sister has serious state regulations I think finding Grandpa an easy do two pages a day math curriculum and having something on level to maintain the reading skills is the important part. They are all young. Maybe they could keep a journal of what they did with Grandpa........honestly Grandpa would probably treasure a notebook filled with what he did with the kids. I think the other school activities depends on your dad’s interests........let him enjoy sharing in his grandkids learning. My Dad would had done awesome nature walks and building skills.....your sisters yard would have been filled with bird feeders! My father in law would have loved the Critical Thinking books mentioned above and science experiment books. The legos would have gotten quite a workout with him in charge!

I just have to say this........I ruthlessly pruned because of a move years ago and have actually went on the second hand market and bought a few of my favorite K-3 things in recent months. Things that do not appear to be being published anymore but were awesome or might be hard to find later. This all came about from a discussion with a young mother who is in the home ed planning stages and as I looked for my favorite memories I realized they were going to be mighty hard to find in another decade plus when my kids might want the stuff for their kids. I have room for another box and decided to fill it. 😂

Sounds like the building is on the way to being finished! Woot!!!! Our guys are going to be out tonight so Dd and I have a girls tv night planned......probably not the typical girly choices as we are between Killing Eve and The Expanse but we are looking forward to it. Glad your dental visit went well. I need to get back to the Cleeland series.........I just started reading Marie Force’s Fatal series again after @melmichigan posted about the most recent installment. 😢

Does she/or some other family member carry a bag that is common? Maybe someone else changed and returned stuff to the bag thinking it was someone else’s.

When my Dd hit 13 I still used the same Clinique products I found thirty years before. Dd is much more adventurous with makeup then I am and watches YouTube etc to learn how to use the products. She also doesn’t have my product allergies........I have a good time picking out 4 or 5 items for her to try each birthday and Christmas. She seems to really like Burt’s Bees and Neutrogena brands. I have discovered I love Burt’s Bees lip gloss myself! Since your Dd is the only girl she might really like to start having some girly stuff of her own. Maybe a cute make up bag and some colored lip balm and tinted sun screen for her face. Nothing major just a start since her friends are a bit older.

Can not say how helpful an aesthetician can be ............and my son listened. He was older than 13 but I wish we had done it then. The gal who does DS’s hair is an aesthetician also. She used to do birthday parties and apparently tween girls loved it. I thought she was incredibly blunt but Ds soaked it all up and before she talked to him I didn’t think he cared at all. She moved out of the birthday party market and now does hair and free advice.....I make sure she is tipped well.😉 A couple of other great tips from her that ds actually does is Cetaphil face wash followed by Oil of Olay or the yellow Clinique mosterizer (ds uses this because I already had it). and 5 days of good dandruff shampoo as needed.....it must have some ingredient that the Biolage one has and some cheaper ones don’t. We bought the Biolage and he has stuck with it. He alternates with a different Biolage product. His acme is so much better and he looks so handsome with his clean scrubbed with the good silicone scrubber hair. 😉

As far as shaving goes an electric razor was what Dd needed to be willing to use one regularly. I have always hated the stubble feel that is left but she is happy because there is no pain and she never cuts herself! Recently the gal who cut ds hair recommended he use a silicone scrubber when washing his hair. He is doing it because someone else suggested and the thing has really made a difference. He used to do a surface wash and actually has somewhat short hair but it was oily, constantly. We bought it from her but this is what they look like https://www.amazon.com/Shampoo-Massage-Brush-Assorted-Colors/dp/B0002RPTX4?th=1. They come in lots of colors, I got one for Dd too and she likes it also.

Sounds like you will have lots of great adventures! We love driving in the New Forest........sounds silly but we just look at the horses and the other wild life.

We haven’t flown out of Heathrow in years so we are far from experts on that airport but I will tell you what Dh and I think from what we hear from others. We would allow for 3 hours at the airport in part because of the rental car return. That extra hour may be needed and used during the trip up from Southampton. The M3 by Southampton seems to be notorious for long traffic jams and we have sat there frequently. The same for the area around Heathrow......last month we spent over an hour watching the planes when the M25 turned into a parking lot by Heathrow. So I would also build an extra hour at least into your travel drive time just in case. No matter what google or your sat nav says. We flew out of Gatwick last month in the early afternoon. Security was pretty quick at that time and I was impressed but I would still go through as soon as you can. There will be plenty of places to window shop and eat on the other side.

I never heard of sea salt spray before this thread so I am no help but I am really curious. I have lots of allergies to hair products so I need to proceed with caution but would love something to control my hair so I plan to follow your thread. 😉 Sea salt sounds like it has potential if I can find the most basic one. One of the reviews of Not Your Mother’s said that it smells wonderful........is it scented heavily?

A few weeks ago I put two “Gone Girl Like” thrillers from my library’s newly purchased section on my hold’s list because I was in the mood for some thing a bit different. Admittedly I seem to be switching to back thrillers again 😉 but both my initial books have now appeared and been read. Since I suspect both will be making the summer beach reads lists so thought I would mention both here .........The French Girl https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/35235624-the-french-girl sort of meanders along so really not a page turner, but interesting. Six students from Oxford went on holiday to France 10 years ago and become involved with the French girl next door. When they return to England they learn she has not been seen since their departure and are questioned. Now 10 years later her body is found and they are all suspects. The story is told by Kate, from the North and State Schools, who was always the outsider in the group. The book grew on me as I continued, at first I simply kept reading because it was the easiest book I had concentration wise 😂 but by the end I was quite invested in the main character.........My other beach read book was The Flight Attendant https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/35506211-the-flight-attendant?ac=1&from_search=true which I read last week. It really was a page turner with a main character who was a mess, an alcoholic flight attendant who sleeps around. One morning she wakes up covered in blood with the dead guy beside her in bed. No memory.........the book is what she does after. Both of these books failed to really explain the solutions to my satisfaction but they were entertaining!😋 Thanks, I think I am feeling quite a bit better. Have you read Robard before? I know I have read several of Robard’s stand alones over the years but failed to keep track of them. She has a couple of other series out there that I may try and assemble and read.

I always try and find a house with a ground floor master. If I can’t have that a mud room type bathroom downstairs is acceptable so I know I can live in the living room if I have to. Too many bed rest pregnancies for me. Also back surgery at 30 which forbid stairs for many weeks. When my kids were little it was easier to be on the same floor but now they are older I like having my own space.

I just read all four books in Karen Robard’s Dr. Charlotte Stone series. They take place one after another with cliff hangers and I just got completely hooked. Charle (Dr. Stone) is a psychiatrist who studies serial killers complete with an office in the prison that houses many death row inmates...one of her cases is murdered in front of her and his ghost attaches himself to her because she can see him, and other ghosts of the recently departed. Yep, I kept on reading. 😂. Great escapism, adult scenes..... perfect for a couple of days when I still can’t seem to stop sneezing. This is the first in the series https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/13114564-the-last-victim. On to Tombland, the new Shardlake Tudor mystery by CJ Sansom. This series is a great favorite of mine because it simply isn’t typical Tudor......in this book Edward is King. https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/40095725-tombland?ac=1&from_search=true

Doone

My experience is mainly with former foster children (now adopted) and foster children who receive quite a bit of assistance at the primary school level. I have actually been extremely impressed with the progress one child has made in terms of speech and motor skills. His improvement is remarkable and all through the school. The specialists all come to the school in the village and it is quite extensive..... This being said children who have been in care are given front of the line preference for many services which can be really frustrating for many. The mentality is to wait and the service will come to you as opposed to the more aggressive attitude I tend to have.😉.

The quiz gave me Cobalt Blue.......... I have had a lazy weekend trying to recover from a virus brought home by my son. Hopefully I will follow his path and feel much better tomorrow. So I have read quite a bit and caught up on Grey’s Anatomy..........anyone else still watch after all these years? I finished a good suspense/thriller this afternoon called The Flight Attendanthttps://www.goodreads.com/book/show/35506211-the-flight-attendant. It was an easy page turner that starts with the main character ( alcoholic flight attendant) waking up next to a murdered man (first class passenger) in a hotel in Dubai. Best description is probably beach read. Disco for the Departed by Colin Cotterhill https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/979311.Disco_For_The_Departed is the third Dr. Siri book that I have read. This series takes place in Laos during the 70’s with the main character being the national coroner for Laos. I really enjoyed the first book but would probably class the next two as rabbit trail making....I have learned a bit. 😉. This is for my Asian Detectives 10 category. i also revisited recently discovered cozy author Victoria Gilbert with her Shelved under Murder https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/36263256-shelved-under-murder in her Library cozy series. In this one the Friends annual sale leads to murder. I like these.....

She also used the review book @Hoggirl linked.

Hugs

You are welcome whenever you want to join us! I believe you are the person who recommended Lady Appleton and the Face Downs......to me. Thank you! I have read the ones that are available to me and enjoyed them. Have you tried Fiona Buckley’s series featuring Ursula Blanchard which is also set in Elizabeth 1’s court? Very similar, so similar I had to be careful to space things out between the series! 😉 I keep meaning to try the Doomsday mysteries....... I only made it through the first two books in The Three Body Problem series but am curious regarding Ted Chiang. Will try and check that one out. Also thanks for the medieval list. I added it to my bookmarks and noticed there are links to other useful time periods. I could spend hours with those lists!

Oh wow! That article is so U.K. and I home schooled there for many years. Some odd things to remember about schools in England is every school has its own board. Both Dh and I have been asked to be on different school boards in the past but we refused. So obviously there can be quite a mixture sitting on each board. The board picks the dates for each set holiday like half term....approximately after six weeks of term time. Every school board in your area moves their dates around to suit themselves so every primary school in your district does not automatically have the same days off.......they generally do but don’t count on it. Add living in a village that sits where three separate government entities intercept like I do which makes it possible to end up with a kid in each which causes even more variation......week long holidays like half term are always over two weeks, occasionally three for our area. It’s a recipe for a family with children 7, 12, and 17 having very few school holiday dates that intercept. I knew a family that had roughly two weeks in the summer and December 23 to )an 2 in common one year. Not a lot of holiday choice. The fine for more than four days out of school a year (includes sick days that aren’t verified somehow) is about £100 to the school for each day you remove the child for a holiday, it is just Wild from an American perspective. Local parents are getting more vocal about paying these fines. Grade level in England is totally off your child’s date of birth. I have never ever heard of a child being held back or advanced, they simply move through the system with an occasional standardized exam to determine how they meet the requirements for the next school application round. We are currently waiting to hear where our neighbor’s oldest child will be placed for secondary......applied in October and results come out sometime in April. It’s a big deal because their younger child with special LD’s will automatically follow the older no LD child. There is little chance of changing the secondary for the younger apparently. I have known these kids for most of their lives and am frankly terrified because the local secondary is dreadful and the younger will not do well, I don’t think the older will do well there either if I am being honest. Only one experimental new school works for the younger and it is not a common one for our village. Home ed is actually on the table for next year as the alternative plan which makes me sad because it is not what the mom wants to do......I wanted to home ed. My family never registered in England although we are British because we always planned on the US exams when the time came and felt the LA would be of little use in preparing my children for exams they were unfamiliar with. Also Uni in the US for one degree was always the plan and we made sure that was known.....I always declined the need for the LA but always had current US exam results which complied with my US home state’s laws and a US umbrella school. The retired LA from the neighboring district attended our church which was unpleasant but we survived.....he loved to explain how my kids were thriving currently but home ed children are being cheated of the “experience” and were never going to succeed in life. He probably would have reported us happily but knew we had too much in terms of documentation etc. Rather like the article! 🤣 We never did the UK exams because finding a place to sit them is so hard......we had planned to do one for the experience. 😉 Which brings me to.....Most of my friends registered their children when they started home ed or ended up registered when they removed their children from school. Working with an LA through the primary years was not a problem. A couple of hours and a relatively pleasant report to prove to relatives you were doing just fine was how my friends saw it. They assumed this meant seats for exams at GCSE level would be found by the LA for their children. No deal. Useless. Hours wasted talking to the LA.......

Great quotes........I don’t remember the “born again” line so I am wondering if I am listening to the audiobook with the British version being read.......my audiobooks came from a US library. Ben Aaronovitch has also written for TV (just looked Dr. Who, the 7th Doctor......a Dalek episode) and these books are particularly good on audio imo. I know @JennW in SoCal recently listened to one and enjoyed it. The dialogue really fits the character’s voices when listening which I think is why the “me and so and so” ...... maybe because Aaronovitch started with tv. @Robin M. Are the walls in the photo blue gray or a dark gray? When I zoom in Kareni’s right, they look more gray then I thought. Either way the Tardis is going to look so cool!