Jr Master Gardener program: http://67.59.137.247/index.cfm

She mentions this in one of her audios - it is difficult to recommend books when some go in and out of print and, once she recommends a particular OOP book, the price can skyrocket. She also says that just because she recommends a particular edition does not mean you have to use it. That said. I picked it up at a local school district's used book sale. Brand new condition. Two dollars. :D

:lol:It may be more clear to you, but in the words of my 8-year-old son, "it is redundant to include the comma." In my former life, I was a copy editor and we were always told to never, ever use the serial comma. I was unsure how to approach it with my son, as most LA programs teach to use it but I hate it. Thankfully, he decided - on his own - that it is redundant to use a comma before the word 'and.' :D I have taught him that it is more important to be consistent - either use it every time or never use it.

We had a 9-year-old boy in our school district commit suicide. Every news article cited how much he had been bullied in school. This was several months ago, before it became such a 'hot' news story like it has been the past few weeks.

My son takes music lessons at the same time as two brothers, and their mother and I have gotten to know each other over the past few years, just chatting during the children's lesson time. She tells me often about the problems the oldest boy is having in school with bullying. Literally, it has brought tears to my eyes, what she has described. In my opinion, it crosses the line from 'bullying' to assault and battery. Her son is in counseling and is on anxiety medications. They keep extra glasses at the school, as her son has his glasses broken by this boy at least once a week. :001_huh: She was telling me recently that the superintendent of the school district had to step in and lead a counseling session for this class, as the bullying had escalated. And yet -- every time she talks about it, she ends with, "Yeah. You homeschool. But I think kids need to learn how to deal with the bullying." I seriously want to ask her what she thinks her son is learning from all this. Nothing good, that is for sure! My son has recently become the target of a bully in an after-school sport's program. So - yeah, even homeschooled only children can be bullied and "learn how to deal with it." :tongue_smilie:

Sadly, we are committed to a side-by-side fridge. We have an ill-placed island. It is way too close to the side of the kitchen with the fridge, so can't have any doors that open wide.

This is a spin-off from my post earlier this week about returning a fridge that you are not satisfied with. I went back to the store and they said that they have had almost every single one of these models come back because of the ice maker. :glare: Yeah. Thanks for continuing to sell it. Anyway. Now I need to buy another side-by-side fridge. I have searched on-line for days now. I have read over Consumer Reports, both in print and on-line. Almost every single review cites problems with the ice makers. I was wondering - has anyone bought a new fridge in the past year or so that you would recommend? I would really like one with an ice maker bin IN the freezer section, not on the door. Thanks!

Yeah. I know.That is what really ticks me off. Our old fridge wasn't working for six months - fridge freezing things, freezer not keeping things cold. I won't say more, as I know we aren't suppose to bash our spouses. Let's just say: the old fridge finally gave out totally at the worse possible time. Buying two fridges in one week was just beyond what I was mentally capable of right now. Seeing a fridge on the showroom floor - the handles don't look all that big. But in our small kitchen, with an island right in front of the fridge, the handles stick out way too far. So I totally accept that as my fault. Still. Do I want to spend the next decade cursing out the handles every time I walk into the kitchen? In five years, will I think spending $180 to return this fridge and find a model with thinner handles was money well spent? Mid-range.

Last week I bought two fridges. :glare: The first one was defective and I had to decline the delivery. It was the only one in the warehouse, so was back to Square One and had to start looking for another fridge. Second fridge was delivered. I hate it. It is way too big for the spot. (I had the exact dimensions that we could have, but I didn't realize that the door handles stick out nearly six inches from the front of the fridge.) The ice maker is awful. On the outside, it kicks ice out everywhere when you try to fill a glass. On the inside, only some of the ice makes it into the bin. The rest drops down the inside of the freezer. Right now the freezer is mostly empty and I am picking up a dozen or more pieces of ice throughout the freezer several times a day. I can't image doing this once I get the freezer full. There is more, but those are the big issues. We paid $90 to have it delivered. We can return it, but have to pay another $90. So that means we will be out $180 and still not have a fridge! :tongue_smilie: If we do return it, I will probably just buy a dorm-size fridge for the time being. I really don't have the time or energy to deal with this. Obviously, that isn't ideal. But I can't see spending 10 or more years with this fridge. (Our last fridge was 15 years old and really should have been replaced six months ago when it started acting up.) What would you do? I'm so sick over the whole deal. We have already lost several hundred dollars worth of food when our old one died last week.

I have double vision up close and it wasn't diagnosed until I was 8-9 years old and having problems reading. I wore glasses from age 5 on, so my parents assumed my vision was fine. Actual vision was, but my eyes were not tracking together. I do not know the name of what I have, but know that it is not correctable. I have had vision therapy and it doesn't affect me for the most part. I know how to 'hold' my eyes together to read up close and all is well. My son, on the other hand, has - what we have been told - is the exact opposite problem I have. He had double vision in the distance and had surgery 2 years ago to correct the strabismus. All eye issues like this need to be seen by an ophthalmologist. A regular eye doctor doesn't have the training or equipment to properly diagnosis.

Mine is very fast - I have actually been very amazed. Are you running the Task Killer daily? Don't know if that will help or not, but the salesperson told us that it needs to be done daily. Glad that changing the wallpaper helped. What is it with kids and changing the settings on the phone?! :glare: Every time DS hands me mine back, something has been changed.

Thank you so much for the input. I have been trying to figure out if I am just being too hormonal/moody regarding this or what. But I really feel :glare: about the whole deal and needed some unbiased opinions. I am suppose to teach one class a month, for a certain age group. Was suppose to be five classes. Then it turned into ten classes. Class/prep time should take 1.5 hours/class. But all the 'stuff' that goes with it (like mandatory meetings w/the city) is taking well over 10 hours/month. Class size suppose to be limited to 15. I just found out yesterday that the next class already has 30 children enrolled. Age range has been lowered a year, which means a four year age gap between youngest and oldest "preschool" age children. Not even sure how I am suppose to teach for a 4 year age gap at this level. Most of the parents 'drop and run' which means a lot of crowd control with 2- and 3-year-olds while trying to actually teach something to 5- and 6-year-olds. I have talked with the city employee three times already. The president of the club stepped in last month and reminded the city employee what the size/age limits of the class was to be. Then yesterday the city employee e-mailed me to tell me that the upcoming class had doubled in size. :001_huh: Now she is telling me that if I want to limit the size of the class, then I *need* to add a second class. I have already told her that there is no way possible I can (or will) add more classes to my schedule. And now I feel like I am in a pickle. What to do?!

I have been in a club for 10 years and held several assorted volunteer positions. Two years ago, a new position was created; the same volunteer held the job both terms. This year, she was going to move out of state and the job became available. I was asked if I wanted it. I accepted six months ago. I still have seven months in my term. The job has since just ballooned way out of proportion. It is working directly with the city (which I didn't know until one month in) and a city employee oversees everything. I strongly feel that what she is asking is above and beyond what is acceptable for a volunteer position. I spoke with the lady who held the position before and found out that that is more the reason she quit, as she already knew her move was delayed a year. I have an e-mail out to the club president and to the city employee telling them that I will willingly step aside and allow them to find another victim. Um, volunteer. It has been more than 24 hours and I haven't heard back from either one. DH thinks I should outright quit. Past volunteer told me that she would support me resigning. Still. It feels so wrong to quit. But I honestly don't know if my health can stand another seven months. Is it so terrible to quit? Next 'duty' is this upcoming Tuesday, so I feel like I will be leaving them in a lurch.

:iagree: My DH and I grew up in the same small town, same decade. But our families were vastly different. As an example: His family lived on a farm and kept chickens. His mother always did all the work of 'dressing' chickens by herself. She still groans about how awful it was. DH doesn't have a clue what 'dressing' chickens involves. To him, you buy chickens chopped up into pieces at the grocery store. I grew up in town, but all my extended family kept chickens. When it was that time of the year, all the family would go to one relative's house one weekend and it was "all hands on deck" to dress chickens. Even from a small age, my sister and cousins helped out. We were 'promoted' to bigger jobs every year - from chasing down the headless chickens to dipping/plucking to actually cutting up the chickens. At the end of the day, we had a large family meal, complete with homemade ice cream. (The guys did all the hard, heavy or dirty work, then they sat around and cranked the ice cream machine and chatted while the ladies finished off the chickens.) Every weekend for a month, we would go to a different extended family member's farm until everyone had their chickens 'dressed.' My sister and cousins all have grand memories about this time we spent together. I imagine it was hard work for the adults to teach us children how to do each step. But I have always been comfortable buying a whole chicken and cutting it up, not a skill that most people now days know how to do. Anyway. My point was - my MIL has always had the attitude that it was easier to do it yourself than teach a child how to do the job. She has four children that entered adulthood not knowing how to do basic skills. Literally, she is my inspiration! :lol: When I think about how hard it is to teach my child how to do chores, I think about how hard it will be on him if I don't teach him!

Goodness! Please let us know when it is published. I love nature books -- and MCT stuff. The combo may just send me over the deep end. :lol: I second the recommendation to just get out there and let kids play around. Take them to a creek to play. Take them on a nature hike. Let them start rock collections. Start a display of seasonal items, like acorns and seed pods. I seriously have a dozen "nature study" book but don't have any particular one I recommend, as I love them all.

Well, I have a boy, but I want him to know how to run a house and cook a decent meal. I was on bed rest when I was pregnant and nearly starved to death because my DH doesn't know how to do more than put together a sandwich. I lived boxes of cold cereal. :tongue_smilie: Needless to say, knowing how to cook is high on my list of life skills my son will learn before he leaves home! DS and I decided on a cookbook and we are working our way through the book. He has to read the recipe and we decide together what we need to buy and make sure those items are written down on our grocery list. I have schedule 'home ec' one day a week - we cook a recipe, clean or do some chore, etc. Otherwise, I just work on good habit training - making sure dirty laundry is put where it belongs, making sure shoes are put away, assisting with laundry, etc. I also take DS to the grocery store with me and let him pick out produce so that we can talk about what to look for with each item. Granted, I don't do that each and every time. There are some times we just run through the store and buy what we need. But I try to plan to go to the store right after lunch one day a week, as that is when they are least busy so we have room to shop around.

I read "Classics in the Classroom" earlier this year and took 10 pages of notes. What I got out of the book: Just read great books. Talk about the books with your students/children. Nothing more. Nothing less. The book actually felt very "Charlotte Mason-like" to me. If you read quality books to your children and expect them to 'rise up' that that level of vocabulary and literature, they will. But if you feed their minds with junk books, they will never learn to appreciate quality literature. A quote from the book: Intelligent people will have different opinions about good questions. You might even say that any book so simple that its full meaning is obvious is unsuitable for use in the gifted classroom, and that any book worth its salt will resist full analysis forever. Pick deep books, and join your students in the joy of perplexity.

Exactly.I actually sat in on several of his lectures at an "unschooling" conference. But even in that format, he was extremely pro-homeschooling, no matter what method you followed.

My dad raised six children. I begged him to let me drop out and he wouldn't agree to it. I hated school and never even attempted to do the work. I was passed along and graduated somewhere around 125 out of 130 students. I decided later in life that I wanted to go to college. I aced the entrance exam and went on to graduate top of my class. By the time my brother came along, my dad allowed him to drop out. He later went to college and is now very successful. I think that Gatto's point (from having read all his books and attending his lectures in person) is that - for many children, our public school system is highly irrelevant. They are the children that 'think outside the box' and don't fit in with our current public school system where everyone must move along at the same speed, learning the same things. My BIL - to this day - thinks that he is stupid because he failed public school. Yet he is an extremely successful electrician earning more than I could ever dream of. If you read the book "Genius Denied," they state that something like 25% of high school dropouts are actually gifted, but 'bored' with school. Those are the dropouts that are going to find their gift in life and pursue it and be successful. http://www.davidsongifted.org/default.aspx I think his point is - at the college level - you take whatever avenue leads you down the path you want to travel. For some, that will be MIT. For others, it will be a trade school. Just my own 2 cents.

We watch a number of National Geographic videos/DVDs from the library for our schooling - but view as they pertain to our current studies. Guess that isn't very original. :tongue_smilie: We just watch and discuss.

:grouphug: My DH just had surgery a few weeks ago and we had a $5,000 deductible, too. They wouldn't even schedule the surgery until we paid a percentage of it, then we had to pay the remainder the morning of surgery. The hospital told us that if we didn't have the money, we could apply for a special 'credit card.' It was 18 months, no interest, only used for the hospital/surgery expenses. I think that is the new way they are doing billing. For our son's surgery 2 years ago, we were billed after, then we made payment arrangements with the hospital. Now you have to have all your "financing" in place prior to surgery. I am so sorry you are going through this. Do you have any children's hospitals in your area that may take your daughter's care?

:iagree:I only homeschool one child, but we are always switching gears and going off in new directions and exploring different paths. I follow The Latin-Centered Curriculum for the base of our schooling, which leaves us with time to meander and have fun.

Background: While we were visiting family earlier this year, a relative's dog bit our son two times and broke through the skin four times. It was not at all a 'mean' bite - rather too many boys running wild on a farm and the dog got wound up and jumped up on DS and bit him on the arm. We called our pediatrician to ask if DS's tetanus shot was current. The nurse said we needed to take DS to a doctor immediately and get him on an antibiotic. As we were traveling the next day and didn't want the hassle of having the bites get infected while we were on the road, we did decide to take DS to the ER. Doctor wasn't even concerned about DS's dog bites and was more concerned about *another* wound (split lip due to bumped heads) he got while running wild with his boy cousins. :glare: Fast forward -- Last week we got a 'supplication' request from our former insurance company requesting information so they can go after our relative's home owner's insurance. DH thinks we can ignore it and it will go away. :confused: We do have a different health insurance than we had then, so no ties to this insurance company. We would both rather pay for the cost of the ER visit ourselves then to file against this relative's insurance. If they force the issue, is that even possible? Anyone have any experience with this? Thanks in advance!

I would go out to Tybee Island and walk the beach. :D We went there 1.5 years ago and DS still asks to go back. I don't remember the cost, but we enjoyed touring a lighthouse and visiting a small marine science center.

Just wanted to say that I am super jealous! We love the Omaha Zoo, but live 600+ miles away. We visit the zoo whenever we are 'home.' When we were there in May, the trainers were in with the lemurs. DS loved watching the trainers work with the animals. The butterfly house was very educational, on its own. Have you been since they opened the sky rides? That gives you an interesting view of some of the animals.