Here a raisin is large and soft and dark brown. A sultana is a mid size, lighter colour and also soft. A currant is small, black and hardish.

Pretty much all toothpaste here is mint (in Australia), you can get some kiddie varieties that are not mint but even then it is not common. toothpaste is mint

To me a skivvy is a stretchy t-shirt with long sleeves and a roll neck (turtle neck) but it is not a jumper (sweater)

That depends on personal preference. I always whip cream with a little sugar and a little vanilla. My mother just whips plain cream with nothing added.

Whipped cream. Very thick. And you put cream in coffee??? Milk is for coffee not cream

Oh and I have absolutely no idea what on earth root beer is. I always assumed it was like ginger beer but this thread has told me otherwise. If it is indeed "cherry" flavour as some seem to indicate then that would taste like medicine and it not something I would enjoy at all, yuck!

Ok, aussie here :) Soft drink is what we call all sweet fizzy drinks (not soda water though). Lemonade is a type of soft drink, is is generally a fairly neutral flavour and not lemony and certainly not limey. Sprite is a brand name of a type of lemonade. Sprite does not taste of lemons or limes. Different soft drinks are called by their brand name Coke, Fanta (orange) or by their flavours for such as lime soft drink, orange soft drink, cola etc. Lemony soft drinks are generally called lemon squash or pub soda. These are NOT lemonade. Home made lemonade is lemon juice, water and sugar. It is very different to soft drink and it is not "lemonade", it is more like a home made lemon cordial. Cordial is a sweet syrup, normally fruit flavoured and very sweet that you add to flavour water. It is not alcoholic. Scones are made with self raising flour, butter and milk. They are cut into circles. They can be sweet or savory but traditional scones are just flour, butter and milk. See the post 2 up from here, those pics linked for a pinafore and a jumper (for Britain) are the same as for here.

The next levels of mind benders are good for an advanced child, my dd finished levels 3 and 4 this year at age 7 (2nd grade), they are for grades 3-6. We also like the primarily logic book and pretty much any logic/critical thinking book from prufrock press or critical thinking co, generally I find you need to go one or 2 levels above the recommended for their age, that might just be my kids but we have never found the ones on their grade level to be a challenge at all

This year for 4th my dd did sewing, she is just about to finish her first quilt. Next year for 3rd and 5th my girls are doing cooking, the plan is that they have to cook dinner and dessert one night a week building up to cooking a complete meal on their own using recipes.

Thanks Lori, some of those look like what I am looking for. The kids are familiar with gardening, we have always had large gardens before this current house. The difference is that before they have always helped out in an established garden with their daddy, this time around they will be starting completely from scratch with their own garden bed each to look after. So they have never planned the garden beds, prepared the soil and worked out what to plant, when and where on their own, they have just helped. We will have other garden beds too and they will be able to observe their father doing the rest but I am wanting them to have a completely independent project. They will even build the raised beds themselves (well the 8 and 10yo's will, the 5yo maybe not...) And yes it is going to be a huge lifestyle change, until 10 months ago we have always lived in a city. We are currently in a small country town but looking to be on our own farm and being as self sufficient as possible asap. We are all really excited and have heaps of plans. We just need to get the bank to come to the party (we are close, so close to affording what we want) and to find the right place, we have been house hunting for 6 months now.

Hi, we are (hopefully) buying a small farm soon. Once we move I am wanting to do a semester long unit on permaculture/gardening with the kids, ages 8 and 10 (grades 3 and 5). Bonus points for a unit my 5yo kindy kid will appreciate too. And even more bonus points for Australian books/programs. So, I am looking for a book, curriculum or course that will run through basic permaculture (preferably) or gardening with my girls. I want it to cover the how to of planning, setting up the garden, planting, harvesting etc. They will each be in charge of their own garden from planning stage through to harvest and food prep/storage. Ideally what I would love is a program that would take them through that entire process step by step. Does this exist? Please tell me the perfect program exists just waiting for us! I think what I ideally need is a beginners how to on gardening for kids and a kids guide to permaculture. Those 2 will most likely be different resources which is fine. Any suggestions on these? Books? Courses? Curricula? They will also be designing and building a greenhouse from scratch with dh. Any resources that you can recommend on this topic would be great too. Thanks

My older 2 are 8 and almost 10, has not happened yet across all subjects. dd9's writing is still problematic. dd8 is still struggling with basic spelling, handwriting and composition, I fear we may never be able to read a word she writes due to the spelling and handwriting. Next year I am doing a big writing focus with dd9, she will be in 10 and in 5th grade and we just need to get her composition skills up to scratch, I could easily place her at least 2 grade levels above her age in all other areas but her writing ability is really holding her back

Come to Australia. No language issues, decent weather, beautiful scenery and homeschooling is not uncommon and growing all the time. :) Seriously, it is a great place! To answer the question at this stage of our lives I would choose England but only for a couple of years, I will always come home to Australia. There are many other places on our list but given ages and current family dynamics England would be our best best and I love it there, so much history. When kiddos are a bit older (and ASD kiddo not needing as much therapy) then we will expand out list, we have serious looked at it before and plan on actually going one day soonish.

We are in australia too. I start my wish list very early, at least 6 months before we need it. I generally buy during the september sales or Black Friday/Cyber Monday for any downloadable curricula. I think I have everything ready for next year, I bought one last item this week in the current sales. It really depends on the curricula you want, some have great sales at predictable times and others are never on sale so it makes no difference when you order.

Has anyone completed round 2 yet? My dd did it today, I was not in the room so do not know what the questions were like but they were either way harder than round 1 or she was having a bad day. She seems fairly convinced she got everything wrong and judging by the fact that she called out "I have no idea, I don't know what to do" more than a handful of times (to be told to just have a go or guess if you really can't figure it out) I am guessing it did not go well. I am surprised she found it so hard though, she aced the first one and before doing round 2 today I got her to do the practice questions for the next grade level category above her current one and she aced that too. Well, I guess we will see in a couple of weeks

My dd only entered the math comp, we received an email about qualifying for the second round 3 days ago

I go by the grade level they would be by age and when in doubt over age (my #1 dd is right on the cutoff so could be G3 or G4 this year) I go with the grade we have decided to call her for homeschool which is G4 this year.

Accepted to the second round here too, now to figure out who we can get to supervise and how that can happen

I allow a calculator only when the lesson involves a lot of long and tedious calculations that are not the point of the actual lesson. If there are only a couple of long and tedious calculations on the page that day then she does them by hand but if the point of the lesson is not the actual calculations and there are a lot then I allow a calculator for the answer but only once she has set up the question and done all possible steps to make it as simple as possible. We are using AoPS and I have only allowed a very basic calculator, it just does the 4 basic functions.

We got the email saying the test had been done and they would be in touch the next day

DD did the maths one yesterday, she enjoyed it. I think we won't hear about round 2 until after round 1 is completed

We used the evan moor daily geography however we do a "week" in one day. It is quick and easy and very open and go

actually truth be told I never even realised there was a social groups tab lol, i have only ever used the forum

Thank you! I was looking everywhere in the forum tab and did not realise it was under the social groups tab.

I am glad I am not the only one, I have been wanting to join it for quite a while but could never figure out how to.