I just wanted to say that while I believe that a general remembrance of the holocaust is common knowledge, I don't think the specific name of "Auschwitz" is anymore. I definitely think it SHOULD be, though! It seems that many people are wanting the shield their children from the specific and real horrors of the past so the details are getting left out. I can't seem to wrap my head around this thinking seeing what many of these same people allow their children to watch/listen to in regards to movies and music! :confused:

No... for a few reasons. Her frame is so narrow that it would be difficult to keep up a strapless dress, especially moving like she would at a prom. I do realize she is only 10 (I need to update my sig line), but our homeschool group does a family prom at the end of the year and I've seen her "dance", lol! Also, her height is mostly in her torso... she's wearing an adult XS leotard for gymnastics even w/o any hint of a bosom. I think that would make the skirt portion way too short to effectively cover her undies while moving.

I've fed my mixed breed Innova, Wellness, and are currently going through a bag of Castor & Pollux Natural Ultramix... she seems to like the C&P best of all. If you have a Tractor Supply Co. nearby, they have really good prices on the high end foods as well as their own brand, 4Health, that is really highly rated. I've also been known to clean out the freezer when we're low on bagged food- raw fish and deer sausage mixed with fresh spinach, carrots, yogurt, tomatoes, eggs, etc. I just put some in her bowl before I cook it for the family.

As the OP, I'd like to try to clarify a few points. I was putting this question out there because the 2 remaining founding members of our group are getting close to graduating their youngest children and the main leadership will then change dramatically. As an officer, I was curious if our SOF specifically excluded other Christians or whether it could be simply tweaked w/o throwing it out altogether (some strongly believe it should stay but could be changed). The bylaws were intentionally written over 15 yrs ago as a result of a very bad split from another group in which there were a LOT of deeply hurt feelings. The other group has since dissolved, but this one has remained strong. The founding members wanted to make sure everyone was on the "same page" so that another major incident/split like the previous one would not happen. However, some of us who have more recently joined, but are officers, are considering other ways of doing things. No one sits down with the prospective members and says, "This is our interpretation of the SOF, and you must interpret it the same way." Every family takes the words as they are written, interprets them on their own, and decides if they wish to join or not. Personally, I never read the first point to say that the Bible was the ONLY Word of God... just the only infallible one. Also, I didn't take it to mean only the Bible of, say Baptists over that of Catholics - aren't they both simply called the Bible by those who practice that faith? And as far as "the unity of believers", I read that as all Christians belonging to the same body... the unity of the church regardless how the different denominations split hairs of specific ideologies. Only God knows who is saved, renewed, reborn, whatever you wish to call it. In my personal family, we have Church of Christ, Southern Baptist, Non-denominational, and Life Tabernacle. We may not agree on everything, but we agree that God is sovereign, Jesus died to give us new life, and we will one day live with Him in Heaven. Currently, our group has some Baptists (at least 3 different "flavors"), some other Protestants (not sure which but definitely NOT any variety of Baptist), and at least one family that doesn't align with any denomination at all and chooses to study scripture as a family w/o a church body at all.

I was reading the Catholic/Protestant thread about the statement of faith and got to wondering about my own group's SOF. We have the word "Christian" as part of our group's name and require prospective members to attend at least 3 meetings before applying for membership so that everyone can get an idea as to whether we will be a good fit for their family or not. We are not a co-op, just a close-knit support group that shares with and leans on each other as well as providing lots of activities for the kids. We are also not affiliated with any particular church. I'd like to know if there was anything in our SOF that would be offensive to any who calls themselves Christian... whether Catholic, Orthodox, or whatever. Thanks! We believe the Bible to be the inspired, the only infallible, authoritative Word of God. We believe that there is one God, eternally existent in three persons: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. We believe in the deity of our Lord Jesus Christ, in His virgin birth, in His sinless life, in His miracles , in His vicarious and atoning death through His shed blood, in His bodily resurrection, in His ascension to the right hand of the Father, and in His personal return in power and glory. We believe that for salvation of lost and sinful man, regeneration by the Holy Spirit is absolutely essential and that salvation is received through faith in Jesus Christ as Savior and Lord. We believe in the present ministry of the Holy Spirit. We believe in the resurrection of both the saved and the lost. They that are saved unto the resurrection of life and they that are lost unto the resurrection of ****ation. We believe in the spiritual unity of believers in our Lord Jesus Christ. This SOF is in our bylaws, and by signing the membership agreement, a family is agreeing to all that is in our bylaws.

That's my dd... She was only 29 lbs when she started preschool at 4 yrs old, and is still under 60 lbs at 10 yrs old and 55" tall. She's always calling herself a skinny-minni or something similar. The WIC nutritionists were always wanting me to put mayo in her fruit, extra butter and full-fat milk, and oils in all her food because she was so small. What they didn't understand was that her daddy was 6'4" and only 175 lbs when I married him! Then he grew another 2" after we married. Ds takes after my side of the family, though. I'm barely 5'2". I have a friend, though, whose 8 yr old dd is taller than her 12 yr old ds... and another friend whose dd is almost 13 and wears a children's size 8 or 9. She's a very proficient dancer and dances every night of the week, so she's very strong and athletic, just small.

My life would be soooo much easier if I could sleep till 11 am or later everyday and stay up till 3 or 4 am each night/morning. I am much more productive/energized in the late evening through early morning hours. Unfortunately, that kind of schedule doesn't work with being a single mom and needing to teach classes for my homeschool group for extra money.

I have mine on the back porch, too. This past winter was the coldest we've had in a while with well below avg temps and lots of snow, and this summer is definitely on the HOT side. It hasn't seemed to make any difference to the freezer. Also, my ex-MIL always kept hers in a detached garage in MS that didn't even have garage doors. It's been there for at least 20 years and is still going strong.

She sounds just like my dd that has just turned 10! Except from the examples you gave, your dd actually spells MUCH better.:tongue_smilie: We started by talking with her pediatrician who referred us for the psych eval back when she was 7 and were sent from there to an occupational therapist. Her OT said she was a good candidate for vision therapy, but we simply cannot afford it at all and our insurance won't cover it. The OT also referred her to speech and she was receiving that until our insurance abruptly decided to stop paying for it. After the homeschool conference this year, we're now trying some things from Dianne Craft nutritionally as well as teaching methods and I'm seeing amazing differences. She's starting to eat foods she wouldn't have even thought about touching 2 months ago and just today learned to spell 4 words forwards and backwards that she had no clue about before. It took just 15 minutes for success where all the writing words, workbooks, letter tiles, computer programs, etc. we had tried before failed. I know others have not seen results with Dianne Craft's materials, but it's working for us. HTH BTW, dd has dyspraxia, a cognitive disorder-NOS, ADHD, and visuospatial delays. We've used Earobics and Brainware Safari at home in addition to the above therapies. But, to really answer your questions, I would suggest starting with her physician, if his referral is needed to get these other evaluations covered under your insurance.

:iagree: This one... as well as the one saying I'm spending too much on car insurance and there's this new law that proves it.

Stephen Lawhead has several along that vein. Pendragon Cycle: Taliesin Merlin Arthur Pendragon Grail Song of Albion series: The Paradise War The Silver Hand The Endless Knot Raven King trilogy: Hood Scarlet Tuck Also, there's a new series by Matthew Christian Harding called The Peleg Chronicles. I found it at my homeschool convention. It's young earth, dragon fiction and here's a description about the first book, Foundlings from his website: Foundlings, book one of The Peleg Chronicles is Historical Fiction that takes place in the time period of Peleg, soon after the tower of Babel dispersion. In its pages we meet dragons, giants, false priests, the death hunt, an under-city of the Dwarven Brotherhood, and many memorable characters. I've only read the first book, but it was a good (if quick) read... providing you are open to the ideas presented. :D

My favorite author is Stephen Lawhead. He does fantasy/historical fiction/allegory and it is very easy to get drawn in to his characters. King Raven Trilogy (interesting take on the Robin Hood legend) Song of Albion Series (very Celtic with battles and intrigue) Pendragon Cycle (Merlin & King Arthur) Celtic Crusades Series Dragon King Series Patrick: Son of Ireland

My dd struggled with this and honestly, anything I tried to "make it uncomfortable" for her didn't work. She didn't have a dry night until she was almost 8 years old. I would have her strip the bed and remake it. If she woke up wet in the middle of the night, she would have the extras right there and was told to take care of it herself. There wasn't any punishment involved, but like you said... it happened and it needed to be taken care of. I always encouraged getting out of bed to use the bathroom before falling asleep and wouldn't let her change into the "night time pants" until after she had already used the bathroom and changed into pj's. Changing was the last thing to happen before climbing into bed. I also didn't check to see if she had wet before falling asleep since she always took FOREVER to get to sleep, and I didn't want to accidentally arouse her by checking. She would also sometimes stay in her Goodnights in the morning until I asked her to change it. But we had a long talk about the infections or rashes she could get by sitting in her body's waste for long periods of time and that helped her to stop. Then finally, one day she just started being dry. We didn't change drinking habits, eating habits, bedtime routines... nothing changed except that she was now dry. Interestingly, that happened about the time she began to be able to read. No amount of phonics, reading lessons, practice had made any sort of progress until she started staying dry at night.

Do you not have a library website/account that would allow you to recheck your books online even when they are closed? That is what I always do when my books are due on a day they are closed. But then, our library allows you to recheck books that are already overdue so that the fines don't keep accumulating... but only if you have any renews left. We can only recheck 3 times before an item must be turned in. I'm sorry you're having such a hassle with your new librarian.

Interesting.... I just tried it using GoodSearch and can't find any mention of Moby. I even looked past page 8 and the Wiki article wasn't there and neither were these board listings! ETA: Of course, GoodSearch uses Yahoo! so it's probably a moot point.

They also seem similar to Dianne Craft's Right Brain Sight Word Cards. But she only includes 32 words in the set.

Me, too.

I was in my sophomore year in college and had a friend convince me to get a modem for my computer. I waited 3 months for the new "high speed" 2800/800 KB version to come out so I could open up my computer case and manually install it. I didn't have a browser, just a local phone number to call which didn't cost me anything. Because I didn't have a browser, there were no pictures. I looked up virtually everything using only script based searches in green text on a black screen.... basically from a DOS prompt. I thought it was soooo cool, lol!

I LOVE Netflix for schooling! This past year we did MFW Exploring Countries & Cultures, and I was able to find documentaries for almost every country/ecosystem covered. They also have a lot of LeapFrog videos, PBS educational cartoons, and other such things for the younger set. It's a great resource for our house.

Sadly, if my church did this, there would not be any children's programs at all... no Sunday School, no Wed night Bible studies, no choirs, nothing. We often have 12 to 20 kids from ages 3-6 show up for the Bible/Missions program and preschool choir (on different nights) and never more than 2 people "available" to volunteer. Same issue with the elementary ages. Everyone wants to drop their children off so they can enjoy/concentrate on their own service/study and will.not.volunteer or apply to be a paid worker. We ask and ask and ask, but no one else steps up. Also, the church leadership are concerned that people will stop coming and bringing their kids if we refuse to keep taking them even when understaffed. They would rather we have the problem of too many kids if it means that more people are hearing God's word.

I understand this is a great goal to have... but sometimes it is physically impossible. I am in charge of my church's paid nursery workers. We have very few that are even willing to do this job even when it is paid that I often can only get 2 workers per room. Our church building is set up so that the only bathroom in the children's wing is down the hall and not connected to ANY room. We can't take all the children down to the bathroom when only 1 or 2 need to go, so one worker takes those that need to go potty, and the other stays in the room with the other children. I don't like the situation, but that's the reality that we have to deal with.

My church does background checks on every single person that works with our children... including volunteers that only help for 1 hour during worship services 1x a month. You are not allowed to help with any age group (even teens) until the background check results come back.

I did this past year, but I won't be doing it again. Yes, it did help me to stick with our curriculum and get through the non-skill areas, but my dd's math and LA ended up falling through the cracks. She has many learning issues that require intense teaching from me and I just didn't have the time/energy to devote to it once I was done with my other student who was also woefully behind in math... but I was getting paid to teach the other student and so HAD to get her more up to speed. I am a single mom and even though the extra money was helpful, it wasn't enough to justify the time it took away from teaching my own dd. We are now continuing our math and LA through the summer to get back on track even though I'm really ready for a bit of a break from school. Also, my ds often felt excluded since the other student was with us for so much of the school day. He was often left to amuse himself and couldn't stay in the same room as the rest of us because of this other student's distractibility - she's 12 and very ADD. She had been on medication, but I found she was easier to handle without it. She may have been more distracted, but at least she wasn't falling asleep any time there was a quiet moment.

My church is doing our VBS this week and it's completely free. Every.single.kid who comes is getting their own bible as well. The pre-schoolers up through K get the Ergermeier's (sp?) Story Bible, the early elementary get the Adventure Bible for Early Readers, and the upper elementary through 6th graders get a study bible (I can't remember the exact title). We've had over 200 kids so far. We're doing the Go Fish Guys Backstage with the Bible and the kids are LOVING it! All snacks are donated by church members and all room decorations are provided by the teachers out of their own pocket so it's not glamorous... but they're there to learn about the Bible & God, NOT ooh and ahh over decorations!

This reminded me of a footbll fundraiser in my home town! It's called the Cow Patty Classic. You "buy" a portion or two of the football field and then, at halftime, they let a cow loose and wait for it to relieve itself. The person who "owns" that portion of the field wins a prize and the rest of the money goes to the football team!