I like IEW for a couple of reasons. First, I am not a writer nor do I remember anything I was taught about writing in school (except for those silly notecards for my high school research paper), and I feel like IEW really helps walk me through--from a beginning level--how to teach my children. I may be in the minority, but I like the dress-ups, I like the checklists. And that is the reason why my oldest is doing well with IEW. He thrives in knowing exactly what is expected of him, and IEW's checklists, etc, do just that.

I keep thinking about how sick my kids were in late April into early May, just as the news reports started coming out about it. Plus, their symptoms matched what was being reported. I do keep wondering if I'm wrong and next week when we're supposed to travel if they'll all be sick! :001_smile:

This is a keeper! How does the blogger know dh so well?? :001_smile:

if my kids had it late this past spring. When the news reports started coming out, mine were down with the same symptoms as H1N1, and it was a LENGTHY illness! I had the news on while giving one of my kids medication one day and laughed when they reported the "first" case in our county. I thought, "nope, we were the first." Could have been a virus, but I'd love to know if they're immune.

I agree with the above poster who said something about "every dad thinks his son is the next best thing,". My dh included, too. Our oldest son, 10, has been in baseball since he was 4, and it's so much fun, but I'd encourage you to take it slow. We've stuck with Little League, and I think we'll continue. It's competitive enough, but nothing like the travel teams around here(ds's LL season, including all-stars, lasted for 50+ games. Too many, IMO, but travel teams can play almost twice that). Sure, it's got a prestigous feel to it, but around here (SW Ohio), even travel teams are a dime-a-dozen. Meaning, there are a lot of really, really good baseball players, especially in the 8-10-12 yr.-old range. Two other things I'd keep in mind is that young boys can slowly do a lot of damage to their arms if they pitch too much, and the amount of ball we committed to this summer really took away from time with our immediate family (including our other children), friends, church, etc. It's been very eye-opening for us. Best wishes. It's hard to know the best path to take!

:iagree:

We review our CC memory work as we start each day. My daughters (7 and 5) use SOTW, my son (10) will still do some SOTW but I'm going to start transitioning him to more independent history work, using Kingfisher and other WTM recommended resources for the logic stage. The wonderful thing is seeing my children "connecting-the-dots" of history based on their memory work.:001_smile: I, too, hope you enjoy CC!

:iagree:

My husband and I would race home from work to watch the PBS game show when we were newlyweds!:D I need to check out Netflix as I know my kids would love these. Thanks for the reminder!

Our options are so much better now...I really appreciate the information.

We're planning a Sept. vacation to Washington, DC, but looking into a place for our family of 6 to stay is looking really, really expensive. We'd like some sort of suite, so we'd have a kitchenette for some of our meals. I know it will be a big chunk of $$, but any ideas/tips? Great inexpensive places to stay? Thanks!

growing up in Cincinnati. I've always thought it was a German immigrant thing... I remember walking into the office at school when I was 8 or 9 and the secretary said, "What do youse need?". I looked around, trying to figure out who all the 'youse' were, but I was the only one in the office. :001_smile: Then I moved south after marriage and tried hard to avoid "ya'll", but it's just so easy to pick-up a southern accent!

I'm sportymom, though we're not that sporty...I think I've registered a few times over the past 7 years or so but didn't post ever, then when I wanted to post I couldn't remember my username/password. So sportymom it is. My kids do baseball/soccer leagues, play outside tons, but it's all just fun. I'm 34, live in SW Ohio and have been married for 12 years. We have 4 children, 10, 7, 5, 18m. Two boys, two girls. We have been homeschooling all along but I've really been getting serious about classical homeschooling for the past 3 years or so. Let's see, we use Classical Conversations (love it!!) Saxon & Horizons, SOTW, FLL, lots of library books for history and science, dictation & narrations, probably more but it's summer vaca (though we still truck along w/math and reading...)! There are lots of days when this is not fun and it's really hard...but these boards always make me feel better.:001_smile:

Thanks, elfinbaby--you took the words right out of my mouth.:001_smile: We love CC. I had written a lengthy post last night refuting some of the misinformation on this thread about CC, but I figured that it didn't matter. It's been said before, and CC, like every other curriculum choice out there, is not for all. For my family, it is.