except that your oldest is ahead of mine. My 4th has been by far my most high maintenance baby which I was not expecting. It cracks us up when someone will say, "Oh 4th baby. I bet she just goes with the flow." Har-dee-har-har!!! Anyway, here are just a few ideas for what they're worth. My 17 month old still goes in her bed every morning for an hour even though she doesn't actually sleep much during that time anymore. I put a few books, stuffed animals, non-noisy toys in there for her and then we hit school hard for that hour trying to accomplish anything that I must be around for. Now...lots of days she pretty much fusses the entire time(!), but as long as I know she's not hungry or doesn't have a dirty diaper and isn't sick...she just has to stay! I hope that doesn't sound too harsh. She gets so much attention the rest of her waking hours, I just don't worry about it! As for the preschooler, I must admit my 4 yr. old is really good at entertaining himself, but I have found a few things that help. First of all, I really try to sit with him and read a couple of picture books before we do school. The olders aren't allowed unless he invites them. It's just his own time. He really like this and I try to make it a big deal. 2 or 3 days a week he goes to his room for our hour of time and listens to a CD and plays with a few things in there. The other days he stays in with us, sometimes just playing, sometimes at the table. There are more interruptions those days, but I count that as learning for everyone too! My 2nd grader does any leftover school work after that hour on his own. Obviously if he needs me I'm there, but we really try to get the more dependent things done during that hour. By the way, naptime is completely untouchable at our house!!! Even my big kids go to their rooms for rest time every day. I avoid errands, activities, etc. like the plague during the afternoon. We actually do almost no errands during the week at all. I go at night or we go on the weekends when dh is home and can go along or keep some/all here. I'm sorry that got long. I lurk here constantly and rarely post, but when I do I tend to ramble! I hope this is helpful somehow, even if it's just in knowing that the next time your 3 year old is running around and the baby is crying for you, I'm probably listening to/watching the same thing!!! Hope you have a good day today!

A few years ago I typed up a questionnaire for dh so that I could find out what was really important to him. I had things on it like: house picked up, me dressed, makeup on, dinner ready, time to himself to decompress, pantry stocked with snacks, etc. I think I came up with about 20 or so things. Then I had him assign each one an importance level of 1,2, or 3. It was really fascinating to me! We were best friends for several years before we started dating and have been married almost 15 years so I really feel like I know him, but I was still surprised at what was (and wasn't) a big deal to him. Just an idea! Have a great day! Katie

We live JUST south of Nashville in Williamson County (actually part of Grtr. N'ville). We've been here almost 7 years and really love it! I'm not as familiar with north and east N'ville, but around here there is lots of green space. I can only repeat what others have said...it is a beautiful area and has lots of great "city" things to offer without being so big that it's cumbersome. Because of so many interstates intersecting it is pretty easy to navigate. The library system is great! Since we don't live in Metro Nashville (Davidson County) I pay $40 a year to have a library card and it is well worth it in my mind! The zoo is really nice, not huge, but a good variety and we love Adventure Science Center which has a new planetarium we haven't gotten to go to yet. It's supposed to be amazing! Please let me know if you have any more specific questions. I'll be happy to answer if I can. Have a great day! Katie

I used sentence strips from the teacher supply store (I'm sure I got that idea from these boards!) and have them on our wall. Each strip is 24" long so I attached them to the wall with no space in between and allowed 12" for each century. I would really have loved to go around the room in one continuous line, but our room wouldn't allow that so I've just used one entire wall. We're young earth "people" so I started ours with a picture of a globe I made out of construction paper then started the dates with 4,000 BC. We have a cross at 0 to roughly mark the BC/AD change. Each line of strips is about 4" below the one above to allow space for our pictures in between. Now...all that said, it is very basic and really as much for me as for ds at this point. I can see that as he and my other little ones get older we'll probably move into the notebook type for more personalization and detail but for us right now this is great. It was really important to me that the centuries each have equal space. The whole thing is so abstract to young ones anyway, I figured to be changing the scale would make no sense to ds. We're all, dh included, really enjoying it even though it's quite blank at this point. We're just starting ancients this year so that will be fun. I do have a picture of each child stacked on top of each other around his/her birth year and a picture of their great-grandparents at their wedding year (1935 and still married btw!), etc. They love that part. And we have a few Bible stories on their approx. dates. It's really neat to see the space between things and I think ds "gets it" as much as is possible for a 7 yr. old. Okay...sorry that got so long. I get so much help from here, but rarely contribute that when I come across something I feel like I can offer I get a little crazy! Yes, this is crazy for me...timeline suggestions...woohoo! :001_smile: Have a great day! Katie, mommy to ds 7 1/2, dd 5, ds 3 1/2, dd 9 mos.

We used the song on Wee Sing Bible Songs. I catch myself humming to myself anytime I need to find one of the minor prophets. It worked great for us. I think there are two songs actually...OT and NT (obviously :)). This makes me think that I need to pull this back out for my littler ones. I did this a year and a half ago with DS to start Kindergarten. Thanks for the reminder! Katie mommy to ds-7, dd 4 1/2, ds 3, dd 4 months

My just-turned 3 yr. old has been the same way this school year..."When will you teach ME, Mommy?" In desperation one day b/c I felt sorry for him I grabbed one of his big sister's preschool workbooks (just one from Walmart or somewhere) and made up some things to "teach" him on a page. I think I had him circle some things and we counted something on the page. At least for us, anything that I sit with him and do he thinks is his school. So since I've had our new baby I've really been trying to do 15 minutes or so where I make everyone else stay out and it's his turn for "school." We look at Richard Scarry books alot and play "Do you see the mouse holding the red balloon?" etc. He loves it and it has really helped his behavior and patience when the others are doing their work. So sad that it took me until now to carve out this time for him and it really takes so little to make him feel big and special and fill up that tank! Sorry I'm rambling...My big kids just left for their grandparents for the weekend and I don't know what to do with myself! Plus, I haven't posted in so long I feel like I'm visiting long lost friends! :) Anyway, I also let him play with counting bears and a muffin tin (put all red ones in this space, etc.) and we do have some Kumon books that I think are great. His favorite thing though is our lap-size dry erase board and a dry erase marker. Those are things that occupy him if he wants to work with the big kids. But he calls his "school" the time he and I are together. Love it!!! I hope any of that is helpful. You might want to look at Paula's archives for a wonderful, wonderful list of preschool activities. If I knew how to link I would, but you can google "Paula's archives" and the website will come up. Sorry again for rambling I hope some of what I said is helpful. Have a great weekend! Katie mommy to ds 7, dd 4 1/2, ds 3, dd 4 mo.