My freezer. Any time I make any staple (rice, barley, dry beans, sauces, mashed root vegetables, etc....), I double, triple, or even quadruple the amount. I takes no more time to cook up 10 cups of rice than it does for 2. What I do not use that day, I pack into pint or quart-sized plastic deli containers. Label and date, then toss in the freezer. Most lunches start with a morning trip through the freezer for a pint each of grain and legume. At lunch (or dinner or whenever) I can use it for anything from a stir fry to burrito to soup/stew to casserole, etc......

I second this. I am not sure it will address your specific issue Immediately but this book was a game-changer for me.

I also would just have the kids leave any cast iron (or anything else that you would prefer to clean yourself). In my house, I am the only person who cleans the cast iron. Dh just cannot seem to resist using soap, even after decades of me asking him not to. And all of mine is pretty heavy so too difficult for dd. But bigger than that, my white enameled sink gets scratched up something awful if great care is not taken with the cast iron. Specifically, the cast iron cannot touch the sink at all. Everything else in my kitchen is for sure free to be cleaned by anyone, anytime!

I agree with others. There are often one or two really light days in a week but then day 4 would often take dd two or even more days. I felt with a separate grammar component that it was enough writing for my dd. More than enough, actually. I had to reduce some of the writing in other subjects (or incorporate into WWS when possible) to prevent burnout.

I could not complain just because I would not think it was a big enough deal. But, I have worked as a server in many restaurants, high and low end, and have never once been trained on how to handle serving to children. Most of it is common sense, but I would never assume that servers have protocol for handing out food near small children. About half of the places I worked at would not have replaced the fish. If I felt it was necessary, I would have had to pay for it. As a server in this specific situation, I would have replaced it myself if the manager did not OK it and the customer seemed to expect it. In one waitressing incident, I had to figure out how to handle droplets of sour cream that had spattered on about 12 people.....after I tripped over a roaming toddler and dropped a HUGE tray of food (also falling myself). The plates hit the floor and the little sour cream containers somehow exploded and rained down all over four tables. I had to replace food at some of the tables, the entire tray that was dropped, and I got no tips because people got it in their hair and clothing. The toddler was fine. The parents were irate and complained to the manager about how I could have "killed their little boy." I was publicly reprimanded by the manager in front of all involved. I quit that night. AND insisted my own kid stay in her seat at all times when at restaurants. So, a dropped piece of fish seems like a pretty easy thing to have fixed to me:)

Wow. I was on Vegsource back in the day. I had no idea there was any connection to this board. I was not a parent at that point nor would I have ever guessed I might homeschool. I was just there because I was a vegetarian looking for recipes. I remember Dharma! Ha ha!

It varies by vehicle. It just happened that both of our cars were not good fits for dd (did not pass the 5-point test) so she was in a booster until age 10. She could (and did) go in other cars (that fit her better than our own) without a booster before that age, but in our own, she had to sit in one....and she was not happy about it. Now she can go without in any car we have encountered but I do still have a booster on hand just in case and I am not afraid to use it. Dh and I both have engineering backgrounds and know a little too much about crash physics. I really do not care what the law says or what "everyone else" does. All occupants of any car I am involved in are always properly secured before the vehicle moves.

Check out Samsung. After two Whirlpool disasters, that is what our local repair guy recommended. We have had our base-model Samsung for two years and have been very happy. I also have no idea what the basket thing is though....

I don't recline unless on long flights and I ask the person behind me first. I don't get bent out of shape if the person in front of me reclines, even without asking, even though it does annoy me. How hard is it to give a little warning? What does make me angry is people who aggressively recline while I have coffee on my tray. There is nothing more fun than mopping up a lap full of spilled coffee...... And there are whole AIRPORTS that do not have flights out with first class. Ours is in this category. So that is not always an option.

We are only a family of three but I do have our small trash pail under the sink. We recycle and compost as well as buy things with as little packaging as possible. I empty the kitchen pail about once every two weeks. That is about the same for the recycling pails (also under the sink). Compost goes out daily, sometimes twice. I cannot imagine having to take out trash every day or even more! Our garbage truck comes very early in the morning so one of us has to set an alarm to get it out on time. This might be our biggest trash-reduction motivation:) It takes us about 6 weeks to fill a garbage bag for the truck. It would be even longer if we did not have cats (and litter). And I really cannot deal with a garbage pail within sight. Under the sink is mandatory for me.

I got a call from our store that we had purchased the recalled peanut butter. Of course it is all gone. Ick. So far we are all alive. But still. Ick.

I would like to "like" all of your relies but since "likes" are broken I will just say it here. LIKE.

For sure!

I must be clueless. I have never seasoned my cast iron. Some was used and some was "pre-seasoned." I cook everything from eggs to stir fry with no sticking.

I was planning to leave SM after dd's 6th grade year. Mostly because I could never really figure out which SM program to use next. We have used SM from day one and have been happy with it. However, dd has always struggled with the CWPs. I only ask her to do about half of the problems in the book and of those, I usually have to help her with half of those. We are planning 6A and 6B this year. I would not describe dd as "mathy" at this point, although I did not get "mathy" until high school so I am not ruling that possibility out. She did fine with the workbooks and extra practice. If you had a kid like this, would you try DM? Or move to something more traditional?

I'd keep them.

Thanks for the suggestion!

This is what I assumed. It looks like starting salary varies quite a bit. I am in a very low income area so I am having a hard time figuring out what a starting salary would look like.

My dd is a level 4 and spends 6 hours at the gym each week. We are a very low hour and low pressure gym. I am happy with that but I know some people would not be. While dd usually places well, she did have to repeat a level.

I am in the very preliminary stages of considering a career change. My only child is 7 years from adulthood. I do plan to homeschool until she graduates and I currently work part-time. Now that dd is getting older, I (theorectically) have more time to either work or go to school. As is true for so many others, the economy has dictated that I will need to contribute to our household finances to a greater extent and earlier than was predicted. I have options, most of which I have a good idea of what they would entail. One of those options includes doing what I do now but full time or at least more than I currently do. However, I do not love my job. It is fine, it pays very well, the hours are good, but it is not my calling. At all. I do not dread it, which is far more than many people can say, but I am also not terribly excited about devoting the rest of my working life to it. So, one pie-in-the-sky option would be to go back to school to do something different. I am limited by the geographically-isolated area I live in (we have no plans to move) and what school options are available to me. Given that, there is one career that seems to come up again and again in casual conversations. Accounting. I have done some research. I know I would have to take about 75 semester credits to get a bachelor's (I already have a BS and MS in another field). Taking two classes a semester, this would have me done about the time dd graduates. I would continue working part-time at my current job while going to school. I have a pretty good idea of what accountants do. Or at least I think I do. I am pretty sure I would be employable where I live. I am a detailed-oriented person, organized to a fault, and prefer working independently. What I don't know is....any accountants. So, I do not have a good handle on how stressful this job might be, if I could work part time should I want to or as I get older, how difficult it might be to start out as one in my mid-forties, etc..... I figured this might be a good place to ask. So, if you are one, were one, or know one, I would love to hear your stories. Pretty much anything. At this point, I am just trying to determine if this is something I am even remotely interested in pursuing.

Thanks for this. I feel better about doing it. More confidence cannot hurt and no point in racing.

This was very helpful. I think I am in a similar boat. I would rather overdo it than jump to quickly. Dd is so sensitive about math, a little extra time is probably the best course. It sounds like you did not find this to be too boring or repetitive.

As an aside, one big reason I am not planning to continue with SM is that there are simply too many confusing options. The whole Standards vs. US version thing was irritating. We switched from US to Standards at 4A. The upper levels have me completely baffled. Maybe I am too "old school" but I need regular topics/words. Pre-algebra, algebra, geometry, etc.....

This is good info. I did not know there was no HIG but that is because I have not used them since 3B. I know many say it is impossible to do SM correctly without the HIG but I have a very strong math background and was taught very similarly as a child. Between what I figured out myself and taking a look at the examples in the CWP, I found the HIG unnecessary. So, I am OK with that. Dd has done some CWP (about half of the problems) but really struggles with them. She has no problem with the workbook or extra practice problems but is probably 50/50 on the CWP. This concerns me as I worry she is not fully understanding the material. She understands and can often correctly set-up the bar diagrams but seems to struggle with putting multiple steps together. We do many of them together. Knowing that she struggles with the CWP, would a slow approach (SM 6A and 6B, then on to AoPS pre-algebra) make sense? I am not really in race-mode and would actually prefer she be on track with her schooled peers, not necessarily ahead.