I had not heard of it and I just looked it up on Amazon and it sounds like something my boys might actually enjoy. Thank you so much!

We are taking a two month road trip up the East Coast starting in two weeks. Life has been so crazy preparing our house for Airbnb (we rent it out so we can travel) that I haven't been able to buckle down and choose a US history textbook for my two teenage boys. Most of our learning will be hands on but I'm looking for a supportive text to bring everything together. I don't want anything too wordy and I don't want them to have to spend more than an hour a day in a textbook because we have a literature list we are going to tackle too. Ideally I want something I can assign sections of and it still make sense and be easy to navigate. I have two toddlers as well so I need something teacher friendly as well. Any ideas? I was considering Exploring America by Notgrass or A Patriot's History (suggested to me by a local mom) or a History of the US....BUT I'm open to suggestions because I'm feeling pretty desperate at this point! Also if anyone has any suggestions on must see places I'd love those too! Thank you!

Thank you. I'll look that up. :-D

My son just started at a hybrid school and, unfortunately, his Spanish class is not a good fit. The teacher in her words "doesn't grade for accuracy just completion" and then grades tests and quizzes really hard. My son is a bit lost because he's not getting the concepts explained or corrected. The good news is the school values homeschooling so we can do Spanish at home and they will include it on his transcript. The bad news is I don't know Spanish or any other foreign language for that matter. :-) So I'm looking for an accredited online option for him. (Accredited classes are easier to transfer.) We've done some Florida Virtual School in the past and have mixed feelings about it. Do you have an online Spanish program you just love or one that has been pretty straightforward? I should add that we really don't care about learning to speak Spanish. (I know that's terrible but foreign language is not his passion at all.) We are more concerned with finding a straightforward Spanish class that doesn't stress him out and getting the credits he needs to graduate. The current class is an immersion almost totally all auditory class and my son is visual and likes to see lots of references. Thanks so much! :-)

Thank you so much for all the replies. It's been helpful and very much appreciated. To those of you who said Portland...oh how I wish it was closer to Indiana because I do think it would be a perfect fit in every other way! We are going to head east and I'll be referring back to this list. Thank you!

Yes, it's The University School of Colorado Springs. :-)

We drink mostly water. About once a week the kids will have a glass of maple milk (milk with maple syrup...sooo good) in the evening to curb a sweet tooth. DH drinks coffee and I drink tea. If I'm not too busy I brew water kefir and kombucha that my middle child enjoys. We don't buy soda for home. Occasionally I will let them have one while we are out.

Haha!!! How embrassing considering I travel full time! You're right! I meant Rogers, AR. Although we spent last summer in Alaska and if it wasn't soooooo far from family we would move to Homer or Seward in a heartbeat. :-D

So we've been traveling in our RV around the country for 3.5 years and we think the time has finally come for us to begin thinking about settling down. My DH and I are super sad about the pause in our gypsy life but we think it will probably be best for our 12 and 15 year old boys. (The oldest one is for sure ready to settle.) The problem (which may sound good to some) is we are having the hardest time deciding where to settle because we can go anywhere since dh works from the road. It's actually maddening not having any sort of direction. We are from Ventura, CA and don't want to go back there because of the cost of living, distance from family, and pace of life. My family (where I grew up) is from the Indianapolis, IN area and we don't want to go there because there aren't a ton of outdoor activities, the weather, and...well...it's flat and gray half of the year. Ideally, we like to find a hybrid school where the boys can go to school part time. So here are our our criteria in order of importance. Does such a place exists? 1. Hybrid school where the boys can go to school a few days a week. We prefer a Christian school but it's not a necessity. We care more about it being part time. This is our first priority. Although we'd consider a full time school if it was the right fit in the right location. 2. Within a day or two drive to Indianapolis. 3. Plenty of transplants. We don't want to live in a place that's clannish. :-) 4. Affordability. This should probably be higher on the list because we dont' want to go back to our crazy trying to keep up life we had in southern CA. I don't want o *have* to work outside of the home. 5. Pretty with lots of outdoor activities. Snowboarding is our favorite sport but realize that we'll most likely not be able to live in the mountains. We don't mind cold as long as there are fun outdoor activities. 6. DH is a freelance multi-media guys (mostly web designer and video production). He has a steady flow of work but we'd like to grow our business once we settle so we would like to be near a town with a decent amount of businesses. 7. Clean air and water 8. This may sound strange but we'd like a decent amount of precipitation. We've been dreaming about giving hobby farming a try. 9. Politically we aren't too concerned about being in a red or blue state. We are libertarians and tend to lean towards the less regulation the better. We do prefer lower taxes. Places we are considering - If you have any experience with any of these places I would love to hear them. 1. Colorado Springs. We are here right now visiting. There is an great little 3-day university model school here. Our biggest concern here is that it's pretty far from IN and lack of water. But we like the people and outdoor activities. 2. Rogers AK - We are heading there next. There is a part time classical school there. Honestly, being from CA we are worried it might be a little clannish but we are just assuming. Any experience here? 3. Nashville TN - I think this might be our first choice BUT I can't find any part time schools there. I've scoured the internet with not luck. If you know of anything or of a homeschool co-op that meets multiple days PLEASE let me know. We'll be heading there early April to explore some more. 4. Knoxville TN - There is a part time university model school but we've never been there. It seems like it would be pretty with plenty of water but again worried about not fitting in/clannish. 5. Chattanooga TN - We visited there last summer. I thought it was super pretty and it seemed like an active mid-sized town. Again worried about it being "clannish".<==== I hope that's not offensive. The only experience I have with the south (aside from visiting) is my VERY clannish family that lives up in the Appalachian Mountains in NC. They are nice people and all but aren't crazy about outsiders. Everytime I have visited they act like CA is a foreign country. It's endearing (and interesting) but not the type of community I want to raise my kids in. We are OPEN to about anything at this point. Do you know of any place that fits some of our criteria (particularly the hybrid school) that I didn't list? I'm ALL EARS! Thank you, Jenn :-)

Thanks so much for the replies and support. I'm feeling much MUCH better after reading your responses. We went ahead and bought MFW since it looks like my son will be able to manage his own schedule but there are still (I hope I'm understanding correctly!) parent discussion questions each week. Hopefully this works for us! Thanks again!!!!! :-)

So I was planning on using TOG Y1 with my 9th grader this year. I used it once before when he was in 4th grade. I got overwhelmed then so I do not know why I thought I should use it again. :-/ But I decided it was what I should do because I'm feeling enormous pressure now that he is in high school. I'm feeling stretched too thin already working part time and taking care of our 5 month old baby and 11 year old son as well. I thought TOG would save me time but leafing through the guides I'm feeling really overwhelmed...like there is no way I'm going to be able to get through all the teacher information just to decide what he should be doing. I know he won't do everything in guides but I don't even know where to begin. To top it off he doesn't even really enjoy history...he's more a math and technology sort of guy. I'm thinking of abandoning TOG and looking for a more straightforward simple history/literature/writing curriculum that will prepare him for college. Is there such a thing?

Thank you so much for all the suggestions. I had no idea where to even start so this is very helpful. Thank you thank you thank you!!!!

Here is our situation. My 13 year old son plays piano by ear and loves LOVES it. I rarely have to ask him to practice and often he will practice multiple times a day on his own initiative...sometimes for hours at a time. Unfortunately, I know nothing about music. He did take about a year or so worth of lessons with different teachers when he was younger but hasn't had lessons for about 3 years due to the fact we travel full time in an RV. Which is a problem. Since we travel full time he can't take lessons from a teacher and I'm starting to feel really bad. Although like I said, I don't know a thing about music so maybe he isn't as gifted as I think...I am his mom after all! But when he plays people seem to be amazed especially when they find out he teaches himself. My husband who is a drummer (but can't read music) says that he is playing two complex melodies on each hand simultaneously. Recently he taught himself how to play Turkish March and then decided he wanted to learn the Volodos Turkish March which I guess is a more challenging version. All I know is he is spending hours trying to get this version of Turkish March down. Then just the other day he said sadly, "Can you imagine how good I could play if I had a teacher." Ouch. I feel terrible. He really wants to learn to read music (he can a little) and get better but I have no idea where to start or what to do in our situation. We are planning on settling down but not for another year or two. Does anyone have any ideas? Perhaps a Skype music teacher? Has anyone had any success with a virtual teacher? Or a book that will teach him to read music? He did do the Alfred series for a while but doesn't like it because in his words "he doesn't know if I'm doing it right." Thanks for any help or suggestions!!

We are spending the winter in the mountains in Colorado and it's been below freezing everyday since we got here in early December. On days it reaches the 30s I'm all like "it's warm out!"

I totally could have written your post!!! My exercise plan varies day by day but I typically like to go sometimes after school and before dinner. The sooner the better so I can get done with that dang shower ;-) and my hair can dry. Sometimes I exercise after dinner but I've found if I wait that long then I most likely won't even bother with it.