If it's the video that I'm thinking of, the song is "I Can Only Imagine" by MercyMe

Eleanor Roosevelt or Edith Wilson -- the latter ran the country for an entire year after Woodrow Wilson suffered a stroke.

The Scarlet Pimpernel I was expecting something dry and boring .. it was a real page-turner! I stayed up for two nights in row, just to finish it!!

Is your little guy on the autism spectrum? Many autistics look at you via the corner of their eyes because direct eye-to-eye contact is uncomfortable for them. My youngest has autism and she does this from time to time, especially when her sensory system is overloaded for whatever reason.

My oldest dd will be 17 next week and we have yet to give her a driver's license. She's had a learner's permit for a year now and she's very close to being ready for the license, but we felt that we wanted her to have more than the 40 hours of driving that the state required. We've had so many young people killed on the local roads in our area that we really wanted her to have ALOT of driving experience before we gave her a license -- we live in a rural area, so lots of winding roads with low shoulders and high speed limits. As for a car of her own, she has one. My sister-in-law and her husband bought a new car and the dealership offered them $700 for their old car. It's 8 years old, but it only has around 70,000 miles on it and it's in great shape, so they sold it to us for $500 and my daughter just loves it! And it gets better gas mileage than my own car! ;)

I strongly believe in child-led weaning and every child is different! My 1st nursed until she was 2 1/2, my 2nd nursed until he was 2 1/2, my 3rd nursed until he was 3, and my youngest nursed until she was 4 1/2. Nursing offers great immunity against illness, and a little known trivia tidbit -- the longer a woman nurses her children, the less likely she is to have breast cancer later in life. I'm very grateful that my youngest nursed as long as she did. She has autism and I've received numerous comments about how affectionate she is -- and I attribute some of that to extended nursing. It kept her emotionally connected during that critical 'early intervention' time for her.

My husband said that when he was 5, he planned on running away. He packed his pajamas and his Dr. Seuss books, and put them in the back of his little red wagon. His mother even packed him a lunch and kissed him goodbye. ;) He said that he got to the end of the driveway and said to himself, "Where am I gonna go?" ... so he went back inside, unpacked his wagon, ate his lunch, and stayed! (Apparently, this was an "I don't like going to Kindergarten" protest!)

My oldest (17 next month) wants to be either a US Marshal or an FBI Agent -- at the very least, she wants to join the State Troopers, if she isn't hired by a national protection agency. She's planning on going to college full-time in 2009, with a major in criminal justice, and she's working on achieving her Black Belt in Tae Kwon Do My second (14 in May) wants to be an artist -- he's also looking at graphic design and architecture My third (8) wants to be a doctor -- most likely a pediatrician My youngest (6) so far wants to be a librarian -- hey, she loves to read!

I have two boys. My 13 year old plays baseball -- he's so psyched! He was picked for 2nd base this year .. after playing for 3 years as a shortstop! He needs a bigger hat to fit his swelling head...that's how proud he is! :) My 8 year old takes Tae Kwon Do .. which I highly recommend, if your son doesn't care for team sports. He's close to receiving his Blue Belt after spending a year and a half in the sport. Both boys take art classes, and both play chess, although we don't have access to a chess team -- I wish we did!

I love this one ... Frank Caliendo on Bush & Clinton Completely clean and hysterical!

I think it was me! I love "Snow Cake" ... especially as the mother of two autistic children!

We don't go on vacations in the summer -- that's half the joy of homeschooling!! We take our vacations in the spring or fall -- this year, we're going to Myrtle Beach, South Carolina the last week of this month -- last year, we went to the Outer Banks of North Carolina. Off season, we can rent a 4 bedroom house for the week around $500. We bring our own food and make breakfast and dinner in the vacation house and we eat our lunches out, as that's when we're sightseeing or at the beach, etc. My hubby and I have the benefit of having a built-in babysitter (our 16 year old), so we usually go out "on the town" once or twice during that week. We've been doing this for years -- we just vary the location (we've been all over the east coast -- from Pennsylvania all the way down to Florida) When our children were younger, we sometimes took my MIL along to help with babysitting -- we've also rented a house with another family several times -- then we can trade off babysitting services. We need a bigger house then, but it doesn't cost us anything more than what we pay now, because the cost is divided between the two families.

My oldest is taking her SAT exam as we speak -- and she's praying she does well!! She was sooo nervous this morning, she was up and ready at 6am! :) This afternoon, the DH and I are off to our county's Home and Garden Show to see what's exciting and up for grabs.

I have 4 children - 1 is a Wednesday. I wouldn't say he's melancholy, but he's serious. We always joke that he was born middle aged! He's very sensible and generally more polite than most 8 year old boys! Very interesting!

I'm taking a 3 credit College English class -- just for fun. My oldest dd is taking classes at the same community college and she doesn't have her driver's license yet, so I have to take her .. and I figured it was better to take a class for my own enjoyment than to sit in the car while she's in class (the cc is too far away to drop her off and then come home, only to have to go back out again). I'm really enjoying it and -- mommy brag!! -- I'm making straight A's!!! :)

Well...here's my take on it and my own theory.... At first, I was elated with the episode, as I've often had the theory that Kate had a little boy that no one else knew about before the plane crashed and the show started. That was why she kept the little plane and why she wanted off the island so badly -- otherwise, why would someone wanted for murder and all those other crimes want to leave the island?? And then, it all got blown to heck! When she met Jack in the parking garage, I started to think that it was Sawyer's child...and she had lied to Sawyer earlier about being pregnant, to keep the child from him (a really crappy thing to do, as he already has one child he didn't know about, but that's another tangent), and Jack didn't want to see the baby because it's Sawyer's. That theory worked great for awhile - the little guy even had blonde hair, just like Sawyer! Then she called him Aaron! ACK! How did Kate get Claire's baby? I still don't know why that's the case, unless something happened to Claire during the rescue and she's dead ... The fact that Aaron is so much older than we think he should be doesn't bother me -- time could move slower on the island than in the 'real world', so years may have passed for everyone else, while very little time passed on the island -- but nothing else makes sense. Unless we go back to my original theory that, once they left the island, which they weren't meant to do, or supposed to do, everything changed as we know it -- I have a 'parallel universe theory' about Lost and always have! It's like Star Trek...if there are any Trekkies here ... Next Gen's "Yesterday's Enterprise" episode ... when the timeline became messed up, by the Enterprise C coming through that wormhole / anomaly, then life on the Enterprise instantly changed ... there never was a peace treaty with the Klingons...the Enterprise was a ship of war because the Federation had been at war for 80 years ... Tasha Yar was alive when she should've been dead, etc. ... once they 'fixed it', then the timeline that we knew (i.e., the viewers knew) returned (Worf and Troi were there and Tasha had been dead for years, etc.) The same thing could be occuring on Lost .... that's why in the current, messed up timeline, fewer people survived the crash. Jack and Kate really DO think that only 8 survived the crash because in *their timeline*, that's their truth -- their reality...if that makes sense.... If Jack can find a way to go back to the island (as he referred to at the end of season 3), he can undo everything that's happened -- everything that's wrong -- and the timeline will revert to the one we (the viewers) know and understand..... And .. remember .. JJ Abrams is a huge Star Trek fan! This sort of thing would be right up his alley.... So those are my early morning ramblings! :)

The story about the 15 yr old boy killing his family struck VERY close to home for us! My husband's family grew up next door to the mother who was killed. They've known her family for 30+ years. She was my SIL's best friend - they went to college together. She and her husband were at my wedding .. and my baby shower for my oldest daughter ... it's so tragic. They were wonderful, stupendous people, and we're just devasted. What a tragedy. Kelly

Snow Cake hasn't been mentioned yet, as not many people have seen it. Alan Rickman stars with Sigorney Weaver. She's an adult autistic and he winds up coming into her life. I won't tell you how, or it will ruin it, but the movie is fascinating....esp. as the parent of two autistic children.

I would recommend Math-U-See....it's very visual in it's approach. I would go to their website and do a placement test, to see where it would be best for him to begin.

I hope I don't sound completely off my rocker! I assure you that I'm quite normal...well, at least with sound mind...but we're starting to believe that our house is haunted. At first, it was just the kids, coming to me and telling me that they've heard or seen things, but we brushed it off. Then I started experiencing them and now my husband has been starting to have things happen to him .. and he's as rational as they come (he was an economics major in college, if that gives you any indication as to how humdrum and mundane he can be!) We live in Virginia and there's a paranormal investigative team that I've found in our area -- or not too far from us -- and I'm tempted to contact them and see if they can help us. But I have no idea what to expect from the phone call! My husband is more along the lines of just waiting, as what we're experiencing is totally mischievous...nothing at all sinister / evil. For instance ... We have toys that go off by themselves, when no one else is in the room, or sometimes even on the same floor of the house. I'll go in to the playroom and clean up..when I return, some toys are back in the middle of the room - sometimes, they're arranged in a circle. We have bedroom doors upstairs that open and close by themselves. We hear footsteps and stomping on different levels of the house. I've seen a little boy, going up the stairs to the upper level of the house. He appears to be somewhere between 5 and 7 years old (and he's not one of our children!) We've heard the laugh of a little child, at various places in the house, when my children are either asleep, or not even at home. Can anyone out there relate to this at all? Or have any experience with this sort of thing?

I'm in Virginia -- Fredericksburg area

My youngest child has autism and there are several things that have really worked with her. 1 - Routine -- routine is very important with an autistic child. Try to set up a routine / schedule every day and stick to it. This helps them to feel safe and secure 2 - Pictures -- this works well along with the routine. My dd has pictures for everything (getting dressed, washing hands, painting time at her easel, etc.) I could go on and on as we have a lot of pictures!! This is very helpful as her expressive vocabulary is fairly limited. 3 - Consistency -- stop negative behaviors the first time and every time. 4 - Consequences -- "If you don't wear your coat, you can't go outside." "If you don't take off your shoes at the indoor playpark, you can't play there." These are very important. 5 - Choose your battles! My dd, for instance, hates to wear clothes! So, at home, I allow her to just run around in a pull-up, but she knows that she has to wear clothes when she's not at home. 6 - Allow appropriate sensory indulgences -- My dd likes to play in water, so we let her take a shower 2 or 3 times a day, so that she can play in the water -- therefore, she's not playing in the dog's water bowl, filling up my sink, splashing in puddles outside, etc. I hope this helps!!

We used BJU Geography in 9th grade and my dd really enjoyed it! Colorful text and very thorough!!

Do they have a Whole Foods / Trader Joes / Harris Teeter near them? I often can find special breads there.

I'm Kelly -- my oldest dd (hs Junior) is taking classes at the community college and homeschooling part-time. I have another ds (8th grader) waiting in the wings for high school ... and two other ones who aren't even close to high school age yet!