Like others have said, it does take time. It depends on your situation whether it is worth it or not. Sometimes it is a "hobby" for me. Other times it is a time-consuming, frustrating chore. All said though, with coupons, we only spend about $50/week for all food, diapers, toiletries, etc. We do not eat tons of processed food. I cook mostly from scratch, do not eat out, etc. We get all toiletries, diapers, wipes, etc for free. That leaves me to spend my money on produce/dairy. Even frozen veggies can be free. I am not in an area of the country with great stores. Mine don't have great deals, and we still do great with coupons. If you are not "into it" though, it can be a real drag. You get burned out. Other times, it is very exciting to get the deals! By the way, we have 6 in our family and a cat.

Are these books worth buying? Where is the best place to find them and do your children enjoy them? Thanks for any help you can give me.

:iagree:

I found that there are usually adult cats in shelters who are already declawed. I have adopted two of them and they are great! They are indoor cats by the way.

Where is the best place to purchase the guided workbooks that go with the Prentice Hall Science Explorer series? Do you find these essential to the program? Thanks for your help.:)

I want to thank you all for your ideas and give you additional information to help clarify a few things. My difficult daughter is the one entering 4th and she has been a challenge since about age 2-3. She actually has shown improvement though, and my husband and I have greatly improved in our handling of her (not as much yelling mostly). Of course, it still goes up and down, but for a while it was really bad. It has gotten better. I don't want to send her to school without giving this a fair try. If need be, I will send her during the year. I would prefer to try to work it out with her. I will not let her disrupt my son's learning even if I have to ignore her and let her read (and send her to school eventually). They both want to keep homeschooling. Also, over the years, I have made improvements too, in housekeeping, etc. I guess I feel the need for a schedule now that my kids are getting older and I really don't want to mess this up. I do not have outside activities during the day. It was more that I would get distracted with the baby or cooking or cleaning. And because I didn't have a set schedule, things would drag out and we would never feel done. It was fine when they were younger. We read a lot, played a lot and did Math, the basics, etc. Now I feel the need to add more structure, and I need help doing it. I am working with the kids to pick up,etc every day. I need to continue to work on this. I do think I need to simplify meals/plan menus. I end up making gourmet breakfast to order every day (my own fault). Thank you for the ideas of scheduling the Prentice Hall series. I will look into that this weekend with my husband. I was also thinking of IEW, but hadn't done the research yet as to which level I needed. I was thinking that I should do more writing myself first with Sentence Composing and Writers Express from Write Source. Do any of you have experience with these or do you think I should go straight to IEW? Also, I think that the accountability and checklists are a great idea. We did checklists for a while. They really did help. I am the one who fell off the boat with those. I think I really need to sit down now and plan more than I ever have before (both school and housework). Thank you for the Hakim recommendation. I will check that out. Also, is Easy Grammar more tolerable than Rod and Staff? R&S is boring for me and the kids, but I was hesitant to change. However, if Easy Grammar is more pleasant and still gets the job done, maybe I should look into it. Again, thank you so much for your thoughtful responses and ideas. Let me know if you have any additional thoughts for me.

I realize this is a huge request. I could really use some experienced help. I have homeschooled my dc (6th,4th,K,2 years old) from the beginning. I did send each of the older ones for a year (or half a year in one case) for K and second grade when I really needed a break. I have been on these boards (mainly lurking) since I started. I have seriously been considering sending them to p.s. for several reasons- 1. I am not the most organized person on the earth, and I am worried that if I continue without a better game plan, the education of my dc might really suffer now that they are getting older. 2. My daughter is especially difficult (argumentative), and the day to day battle with her wears on me. 3. I am worn out from the day to day responsibilities (that we all have) of cooking, cleaning, and mainly the education of dc. I am not an organized housekeeper either and really struggle in this area. 4. I really don't want to keep my oldest, especially at this point, from opportunities (scholarships, advanced classes, etc) that might open up to him in the coming years. I guess I feel like I am not doing a good job at anything, and he is getting to the age where I really need to step up. My hope is to continue to homeschool and to have my dc start community college courses during the high school years. In the meantime, I need to come up with a better plan of attack. They do want to continue to homeschool. I suffer from lack of motivation. I am thinking that if I really commit to focused, morning studies and leave afternoons more open for independent reading, piano practice and free time, then we can really buckle down in the morning and it will motivate us all. I have never really used a schedule, but I am thinking that something like that might be necessary. This is what I an currently considering: Math-I use Singapore Math. My oldest is in 6th grade (and in the 6th grade book) and I am planning to continue with that. English- I have Rod and Staff English. We are in the 5th grade book (didn't finish last year) and I will continue with that. I am looking for suggestions for report-type writing. I am not at all confident in teaching writing. My oldest has done a journal since he started writing. He writes fairly well, but needs more instruction in report/essay writing. I need help with that. I am not much interested in teaching creative writing at this point. History- We have read/listened to SOTW all the way through. We did not do much with it. We did read some additional books. My kids are strong in geography. I would like to focus more on American History this year, but I am not sure what to use. Spanish- I plan to use Rosetta Stone for this. Science- I bought the Prentice Hall Explorer series, but have done nothing with it yet. I am not sure how to use these or if something else would be easier/more effective. I have not done formal science instruction yet, but we have read many science type books and dh is science-type and engages them in many science-related discussions. I also use Spelling Power and handwriting is covered. I am in a time crunch. I confess to both indecision and lack of organization. I really want to give it another try and try to to it better this time. I would really appreciate any advice any of you are willing to give both in terms of routine/schedule and curriculum. I really need curriculum that is easy to use (no huge teacher manuals to read through). I look forward to any suggestions you can share. Thank you so much!:confused1:

How much soup should I bring (pasta e fagioli) to a family with 2 adults and 4 kids (2, 5, 11,13). The kids might not like it anyway (it is a little spicy). I didn't tell them I was bringing dinner. I was just going to drop it off with some homemade bread and maybe dessert (maybe for lunch). I don't know how much to send or what to put it in. Thanks for your help. (They might want to freeze it for later use).

I would like to see this too (or at least know how to do it on my own computer). This is my first post on this board. I am finding it time consuming trying to figure out which posts I have seen. I used to be able to pop in periodically and just scroll to where I left off the last time.

My ds is currently in 5th grade. I recently purchased the series off E-BAY. Does it matter which books I start with? :confused: Any advice would be greatly appreciated.