That one should come with vouchers for free therapy sessions. I still think birds are so creepy, and I haven't seen that movie in a couple of decades.

At this point, I limit it to 2 days per week, and we cram all of our outside activities in. If something interests the kids and falls on one of those days, and is afforable, I add it. I couldn't get both kids in swim lessons on the days we were doing everything else, so I take them swimming myself once a week, and we can switch to formal lessons at a later date. Both kids have dance on the same day, at the same place, which is very helpful. DD takes science classes at the natural history museum, which works well for DS, since he can explore there with me while she is busy -- and when he's old enough, he'll be joining her for the classes. Things will get trickier next yeafr, when we hope to add in music lessons.... I'm not sure how busy our schedule will be at that point, and how we'll cope.

Congrats, and best wishes for an easy pregnancy!

We pretty much arrange things so we don't get much of a refund, and we always spend every penny on paying off our student loans. Even when they sent out stimulus checks, we paid down my grad school debt with it. It felt amazing to pay off Dh's loan last year, even though it was hard to watch everyone around us out shopping with their refund money.

I grew up in a household that rarely tuned in for things like this.... but we will be watching, along with the rest of the Pittsburgh region. We watch some games, but never plan our schedules around sporting events (okay, aside from during the World Cup, when I shamelessly shuffle things around to watch as much as possible). I like football enough, but I am definitely lacking whatever it is that makes for a true fan, I guess.

My kids beg us to bring home extra boxes when we are packing groceries into them at ALDI. I always think the other shoppers must think we have no toys:001_smile:

I have to second or third George's Secret Key to the Universe. I read it aloud to dd, and she read most of the nonfiction inserts on her own, even though they are not easy reading -- she was just captivated.

I'm having a hard time remembering, but I think dd had some starting around 4 months. She never really liked it, though, and we didn't really push it. I tried it with ds around the same age, and he was pretty underwhelmed as well -- he maybe ate 2 servings out of an entire box. With both kids I didn't really go the baby food route. They loved mashed banana, sweet potato, avocado, yolk from boiled eggs, and whole milk yogurt. I still remember dd eating brisket by the fistful at her first Passover seder, when she was 9 months old. I always felt the baby food thing was sort of a scam, although I did carry those little tubs of slightly chunky fruit when we were out of the house for extended periods and I didn't know what food options we might encounter. Both kids were totally graduated to table food by their first birthdays.

I moved high schools part way through French and to a district that did not have any German -- the 2 languages I had studied at that point. I ended up using Learnable for French 2/3 and Spanish levels 1 and 2.... I thought it was an inclusive curriculum.

I've never used it. Our library sends email reminders and pick-up notices. I go twice a week, and check my accounts (yes, that's plural!) the night before to make sure everything due between visits is in the library bag. It also helps that my library doesn't charge fines on anything from the children's collection, which is where 90% of what I borrow comes from.

Scones. all sorts, used to make them all the time before I had to cut down on wheat. DH really does not like scones, so this is a most unfortunate specialty. Also, I make challah that my family sneaks off with when they visit, and I do think it's pretty good stuff.

My only rule is no pajamas. I know plenty of folks who do school in their jammies, but I'm the paranoid type who does care what the neighbors think, at least on this issue. I've also worked from home for the past several years, and try to make sure that I'm dressed and presentable by a certain point in the day -- although not always before I begin working. I know nobody can see what I'm wearing while I'm at the computer, but it's just my deal.

I don't own a denim jumper, and never plan to.... I do own a pair of denim shortalls that my dh really likes, although I feel like I'm back at Girl Scout camp whenever I wear them.

I'm voting with the "mama" camp on this one.

I have three big loads of laundry neatly folded and just waiting for me to put it all away. Unfortunately (fortunately?) I stacked everything in my reading chair, so I can only procrastinate for as long as I am willing to postpone relaxation. I could list half a dozen big projects I'm procrastinating on, but I don't want to ruin my day by thinking about them right now:001_smile:

We also mixed up the order in SOTW quite a bit. I have a young first grader, and I wanted to be able to go in depth on individual areas without changing regions so much, at least for the first half of the year. We did about 3 weeks of prehistoric peoples/how archaeologists gather data, then moved on to the fertile crescent, covering multiple eras there for about 3 more weeks. We spent 10 weeks on Egypt, covering more than one period there as well. DD could have stayed on Egypt for the rest of the year if I hadn't pushed on.... We did a week of Aegean civilizations and are going to be working on Greece, and then Rome, for the forseeable future. I'm saving all the chapters on India/China/Africa etc. for the end of the year and possible unit studies in the summer, since we school lightly through the summer months, and I actually think each of those areas could definitely be stretched for more than a week if we do a lot of hands-on activities.

Black and unsweetened, and in large quantities.

Gottschalk's Grande Tarantelle, also played very loudly. It has magical powers to propel me through unpleasant tasks.

We always have school on the weekend. Sometimes we have one day of the weekend as a "regular" school day, but we usually split it up and do a bit each day. My kids are young enough to be blissfully unaware of what schedule the rest of the world follows, so it's never an issue here.

She sounds adorable!

I have to agree about the Breakstone's 2%... it really is superior to others I've tried. I like cottage cheese, and my favorite ways to eat it are: -- with grated apple and lots of cinnamon -- with hot sauce mixed in for dipping veggies -- in an omelet with fresh tomato slices and basil (one of my favorite breakfasts during summer months) I think it's pretty wonderful with many types of fresh fruit, especially pineapple or berries.

I would drop the formal math for now and use games that reinforce the skills in 1A, then just move into 1B in a few months (or next school year). When we encountered some trouble around the end of 1A/beginning of 1B we did this: -- Used Legos to make and break apart groups of ten to solve problems hands-on -- Played the card game War a lot to just get number values to become second nature (also, this didn't feel at all like school!). Now we make it as much a game of speed as possible. -- Jumped ahead of SM a bit to use coins to cement the concept of adding/subtracting tens (adding and removing dimes from a change pile) -- Worked on skip counting (chanting as we took our daily walk) so that the multiplication exercises didn't require lots of counting We are working through a review section now, and I am really pleased to see how well dd is handling word problems, which is a lot of the reason I chose SM and intend to stick with it.

I almost always go for red, but I've had some nice Semillon/Chardonnay blends from Australia.

We kept working through ETC while we were doing Headsprout -- I think we did books 2-4 during that time. We just continued with ETC to fill in any gaps. If you use ETC, you wouldn't have to begin with level 1, you could pick up further into the series.

I was thinking of things in music or other areas in the arts where you can do some performing and/or offer lessons. Having a degree might get you some clients, but wouldn't be necessary, and in some areas you can earn quite a bit hourly. I suppose the same could be said for foreign language instruction, although people might look for a degree unless you are a native speaker.