My childhood is dying. May his memory be a blessing.

Cold! 59 chilly degrees and sunny in San Diego.

I saw that, but I thought you had to use one of the talent search test locations. Is that not correct?

Also, CTY does offer the PSAT 8/9, but for 5th and 6th graders. Perhaps, we should just wait until then. 3 hours is a very long test for a 3rd grader.

It looks like Western Academic Talent Search has a site in Vegas, which is far, but more doable. He's not in 3rd until next year, so perhaps this will be an option. Or, maybe, I could find a gaggle of 20 kids to establish a test center in Southern CA.

Yep. That's the issue. All their PSAT test centers are in the midwest. I think that's why I had it in my head that we couldn't do it unless we were in the midwest. Hmmm. What to do?

I don't think we can participate in NUMATS in CA? It's only the midwest, right? Not sure how else we could take the PSAT 8/9.

You're not alone. I spend a fortune on my kids. Like my grandmother and mother before me, it's my love language, so people can just deal. My DH would be thrilled if I spent $200 per kid. To give you an idea, I sometimes go over my budget of $1000 for my kid's birthday parties. But, everyone always has a heck of a good time, and that's what matters to me.

Hi! I decided to skip WWE4 after reading the forum for awhile. It seems to be largely repetitive of the skills learned in WWE3, which my DS doesn't have any issue handling. If I had a more struggling student, that needed some shoring up of skills before moving on to WWS, then I could see doing it. My son much prefers more creative writing assignments, so I will be introducing some Bravewriter elements next year. But, to be clear, I plan to spend two years (3rd and 4th grades) working on TC (we will skip the first part since his grammar is solid from MCT and Latin), W&R, Bravewriter, and Killgallon. It's way too much for one year with everything else we have going on. Plus, he is a STEM kid, so writing isn't his passion. I plan to outsource WWS to the WTMA, starting in 5th.

It doesn't sound like an involuntary hold is necessary at this time, but a med adjustment likely is. Please call her pdoc before things escalate.

Speaking as someone with Bipolar, I would call her doctor and let him/her know what is happening immediately. Sleep deprivation is my primary trigger (which was fabulous for my mental health when I was working 100 hours per week as an investment banker), and my manic phases often manifested as feelings of invincibility/grandiosity, in excessive and unrealistic planning/goal setting, and ultimately biting off far more than I could chew, to my detriment (fueling the inevitable depression and feelings of worthlessness/failure that followed). I would take up jogging, and then start planning my next Olympic distance triathlon, ending up with a stress fracture and a near-drowning incident in the process. My guess is that she needs a med adjustment -- likely bumping up her mood stabilizer and/or lowering an antidepressant. Either way, her pdoc needs to be made aware of what is happening.

Thank you all for sharing your personal stories, and for your prayers and good thoughts. They are greatly appreciated. To answer one of the questions, her cancer is invasive ductal carcinoma, stage IIIA, grade 2/3, node positive, progesterone positive, estrogen positive, her2 negative, genetic testing still tbd. She does attend a church, and I will see about possibly setting up a meal train for local friends.

I would also point out that Yael is speaking of traditional (read: Orthodox) Jewish mourning rituals. More than 90% of Jews affiliate with other branches of Judaism, where halakha (Jewish law) and custom are interpreted much more broadly. Within the Reform world, which includes the vast majority of Jews in the U.S., Jews are encouraged to take on only those mitzvot (commandments) that are meaningful to them (e.g., I'll take the helpful shiva visitors, but still go on my cruise to the Bahamas in 9 months). So, you will find that, in reality, many Jews take what they need of Jewish law, and leave the rest. (I'm not commenting on whether that's a good thing, but there it is).

Another vote for USAA. I have banked with them since I was 17. Best rates and customer service. I've used them for banking, insurance (auto, renters', life, and RV), and investing.

I was a 30-something litigator at a multinational firm, and used to get UTIs because I was too busy to drink water and/or pee. I have ADD-Inattentive, and would get so hyper-focused on work that I would literally make myself sick. I still needed my mommy around. :)

This is why Jews sit shiva for 7 days, say the Mourner's Kaddish prayer for 11 months, and avoid joyous or festive activities (even things like listening to music) during the year-long period of sheloshim.

Thank you all for the prayers and words of wisdom. Some more info: my sister has bipolar, anxiety, and ADHD, so she is already a volatile person (as am I). She lives in Sonoma County in Northern California. We live in San Diego. It's at least an 8 hour drive, much more with any traffic in LA/OC and the Bay area, which there always is. The oldest is in K in public school. Her younger goes to preschool part-time. I cannot put my older in school, as he is several grade levels accelerated, so he would have to come with me.

Thank you. Worst case, my oldest (who I homeschool) and I can stay the entire time. My husband would stay here with my little one (who is in preschool). Thankfully, my inlaws are snowbirds, and will be in town until April to help my husband.

She is 40, a single mother (her ex douchebag walked out on her when she was 5 months pregnant), with 2 young children (ages 3 and 6). She is having chemo before surgery, and will need assistance. What can I expect during the chemo? How can I be a help to her? I don't yet know if the chemo will be every 2 or 3 weeks. Should I stay for the entire duration of her treatment (likely 3 to 6 months), or just when she has treatments? If you have been through this, what do you wish you had known? We have no history of breast cancer in our family, so this has been a shock for all of us. Thanks in advance for your advice, and prayers for her.

I tipped 30% to my stylist last week for the holidays. I would normally tip 20%.

OP, it sounds like a rookie parenting mistake -- one that many of us have made (or are likely to make in the future!) with our oldest kid. I don't think you should beat yourself up about it, or feel misunderstood. What I hear is that the more experienced parents of older kids are saying to just slow up on the independence a bit and not to read too much into the lying. I hear them saying that this scenario is pretty common, and this is how you can avoid it in the future. I have a pretty mature almost 8 year old, and it is very easy for me to give him more independence than he can handle. I do it on the regular, and I am sure that many of these more experienced parents are just sharing their BTDT wisdom. Please know that your thread has been helpful to me as a reminder that I still should hold fairly tight to the reins with my DS, even when it seems like he could handle me letting go a bit more. I would just chalk it up as a first-born parenting lesson learned. Hugs to you.

We moved in September, and went on a belated vacation, so we got a late start to our year. I've been struggling to "catch up" ever since. We might even have to do some school over the summer. :scared: BA4 has been slow going this year because my DS still didn't know his times tables cold. Computing the multiplication was using up a lot of his brain power, which didn't leave much left for learning things like exponents. So, we took a detour to shore up his math facts with Timez Attack, which I highly recommend. Hopefully, we are back on track now, going into long division. :willy_nilly: MCT Town, WWE3, and W&R Fable have all been going well, as has my DS's lit class at Athena's. We may get to TC this year, or just shelve it until next year. We have been hit or miss on New American Cursive. I really need to start making copywork with the software. History of US on audio has been such a hit that we haven't been doing as much with CA history as I had hoped. As the time periods coalesce, I am hoping to do more fun CA history field trips. We did go to a gold mine in Julian, so it hasn't all been a bust. We dropped Megawords because I made my DS a deal: if he won the spelling bee at his charter school, he could drop spelling from our homeschool forever. And he did it! GSWL is going super well. We will probably finish it in the next month, and move onto Minimus Secundus and Latin Prep. GSWF is also a hit. Just have to figure out what to do next (likely SYRWTLF and Online G3). Hebrew has always been my son's least favorite subject, so we are plodding along at a glacial pace through Shalom Ivrit and Memrise. We bit off more than we can chew with Athena's physics. I need to somehow get us caught up, but I am not optimistic. I should have just continued unschooling science, but he begged me for this class. Sadly, it is just too much with all his other activities. He's got one module left to finish in Youth Digital's Mod Design class, which has been a hit. I promised him that he could sign up for JAM's online class on how to be a You Tube gaming star after he was done with Youth Digital.

We've completed Grammar Island and Town, and I would do the grammar section of TC before MCT. TC's first part is a very gentle introduction. Having said that, we are big MCT fans, so I dont really think you can go wrong either way.

I had an amicable divorce. We met in the Army when I was 17; he was 19. We married at 24 and 26, respectively. We went into the Army to pay for college, and ended up going to the same college together. Our plan was for him to become a history professor and for me to go to law school. We wanted to be a DC power couple. Along the way, he found that he enjoyed being an officer in the infantry. He was an Army Ranger. Even after deployments to Bosnia, Iraq, and Afghanistan, he told me that there was nothing he could imagine doing that would be more fulfilling than leading men into battle. In short, he was the kind of guy to whom you would want to entrust the life of your 18 year old son. Unfortunately, I was a much better soldier than I was military wife. Out of the 11 years that we were together, we were apart for 7 of them -- for several years, we were an ocean apart. It broke me. I couldn't do it anymore. I wanted my husband around, but I also wanted him to be happy and professionally fulfilled. We divorced amicably, both happily remarried and each have 2 beautiful children. He is currently a Lieutenant Colonel, and has been in command of over 1000 soldiers in a batallion. He has advanced degrees in history and military strategy. I have no doubt that he will be a General someday. Most important, we are both happy, and in loving marriages. Were we wrong to divorce? I went through years of terrible depression dealing with our constant separations. I was young, and learned much about myself, and what I needed in a relationship. Learning from the mistakes my ex and I made together has made us better partners to our spouses today. I am still sad that our marriage ended, but I truly believe that it was for the best. YMMV.

This is very interesting. Thank you for sharing. I guess that my only experience with giftedness comes in the form of the precocious child -- whether in art, music, math, etc. I don't want to derail the thread, and perhaps it is topical to discuss these varying types of giftedness. Sacha was very much what I typically think of when I think of a gifted kid. He could speak in full sentences in two languages at 18 months, could read CVC words shortly thereafter, and had figured out multiplication, on his own, by 4. Ronen hasn't done any of this, but he could ride a regular Razor scooter around 15 months and a regular pedal bike with no training wheels at 2.5. He would speak in long sentences, but they were not intelligible until fairly recently (thanks to speech therapy since age 2). But, even in their intelligibility, he still seems to talk a lot of nonsense. But, unlike older brother, Ronen wants to know how everything works. He builds elaborate boobytraps around the house, connecting the dog's retractible leash to various electrical cords and objects. He is an athlete (like his father), is very stubborn, emotional, daring, and tenacious, and a kinesthetic learner. But, Ronen is also the child I never had with Sacha, who is very logical, cautious, obedient, and always seemed like a small adult. If I had to speculate, I would say that Ronen will likely turn out very much like his father, who has a brilliant mind for building and fixing things, but who was never very academically inclined, and struggled in school (due to ADHD).