My dds just for fun top picks are: Dogger by Shirley Hughes Fritz and the Beautiful Horses by Jan Brett The Little House by Virginia Lee Burton Caps for Sale by Esphyr Slobodkina Mog Stories by Judith Kerr Katy No Pocket by Emmy Payne For learning about art we've really enjoyed: Katie meets the Impressionists and other Katie books by James Mayhew For slightly older children the Getting to Know the World's Greatest Composers by Mike Venezia. I know that some people don't like the cartoons, but my 8yo dd thinks they are fun.

Just after we were married, dh was hanging a mirror for me. After he had drilled the hole, I decided that it needed to be just 5 cm (2 inches) lower. He convinced me that drilling that lower hole would damage the brick and thereby the structural integrity of the wall!! He had such a long explanation about tensile strengths and and and....that although I was skeptical, I believed him!! Must have been young love...

That's just brilliant!! :lol:

Jessica, Does your daughter mind having every day the same? Mine doesn't and gets a real sense of ownership in having a say in which subjects follow onto which. We start with bible, take out the days subjects (the books are in seperate magazine holders) and she chooses in what sequence she wants to complete the work. We're very much do-the-next-page homeschoolers, so its pretty easy to move through the subjects (I work out how many pages per subject we should complete in a day at the start of the year). She knows that the "basics" - maths and language arts - are the most important and often chooses to do them first so she can linger on something else that interests her. We're moving towards her having a say in how her whole week is structured now. If she then chooses to complete all math for the week on Monday, it will be her choice. Do you do the SOTW activity guide projects? They count as crafts here. I'm not familiar with Keepers of the Home. We pick up kits at the local craft store quite regularly and dd has got into beading lately.

I'm glad you like and use the materials Amy! It's really nice to get the feedback. Chapters 26-30 of the workbook are up at the group. Chapters 31-35 will be up in the next day or two. I don't mind you asking. It's the incentive I need to get it done! We're doing the activities from the guide in a small group together with two other families one afternoon a week. Things have come up now and again, so we’re moving through the book slower than a chapter a week. It's a bit frustrating, but the benefits of sharing preparation and presentation of the activities with two other moms, and the benefits for dd to work in a group outweigh the drawback. p.s. I did try to reply to your mail, but yahoo bounced it back twice.

I have made worksheets and other materials to supplement bought curriculum (ETA: Aesop's fables copywork, A file for memorization, History Timeline template, timeline pictures, memory cards and some work pages to go with SOTW1 and SOTW2, Composer timeline pics) I;ve also written level one of a spelling program because I couldn’t find what I was looking for (no frills, rules based with dictation sentences). I'm working on level 2. See the links in my signature.

Thanks for the link - neat site!

Please consider sending books overseas as well. You get 3 points for every book sent overseas. The option exists to set your posting profile to "ask me", so that you can still say no to sending heavy books.

Nope. I'd love it if someone from the same country joined!

My mom was a lot shorter than me, so nothing would have fit me, but I did keep a jersey just to remind me of her. I still have it 20 years on.

Once you have activated your account, you can click on the "Life" "Earth" and "Physical" tabs at the top of the site. In each of those there are topics for Grades K-2, 3-4 and 4-5. You can download the entire fiile or sections of each unit. They typically include a reading booklet, worksheets, and experiment. Hope this helps!

The material looks really great! Get your access via this Registration Page

Unforetunately our library is hopelessly underfunded - they had a budget of US$1000 for last year for ALL purchases. From the SOTW2 list, they had exactly 3 books from the entire list- Beowulf, Shakespeare and I don't remember which other. So, I look around in 2nd hand shops, 2nd hand online sites, bookmooch, etc. If I haven't found anything a month before we need it, I'll buy new from a local online bookstore. We've had at least one read-aloud for most of the chapters of SOTW so far. I have a list in my purse for when I go 2nd hand shopping and am always thrilled when I find something we need/want.

South African. Born and grew up in the Cape Town area and moved North after graduating.

Here's our schedule. Monday - Horse-riding for 8yo dd - Swimming lessons for 3yo (4 in two weeks) dd Tuesday - Violin for 8yo dd Wednesday - Pottery/therapy with occupational therapist for 8yo dd (in a group of 4) - Swimming lessons for 3yo dd - Catechism for 8yo dd Thursday - History Club / Science Club - we rotate this with two other families and do the SOTW activities and Sonlight "Discover and Do" experiments together. We did have each once a week, but one of the other family's competitive gymnastics practice has made it harder to get together. We are moving through SOTW slower than I'd have liked (we're half way through book 2 after 2.5 years), but the advantage is that the children benefit from getting a lesson from someone else and from the mom's diverse crafting skills for the activity preparations. We're doing a literature based South African history study in the alternative weeks. For science I regard the Science Club afternoons as an "extra". Both girls join in. - Kindermusik for 3yo dd. Saturday 8yo dd has an hour horse-riding lesson, but spends the whole morning mucking about at the stables. She is horse-mad and hanging out with the other girls there is the highlight of her week. They get put to work looking after the horses, so its good for her!

I remember my mother for her joyousness, unconditional love for my sisters and I, unwaivering support, wisdom, independence, creativity, fantastic sense of humour, loyalty to her family and friends and absolutely living by the maxim that "if you can't say anything good, don't say anything at all". She was always positive and upbeat about life - even when she was very ill. My mom passed on when I was 18 and I would have liked to have known her as an adult. I think we'd have got on well. She would have loved having grandchildren and being part of our lives. The bargain-hunter gene most definitely came from her - she loved a good find! I'm also pretty organized and must have learned that from her too.

I have "downloaders ache" - I've been clicking away for about two hours solid! My girls both had very short bed-time stories this evening!

Even though for the first time I've been able to do the downloads with a fast internet connection - yay!!!, the Free Download Manager program has made downloading the books so much easier for me. It queues the downloads and will resume a download after a broken connection (which still happens here quite frequently).

This is unforetunately not a very good picture, but it gives you an idea of our timeline. It is up on the wall above the desk in our study. It's about 6 feet wide and 3.5 feet high. I made it myself and you can find a template at this yahoo group. The lines are arranged on wall in a triangle, starting with a Prehistory strip right at the left-hand bottom and then two strip for the years 3099 to 3000 and 2999 to 2900 on the next line. There are two centuries (with strips of different colours) to a line for the BC years going up to the year 0 at the top. The AD lines go from 0 at the top to 2000 at the bottom. There are two centuries per line going down to 1499 and from there is a century per line going on - as there are more events in those years. You could make the timeline "thinner" and "taller" if you only put one century per line - starting from the floor and going up. You could also use the strips to build a timeline going up the stairs in a step-wise fashion (with year 0 on the landing). I hope this makes sense!

I use a display folders with 50 pockets to a folder. At the end of the year, I put in a selection of the year's work for each subject and include the daily record book and complete workbooks as well. For grades one and two, both files have ended up about two inches thick. For art, I have a seperate folders. The best pictures make it to the fridge for display and from there into the folder. I take photographs of cardboard "sculptures" and add those to the file too. Dd's pottery goes into a box via the top of the microwave. I have a large wooden chest for all the display folders and pottery boxes. Before starting the filing system, everything was loosely thrown into the chest. When it eventually could not close any more I spent a few evenings purging and getting the filing system set up. It's really easy to maintain now that I have it sorted. There's space for a few more years now!

About a year ahead so that I can look out for 2nd hand items. With the outrageous cost of overseas postage, I try to get things by surface mail, but it can take literally months (the longest was 7 months!!!) to get here.

Thanks for the reminder that it's all up to Mom! Paula's archive has some more ideas for pre-school activity bags.

I chose Bleh! It's Saturday morning here and dh had another seizure during the night. He has an excruciating pain in his chest from the muscle spasm and will probably be sleeping for most of the day. Sooo, our Saturday plans are cancelled. We were going to have coffee at the newly opened coffee shop at the art gallery in town and then run some errands. 8yo dd has horse-riding later this morning and is getting a play date over this afternoon. 3yo is already painting. I’m feeling rather sorry for ourselves this morning (lack of sleep), but should get over it in a short while…

I've started listening to audiobooks while doing chores and really enjoy them. What are your favourites?