You guys are awesome! I have lots of places to research now. I love the look and feel of places more in he north-Chicago, Madison, even Boston. However, the weather has me very concerned! Life in a wheelchair is not at all fun when battling that cold and snow:) I am from the other side of the US, in Idaho. I would love Portland or Seattle, as would the kid with her love of the ocean. She has been telling us for nearly 2 years she wants to be an oceanographer, but we shall see:) We definitely are looking at Reno. With Davidson there, I have to believe that there must be some great programs around there as well for littles...even outside Davidson. I really think we are going to need lots of options and support:) I need to do quite a bit more investigation.

I have a very wiggly almost- 5 year old and her piano lessons are 1 hour total...however, only 30 minutes are at the piano with the instructor (and even then she is very flexible.) Alex then has 30 minutes of theory/game time in the rhythm lab. I was worried it would be too much, but she LOVES it. Her violin lesson usually runs closer to 30 minutes, but I would bet that is closer to 15 minutes of actually playing. Violin is a lot harder for this kid as she seems incapable of standing still:). I don't mind since the lady comes to our house and it is really quite inexpensive. One thing common around here is offering homeschoolers a bit of a discount as they can attend during non-peak hours. I think we get $200 off of our annual price just because we can go before 3:00 pm. Is this a possibility with your children's instructor?

Ugh, my dd4 is going 3 mornings per week to a preschool and we have already had 2 fundraisers and are gearing up for a huge one! It is crazy. The first was TUPPERWARE! With a kind note advising that each child was expected to sell $70 worth from a tiny little book with not many useful items...of which the school actually receives 40%. Sorry, but these kids are 3, 4, and 5. I was not about to take my kid around to sell them. (Although I did briefly entertain the idea of purchasing some for my dysfunctional mother for Christmas, since nothing says I love you like a random collection of plastic containers!) I just made a donation. It is interesting to note that all these fundraisers are NOT to purchase great materials for the kids. They are to provide bonuses and gifts to the teachers. Whilst I do get the philosophy that if you look after the teachers you will get better ones in theory, it would be much more efficient to raise tuition for better benefits and wages, and take up a donation! I just can't quite get my head around it:(

And don't forget to look at the big long 'come back, we miss you Sparkly' thread. I am on my phone, but can someone link it?

Yay! Glad to see you back...

Yes, to all of the above questions. We have a constantly-evolving list of questions just like this whenever we see any chem jobs pop up in hubby's field. And it is impossible to plan even six month out for this kid, so I need options and flexibility. It would be wonderful to find even small groups of kids with similar interests, and we REALLY need things where age is not the primary concern:)

Following for ideas to cherry-pick😄 A few days ago after a seemingly all-day whine Festival (and me without my little black dress!) I finally told my dd4 that I had had absolutely enough of the whining and was not going to respond to any requests with even a hint of a whine in her voice. Her response? "But I don't waaaanntt to whiiiinnee!"

It is becoming patently obvious that we are going to need to move. There are just not many (if that!) options for Alex locally with her enthusiasm for learning, achievement level, and interests. I have a feeling that this will most likely be a problem wherever we go with a PG kiddo who is extremly opinionated and stubborn, but I KNOW we can do better than this for her! She has been attending a Montessori preschool 3 mornings a week and I can honestly say it had been a flop...other than the fact that she is interacting with kids and I am getting a bit of much-needed rest. She reads a lot and draws a lot. I had to intervene as they actually put my child in time out because she 'won't go play with the kids' and insists on chatting to the teachers. Hubby is always on the lookout for jobs at other universities, even if t means a pay cut. We are even at the point where we would consider simply moving and continuing to look for a job for him, although I cant believe we would be that reckless when she is still so young (5 in Dec!) We will be homeschooling her, but it would be nice to at least have the option of a school or collection of activities as a backup plan. So, if you could choose just about anywhere to live in this situation, where would it be? Bonus points for plenty of math-oriented activities, circles, groups with plenty of room to grow!

We just added a neon tetra to my dd's Beta tank, and her beta seems to genuinely like it. Our tank is a 3-gallon, aerated, and has a light that helps keep the water warm. I had always been told myths about betas, but part of my requirement when dd asked for a pet was that we read and learn about them...and yes, it came in a tiny cup too small to even let the poor thing swim:(

Do you think it is possible that there were little hints in his physical health that registered sub-consciously? That would be my take, as it is usually my experience. It didn't register consciously, but sub-consciously you picked up on some very small clues. This initiated a dream, and remembering it whilst awake had you specifically looking for physical symptoms? Regardless, I hope you get good news from the cardiologist and he feels better soon.

Have to share a variation my dd invented for Zeus on the Loose for those of you that have it. Zeus on the Loose had been a clear favorite for a long time, and it has really made my kiddo quite fast as addition facts and mental math. I think it is still a favorite because of the strategy and the fact that it is Greek Mythology/) This morning when dd drug it out, she decided we were going to play a variation called 'going to Hades'...after hubby and I giggled at her title she explained that we could start the Mt. Olympus total at 100 and subtract to the ultimate goal of zero. The Poseidon card was played as an opposite, so instead of subtracting 10 we added 10 in this version. All other cards were played as normal. It actually worked really really well, and was a lot of fun. Really good mental math subtraction practice too:) Just another option!

I am resigned to the organizational disaster that is my Tupperware/plastic container drawer. My strategy is this: when I move clean containers from the dishwasher to said drawer I push, pull, stack, re stack, and possibly utter a word or two under my breath until everything has been reshuffled just enough to get the drawer closed. 😊And if I need anything out of it and am feeling frisky, I have been known to wait until hubby ventures closer to the drawer than me before innocently asking him to grab a container for me. If I am VERY in need of amusement I might ask for a particular container or a (gasp!) matching lid! ETA: I have a friend with a meticulous storage container cabinet. I was amazed! Until she showed me how she keeps it that way... She keeps EXACTLY three of each of four sizes of Tupperware. All the same brand, color, and style. They are all the 'stackable' version. So three lids stacked with three containers on top. A separate pile in the cupboard for each of the four sizes, arranged from largest in the back to smallest in the front. That is it. Strict control of what is there. No mismatched containers, no hand-me-downs, no disposable. Who does that?!

The Key to series has some great CHEAP booklets with nice incremental steps like that: Key to Decimals series: http://www.keycurriculum.com/products/key-to/key-to-decimals

Have you seen this plant experiments kit? I think I will order it. http://www.hometrainingtools.com/botanical-discoveries/p/LM-BOTDISC/ They also have the botany coloring book... http://www.hometrainingtools.com/botany-coloring-book/p/CB-BOTANY/

I love the idea of teaching her to advocate for herself...but in this particular area, especially where she is just seeming to realize it is okay to be gifted, I would be really worried about that being crushed by a teacher who either wasn't prepared to answer or says something not supportive. Either intentionally or inadvertently. If you really wanted to go this route, maybe sounding it out with the teacher prior? Unfortunately, when there are limited spots in a school gifted program they often do go off of the standardized tests, and partly a teacher recommendation. In a case like this you may well have to acquire independent testing results, even if the teacher believes the child's ability is not reflected by the previous standardized tests. It is their fallback when they get lots of phone calls basically saying the same thing:( (Absolutely not saying this is the case here, as you know your child better than the teachers! Just a perspective from watching my nephew, PG, not qualify for the ps gifted program based upon standardized scores and lack of people-pleasing ability.) Good luck. I think it is really exciting that she has arrived at the idea that maybe it is okay to 'let her powers out!'

I agree. I bought a children's dictionary when we started keeping a vocabulary journal. The problem was that it never had any of the words she wanted to look up. We tried a different one, for slightly older kids. Same problem. The only time we actually used it was to teach dd HOW to use the dictionary. I would pick out a word from the book and then have her look it up. Fewer words meant an easier entry into dictionary skills. That lasted a handful of times and she was ready for a regular dictionary.

Also, Ellen McHenry has some great free botany games and lessons, some for all ages available:) http://www.ellenjmchenry.com/homeschool-freedownloads/lifesciences-games/botany.php

Remembering a shorter unit I did with my dd, Montessori has some wonderful downloadable 3-part cards for botany. We learned basic leaf shapes, plants, and trees. We did a leaf rubbing and specimen collection notebook where she used what she had learned to identify them using Smithsonian Identification books. Education.com has a download on trees with quite a bit of information and fun pages. DK Eyewitness has a video on plants and one on trees that were both well-recieved as well. ETA: if you have a local university check with them...ours has a massive wall-sized cross-section of a tree on display. You can see the rings and they have inserted little time markers that reference famous historical events. That made a huge impression on our whole family. Apparently these are fairly common. Also, we went to two different botanical gardens. They both had a junior naturalist badge you could earn by completing a talk and a booklet filled with learning activities and facts. A lot of fun:)

I think the context matters. Most kids, if they hit, just seem to react. It isn't really planned and they end up sort of smacking at the nearest body part. That being said, I learned that my sister had been 'popping' her kids in the mouth when they smarted off by watching her three-year-old intentionally try to hit my dd in the mouth because he didn't like what she said. I was lucky enough that it led to a serious discussion with my sister (who has 4 kids, the first at 15) and was completely overwhelmed by so many circumstances. Not an excuse, but coupled with our upbringing, had roots. Ultimately we were able to get her depression meds and a parenting class and things are much better. So yes. It would be a area of concern if it was deliberate and aimed, rather than just where a frustrated little hand ended up...

We did much the same with WWE1 for handwriting practice...and it does get progressively more difficult and I wanted her to get more out of WWE. It is just one of those programs where it is best digested and kept short and sweet. As you progress through AAS you will also get more sentences with increasing complexity. We tend to do a full step per day now, a couple of times per week which has 10-15 sentences as well as a writing station. For more writing practice, a couple of the things Alex has enjoyed: A vocabulary journal where she chooses a word from read alouds, looks up the definition and writes it out with a sentence she creates and a picture. She also has a science journal and will write in it. Another thing that made sense for her was to learn cursive. We really did not devote a lot of time to this, I just showed her how to form the letters and connect them. We then started doing a few of the AAS words each day in cursive, and she took it from there. Now at least a couple of her AAS sentences will be done in cursive. I also bought the HWOT copy book for cursive in Spanish, but she didn't like the style so we just do a simple Spanish workbook and she writes in Spanish and or cursive.

Too cute:) Speaking of your mythology club, I was thinking of it a couple of days ago. We are going to the UK for Christmas and have decided to take Alex for a week side trip to Greece. Planning on hitting as many museums, temple ruins, etc as possible. Happy to bring back anything that can fit in a suitcase or be shipped:) I will send you a PM with details:)

We had a weekend like that. Dd4 is extremely consumed by Greek Mythology at the moment, so we took her to a larger museum with a collection of ancient Greek and Roman artifacts. i discovered she has an interesting view on Zeus and Hera. "Mom, maybe Hera wouldn't hae been so mean and vengeful if Zeus would stop making all those BABIES! said in a voice definitely not museum-appropriate:) Afterward we took her to her first play as a suprise. Totally innocuous, a Rapunzel variation. So when she got VERY upset when we found our seats I couldn't figure out why. The guy directly behind us was wearing a shirt with Abraham Lincoln on it and she was worried he was going to get shot by John Wilkes Booth😳 Because apparently plays are synonymous with assassination in her mind:(

Wow, I guess I just don't see there actually being an age that is too young to read, provided it is fun and enjoyable to the kid. When I saw the title of the thread I assumed it was about some of the pitfalls of early reading:). And yes, there can be a couple of those. Appropriate reading material, and dealing with the fallout/embarrassing moments when your tiny tot reads something inappropriate off an advert/billboard/checkout lane fodder/closed captioning on a public TV...yikes😳 OP- give the kiddo what he wants for as long as he wants it...better yet, always stop just a bit before they have reached that DONE point. Teach them to say 'all done' or 'that's enough' and stick with that...not whether a lesson is done or you have finished the page at that age. If you hit a block with them, he will let you know and you can shelve it. Make it games instead and just read, but definitely don't worry about a certain starting age if your kiddo is truly wanting/needing to try!

Us too! We spent 10 days this summer there and it is officially dd4's favorite 'place on the whole earth!' We left a bunch of things with housekeeping, and they were so sweet and gracious. Of course, every single person we met working there was:)

My dd absolutely loved the randomness of the Mathtacular elementary math DVDs. We didn't do them as a program, just watched 'for fun,' but they do a pretty good job in a very off-beat way. I know her first exposure to area and perimeter was with Justin building a treehouse in one of the videos:) I just had a quick look and many of the Mathtacular shorts are available on YouTube, including the perimeter and area clips.