Raised in an Evangelical Free church, attended various similar denominations during college, grad school and early adulthood. Now attending an Evangelical Covenant church.

I've traveled to Canada for work, including meeting with Canadian companies, and didn't need any sort of documentation to enter the country. I was there for 7-10 days, IIRC.

I homeschooled for 9 years and this is my first year without anyone home. I have four kids but never homeschooled them all at once. The most I had was 3 at a time and that was challenging, but I loved it. I look back on those years now with great fondness even though it wasn't always easy. Last year was tough because I just had one home and she really needs peers and a teacher other than me. She's starting at a lovely school next week and I know it will be so good for her. I just wish I had more kids to homeschool. 🙂

I have a treadmill that I have moved several times over the years. The first time we moved it, it worked great prior to the move but would not function afterwards. I worked with the company to do some troubleshooting and the problem was a small part that is often damaged if not handled very carefully during moves. I was able to replace the part. Thankfully, it is easily removable and so now I take that part out during moves. The company has since gone out of business so I'm not sure I could get a replacement any more. I wonder if it's possible that there is something similar going on with this elliptical? I get that it is a huge hassle for you but wanted to point out that the seller may not be totally at fault, either.

We went through this earlier this summer with our 17 yo son. He has wanted his ears pierced for awhile. My husband was very opposed but my opinion was that it is fairly harmless. He's a really good kid and if this is the extent of his "rebellion," we will be fortunate. 🙂 He ended up doing it and while he's gotten a couple of negative reactions from grandparents, it really is no big deal.

We are doing the opposite - going from homeschooling to Sadlier 7th grade in a private school. I have the 6th grade book and it looks similar in scope to most homeschool curricula except for Math U See and Teaching Textbooks. I think you'd be fine transitioning to any comprehensive program provided that you've done the new curriculum's placement test.

I have a master's degree in international relations and taught intro to IR on the college level. It is typically a sophomore level course. A strong understanding of world history would be especially helpful, particularly 20th century world history. Sonlight's core 300 looks really good as a foundation for future study in international relations.

We have a really good pharmacy -- we have a kiddo with a lot of monthly meds, so that's important for us. There have been a few times recently when they've had to order out for components of a compounded med and that takes a few extra days. As long as I refill as early as possible, we have been fine.

He's a rising senior. He'll be taking some early college classes on his high school campus this coming year. That may help him think about what next steps are best for him. Many of his friends are a year older so seeing the various paths they take might help him narrow down his options, too. The college options he's considering are mostly local and flexible in terms of application deadlines so he has time.

This is a really good point. I've noticed this sort of thinking on DH's part in a variety of contexts and am glad to finally have a word for it. I've tried to address this over the years in different ways, including through counseling, but it has not been successful. For sure! I have seen this in my own family of origin. However, DH is a rather rigid thinker so in his mind, there is only one way to be successful -- not just to be academically-motivated, but to take a similar college/career path as he did. This is a great strategy. I'll try this with DH when similar situations come up. Thanks for sharing.

Our public schools allow it but most private schools do not.

I don't want to get into this too deeply for privacy reasons but yes - that is a definite possibility.

Totally agree. DH has definite issues with his own perfectionism that are impacting his outlook on this issue. I said basically the same thing as you said above to him yesterday.

He has expressed frustration with him but he has not said those specific words to DS directly, but to me. I do think that DH is at risk of damaging their relationship over this. There are bigger personality issues at play than I feel comfortable going into here.

I have a 17 yo son who was homeschooled for part of elementary/middle school. Of my four children, he was definitely the most capable/academically-inclined. He used to make extra math worksheets for himself, did his own self-assigned copywork and was even a bit of a perfectionist when it came to things like handwriting and grammar. He went back to school in 8th grade to a public middle school that is highly-regarded. He did the bare minimum, got almost all As, and internalized the culture of apathy. Standards were low and overall student behavior was poor. We sent him to a small private high school beginning in 9th grade. His transition to high school was rocky academically with many missed assignments and lack of motivation. He basically admits to hating "school" - meaning academics - at this point. He is a gifted and hardworking multi-sport athlete, is well-liked and has several good mentors/teachers/coaches who see that he's far more capable than his GPA shows. He does the bare minimum to maintain a B average. At home, he is not particularly tidy or organized. He loses things all the time. He wants to go to college but will get little to no need-based aid and yet he really needs to get some merit aid to make private college feasible. (In the meantime, his younger brother transitioned directly from homeschool to the same private high school and is doing extraordinarily well.) My husband and I were both highly motivated students who did well in high school/college/grad school with very little involvement/cajoling/handholding from our parents. My DH, who is quite frankly a perfectionist, is convinced that DS is immature, will never get it together and is doomed to some sort of low-level job and a subpar future. I totally disagree and agree that he is maybe a little immature but he will figure out a path for himself and it doesn't have to look like anyone else's. He can be successful in life without following the exact same path as DH. I do wonder if he might have ADHD as it tends to run in the family. Am I the one off-base or is DH? Isn't it pretty common for teens to have messy rooms and not particularly like academics? With his B average, he has not closed doors for himself (other than merit aid, perhaps.) He is not aiming for a selective college. He wants to go to a not particularly-selective private college, or perhaps community college to start out.

My mom and two college friends. I talk to my mom almost every day but the college friends every couple of months - more often if something is going on. I know they'd do anything for me, and I for them, even if we don't talk daily. I have a couple of other friends that I talk to more often but it's more casual. I think there's definitely deep friendship potential there if we could find more time to spend together. I do know they'd do anything for me, too.

Ours is a personal friend, so extremely accessible. My husband has his cell phone number and sees him socially 1-2 times a week. He's had us over his house to check for ear infections, etc. His practice is not in an extremely convenient location but we stick with him because of the other benefits.

I outsourced math for my oldest in 7th and 8th grades, to Derek Owens. It was a great fit. He was a strong math student and did well with the independence. Having three younger kids, it freed me up to focus more on their needs. I tried outsourcing math for my 6th grader this year and it did NOT go well. She struggles a bit in math but wants independence. We tried a few programs that have video/online components and it was not successful. With one, Teaching Textbooks, she would always skip through the instruction and then wonder why she struggled doing the problems. She dislikes math so her motivation was to get done as quickly as possible. 😞 She definitely needs 1:1 attention from me for that subject.

My son became acutely sick with pneumonia and low oxygen saturations over the weekend. My mom, a retired nurse, told me that he'd surely be admitted. The doctor at the urgent care wanted him to go by ambulance to the ER and assured me he'd be admitted. We went to our familiar children's hospital and it was crazy crowded -- they got him in right away, but we sat in an ER room for hours, planning to be admitted. It soon became clear that we would be in the ER overnight because there were no rooms available on the floor (or more likely, not enough nurses staffing beds.) After receiving IV fluids and medication, his condition improved to the point where they agreed to discharge him only because we have oxygen at home as well as monitoring equipment and familiarity caring for his complex medical needs. Any other time, he would have been admitted. He's on the mend now so it turned out OK for us but I wonder how many people who really need hospital-level care are getting turned away because of staffing shortages.

When my kids were toddlers/preschoolers, my husband and I both worked at a private university where tuition benefits were provided for the employee and their dependents. It phased in fully over 5 years of employment and the maximum benefit was 95% off tuition. I ended up leaving to be a SAHM and he left to pursue more highly technical work in the business world. Salaries were significantly lower in academia than in the business world and that was a factor as well. Over the last decade or so, the university has had numerous layoffs so even if we had stayed, there was no guarantee that we would have been able to use the tuition benefit at all. Of course, now our rising senior is considering going to college there ...

We keep getting mail about this since my son apparently used one of these systems early in life when he had a trach. Thankfully, he is now trach-free and we no longer have the equipment!

I have several of them and have used them to reinforce concepts/remediate but I don't think they have enough practice to serve as a primary curriculum, at least for my kids.

Thanks for sharing! Ordered - hoping to not use them but since a couple of my kids' friends now have Covid, they'll be good to have on hand.

I use the Peloton app. I don't have a Peloton bike but they also have a huge variety of workouts ranging from stretching and strength to yoga and running. What I like most is that most of the workouts are short so I can stack a few for a customized workout.

Yup, and with mixed feelings. I started homeschooling in 2013 and have homeschooled all 4 kids at some point. For the most part, I've loved it. My two older boys transitioned to school in 8th and 9th grade. My youngest boy has profound special needs and so I only homeschooled him last year during Covid. So that means this year I just have my 6th grade daughter home. I love her dearly but she is much more challenging than her older brothers. She has ADHD and anxiety, high social needs (but social anxiety with new situations/people) and is kind of in that stage where she just doesn't care about school. I'm tired of trying to motivate her; we're basically doing the bare minimum. So, next year, she's moving on to a wonderful private school. I'll continue teaching at our co-op and we'll see what else pops up ...