That is wonderful! My oldest elected to go to community college just so he could avoid taking the SAT/ACT because he's a slow reader. The funny thing is now that he's out of high school he's been reading for pleasure more than he ever did when he was being homeschooled. Go figure... :glare:

We switched our phone service to Ooma a couple months ago and I am able to blacklist phone numbers. Then I can choose how the call is routed, set it for voicemail, continuous ring, number disconnected, or a call blocked message. Since most of the calls we get are robocalls I have it set call blocked message. At first I was concerned about not sending them to voicemail just in case it was important, but we are getting daily political calls that drive me nuts. Besides, anyone that really needs to get a hold of us has our cell phone numbers.

When my third child was born, we were given a 2 room suite at the hospital. My dh and FIL were able to stay in that room with the french doors closed while I was in labor. My dh does not do well with medical situations. Perhaps you can ask your OB if something similar is available for you? Then your dh can be with the kids in the next room, but they are definitely separate from you. I don't know that I would have wanted my older kids at the hospital, but in your situation it might be a reasonable solution.

Our local township offers paper shredding a few times a year. They do have a limit on how much you can bring, but it's pretty liberal.

I've had allergies my whole life and my doctors have always talked about the night air being more problematic. Pollen levels go up and down over the course of the day and often times I can open windows during the day, but once evening rolls around I have to close up the house or I can't breathe as well. Hopefully this only lasts while you are pregnant!

With three kids and two dogs, the carpet cleaner is probably one my most valued tools in the house! We too have a Hoover upright that is about 8 years old and has been a real workhorse. I had a real hard time convincing DH that we needed to purchase one at the time, but even now he would agree that no family should be without one! :lol:

Thanks for all the suggestions, I'm definitely going to look at MM. We used MUS when we first started multiplication in 3rd grade, which frankly just confused him to no end. The poor kid is so worried about 10s, 100s, etc. that he just can't seem to focus on the algorithm. We have started out simple and added one layer at time, but somehow he always ends up completely confused and frustrated. He also goes between MUS's version and the standard algorithm most of us learned. Last week he was doing great and then today it was back to square one. We are now using MotL now and it works very well for most everything, but since we are still stuck on this one point I decided it was time to consult the hive! Thanks for all the advice!

I need your best suggestions for teaching multiple digit multiplication in a slow broken down process for a boy that is 12 and has always struggled with this. He doesn't seem to have any other learning issues. He's doing fine with long division, fractions, decimals, etc. But multiple digit multiplication is a total crap shoot. We review it constantly and from one week to the next I never know what I'll get. Last week he did fabulous. Got them all right, except for one small addition error. Today he got them all wrong. Not even close. The problem is that he over-thinks place value. Sometimes when he has to carry a number, he jumps a column. Sometimes he adds zeros because he's thinking hundreds when it's only tens. The kid is just a mess and so am I. Help! :confused:

Love Aldi for the snacks, crackers, cookies. Also love their salad dressings and condiments, big savings there! We are absolutely hooked on their bacon. We buy their high end thick sliced bacon and every once in a while when I have to shop at the regular grocery I will buy bacon there and always regret it. We've not had any problems with their cheese, but again I buy the better quality, not the cheapest stuff. Milk & eggs are usually much less than our regular grocery chain too. Last few weeks milk was $1.99! I was also pleasantly surprised recently to see that many of their breads are made without HFCS. Our dislikes.. we are cereal snobs. We don't really care for any of the seafood either. Produce, it just depends on the stock.

I see that ALEKS also offers a new integrated math option for high school! This might be just what we need! ETA: Well, I jumped a little fast. They only offer 9th grade integrated math.

Thanks! I never would have thought of that!

It's looking more and more like my ds (a sophomore) is going to be home for the second semester of this school year. I'm currently doing what I can to prepare curriculum for him but I've really hit a snag with math. For the last year and a half my son has been in a STEM school using SIMMS Integrated Math. Last year he had a wonderful teacher and did very well. They also integrated much of what they were learning into his physics class which help reinforce what he was learning and it was a good fit. This year he has a different teacher that believes more in collaboration and it's been a rocky road. This is just one of many reasons why he may be home at the end of this semester. My question is what would others recommend to assess his learning and determine placement? I'm really at a loss and I know that I do not want to try using Integrated Math at home. The TMs are terrible and I think he needs reinforcement in some areas since they've been all over the map. Prior to the STEM school we were using Chalk Dust and liked it, but now that he's done a little bit of everything I just don't even know where to turn. http://www.kendallhunt.com/simms/

I had them horribly when I was a child and they lasted through my first pregnancy. After the 1st trimester things were MUCH better for a long time. Then after a few years they came back. I went to every specialist, tried all the meds, made diet changes and nothing seemed to help. It wasn't until I found a integrative doctor that specialized in allergies and environmental medicine that I was able to truly get control of my headaches. It was a combination of foods, chemicals, yeast overgrowth, and fighting the inflammation in my body with diet and supplements that made a world of difference. I was SO used to feeling some level of awful all the time that when the clouds finally cleared and I felt great, I just couldn't believe the difference. The whole journey started when I read a book called "Inflammation Syndrome" by Jack Challem. I hope you find what works! It's a long and difficult process to get to the root of these things.:grouphug:

We bought our board with a 50% off coupon at Hobby Lobby and it only cost about $10. I have several in my house and this is by far my favorite one. Another idea is to use dollar store cookie sheets. You can arrange the tiles on a couple sheets and then do word work on a blank cookie sheet.

If it makes you feel any better, this is our 11th year homeschooling and just last week I dumped almost everything we are doing in favor of a more scripted curriculum that would make things more manageable and enjoyable at our home. Over the summer I planned out which books we would use and then late in the summer the kids talked me into doing unit studies. I thought it would be a great fit but it wasn't. So, I have been thinking about Paths of Exploration for a year and half and decided it was time to try it. Yes, we are behind, but the beauty of homeschooling is that we can tweak things and if we need to catch up over the summer we can, or we may just skip a unit. I've homeschooled long enough to know that it won't kill us if we don't finish a book. My mil was just diagnosed with breast cancer and my oldest ds is going through a rough patch right now. I needed more time to focus on people and less time planning school. Plus my kids missed doing the fun stuff that I never seem to have enough time to get around to. The books just came over the weekend, so who knows if this will work as well as I want it to, but I feel so much better knowing that I don't have so much planning on my plate!