I went from 4 to 6, because 5 and 6 are twins. But honestly, besides the unique challenges of twins, it wasn't much different from 4. Often I have my preschool aged nieces here, too. It really makes no difference. The older kids are able to help out more every year, and the baby stage doesn't last forever!

Climbing to Good English by Schoolaid

I use different colored markers on the whiteboard to show the patterns... I think this is explained in the teacher's manual. The way the students have to attempt spelling the word before they see it and copy it really helps focus their attention. It's been amazing for us. Since the lessons are short and simple, you could easily speed it up by doing 2 lists a day -- one in the morning and one in the afternoon. I just got the $10 teacher's manual download, and the kids use plain notebooks. Best $10 I have spent in our homeschool.

It's much less than half the state.... but anyways, this is a major reason a lot of Northern Californians want to become a separate state. Southern California does have a problem with water use. Those of us in Nor Cal don't like getting lumped in with them ;-) And yes, a lot of water gets shipped out as produce -- much more than is used to irrigate lawns. Much of what is grown in the desert areas is HAY that is shipped to CHINA. So we basically sell So. Cal water supplies to China. That's kinda messed up, IMHO. But such a huge portion of the economy depends on ag -- such a huge mess!

This might seem a little nit-picky, but CA isn't a desert, and doesn't need to do things the way "desert states" do. A few parts of it are a desert, but there FIVE major climates in California. Much of the area suffering drought is the Mediterranean climate area. That means that we USUALLY have more than enough rain during the winter to store and use for the dry summers. This type of climate does not occur anywhere else in North America, so I know it is difficult for most Americans to understand why we irrigate out here as we do. Although it is not a desert, it is necessary to have water storage facilities to keep up with the population and agriculture. Because of environmental concerns, this has not always happened. This current drought is the worst drought in 1,000 years. It's "exceptional." This is a totally different thing than the problem with the Southern Californians who DO live in a desert and get their water from the Colorado River, where lawns aren't sustainable even without drought. But that is a small portion of California (maybe not in population numbers, but in land area).

Aw, that's sad. I read his "How to Tutor" book as a young teen and then went out and found some students to begin tutoring, as my first "job." And I use Alpha Phonics with my kids now. He did some good work during his lifetime.

Regarding the green lawns-- up until recently, residents were often fined by cities, not just HOAs, for not having one. I remember that the year the drought started, the city of Sacramento was still fining people who dared to take their lawns out and put in drought-tolerant landscaping. The ONLY option was a green real grass lawn. And Sacramento only gets up to 20" rain between November and April, in a good year -- NO rain for half the year. There are so many different climates and water supplies in California that you can't just say "water is expensive/cheap in California" or "California is a desert and no one should have a lawn." It's really big diverse state and the water issues are a huge mess. I pay about $40/mo. for 9 units a month for a family of 8. (about 6800 gallons a month). The sewer costs $50 a month on top of that. We have an adequate ground water supply. But if you travel one mile to the north, the water supply is a reservoir that is going to run dry from lack of snow. We managed to cut way back by not watering our lawn, and also by not having twins in cloth diapers anymore :-) General mindfulness about water usage helped quite a bit.

Good lard, and no canned beans. I render my own lard from the home-grown pig we buy each year, but if I didn't have that I'd probably use bacon drippings or a nice oil.

We use Sequential Spelling and I LOVE it -- we've had a total turn-around with spelling in our house. I just use the teacher's e-book, which was the best $10 I have ever spent.

Good info! Sounds like it wouldn't be a good fit for us, then. I'm not really interested in supplementing that much Latin for a test. I'm thinking we'll just do the NLE Intro after BBLL 2, around 6th grade. I may do the National Mythology Exam for 5th grade instead of a Latin one -- seems a little more appropriate for our scope and sequence.

Thanks! That is helpful to know.

From reading other threads it appears that the Exploratory Latin Exam would be appropriate after the Big Book of Lively Latin 1, and then the NLE Intro exam after LL2. (With some supplemental cultural studies). Is this correct?

I use bar graphs to illustrate, and we call it the "extra." It took several day of repeating: "how many more" means "how many EXTRA."

I get Keens for my older kids every year that I can afford it. They are the only shoes that I have been able to pass down to be worn the next summer by another kid. In fact, my youngest has a pair of Keens that is on its fourth summer, and they're still as good as new. So they save me a lot of money in the long run. I probably wouldn't get them if there were no kids to pass them down to, though.

I have 2 three-year-olds, and they tell me they need to potty about 20 seconds before it's too late. So I always appreciate an available toilet, even if it's a port-a-potty. When we have family events with only about 50 people and 1 toilet, the bathroom is CONSTANTLY in use by someone. And that is with many of the guys going out back to "water the bushes." I wouldn't bat an eye if I saw a port-a-potty at a rural home for a party.

I don't think the fact that our group is only for privately schooling families is seen as a big deal in our area, because the homeschool charter programs are so big that they comfortably do their own thing. The charter schools have their own field trips, enrichment classes, teacher support, etc. I can't join in with my friends' field trips and such because I'm not part of their charter program, and they can't join in on my group's trips and Spell-a-Thons, either because they're part of a different program. There are so many groups here that's its really not an issue. I could see that it might be in a smaller community, though.

The homeschooling group I am a member of does not include students who are enrolled in public school, even if it's a home study ("homeschool" charter) program. There are a LOT of public charter school families in my area who consider themselves homeschoolers. I can understand why, since the mom does the teaching and the kids are at home. But they still answer to a school official, whereas independent homeschoolers don't answer to anyone. Charter school families get support from their charter school, so I think it makes sense to have a group that only supports families who aren't enrolled in a government-funded school.

I couldn't believe it when I looked up the homeschool conference in my city this year.... the exhibitor list included a few curriculum publishers and a booth for essential oils. Somehow it's related to homeschooling now? That's besides the fact that the workshops aren't actually about homeschooling, but about Christian parenting. I don't understand why the organizers think I would take time and money away from my family to go listen to more sermons. I already have a church, thank you! I'd like a workshop about teaching Shakespeare or high school math.... please????

There are some videos on Education Unboxed that I found helpful when we hit this spot in 3A. I also pulled some worksheet from Math Mammoth. But one of the most helpful things for us has been to use graph paper to work the problems, and just lots of practice. Here's one of the Education Unboxed videos/

Mostly it explains her thesis and her study results. I love that book.... but if you're looking for something that will help you teach your son, I highly recommend Arithmetic for Parents by Ron Aharoni.

Rio Vista, Antioch, Pittsburgh, Concord, Richmond, Tracy, Bethel Island (aka Methel Island)...all areas with very high crime rates, lots of gangs, very high rates of methamphetamine users... and the traffic is nuts all over, so you'll probably have to move closer to the office than you realize to have a one hour commute.

I have heard that baked potatoes sitting out at room temp can be a source of botulism.

I'm not sure what you need, but I have these supplements bookmarked to use for my kids later: Headventureland.com Learning Latin Through Mythology by Cambridge University Press Fairy Tales in Latin, by Victor Barocas

I used to get together for a mini co-op of sorts with 2 other families, back when our oldest kids were K'ers or 1st grade. Eventually, between the three families there came to be 12 kids -- so the odds that one of the kids was sick was so high that it made getting together an exception rather than the rule. You may not have that particular problem, but it may be worth exploring what your tolerance level is for sharing fevers and coughs.

Our church has the same thing. ... excellent, affordable private school. They also have ESL classes for adults, ministry for college students at the nearby universities, and a sports camp at a public school during the summer. The biggest draw, though, is the preaching.