Here is a picture of one of the decks I did with Trex. Not my in-laws house, but this is the house I sold.

It really depends on what Trex you are talking about and when it was installed. The older product lines didn't look that nice. The newer ones are nice and have held up so well. I built decking with it for my house (no longer own) and my in-laws in the hills on a steep slope. They never do any maintenance on their home, so whatever happens we have to do. We've done nothing for the Trex decking for the past 15 years and it still looks and functions as well as it has since we installed it. They get on shore winds from the bay and western exposure from the sun.

One rule of thumb is to plan to set aside 1% of your home's value annually for what you might want to think about as a reserve/replacement fund. I'm a CPA by trade so my answer reflects this. Now, if you want to get really into the analysis, you can copy how homeowner associations work a budget for their reserve fund. Basically, you have a spreadsheet where you list all the possible items that you have to plan for. Fencing, Roofing, Gutters, Asphalt, Bathrooms, Refrigerator, etc. You can get as detailed as you want. Nowadays, it is very easy to find this information online. Research the useful life of each. For example, a wood fence generally has a useful life of 15 years. On your spreadsheet, you would have this: Fencing Useful Life Original Date Remaining Life Replacement Cost Reserve Needed Remaining Life is a formula that subtracts the number of years between your current date and original date (this should be a cell that as today's date) from the useful life. Reserve needed would a a calculation that is the replacement cost divided by useful life multipled by the difference between useful life and remaining life. Say a fence is 10 years old and has 5 years left. It costs $4,000 to replace. It means that as of today you need to have $2667 saved. When you do this for everything and have the amounts you need for everything added up as a total that tells you how much you are underfunded if you are. Doing it in a spreadsheet that autocalcuates for you based on the current date (there's a formula in spreadsheet that pulls the current date), then it automatically updates all the calculations for you. If you find out the cost changes for something that you need to replace, then you just update that number.

This is good to know. Did he do it back to back? Or was there a gap in between?

I like WWS as well and have used it. I hesitated suggesting this because I don't think it gets to teaching an essay well. It teaches lots of useful tools (parts that you need for good writing), but essay writing not really coverd by the end of the level 1 book.

I'm not just recommending it. There's no way to do this without it. Now if you want to have spine or add some additional reading, each set of cards has a list of books that they use. They are exactly the same as the books listed here for their teach it yourself package: https://veritaspress.com/store/1815-to-present-older-homeschool-graded.html . Now you don't have to use those to complete the course. I realize that I didn't answer your question. Yes, my son really enjoyed the SP history courses. Honestly, it was a lot easier to do these than when we did the entire SOTW. By the way, I have long since wrapped up the courses, but I still get the email promos. You can set your start date for later...you just need to tell them that when you purchase. Just wanted to make sure you’re aware that we're running a two-week summer sale on Online Self-Paced Courses. Veritas tends to run promos seasonally (and with varying offers) so if you’re looking to save $100 on every Self-Paced Course for this summer, or the coming school year, you won’t want to miss out on this one. Your coupon code (EXPLORE) for $100 off of each course is valid through 6/21/21, so you’ve got a couple of days—but don’t put it off. Feel free to let us in Service know if you need any assistance with anything.

All things equal would the live class tip the balance for Kernion?

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I thought I remembered @8filltheheart also recommended his course as well. She rarely recommends any online course.

It seems like a lot of people recommend Moskaluk. Connie (Clover Valley Chemistry) recommends his course. on her website. However there isn't a live component to that class. Isn't Kernion the only one offering AP Chem with a live component? I have heard positive things about him as well.

There's no problem jumping in at the end. You don't need to buy 2 subscriptions. You just have to know that once you do a quiz that grade will be recorded. They do have a free trial though. One tip I will tell you that the first assessment in lesson 1 that you need the history timeline card for that day or you won't be able to answer some of the questions. I will say that the last two history courses pair well together because it is pretty much mostly US history focused. I believe they still offer a free trial for VP self-paced history.

EWG is a good site that reviews the safety of personal care and household products. They tell you about whatever it is that you are using. I linked their sunscreen guide here. Our family uses ThinkSport. https://www.ewg.org/sunscreen/

Each Killgallon book doesn't last more than 6 weeks tops over here if we were to do it every day. I do enjoy their books though as a supplement for what we are doing. Killgallon will not cover what I think he will need. It does do a great job of improving the style of writing sentences and writing paragraphs. I think I would suggest IEW either the Student Writing Intensive level B (totally can find this used) OR the new version Structure & Style Level B (this is the revised program w/new videos). This link shows what is covered in level B. He needs to be able at minium take notes, write an essay, and properly reference his writing. While the program says intensive, it is not overwhelming to a student...so they mean intensive like focused if that makes sense. It is easy to skip some assignments (I did) that are meant for reinforcement if your student easily mastered the material. It's rather useful as well in practice in using the composition checklist which isn't too different than working with a rubric. https://iew.com/sites/default/files/videocourse/fileattachment/SSS-1B-S_Sample.pdf

Well, I think that is why it is popular. It's cheap, checks the box and requires little from the parent.

Ok I thought of another one. Aleks.

and really it is dead cheap. $30/month for 4 subjects for high school. $19.95 for K-8 access.

I think you can just do a subject, but I often think people who end up looking at T4learning are looking for all-in-one solutions.

that's popular as well, but usually I see people signing up for the whole package from Time4Learning.

Sometimes I wonder if all the posts about chosing TT and BA is because both seem to be purely online, hands off, and self-grading. My impression that it the goal people are solving for even if it isn't explicitly stated. If you are looking for purely online...is there anything else that is popular among homeschoolers that does that?

This actually help our situation because I was going to put effort into doing number theory and geometry this summer. Now, I know I can wait until the fall when we would be doing some of this with math circle and with math as we go along.

I just confirmed it with our math circle director. The dates are on the MAA site.

Just heard that AMC 8 will be in January and AMC 10/12 will be in November. AIME will be in February.

I remember quick pickling green tomatoes last year. It was so good. https://www.gardenbetty.com/four-ways-to-pickled-green-tomatoes/

Some crushed red pepper in there if you like a little kick as well.

I do a similar one but with cumbled Italian sausage. And I came to suggeset the tiktok feta pasta as well. Was all the rage for awhile in my circles. I have a strong dislike for feta so that was a pass for us. It was so popular that it caused a feta shortage for awhile locally.