This made me smile. I love you, Pam. :D

But that has a great deal to do with my personality, I guess. The ones I checked into when I first started homeschooling were just queen bees and the drones. Total waste of an afternoon evening. Now my kids do take art at a co-op, and that has been a better experience. I made a resolution a few years ago never to attend any more meetings for any reason for any organization. So far, I have stuck to it and it is wonderful!

We do no snack unless you have eaten the meal prepared, but as with the others, we start over fresh with the new meal. The 2yo doesn't want to eat his breakfast these days. He has discovered candy and it really seems that that is all he thinks about. His brothers get a snack at 10 a.m. and the little guy does too... after he eats his breakfast. But at lunch, I would just start over.

Oh, Ria... I am so sorry.

We use All Free and Clear as well.

That is one depressing book. It should be required reading.

My guys will read them, I am sure, but they (especially the oldest) get swept up in the whole thing and like to keep going until they burn out. I don't want them to get bored with the plot line, because I think they are so good. I think I am making them wait until they are old enough to appreciate them. :D They better like them! We might have to disinherit them otherwise!:eek:

First of all my oldest is slightly socially awkward. Not quite to the extent that you are describing, but close. He has one good friend, but he is really "best friends" with his little brother. 1. It takes lots of down time playing to make friends, in my opinion. Could you start actively hunting for a kid with similar interests and then start inviting said kid over to play...often? The karate class sounds like fun, but your son is unlikely to meet anyone with similar interests there... not that it isn't valuable... (more on that in a minute). You might try a co-op class or a science museum class, etc... The going on and on about a topic doesn't strike me as that unusual, I think it is pretty age appropriate. Most nine year olds are not likely to give a six year old the time of day. Could you move him to a class with kids who are six and seven? There may still be social differences, but they won't be AS pronounced as in a mixed age setting. There is as much age difference between this other kid and your son as between your ds and a three-year-old. 2. One of the best things that we have let our oldest do was play football on a community team. Now the practice schedule nearly killed us (four nights a week and games on Saturday). He felt VERY awkward for the first few weeks, but as he gained skill he gained social awareness. The coaches, because of the nature of the sport, worked VERY hard to develop a team spirit, and my son was accepted because he was a "Raider" whether he was a great player or not. The team and coaches recognized that every member of the team had value... even the star quarterback was dependent on his blockers. It taught ds to see that a team can be brought down by one player's off day and yet you can have your personal best game ever and still lose. He is not great friends with any of these boys, but we occasionally see them in the community and they are always happy to see each other. A few have become good friends. Because they were all on the same team, they (the boys) had a vested interest in helping the weaker players get better. There was no scorn for the kid who got knocked down, instead they would coach each other, explain to the weaker player how to tackle better ("Try hitting me lower, next time!"), get away from a block, etc... I'm not sure you would get that sort of "team" spirit on a individual sport like swimming or karate where they are all together, but in a competitive way. One of the main things I wanted ds to get out of the football experience, besides camaraderie, was the experience of losing and coming back from a loss. He has always been very careful not to attempt things at which he felt he might fail. This allowed the experience but without making it all about his own personal failure. He didn't lose the game, his team lost the game. He was not alone in his loss. He was able to observe how the other boys reacted to a loss (and a win) and we talked about appropriate reactions in the group. It also helped me to see that some of ds's reactions that I had thought were inappropriate, were actually age-on target. He was not the only kids who cried after a loss, probably three quarters of the boys did. Having him in this very heterogeneous (and yet homogeneous) group helped me to gauge my own expectations of him. Whew... I didn't mean to write a book.

They will certainly read them if they want to when they are older. My oldest doesn't handle character death well yet. He still needs to wait a few years.

I am so, so glad. I wish I could get them! It was super easy and we have had NO problems with the teeth that were sealed. The ones that weren't are a whole 'nother story.:eek:

Hey! I know that song!:D

:eek: Good grief...If my kids took a bath or shower with soap every day, their skin would be cracked and bleeding. Ds5's hands are already bleeding and dry in spots from having to use soap on them to wash up after we go out somewhere. I only make them wash up to get rid of germs. My skin is the same way. If I have to even get my hands wet, they will be cracked and bleeding by the next day and I will be trying my best to hide the blood with band-aids. When they do take baths, we have to use special soap and massive amounts of lotion to keep from getting bad, bad patches of eczema. My doctor/ allergist also told me not to wash them more than was absolutely necessary. I'm glad your family doesn't have a problem with this, but believe me, there are families who do.

As Lynn suggested below, he could easily be catching a virus. His little brother has been sick. Naps all around I think!

My ds 8 got annoyed with his little brother 2 and knocked his head into the table leg making the little guy cry but causing no permanent damage. The little guy was climbing onto his chair to sit next to his brother (not the same chair). For what it is worth, ds is having a terrible, horrible, no good, very bad day. This is the third time this morning he has done something that he knows is either not allowed, mean or rude.:mad:

My methods are not fun, but they are effective. 1. Food Poisoning/Stomach virus: I caught one over a year ago. I lost about 25 lbs over 3 months. I still can't eat large meals. Pre-virus I could easily down a restaurant sized hamburger and fries. Now I can eat about half what I could. It is like all that time when I couldn't eat shrank my stomach. 2. Stress... Last year when we were going through all that drama with the church, I would go out and walk at night because I literally was in despair. I would walk/run for 1-2+ hours while ds had football practice. I would keep walking until I was exhausted, too tired to eat, too tired to be worried for our friends who were in the middle of the whole thing. Now that it is almost spring, could you sign up your boys for some outdoor sport and walk while they have practice? Football worked really well because I just walked around the track and they practiced in the middle. The eat to live stuff is certainly true, though. I think that is very much psychological though. Dh associates food with comfort, and I don't. He has a harder time with his weight than I do. You can do it! It will be spring soon. You can make it! Get your ipod and head out. It will be spring soon!

My eight year old does his own. Sooner or later, I am sure he will hurt himself. He wants to do it though. He has a pocket knife though, so I figure the clippers are safer than that!

Could we get a picture? nt

If the did, then the term "Civil War" is not accurate because they were two countries fighting each other. In the North, it was believed that the southern states could not withdraw... if the could not withdraw, then they were still part of the USA, hence it was a "civil war". The North won, so they get to pick the name.;) Edit: BTW, I don't mean to imply that any of you all don't know this... I'm just adding information. I didn't mean to post it under Colleen.

Dh and the kids all get the vaccine, I can't... egg allergy. I would if I could, though. My kids and I all have asthma and if I consider it worth the gamble. I'd rather pay for the shot than have one of them, or me, end up in the hospital even if it only protects me against a few strains... that is a few I won't get, anyway!

Why don't you just go down to the thrift store and buy enough glasses for all your kids to have one, only buy them from different sets? For my guys, I pick up onesies at the thrift store and they remember which is theirs each day. Or did you especially want bottles?

They shed so much, you would think they would be bald. It is incomprehensable how much our pug shed. But Truffle was, in every other respect, the best dog we ever had. We still miss her.

If you think that she won't be able to handle college without accommodations, then you need to try to get a diagnosis. In my experience, unless you have the diagnosis, you don't get any accommodations.

Don't stop. Things will get better.

The last chapter of The House at Pooh Corner. Try reading it outloud to a five or six year old boy. I get teary just thinking of it. I stop at the next to the last chapter when we read that book.

That is an awful lot of writing for a little guy unless he LOVES to write. We just jumped in with WS 3 this year, ds is in third and he is able to physically do more with his writing... and he writes well for his age. If you are going to do narrations/ summaries in the other subjects, I think the WS is too much.:cool: