This. Currently, I spend very little money on homeschooling. This year, I bought math curricula ($50), a few books that I didn't already have ($25), and paper, pencils and art supplies ($20). If we had to, I could have spent nothing on math or books this year. In later years, I would be fine with using very inexpensive used copies of college textbooks to teach math, science, and history if necessary. Not ideal, but I would do it if I had to. However, the invested capital is there. My husband and I are highly educated, I read extensively and have a strangely powerful memory (or soon says everyone who knows me...it seems normal to me), we own a ridulous number of books including enough math curricula to educate through grade 6, we own computers, we have an excellent library system (where I could use the Internet for free once or twice a month if I could no longer afford my own connection), and, to that point, we can afford an Internet connection and gas to drive to the library. If we didn't have these things, it would be very difficult to provide an excellent education I expensively, at least beyond the lower elementary years. And once one begins to consider special needs, learning disabilities, and therapies, homeschooling inexpensively is likely no longer possible. This is quickly becoming our reality.

My husband's job is flexible enough that he can do some work remotely. This allows us to travel across the country once a year to see family, a trip which is ideally about two weeks long, without him taking (much) time off. Between working from my mother's house and attending two work-related conferences that happened to be near my parent's home, I think he took three work days off of the entire two weeks we travelled. Nope, he doesn't know how to take time off. I expect that when the kids are old enough for me to drive back home without him, he won't even come along. Edited for typos.

I know someone who does this to pay for her daughter's beauty pageants. It's infuriating for many reasons, not the least of which being that she has plenty of money while most of the people funding her struggle to make rent.

I reply with text because if I text someone, it's generally because I can't talk (usually because I'm surrounded by young, loud children), and I assume the same of anyone who texts me. However, I don't always respond right away. I treat texts much like phone calls in that if I'm busy, the texter with have to wait.

I pronounce it with three syllables due to influences in college/grad school. My parents and all those in my hometown use two syllables. Of course, I also say "soda" despite growing up with "pop" people.

I liked the look of that program but they don't have a Mac version. Is there a minimum speed (wpm) in Nessy?

Two introverted parents, two extroverted kids, one introverted kid = one insane homeschooling Mama.

I go to four different stores at a rate of 1-2 stores per week. I choose the store based on what we need (each store has better prices on particular standard items), where I'll be for other errands, and what is on sale. I'm big on buying large amounts of meat when I find a good price, so I follow the meat sales carefully.

I just discovered Keyboarding Without Tears this weekend and it looks promising (my boy has significant fine motor challenges too). I'm trying the kindergarten level first.

Congratulations! I didn't have twins, but I wanted to add that postpartum anxiety is real too. Because I had a history of depression, my doctor, husband, and I were all watching for postpartum depression. That never came, but we completely missed the anxiety until I couldn't go grocery shopping because I was convinced that th van parked down the street was casing my house and would immediately break in and steal my computer (with all my pictures of my babies - that's what I cared about) if I left the house. It's been a long road coming back from the anxiety, and I wish I had caught it sooner.

Congrats! I'm so excited for you! I would have had four if circumstances had been different, so I'm a bit jealous of families of four!

My father-in-law and his sister were skinny Type II, both diagnosed in their twenties, until they discovered that they had MODY II, a genetic form of diabetes, rather than Type II. In MODY II, insulin levels are always lower than in normal human bodies and lower than optimal to manage blood sugar, and, therefore, blood sugar levels are always slightly elevated. A marked difference from Type II is that most MODY II people don't get the crazy high BG levels (no spikes up into the 400s). MODY II people tend to be thin, possibly due to the chronically low insulin levels. My healthy-eating, highly active, skinny husband was diagnosed with Type II at 23, but when his father learned of MODY, we realized that's what husband has too. He can still eat anything and not gain weight. Two of my kids have it too, and they eat more than I've ever seen little kids eat while simultaneously falling off the weight percentile charts. CICO worked for me before children. After the first pregnancy, exercising heavily, eating low calorie (yes, I know how to count. Remember CICO worked for me before kids - I dropped 30 pounds of college gain, caused by eating junk, with CICO), and nursing exclusivy resulted in significant weight gain: 30 pounds more than I'd gained in pregnancy. I'll say that again: low calorie, exercise, and nursing exclusively and I gained 30 pounds! I tried everything for 4 years, the discovered low carb and a few food sensitives and finally got the weight off. Something about pregnancy changed my body significantly!

I seem to move every time I turn around, and, yes, I've started school even though two of those moves were in the beginning of October. My kids do better when they have routine. To that end, school starts again as soon as the kitchen is unpacked (usually the next day). However, I completely understand your concern about making your house safe for Marco because my 4 year-old is very similar (your stories often make me tear up in understanding). My kids have enough issues, that they aren't able to help much with packing and unpacking (another reason we school). You didn't ask for packing advice, but I'll share what works for us given our intense kiddos. What we've done is pack in sets. The first set, labelled with a 1, is all the things that we don't need for a long while but aren't decluttering (winter clothes, sporting equipment, tools, non essential toys). These boxes have both a 1 on them and the name of the appropriate room. These are all put in the back of a single room in the new house that can be LOCKED. You sort the boxes by room later, when you are ready for them. Stuff that is more necessary is labelled 2, marked with the appropriate room, and put in the middle or front of the same room that can be locked. Stuff marked 3 is essential, so when unpacking the moving truck, those boxes go into the labelled rooms and are unpacked as quickly as possible. I often fill the closets with the number 3 boxes so that I can tie the closet doors shut to keep him out. I've moved into tiny houses and managed this method. It's not ideal to have my bedroom full of boxes for months, but if that's the door that locks, in they go (we have a room for a study this time, so that held all the 2s and 3s. This was good because this house didn't have deadbolts or a fence blocking the entrance to the street. We had to fix those issues as fast as humanly possible.). Best wishes!

I get the occasional negative comment, usually from medical professionals. Ugh. This never happened before I started looking for help with the spectrum, ADHD, and mental health challenges that are clearly affecting my children. I'm one of those who projects confidence in my decisions, so people kept their thoughts to themselves. I'd like to get back to that point. My husband, on the other hand, has never heard a negative comment. He talks about it all the time at work and most of the people are interested, positive, and, often, express that they wish they could homeschool their kids.

I never had emotional PMS until after my third was born, now it's awful. I also had a perfectly predictable cycle before his birth and a less so one after. I have learned to mark the calendar with all possible cycle days (a 26-32 day range right now - not so bad, it was really crazy at first) and I work hard on my self talk in that window of time. If I catch myself contemplating how everyone I know must think I'm annoying and really no one likes me, I look at the calendar. That usually happens near the beginning of PMS, so I have some warning that the worst is coming. Then, I just try to stay aware. I text a friend a lot in order to avoid complaining to my spouse during PMS (I have a nice friend). I avoid alcohol completely during the window. And, I try to make myself go for a long, hard run the first day of PMS because exercise helps a lot, but I feel so tired in day one of my cycle, that I can't make myself exercise at that point.

If I could have only two manipulatives, I would have a base 10 set and Cuisinaire Rods. If I could have only one, I'd have the Cuisinaire rods (a big wooden, not plastic, set - 155 rods. This is often called the small group set.). I absolutely adore Cuisinaire Rods. You can teach almost any concept with them.

Does supermother homeschool too? That would be downright shocking! I used to have a clean house...when I had one child who was in full time day care and both DH and I worked full-time outside the home. I found it much easier to clean up after ourselves when we only cooked one meal at home most days and only had three or fewer hours that our one child was awake to make messes. Since he spent most of that time eating and bring bathed, the messes were just not an issue. Now, I am at home full-time, we have three kids, two of whom have significant issues, and I homeschool. My house will never be neat again. I do work very hard to keep the kitchen clean. When it's a mess, I find myself unconsciously muttering things abut hating my house. When it's clean, I don't mutter.

We had to buy before we wanted to because our rental market/housing market is so insane. We moved twice in four months before doing so. The first time, our landlord wouldn't renew our lease because he wanted to sell, the second time, our landlord asked us to move so she could sell (yes, we had the right to stay and have our lease transferred to the new owner, but that felt too risky). Searching for rentals took so much time due to such low supply and the rents were sky-high and going up, so we bought. That was a crazy experience too...houses have multiple offer the first day they go on the market here. So glad it's working for you, Creekland!

What supplements are helpful for tone?

When I was four, my parents were briefly sucked into a cult that was led by some of their casual friends. They burned all of my toys because they might harbor demons and "spanked" us severely and often to save our souls. Thankfully, they realized what they were into and left in less than 6 months. Unfortunately, they didn't go very far...I grew up with many of the ideals that show up in Duggar/Gothard/Vision Forum worlds, but in a much prettier, huge church package. At the time of the engagement with the cult, my parents were strapped financially, my dad was as yet undiagnosed with bipolar, and the teachings initially appealed to them (mostly him). I honestly don't know how the got out. They did lose all of their friends in doing so (some friendships were repaired later when those friends also left the cult). My mother says that the doctrine sounded like the "right" way to follow God, but she really can't explain more than that.

Going gluten, dairy, and peanut free. Each affected my skin in different ways. I thought I was doomed to adult acne until I discovered this 4 years ago.

I hear you. I lose this identical argument with my DH.

I own a manual. It's now my husband's commute car (I have the van evaluate do t fit in the little car), but it was the first car I bought after college (yes, it's getting old. I love Toyotas). I bought a manual because no one I knew who could drive a manual would teach me on their cars. This was a weird mysogynistic thing: I only knew men/boys who could drive stick, no women, and even though three of those were my brothers and father, they wouldn't teach me. So, I bought myself a manual and taught myself.

In our area, they want the parent's photo ID, not the child's.

I grew up 45 miles north of Columbus and turned out just fine. Hugs!!