I'm sorry. I really do feel your pain. My son was an awful sleeper. He was still waking up like 7-10 times a night most nights for the first 15 months of his life. Then it went down to like 3-5 times a night, then 2-3, then 1-2, and now he's 4 1/2 and most nights he still wakes up once. A few months ago, he would just call out to make sure we were still "there" or something I guess because he'd usually go right back to sleep after we walked in for a second to reassure him. These days he just crawls into bed with us at some point in the middle of the night instead. It was exhausting for a long time but it DID get better lol- it doesn't last forever!

Ask your kid/s what they think the rules should be. Decide on them together. You might be surprised by what they come up with :)

My 4 y/o son liked when I gave him simple mazes (I would just find and print them online mostly), he liked trying to trace (a very simple coloring book and tracing paper would be good for this), he liked finger painting, water color painting and coloring with markers/crayons on plain, blank paper, and he loved when I gave him some construction paper with child safety scissors, and a one hole punch. Stickers and stamps were good, too. As was playdough and a kid's cutting knife and rolling pin and cookie cutters. Also simple puzzles, pattern blocks, and his sister's homemade geoboard. So you could always do stuff like that as opposed to workbooks if you wanted with the same effect, I'm sure! I don't know how expensive those workbooks are on their own. But just throwing it out there! :)

LOL well now that you mention it, it would be kinda gross to me if it was someone else aside from myself or my husband blowing on our eggs haha. It didn't bother me that my husband did it, rinsed the eggs, and prepared the food. But still I do think it at least peels easy by hand thanks to the baking soda!

OK ours are done! My husband wasn't exact with the amount of baking soda (he used a regular teaspoon like for eating/stirring, not measuring) and put in like two even though the guy said one. And we didn't know if it mattered how much cold water they sat in. And we added some ice cubes as he'd mentioned. We also weren't sure if you were supposed to let it sit a while. So we waited like two minutes and then he tried the first egg. It did not blow out the way it did for that guy...but it peeled SUPER easy without the shell sticking. He kept going and trying with the blowing and the next three eggs we'd hardboiled DID blow out...although it took my husband like 3 hard blows instead of the one easy blow that guy did. Either way, definitely quick and easy and left the eggs in good shape and not gouged to shreds!! Fun :) Let me know how it works for you guys!

No... after they are DONE boiling/cooking, and you are sitting them in cold water to cool off before peeling...that's when you add the baking soda!

When my 9 y/o went to public school K, they didn't have "nap time" at all! It was all academic. They only got a 10-15 minute recess, and they had "silent lunches," and the rest of the day was desk work. Yuck!

Somebody not that long ago was talking about how to peel hardboiled eggs without the shell all breaking and sticking to the egg and being hard to peel etc. You've got to check this out! (We're actually hardboiling some eggs right now and my husband remembered coming across this youtube link and looked it up again to remind himself of what we're supposed to do. So when our eggs are done, he's going to try this and see if it really works. I'll let you know lol).

I'm just curious, for those of you who said it WOULDN'T bother you at all- do you all have much younger kids? It seems from your signatures at least a couple of you do. If I had younger kid who wasn't really reading and wouldn't read that sign and ask me what it meant, it probably wouldn't bother me as much either. I'd still find it tacky but not particularly worrisome as far as my own children were concerned. But I have a 9 year old daughter who does read and would ask me what that meant if she had seen it, and I just don't want to have to try to explain (or have to try to avoid explaining) such a thing to her. I don't think it's appropriate for a business to display that sort of message at all, and I especially don't think it's appropriate for it to sit on a busy, public street where every child who can read but isn't old enough for risque jokes has to be faced with one. And then their parents have to deal with how to respond to those children, all because some business owner couldn't use an ounce of common sense as to what is appropriate for public display. I wouldn't give that guy my business, that's for sure. LOL at the idea of bringing in the kid to ask the owner what that sign means. It's very tempting! But I'm a little afraid of what he'd say. He obviously doesn't censor himself well lol.

I totally skipped the chicken mummy project, but I love seeing your pictures! It does look like a fun experience. You guys did a great job!

My family is spending a few days next month on a Lancaster County, PA "farm stay" vacation. That's pretty out of the box for us! :D It's like a bed and breakfast where you stay, they give you breakfast, and you experience life on the farm and can help with farm chores and things like that. I don't know if high schoolers would be interested in that though. There are also dude ranches, where they can learn more about the horses and stuff. But then again like someone else said, you could always go on whatever vacation YOU want and then make it educational. You want to go to the beach? Go to the beach. Maybe while you're at it, there's a lighthouse or a marine biology kind of place you can explore, museums there, things like that.

I'd keep them both home. I had to make that decision when I pulled my daughter out of public school to begin homeschooling her. I had the whole "should I put my 4 y/o in preschool" debate with myself and when I listed the pros and cons of preschool, I decided it wasn't worth it. I'd miss out on too much with him, I wanted to homeschool him from the beginning, I figured I could keep him busy and distracted when I really needed to (a one hole punch and a pile of paper seems to work wonders), and I think he benefits from being around his family in his earliest years rather than in a school.

Your child doesn't need every subject under the sun and multiple curricula for each subject and hours and hours a day doing school work.... have fun. Play. Explore. Pretend. Go outside. Talk! I averaged about 3 hours of schoolwork a day with my 4th grade 9 y/o and we had plenty of time for life, which for me was a good thing. So for a K'er, 1st and 2nd grader etc... it would be even less time spent on academic stuff. (Which is not to say we didn't do other educational things with our days, but they were fun, hands on, getting out in the world kinda things, too). Your child doesn't have to learn to read and add etc before he turns 5. I'm really glad I found the Oak Meadow curriculum because it's much more laid back in the earliest years. K is more of a preschool curriculum, really, but I LIKE that about it. It's very story, nature, arts and crafts, music and movement based with lots of creative, hands on ideas for learning. I'm looking forward to starting it with my son in the fall. I loved it for 4th grade for my daughter, too, she'll be moving on to OM5.

Homeschooling is a big change, when you've been used to having your kids in public school, and any change- even good ones- will make you nervous and anxious. It's normal to wonder if you're doing the right thing, if you're going to do well at it, if you're going to screw your kids up, and all sorts of things like that when you first start homeschooling. I know, because my daughter went to public school for all of K, 1 and 2, and most of 3 before I pulled her out and began homeschooling. We just completed my first full year homeschooling her for 4th grade. And I'm very much looking forward to continuing to homeschool her for 5th and to start homeschooling my 4 y/o son, who will not start off in public school at all, the way my daughter did! What I can say is: Relax. Take a deep breath. It's going to be okay. Within weeks of homeschooling, I already felt more relaxed, natural, confident. I was thinking "What was I so worried about? This is great!" And it has been. That's not to say there are never any hard or bad moments, there are, as with everything in life. But overall, it's been great. We've really loved this process! There are many social opportunities you can provide for your son. Scout and 4H programs, joining a homeschool/co-op group, library programs, classes, camps, field trips, YMCA's, sports, and so on. Reassure him that you can provide some of these opportunities for him, and that you can set up playdates with the kids he's already friendly with and so on. By the way, my daughter, although she didn't even like public school, and loved the idea of being homeschooled, still got a little "school sick" and went through a "I miss my friends at school" phase, when she first left, and when classes were first starting up last year. It didn't last long, I've given her other social opportunities. It's one of those things that you just do your best with and in the end, it will work itself out. This is an adjustment for you- remember, it's an adjustment for them, too! Not a bad one. But different. It takes a little getting used to. As for planning, do it however it works for you! I bought the Oak Meadow curriculum (used) which is divided into 36 weekly lesson plans. I spent some time here and there at my leisure over the summer breaking it down into daily lesson plans that I type up on a wordpad doc on my computer. It's a bit time consuming, yes. But then all school year long, I can open up that document, copy and paste that week's lesson plan, and print it out. But I like to be ridiculously organized with that kind of thing and I'm always writing things down and making lists and notes lol.... Anyway, you'll do fine! You'll figure out your own way and everything will fall into place. Just be willing to tweak as needed, try not to get too overwhelmed, and try to HAVE FUN with this! BTW I spent an average of 3 hours a day, sometimes a little less, and sometimes a little more IF we were doing some sort of hands on project, doing schoolwork/curriculum stuff with my 4th grader. So don't feel like they need tons and tons of busywork or anything like that!

reading and writing (poems, short stories, articles, essays, etc).

Ben will still be 4 when we start- I'm hoping I'm making the right decision! If he were going to public school, he'd have had to wait another year to start K. I plan to start the week of Labor Day, and he'll turn 5 two months later, in early November. I figured because of the nature of OMK it will be perfect for an about to turn 5 year old (my daughter started public school K about a month before she turned 5 back in the day after all, and that was way more academic, and she did okay- even though now I'd do things totally different with her if I could go back, of course)! And it seems too young of a program to wait another year til he's almost 6. Hopefully a few years down the road I don't end up feeling like I started too early or anything though!! What do you think, Cindie? My plan so far has been to try him out in September and see if he seems willing and able and eager to go for it, and if so, to carry on. If not, I'd put it off at least a few more months and then try again. (If I told him today to draw a haystack or whatever like for "A" he'd probably look at me like I was nuts. It's very hard to get him to even want to try to draw anything beyond scribbles still. Not sure how much that is going to change in the next couple of months! I guess I just have to see how this goes!)

I bet they will at some point. But they JUST came out with Grade 3, right? So it might be a while! We haven't used them, yet, but my daughter is REALLY looking forward to using TT5 this fall, she thinks it seems really fun!

My 9 year old used this free online typing program: http://webinstituteforteachers.org/~gammakeys/Lesson/Lesson1.htm

LOL that's pretty funny! I had the opposite problem back when my daughter used to go to public school for K through most of 3rd grade.... I told her there was no Santa because I was tired of her wanting to know why all the other kids got Santa and she didn't (and "you're Jewish" was not good enough for her, she felt left out). But I cautioned her repeatedly NOT to tell the other kids at school that Santa wasn't real. It was bad enough she was the only Jew in the class, I couldn't let her be the Jew Who Ruined Santa lol. She's almost 10 now and it's become easier for her. Now it's going to start over with my 4 year old. He won't be in school, but still, you can't go to a store in the month of December or January without hearing things like: "What's Santa going to bring you? Are you being good for Santa? Is Santa coming to your house soon? What did Santa get you?" (and if it's not Santa, it's the Easter Bunny!)

Christmas time- Blech. Snow that's pretty for a minute then turns to that nasty dirty grey, ice, freezing wind, feeling cold, shoveling, slipping and sliding, being stuck indoors, me wishing I lived in Florida, or that it was still summer, or that everyone and their mother would stop asking my Jewish kids about Santa Claus.... lol. Nah! I'm perfectly content with summer!

Here are a couple.... http://www.homeschool.com/articles/socialization/default.asp http://school.familyeducation.com/home-schooling/human-relations/56224.html

At a small local used car dealership place, which sits at a pretty busy intersection on a main road, they've got one of those medium sized signs where you put up the letter cards to make the sign say whatever you want, and you can change your message as often as desired.... Today we passed it and the sign said: "CONGRATS (SO AND SO, AND SO AND SO). MAY YOUR UPS AND DOWNS ALL BE BETWEEN THE SHEETS!" What say you? Humorous? Or inappropriate? I wasn't quite sure what to think. I looked back to see if my 9 year old daughter was looking out the window and paying attention. She wasn't. She was flipping through an American Girl Magazine. But I would not have wanted her to read that sign and ask me "What does that mean?"

I like what Cadam said. You and your husband had a plan when the kids were young. You wanted to homeschool. Presumably he knew this and agreed to it. You made a choice to send her to school because you thought it was YOU who couldn't homeschool- now you see that that isn't the case and that her interests aren't being best served by her being in public school. I don't think it's fair for your husband to just "put his foot down" and make a blanket statement/decision that is against what YOU want to do, against what you originally both agreed on, and not in your child's best interests- just because of money. Some things are more important than money. I wouldn't be giving up so easily, myself, if I were you! Good luck! :)

I decided I'm going to get her a big binder, divided into subjects and I'm going to have her do all writing assignments on regular lined notebook paper. But I'll be able to holepunch blank white typing paper or cardstock to add it in if we want to add in typed sheets, or do illustrations or collages or anything else that would be better served by blank paper or a "MLB" page kind of feel. So she'll start 5th grade with a more "big kid" feel, and my little one will start K with his very first MLB's :)

Wow- in all my years renting (in both NY and PA) before I finally became a homeowner just a few short years ago, I NEVER had a landlord provide a washing machine or dryer. We did the laundromat thing for quite some time before finally finding an apartment that had enough space for us to go buy our own washer and dryer. I'd be happy they provided one at all lol. But if they're willing to replace it again because of a smell or a noise or whatever, that's great!