A 1 hole punch and a pile of construction paper. Add in a pair of safety scissors if s/he's okay with those. :D

I did a Flat Stanley project with my daughter, then 8, last year. It was really neat. We sent Stanleys to all different people we knew through message boards, friends of friends, etc. They went to a bunch of states and a few other countries as well. We asked people to "dress" Flat Stanley in something that would depict something Stanley "did" while he was with his host family, or something that represented the area where he was visiting. We said they could be as creative as they wanted with that- they could use crayons, markers, fabric, etc. It was really fun when we got all the different Stanleys back and saw how people "dressed" him. We also sent a questionnaire along with him asking a few basic questions about where he was visiting and the types of things he saw and did while he was there. I maintained a blog/journal site tracking his adventures whenever people sent me updates either via email or in the mail or sent postcards or whatever, so that everyone who had one of our Stanleys could see what other people were doing with him. It really ended up being a fun project. People sent me some really cool pictures of them doing things with Stanley, which I'd put on the website. Some people sent souvenirs back when they returned him. A lot of people never did return him at all lol- but we got a decent amount of the Stanleys back. If you are interested in checking out the site, here is the very first entry: http://travelingwithflatstanley.blogspot.com/2009/06/flat-stanley-joins-family.html You can use the links at the left to proceed through the posts and when you get to the last numbered one, you can click "newer" at the bottom of the page- Of course the site was abandoned nearly a year ago when summer ended and I got busy with the school year but you might find some fun ideas on there if you're interested :) P.S. As you might see if you take a peek, we ended up making a "hometown Flat Stanley" for us to keep and take around our local area, too, and we put his/our adventures up on the site at the time, too, in addition to the ones that were traveling, so the people we were 'meeting' in other locations could also see what it was like where we lived, if they wanted.

Not racist, and I don't really love it when I get someone for any sort of tech support or whatever who has a thick, hard-to-understand accent, either. It makes it more stressful and difficult and I have to keep saying "I'm sorry, what did you say?" and I start feeling awkward about doing that, thinking it must make THEM feel awkward, too, etc. But it has absolutely nothing to do with racism, your sister is being ridiculous.

Are you kidding? What an idiot. I'd TELL him he was an idiot. And then I'd never take my child there again; I'd find a different place for him to take gymnastics.

Definitely not! I pulled my daughter out toward the end of March of last year, at the end of third grade, homeschooled her for the rest of third and all of fourth, and never looked back. We've had so much fun homeschooling. And there were just way too many things I did not like about the public school system. I wish I had pulled her out sooner- or better yet never sent her to begin with. At least I won't make that same mistake with my 4 y/o son. He'll be home with me right from the beginning :) I agree with those who said make your own yearbook. There's nothing all that special about a school yearbook, you can make one that's a lot nicer and that depicts much cooler stuff than any public schooler's yearbook can depict :D

Do you belong to a homeschool group? If so, do they do any summer get togethers and outings? If not, can you suggest some? My group stays active in the summer, we go on field trips, outings, tours, set up pool and lake and in home get togethers, etc. We plan a couple of mini vacations over the summer. We're going to be hosting a child from The Fresh Air Fund. We get together with family and friends and go out and do things together. We plan to do SOME schoolwork over the summer, mostly Story of the World, attempting to learn some beginning Spanish with a book and audio CD, and trying out Times Tales to improve on memorization of the times tables. The kids will be doing various activities- a couple of weeks of art camp, swimming lessons, etc, so I'll be chauffering for that. But we also kind of like having time to just relax and do our own thing. The kids like to play on the computer and with the Nintendo DS and play outside with friends and read books and do crafts or go in the kiddie pool in the backyard or just sit around watching TV. I like having time to just do nothing but read, play on my computer, play a video game, maintain my blog/journal, do a little writing, etc. I'm sure you can find things to do to keep busy with if the lack of daily routine and activity gets too boring for you! :)

Yeah, really! Come to think of it, I just signed my daughter up for swimming lessons. Maybe I should call and ask them if I'm supposed to bring my own pool. Just to make sure! :lol:

Hm. I like to read, write (poems, short stories, articles etc), browse message boards of interest, and I sometimes like to play video or computer games. I'd also probably make plans with girlfriends to go out and have some girl time, maybe do some shopping, go get a pedicure, etc. I might catch up on shows/movies I like. And if I got bored or ambitious I might pick a room or a closet or something to start thoroughly cleaning out or organizing- or rearranging furniture in.

Oh wow, I'm with you. When I hear "horseback riding lessons" I always just assume you show up and they bring out some gentle, tame horse for you to ride for a half hour or an hour or so and you go back home. I never in a million years would have thought I was supposed to own and bring my own horse to 4H horseback riding lessons! If I paid attention to the arena fee thing at all, I would assume it was something the families were supposed to help absorb, that the 4H club or whoever needed to pay that to use that particular arena to give the lessons in or something. And that certainly would have been embarrassing enough without someone laughing at you, how rude! They definitely should reword.

You could give them a notebook or sketchpad type thing and on each page they can write the name of the book, the title and the author, and then they can draw a picture of one of their favorite scenes from the book?

I've always just signed my own name and written "for minor child" underneath it, and I've never had a problem depositing a check that way.

For one of my daughter's birthday parties, we invited just her female friends, and we took them to this local bed and breakfast which was a historical building, and they did lunch and tea parties there. (FYI we also could have done the same thing with a small local coffee shop and tea garden). So the girls dressed up and we went to this place and they were served lunch and they had real tea in china cups, we brought in our own cake, they really loved it. Afterward we returned home and had relatives over for a BBQ and another cake for just the family. I think that was her 7th birthday. For another party, we took all the girls to a local nail salon in the mall and they each had their nails painted and had designs put on their nails, and then we moved across to the pizza parlour where family met us and we had pizza, cake and presents there. She was a little younger for that one though, 6 I think. For another party, her 8th, we had a "storybook" party at home. We asked the girls to dress up as their favorite book character, we decorated with printouts of book covers as well as balloons and streamers, we played book related games, had storytelling, and I bought online one of those cake pans shaped like an open book and we made the cake, but on the computer we made this printout which we took to Walmart to get made into one of those edible cake photos, and applied that to the cake. One side of it was text that said "Once upon a time, there was a girl named Alexa, who loved to read" and the other side was a photo of her. Some gymnastics studios also will do gymnastics parties, not sure of price. One of our local zoos does a zoo overnight and I think when she turns 10 next year, I might have her invite one friend and see about taking the two of them to do the zoo overnight, rather than a bigger party. We almost did that this past year for her 9th birthday but instead her dad and I took her to a hotel overnight and used the indoor pool which she loved, she never gets to go swimming on her birthday because her birthday is in October. :) If yours has a summer a birthday, you could invite some people to meet at a lake or beach and have a picnic or bbq, do water gun fights, water balloons, all kinds of water fun! If it's not summer, you could check into an indoor pool party somewhere.

I should preface this by confessing that we do not even go to church to begin with (and aren't Christian). With that said, I imagine that I would just be glad that my kids had an interest in attending youth group and would allow them to go to the one of their choosing, assuming there is nothing about that particular church or youth group that you are really in some sort of moral disagreement over.

Well, if I were you, I'd give it a try anyway. Give it a few tries. You said he'd go along with it for you, so give it a shot. You never know, he may be fine and end up warming up to somebody! Then at least you'll know you tried. But if you invite people over and he just seems like he's not into it and it's awkward and obviously not working out etc, then you need to just make sure you make time for YOUR friendships with YOUR friends- have girls night/moms night out periodically. Even if you can't do things as a couple, it doesn't mean you can't do things with your friends on your own at least.

Wow, yeah, that's what I was thinking. PA is a pretty highly regulated state when it comes to homeschool laws. But at least here in PA the compulsory school age is 8. What a shame they feel the need to "evaluate" 6 year olds in Florida! With that said- I'd find a new evaluator. The one I use here in PA is great, and most people I know are happy with their evaluators. They are encouraging and work with us, and that's what yours should do, too, not nitpick your Kindergartener to death. Especially one who is obviously as bright as yours!

Yes, we have three sets of couple friends that we get together with fairly regularly (individually, not all three couples at once). We go to each other's houses for dinner, and the kids play, sometimes we play board games together, sometimes we go out to eat or to some adult social outing together. One couple I met on a stay-at-home-mom's meetup group I used to belong to. The other mom and I hit it off so I asked her if she wanted to bring her husband and kids over for a barbecue so I could see if we all hit it off- and we did. After that, we regularly got together with them. Another couple I met through my homeschool meetup group. She brought her husband along when they came to a co-op type thing I hosted at my house and my husband happened to be home too so they chatted a little and seemed to get along. Not long thereafter, she posted on the group's board asking if anyone wanted to come over for an informal get together to just hang out and socialize. My husband and I were the only ones who went, but we had a great time, and thereafter, we pretty regularly invite each other over to each other's houses for dinner and hanging out. Another couple my husband actually met the guy through his saltwater aquarium hobby and asked if I would mind if he invited the guy and his wife over for dinner so I could meet his wife too. I said sure, and it went pretty well, so now and then we continue getting together for bbq's and whatnot. It's great having friends like that. So I think you should maybe take the first step, pick someone you seem like you hit it off with well enough, and invite them over for a low key BBQ. Have a couple of drinks (if that's your thing), cook out, b.s., maybe see if they want to play a board game, and just see how it goes :)

I love this idea too :) I just entered a photo as well. I don't have an expensive camera and I don't really edit my photos but I did have a photo that immediately came to mind when I saw what your theme was, so I thought it would be fun to enter it :) I loved seeing the other entries so far, too. Whoever took the one of a girl reading under a tree, that was a great photo!

Well, I guess the grass is always greener! LOL.

Yep, that was me! I had posted asking if anyone had any experience with the program. They do call all the towns where the host families live "friendly towns" but yeah it isn't local to one particular place. The host families live across 13 northeastern states, from Virginia to Maine, and Canada :)

Ha. Yeah. That's what I told myself! Well, she's back in Florida now, and everything's back to normal over here. I still find myself occasionally thinking about it and shaking my head, but you can't change people who are set in their ways like that, I guess. All I can do is make sure I raise my own children differently.

I keep all of my daughter's homeschool work. I want to be able to look back on it some day and for her to be able to look back on it some day. I wish my mother had kept more things from my childhood. When we finish a grade, I box everything from that year up, label it, and store it in my closet. I guess eventually I might have to start using the basement, my closet isn't that big. But I can't bring myself to throw her work away :)

Well. Here in PA, we have to hire an evaluator at the end of each school year. S/he looks over the child's portfolio (samples of their work) and determines if they think an appropriate education is being received. When my evaluator looks at our work and comments positively and hands me that letter, I know I'm doing a good job. In certain grades, we are required to do standardized testing. If my child is doing reasonably well on those tests (though I do not by any means see standardized testing as the be all end all to these things), I know I'm doing a good job. If I can see my child demonstrating that she is learning, in the things she says or does or reads, regardless of whether she is learning the same thing at the same time as the kids in public school are, I know I'm doing a good job. When I read in the newspaper about how the standardized test results came out for all of our area school districts and almost all of them across the board are below average, I know I'm doing a good job. When we have fun, enjoy each other's company, enjoy learning, have time to enjoy our own pursuits and interests, have time together as a family, follow our own schedule, and my child has plenty of time to BE a child, I know I'm doing a good job. When I hear my daughter tell people that she's glad she's homeschooled, that homeschooling is fun, that she gets to do lots of cool things, I know I'm doing a good job. My daughter went to public school from K through most of 3. There were many, many things I didn't like about it. I pulled her out and homeschooled for the rest of 3rd grade, all of 4th, and I'm looking forward to 5th. As of now, I have no doubts about whether it is going well. It IS going well. And I have no regrets, other than "I wish I'd started homeschooling sooner." At least I won't make that mistake with my son. He'll be home with me and homeschooled right from the beginning. :)

Oh, also 4H clubs. And if you belong to or join a homeschool email list from your state, you can sometimes find people who are close to your area and if you hit it off getting to know each other in email a bit, you can set up a get together with them. I actually met at least 3 or 4 people that way- well, actually, we'd chat in email and then I'd tell them about the homeschool meetup group I belong to, and then they'd join :)

We joined a homeschool group on meetup.com. We have become closer with some families than with others. We also joined a homeschool bowling league over the winter/spring, and I'm sure there are other places that have programs and activities just for homeschoolers. I know some museums do, for instance.

I cried all day on my 30th birthday. 31-36 weren't bad at all. I just turned 37 and while it wasn't as bad as turning 30, it was a little tough- it just sounds SO much closer to 40 lol. And while I don't want any more kids either, that feeling of knowing that I'm close to not being ABLE to is quite bothersome! That it won't be my choice anymore. Ugh.