It's very handy. I have a cheapo laminator, and it does just fine. It was like $20.

Oh yeah, totally normal. :) Welcome to the club! Tell us your curriculum picks! (And if you haven't yet subscribed to Secular Homeschooling magazine, do so now! Or at least read the articles on the site.)

Oh good, I wanted to read everyone else's reviews!

Wow, that sounds excellent. Go emeraldjoy!

Yes, I would concur about communion. In our church, communion is (partly) also a renewal of baptismal vows. No one would scream or anything if you took it, but it's a little tricky to renew covenants you haven't actually made and presumably don't want to.

I'm all for visiting churches. I'd be happy to take a friend to church in a spirit of friendly visitation (and have done), and I have often gone myself or taken my kids to other churches. Our church buildings all say "visitors welcome" on the sign, so I guess that tells you their policy. My dad used to take me to various churches when I was a kid. I thought it was great. Sometimes I would go with my best friend to mass, and once I went with a neighbor friend to something called a Missionette meeting, which I thought was like Girl Scouts. I wanted to be a Missionette too, but then it turned out that they mostly passed out tracts. I had no idea at the time, nor did my parents, that it was an Assembly of God program and the leaders would probably have freaked out if they had known there was a Mormon in their midst. These days, my husband and I both like to visit other churches, but I'm more enthused about going out and finding one to take the kids to, whereas he only does it when an opportunity arises. We've gone to evangelical-style services with friends, I've taken my older girl to Latin mass a couple of times, we visited a Sikh gurdwara a while back (did you know they have free food all the time for anyone in need or just hungry?), and my current plan is to take them to the teeny little mosque here in town. We recently attended a sort of interfaith dinner, and I found out from the Muslim guy next to me that you can visit a mosque, which I thought wasn't OK. So I have his phone number and I need to call him.

I've heard of some serious drama in exclusive groups as well. I think drama probably happens sometimes no matter what you do--some folks just have to have it.

We call them late-nights. They work really well for us, because my oldest tends to get over-excited, miss her sleep window, and end up insomniac and upset. And some of our friends don't do sleepovers anyway. And you can invite 2 or 3 friends to a late-night, have a lot of fun, and then get a good night's rest. Yay.

I'm pretty much a purist. I read a lot of books on different methods, and I just keep coming back to WTM. It's what hooked me on homeschooling and it's still my favorite method/recommendations. I like to describe SWB as my homeschooling guru. :D

:iagree: This is how I would approach it.

You can be OK with Darwin and also be a Christian. There are many of us around (in fact, AFAIK it's the young-earth creationists who are the minority). Creationism is not a salvific issue for most people. Anyway it sounds like you should visit some churches in your area and see if you can find one that fits your beliefs. :001_smile:

Read the book and you'll find out! The point of the story is that her intuition was what saved her--not her rational mind, which is trained to explain away fear, not her 'polite' self, which put up with an overly-familiar stranger because she didn't want to make a fuss. She didn't need to think "He closed the blind, therefore he has something in mind that he doesn't want visible, therefore he is lying to me, therefore I need to do something, what should I do?" Her instinct took over and she got out--it's a story of victory through trusting yourself. He's talking about fear as a tool--if you're suddenly afraid for what seems like no reason, it's because your subconscious has noticed anomalies and is reacting. So there's no need to go around afraid all the time "because a rapist might be hiding behind every bush." That's counterproductive. Nor is there a need to dismiss sudden fear as irrational and silly--if you are suddenly afraid, there is probably a reason that you just haven't noticed consciously yet. So you can go about your life in a relaxed way, and when you're afraid, you pay attention and do something about it. Before you allow a stranger into your apartment, and without giving in to manipulation or worrying that he'll think you're rude.

I guess I already have plenty of fellowship with my fellow co-religionists--that's the easy part. I like meeting a wide variety of people, though, and all I'm interested in finding in a homeschooling group is a bunch of people who homeschool. Besides, I already know all the Mormons in town who homeschool--all 3 of us.

Our instructor would not allow such behavior. He made it very clear that fighting or bad attitude would get you thrown out of the class, or at the very least you'd have to write a report. I agree that hitting him in the pocketbook would be a good plan, but if you don't have many options that's a tricky thing to do.

Bill, read the whole book. Really, seriously--read the whole thing and then I want to know what you think. It seems to me that you've taken small chunks only and are assuming a lot from them, and a lot of your assumptions are the opposite of the point of the book. :001_smile: It's true, however, that Gift of Fear is aimed at adults--so is Protecting the Gift IIRC. I seem to remember that there was one for teens, but if not a parent should certainly read the book and pass on the lessons. My buddy the cop, one of the smartest and best guys I know, recommends this book to absolutely everyone. So there you go, my buddy the cop said so. :D

I'm going to hope and pray that you're right, because that would seriously change my life. You don't want to hear this, but we just have to keep it to every other day at most. I get UTIs ridiculously easily :( and even with all precautions, tea every day will give me one.

I completely agree. I don't like statements of faith as a requirement to join a social group. Of course, those statements are written to keep scary Mormons like me out, so you can think of it as sour grapes if you like. But FWIW I wouldn't join an LDS homeschooling groups that had an SOF either--not that I've ever heard of one. (That last sentence needs a couple more acronyms, don't you think? FBI! LOL! KWIM?)

Yep, definitely a book everyone should read, esp. women.

I just stopped eating cheese or anything fatty, and that worked fine until I had the surgery about six weeks later. No more pain.

I read Victorian fluff this week--The Woman in White. That was pretty fun, and actually moved faster than my book club's current pick, The Swan Thieves, which I am reading (slogging a bit). I also read a book manuscript--my mom is writing a middle-grade biography of John Bidwell, who founded our town and played some interesting roles in California history. She's got a ton of great stories collected. Who knows whether it will ever be published, but there actually is a need and she's done an excellent job with it. Am currently reading The Swan Thieves and a great new book about St. Paul: Paul Among the People: The Apostle Reinterpreted and Reimagined in His Own Time.

Oops! I forgot to post mine, I only put it up a couple of days ago anyway. Here it is.

I remember really enjoying "The Sisters Impossible," by James David Landis.

This evening I shut myself into my sewing room and didn't come out until the kids were going to bed.

Diana Wynne Jones! The Chrestomanci Chronicles are a good place to start.

That's a very hard call, but I think it's more aqua than you want.