Do-It-Yourself School

I became disenchanted with regular school a number of years ago.  However, it wasn't until my oldest child was in 5th grade that I decided to take my children's education into my own hands and do it myself.  That was 4 years ago.  I really just got tired of conforming to the public school system (conforming just isn't my thing).
Recently, I've been thinking I should post the curricula I'm using as a way to organize my own thoughts and, perhaps, help someone else make a decision about some aspect of their child's education.

Math:

Singapore Primary Mathematics US edition, Books 1A through 6B
I have been using this curriculum my children starting in Kindergarten, finishing by about 7th grade.  I say "about" because I slow down or speed up based on my child's readiness.  My oldest daughter, who is starting 7th grade this school year, is finishing up book 6B. By the end of this series they are ready for Pre-Algebra.

Life of Fred
I haven't used this yet.  I was looking for a math curriculum to follow Singapore Math.  I feel it is important to be consistent for the Algebra 1/Geometry/Algebra 2 math instruction, since sometimes geometry is integrated throughout algebra and sometimes it is not.  After a great deal of study, I narrowed it down and let my daughter choose.  She decided on Life of Fred.  We will see how it goes.

Spelling:

Explode the Code
 I buy books 1, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, and 8 when each child starts kindergarten and go through the books in that order, finishing about 3rd grade.  I buy the "1/2" books if a child needs extra help before going on to the next book.

Spelling City and Spelling Workout
After completing Explode the Code, I have been using the Spelling Workout workbooks for the activities and the Spelling City site for spelling tests.  Over the last year or so, I have relied more on Spelling City for activities as well as tests using their premium account.  This allows me to create assignments for the children and it keeps track of everything for me (a big time saver).

History:

Story of the World
We have been through all 4 books now and are back to the first book this year.  I really like this series.  I bought the books on cd and we listen to history while driving to our weekly Tae Kwon Do class.  I created notebooks for the children using my preferred activities from the Activity book (I made copies and had them spiral bound for each child).  I don't use the tests and we will be using a timeline with everything on it already.

Grammar:

First Language Lessons 
I bought FLL 1&2 when they came together in one hardbound book. I like it a lot and continue to use it.  I ended up creating a supplemental poetry booklet, illustrated by my children, to give easier access to the poems we memorize.  I like the poetry memorization and the memorization of grammar definitions and lists.  Initially, I was not thrilled with the memorization of word lists (like the prepositions and helping verbs), but I have found it very useful as we progress in our grammar studies.  Even the older children will chime in when we chant the helping verbs.  FLL 3 & 4 are more time consuming for me, as the instructor, than I would like, so I have looked into other options. I also found the leap from FLL 2 to FLL 3 is not gradual enough.  If I were only teaching 1 or 2 children, I might have stuck with this series, but I have 7 children and just can't spend as much teaching time as FLL 3 & 4 require.  (I like that there is no prep time, though)

Climbing to Good English
I used Good English to bridge the gap between FLL 2 & 3 and also used it for my older students who were beyond FLL 4.  This relatively inexpensive and fairly comprehensive curriculum was less time consuming to teach, but after using book 2, two years in a row with different children, it burned me out and became tedious for me as the teacher.  I think that having 3 of my children complain about it all through the first year of using it didn't help.  So the search continued to find a good grammar curriculum for our family...

KISS Grammar
I found a reference to this on a forum I visited while looking for a used Junior Analytical Grammar book for my 7th grader.  It intrigued me, first, because it is free.  As I investigated it more, though, it excited me due to its unique approach to grammar, as well as the fact that it has materials for various levels enabling me to teach my 3rd, 5th, and 7th grader grammar all at the same time (yes, as a mother of 7, time is a huge factor for me).  So, no JAG for dd for now and we will see how things go.  As I mentioned above, I will still use FLL 1&2 for my first grader, but, if I'm still using KISS in two years, ds will join his older siblings.

The Sentence Family
This is a delightful way to teach basic grammar concepts.  I use it as a supplement and will go through it with the kids again this year.

Writing:

Writing With Ease
This is the first writing curriculum I used.  I plan to continue to incorporate some of the concepts, but I will be moving away from the workbooks this year using Science and History for topics on which to have the children write.  I liked the ease of using the workbooks with everything ready with no teacher prep time, but, once again, when I had multiple children all at different levels, I just didn't have the one on one teacher time to keep up and one ore more children tended to fall behind due to my lack of time (I'll probably write a whole separate post about my time issue, if I have the time).  I liked that the little excerpts from literature created a desire in my children to read the whole books from which the excerpts were derived.  I didn't like that each level takes a whole 36 weeks to complete.  Things always come up, whether illness, field trips or life in general that sometimes interrupt a school day and prevent us from accomplishing all that we set out to do.  I prefer a curriculum designed for 34 weeks, or less, giving us more flexibility in our school, yet still enabling the feeling of having completed a curriculum in our school year.

Conclusion:

I have not included all subjects in this post, but it is late.  I will see about posting more.  It helps me organize my brain to put my thoughts in writing.  I hope this is of some use to someone.