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HI Joylyn,

When our first children were 4 years old and all their playmates went off to
schools, preschools, and Waldorf Kindergarden, 4 of us moms who had decided to
homeschool arranged a co-op. Basically each week a family hosted and another
mom would stay. That left 2 moms to go to coffee, shop, take care of bills, or
hang out. We all had second kids so we had 4 4-5 year olds and 4 2 year olds.
We sang a song or more, did a craft, played and then had lunch for the kids
and moms. Seeing the kids sit down and eat and socialize was beautiful.

These moms and kids are still our favored friends. Even though 2 families
have moved out of town. This summer 3 of us all got together for a week of
condo camping and fishing. We had 9 kids between us and the kids truely have
deep lasting friendship with each other. I think the co-op lasted for 1 1/2
years and stopped when 1 kid then went to kindergarden and the rest of us got
more involved in our local homeschool support group. It was very easy to host
too. Cobstruction paper, glue, paint, playdough, cookies. I think we all used
Alternatives to Preschool for ideas, which is an LLL book.

Mary H.