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Regarding PA vs NJ, my husband and I are both originally from PA and when we had our daughter (now 6), we finally landed with a mortgage in NJ, after living in NYC and elsewhere. For the first 4 or so years of her life, I loudly and regularly expressed my desire to return to PA where most of our family members still live.

Then I began to be interested in homeschooling and soon determined that remarkably, NJ is one of the easiest states in which to homeschool. There are very minimal regulations, no yearly requirements, no submissions to school districts etc, and if any local official requests info, it is their burden to prove the request as necessary in the first place. Kindergarten is not compulsory, official schooling is required by law to begin at six but even so, NJ homeschoolers are innocent until proven guilty.

At the same time, I discovered that PA is often much more restrictive and can be tedious in its requirements, although that seems determined by where you live specifically - certain areas/jurisdictions are more invasive than others, apparently. Some Freepers in PA say they have never had a problem with anyone while others say it's been daunting.

At any rate, I no longer nag about moving back to PA, as we intend to continue homeschooling indefinitely, and of course have joined HSLDA anyway - there are SOME problem cases in NJ and you just never know! And of course, there's no comparison between the cost of living in NJ vs PA - housing cost differences alone are enough to make one weep. Hard.

Something else worth mentioning, as someone else said, there are so many local homeschool organizations out there. Countywide ones, secular ones, religious-based ones, statewide ones (ENOCH here in NJ is good), plenty of places that cater to homeschool groups, for example, the county group we started with offered gymnastics at the local gymnastics school, also swim lessons at the local swim school, with discounted rates for the group. The one to which we currently belong has a "learning center" every other week where the kids get together for class with their age groups (I just finished co-teaching my daughter's third semester class, which was on birds), have gym etc, also belong to the same swim school, go on monthly field trips to places like the Crayola factory in eastern PA, planetariums, museums etc.

There are so many resources, so many groups, socialization is such a non-issue. I just spent a couple hours this morning shopping for a first grade curriculum, the options are mindboggling! :) I need to find a program that allows for the moderate inclusion of my 2 1/2 year old son, or he'll drive us all crazy during school. And congratulations on the birth of your daughter, she is beautiful. We just had our third and final, another daughter, on Dec 22.

Thank you SO MUCH for that wealth of information on PA and NJ... We're a couple years away from moving, but we're also a couple years away from homeschooling, and I want to make sure I have all the info down before we get there.

We're currently in CA unfortunately. Hubby's family is in PA and NJ... My family is in northern CA and now OR. It's tough trying to decide where we should live - probably where most of the kids in the family live as most of them are currently under 5 yrs old: PA or NJ.

And I'm glad to hear about the "socializing" aspects you're enjoying. That leftist complaint about homeschooling doesn't stick with me - never has. I think their complaint (a la Estrich) has more to do with lack of socialISM indoctrinating our children (not THEIR children), than our children not hanging out with school pals. I have no doubt that whereever we live I'll be able to find likeminded homeschooling families for sports, field trips, etc.

And thank you... and CONGRATULATIONS on your own new baby! I bet you still just.... smell her and just marvel at it. :) That wonderful baby scent. I do.