Late-Night Book Orders

There is nothing so fun as ordering homeschool books late at night… this is my reward for finishing an article that will pay me a fraction of what I’ve just spent on books.  Sheesh.

Here’s what I ordered – from Rainbow Resource and Better World Books:

Four books for our summer reading list – out-of-print books on the FIAR list (sigh, must check with the library ahead of time next time…):

000765 - Papa Piccolo
011069 - Night of the Moonjellies
023958 - Pair of Red Clogs
031058 - Who Owns the Sun?

Three for our Elemental Science program which we’re supposed to start this week…

029186 - Kingfisher First Animal Encyclopedia

Plus, two from Better World books:

Janice VanCleave's Biology for Every Kid: 101 Easy Experiments That Really Work

Janice VanCleave's Science Around the World: Activities on Biomes from Pole to Pole

And one history book from Rainbow…

018005 - Usborne Encyclopedia of World History

Finally, just for good, clean homeschool learnin’ fun... (disgusting, isn’t it???)

033792 - World Map GeoPuzzle – because it turns out I love doing puzzles with my kids, GZ is absolutely hooked on puzzles, and we all love geography!

004540 - Graph Skills Lapboard – too late for this year, but hopefully, there will still be some algebra in the air next year… otherwise, I guess we’ll use it to play Battleship.  ;-)

oh, and in my Better World order…

The Well-Trained Mind: A Guide to Classical Education at Home.  I just figure, it’s about time.  It was cheaper used at Better World, plus FREE shipping!

What a wonderful feeling… to be expecting big heavy boxes of books.  Of course, that is sometimes followed by the lousy feeling of getting dinged for customs by the mail guy at the door demanding $13.83 cash or he’ll take the nice heavy box to the post office where you have to shlep after 5 pm the following evening to pick up said delightful box.

Tricks for customs, in case you’re ever shipping to Canada:

• Mark the package as BOOKS, EDUCATIONAL, USED, DAMAGED etc… anything that is true that could reduce the value and/or tax on the enclosed items.
• For the customs value, state ONLY the lowest wholesale price of the books – NOT the full retail price.  If you buy the book for $5 and sell it to me for $15, write $5 on the customs form.  This is legal and could save me a few bucks in taxes.
• Under “value for customs”, whatever you do, do NOT write in the full invoice value INCLUDING shipping.  You’d think only an idiot would do that… maybe, but if so, there are a lot of idiots out there, or lazy people who just copy the same number back and forth on all the forms. 

Just to sum up:

• On a $100 invoice, I am not importing the $22 I have paid for shipping.  I am importing the “$80 worth” of books, which – see point #2 – is probably actually $40 worth of books.  So you write “$40” and I get dinged nothing and can receive and enjoy my Delightful Box immediately and we are all happy.  If you write $100, I get the mail guy demanding of me – in my jammies – a weird amount of cash that I almost never have on hand, and some of us are unhappy.  So don’t.

Thank you, universe, for listening.