This is one crazy schedule!

Girly Monkey ready
to dance

   This week marked the beginning of our crazy fall schedule in almost full force. I knew it was coming and I was trying to get ready for it. I already covered my school schedule, and it's very demanding. It's so demanding that if we fall behind we have to catch up on the weekends. But throw into the mix two dance classes for Girly Monkey, three for Funky Monkey, one soccer practice for each and one game each and you have one full schedule, and that doesn't even include a dance class for little Monkey that will start next week.

Funky Monkey helping with
his sister's soccer game

   Every day of the week there is an activity with the exception of Mondays.Tuesday- Girly Monkey has ballet class and Little Monkey has dance class, Wednesday- Funky Monkey has a Ballet class and soccer practice, Thursday- Girly Monkey has soccer practice, Friday- Funky Monkey has Modern dance class. Saturday is the craziest of all, with Funky Monkey having Ballet practice that ends the same time as his soccer game begins and they are about 45 minutes apart from each other. So he has to miss last 10 minutes of his Ballet and have me rush him to his game (since Daddy is the coach he has to be there for the beginning of the game and can't help me) which he misses half of..
After I drop him off and his booster seat with Daddy at the game I have to rush because Girly Monkey starts her Modern class 45 minutes after that. And there are Sundays, with 9 am games for Girly Monkey. So I am a little overwhelmed to say the least. Right now I can keep up, but when Monkey In-Waiting comes along it will be much more difficult. At least Little Monkey got a chance to play at the playground few times this week.

Funky Monkey ready for soccer

Omani recipe

   With all this craziness and driving to and fro, and my Gestational Diabetes clinic and testing, we have fallen a bit behind in schoolwork. We did manage to learn about our new country (Oman) and watch a short video about it, and even tried a recipe from that country. It was "Haleeb wa Zaatar" or Hot Milk with thyme infusion popular in rural Omani Villages. Little Monkey really liked it, whereas Funky Monkey and Girly Monkey were not very crazy about it. But that's where trying some new foods from other countries is meant to broaden their culinary horizons and allow them to try (even if they don't like it) something different.

In his Ballet outfit

   We continues with our study of Renaissance this week, and covered more of this time period. The kids learned about Medici family and Michelangelo, and lessening power of the church and rise in literacy. We also got a chance to study another composition by Carl Orff. This time it was Gassenhauer. It was a very interesting an up-beat piece of music and Monkeys really liked it.

Playground time for Little Monkey

   We also examined a painting called the Flowers of Fire by Georgia O'Keeffe. Monkeys really didn't think that this paining looked much like flowers until we looked at some up-close pictures of irises. It was still hard to convince them that they were indeed flowers. Girly Monkey could even examine the painting more up-close since she got her new glasses. That's right, four out of five of us now wear glasses.

Girly monkey in her new glasses

   We still have to do our paining for this week and it's already Sunday, but I am pushing to have it done so that we could start this week on time and not behind. It's always a juggling act, but we get it done ... eventually!