Lunar Eclipse

Last night , after a long day of church and being at a new friend's house, we crazily went to the park to watch the eclipse.  It so easily could have been a disaster of overtired, too excited, shivering kids up way too late after a long day - but it wasn't!  Too excited? yes. Tired, yes. But not too cold, nor bored, nor whiny.  We enjoyed it!

We saw one from Bangkok in 2011 but this one was MUCH better: closer, clearer, kids old enough to be interested longer, and somewhat better planned.

We were all really looking forward to seeing the full eclipse with the blood moon effect, but by the time the moon was in full eclipse, the cloud cover was nearly complete and we couldn't see it at all.  But since by that time it was super late and we all were beginning to feel the Fall night chill, it was a good time to go home anyway.

And now, though well satisfied with the night's adventure, we are dealing with the aftereffects of snarly kids (Aiden didn't sleep in even one minute!), schedules all askew, and leftover weekend mess :-)

School according to Grace

Waking up at 7 to do morning list,(make bed,brush teeth,brush hair, do exercise, read bible, check email,and eat breakfast) is not fun. I tend to wake up at 8-9, so it's pretty early.

The subjects in school are Bible memory, English (Latin prefixes), Math (Khan Academy/Math Prodigy), History, Read Aloud, Astronomy or Bible, Music, and Chinese. And all that happens in about 4-4 1/2 hours!(BEFORE lunchtime!) We have a checklist  for what to do within the subjects.

But on Wednesday, it's different. It goes, STEP class (W2W) and Music. After lunch, there's Violin lesson (Jasmin), come home, supper, and Choir (Mom).

My favourite subject is Math. My least favourite is English. I'd like to have more time, less subjects. English is boring because of all the writing, while Math is fun. I do math by myself on the computer. I can go as fast as I like and try different parts of math so it never get boring. It's fun learning new stuff.

Jasmin is sick today, got out of school :(.

Week of Beginnings

We started school

Not as ready

as mom would have liked

Schedule rough

sleep not yet

fully caught up

Supplies and books

rather scattered still

Chinese school began

with visible relief seen

on girls'  faces

when told

only Saturday mornings

A rushed, not quite ready

morning departure

made void 

by being 1/2 hour early

A grade 3/4 split

pleasing sisters

staying together this time

Sunday School too

New classrooms and friends

Hundreds of kids

Getting them all in the right places

an organized chaos

STRECH class at church

a wonderful provision

 a homeschool class

during women's study program

New kids to know

"my age finally!"

Grace whispers.

Class time

new learning

Another teacher for a time

Choir for Mommy

meaning an evening of Daddy care

Exceptions and extras

Inevitable late bedtimes

made Mom tolerable by

choir singing euphoria

An amazing tonic

Long awaited

Often asked for

AWANA back in play

Tonight!

Another late night

How will we fare?

Another Daddy evening

Mom getting 

uninterrupted planning time

And then

Mommy hopes

we're done with

new beginnings 

for awhile at least

Just Before School

A promotional free car wash

Just about to expire 

A treat for an all-about-cars boy

Loud thrumming

 Soapy violence

Wet chaos

Stunned boy

And then - can we do it again?

 A day in the park

Waiting for Dad at meeting

Park picked carefully near a library

To fill in the hours

Only we never went inside.

 Splash pad, playground and field untouched

Focus all in the ground

"Clay" found under the sand

Of the volleyball court.

 What with 

Excavation

 Collection

Preparation

Production

and

Presentation

 There wasn't any time for

the Splash pad - except to wet the clay -

the play ground

the field

the library

or lunch - except under duress - 

3 hours in the sun

And we still managed 

to arrive at our friends' house for supper

in a fairly presentable state!

(As long as you didn't look too closely

at the handfulls of sand hiding in

Jasmin's hair

Grace's pocket

Aiden's ears.)

It certainly helped that they too

had spent the afternoon 

on sand at the beach.