Trying Out Everything

This school year both of the kids wanted to try new after school activities.  Marty and I were (and still are) very sad that Josie decided to drop out of the swim team. She was getting quite good or at least saw huge improvement, she actually liked to swim and we loved the parent community on the swim team.  Very very sad.  But, we both feel really strongly that as long as they are involved in something they should decide what they want to be involved in.

Last year Josie did mostly just Swim Team as it required practice 2-4 times a week and roughly once every other month (she attended 4 or 5 total) all day Saturday or Sunday swim meets. 
Benjamin last year did soccer on Saturdays as well as chess club and Late Birds (after school care) on Tuesdays, Late Birds and Robotics class on Wednesdays and Lacrosse on Fridays.  His school day also ended at 1PM!!  It was really like a half day for him every day.

This year Josie wants to do an acting club called ISTA, Odyssey of the Mind - I had never heard of OM before moving to Berlin.  It is a pretty cool club where the students run the show with a parent volunteer or two.  They then compete in Spring with other teams from all over Berlin and if they win they compete with teams from all over Europe and then in the end there is a final competition that is worldwide.  She is also doing soccer on Saturdays and wants to do Tae Kwon Do on Wednesdays.   She is much more of a little bit of everything than a lot of one thing. She is also in a NO PHOTOS stage so unfortunately, no photos here of her.

Benjamin has had a hard time deciding what to do.  He has lamented that his schedule is too tight and he "needs more down time"  Haha!!  He has nothing on his schedule other than school.  Granted he goes one more hour this

year, until 2PM but still.  He does Saturday soccer but his weekdays are wide open.  He tried Robotics class but said it was boring even though he loved it last year.  He tried a martial arts class that is run by a friend a couple of his friends attend.  He didn't like it.  He tried Tae Kwon Do and said it was "too many laps around the track and too many sit ups"

  This year he has landed on Tuesdays and Thursdays - lacrosse.  He mostly decided this would be fun because he is older and now the team plays with full gear which requires a fitted mouth guard, chest pads, elbow pads, gloves and a full on helmet.  Wednesdays he decided to play basketball and Saturday soccer along with a mid week recorder lesson with the music department during lunch time recess

which he loves.  He normally practices while Marty is doing his radio show which isn't such a smart idea.  He is still quite squeaky.
Hopefully we will be into a good routine here shortly because right now things still feel a bit chaotic as far as who is doing what each day.