more meal photos . .

 this evening's meal featured a new risotto recipe. i found it online . . just through a random search for eggplant risotto.

 

 what made this recipe so good, was that i used four slender eggplants: two i roasted, and two i sautéed. meanwhile, i sautéed onion and garlic in olive oil in a pan and then added the rice and ladlefuls of broth. when all the broth was absorbed, i added the roasted eggplant, which i had scooped from the skins, minced lemon and parmesan. when dished onto the plates, i added the diced eggplant with parsley. i finally found the recipe again and you can see it here. it was incredibly creamy. i've never combined eggplant and lemon before, without tomatoes.

i've had this movie from the library for over a month now, and finally watched it while working on a sock i've been knitting. i had refreshed my memory of michelangelo's life beforehand so i wouldn't be wondering what was true and what wasn't when watching. they embellished the characters, but the storyline was rather accurate. i also enjoyed rex harrison and charlton heston's performances. eva had recommended it back in february.

installing the heat pump

today workers came to prepare our wall for a heat pump/air conditioner. our apartment complex is installing them for free. since we do not have an air conditioner, we felt this was an all win situation. (i priced them during the summer - they are quite expensive!)

jack was moved into morgana and chanda's room where he got to listen to morgana practicing her guitar.

chanda worked at the table in the living room until they started drilling . .

and then we ran for the bedrooms on the north side of the building . .

and took refuge with korrina who was watching the third harry potter movie.

jack slept through it all . .

we now have a new sleeve in the wall. tomorrow the pump will be put in.

muddling through a busy week . .

this week is a very busy and crazy week for us, and of course greg is away for it! chanda is at the theatre everyday for patrelle nutcracker rehearsal (all day on wednesday), and morgana has rehearsals and tech for her sokolow dance performance and her modern dance teacher's family matters performance at the new york live arts theatre on 19th street . . . . AND korrina has tech and dress all this week and opening night on thursday for the show she's stage managing at the herbert berghof theatre.

even though we have been getting home so late, and getting to sleep later than usual, morgana, chanda and i managed to get out of the house this morning for a special student showing of the sokolow dance theatre ensemble's anna sokolow way. this is the show morgana will be performing with wednesday, friday and saturday nights. her modern dance class is performing anna's unanswered question with the company. morgana says it's very special to be working with them, and the energy they have is inspiring.

we met our friends there for a nychea representation at the morning school performance. the company director and several of the company members talked about what is was like to work with anna, and how her dances reflected her life and the times she lived in. it began with a dance piece about immigrants arriving to nyc through ellis island, then jumped to a ragtime dance piece, followed by a solo reflecting the nightmare dreams she would have about the holocaust, then several theatre dance pieces inspired by kafka, mondrian, magritte and kurt wiel. it was a walk through time which showed us how she contributed to modern dance and how she was inspired by the lives of artists around her. she was a fascinating person, and i could feel the love and respect the dancers have for her. she died in 2000 at the age of 90, choreographing all the way (i think the last piece she did was when she was 89). she grew up on the lower east side and attended the emanuel sisterhood settlement house and the neighborhood playhouse where she began dance classes with martha graham.

 we came home to have lunch and then actually managed to do some schoolwork. i cut out hearts for my craft fair project. 

 chanda did a little italian and latin and violin and fit in a nap. morgana worked on her guitar and finished a suetonius quote in her roman history lesson book. i think her book looks beautiful and is a good reflection of the work she's done so i took a few pictures:

 hannibal crossing the alps. . 

 structure of the roman government . . 

my hearts . . sitting on the piano and waiting for thursday.

roses, thank you cards and julius caesar

 (chanda's roses for her birthday from her acting teacher).

today we read and talked about constantine and julian the apostate and the beginnings of constantinople on the site of byzantium, a greek city founded in 657 bc by byzas of megara. it's incredibly refreshing to finally know where the word "byzantine" came from and understand that it was the eastern roman empire founded by constantine i. it's amazing to me that i never learned about the roman empire when i was growing up.

we also continued watching julius caesar with john gielgud, marlon brando, james mason and louis calhern . . greer garson and deborah kerr . . it's a 1953 production directed by joseph mankiewicz and i've really been enjoying it. we had to stop right after mark antony delivered his "friends, romans, countryman" speech . . morgana had to run off to man the phones at the hb office, then they were both at dance class . . and now they're watching their friend deychen's orchestra concert. maybe we'll get to the end of it tomorrow morning.

it was time for chanda to write out her thank you cards. a few of the gifts she received were: a gift certificate to lionbrand yarn store (fun!), hot chocolate mix, a rug hooking kit, a knitted shrug, the hobbit movie, and lemon loacker cookies.

and beautiful stationery.

greg and i actually ate dinner alone this evening! but they're home now and supposedly starving.

the cold arrives

we woke to 27 degrees this morning. it's finally cold and we're consistently turning the heat on. late this afternoon i met janet for a hot chocolate at chocolate bar and the moon was rising.

we finished reading julius caesar and really enjoyed reading it aloud. it makes such a difference to take turns and find the motivation in the words.

roman history drawings

 morgana worked on a sketch of julius caesar this morning . . 

 and chanda worked on a drawing of caesar crossing the rubicon.

meanwhile, i read aloud from gombrich's a little story of the world, and jansen's history of art for young people.

what we're currently reading

chanda has been making me happy these mornings by waking and reading augustus caesar's world  by genevieve foster. she's also reading a book by cornelia funke . . but she knows i would like her to finish this first as it's part of our roman history block.

 morgana is almost at the end of the bronze bow, about a young man growing up in judaea during the time of jesus. she's been enjoying it just as much as i did. elizabeth george speare wrote two other books we really like: calico captive, and the witch of blackbird pond, one of my sister's favorite books also. in fact, it takes place near her home in connecticut and chanda saw the cottage in which the young heroine was supposed to have lived when she was visiting this past summer.

 

 we've been reading shakespeare's julius caesar aloud.

 we've been reading from the first folio which can be a bit challenging . . 

 all the "s's" look like "f's" and "u's" look like "v's." but it's been a lot of fun. i find it much more enjoyable than reading it to myself.

ironing and hannibal . . a daily day

we finally got to the laundry today, along with reviewing and then summarizing rome's wars. after a main lesson, they will work on a language (switching from latin one week to italian the next) and math, and then instrument practice. chanda has ballet every afternoon, but morgana's afternoons alternate with babysitting and a guitar lesson and ellen's modern dance class.

global warming?

 the sprinklers were on at bleecker street playground . . which i was glad of as it's been very warm here this week. warm and humid. we had a cool september, but it's really warmed up for these first few days of october. having the sprinklers on is an indication of global warming to me.

 morgana and chanda looked up words with latin prefixes in the dictionary today . . 

 chanda worked until it was time for her ballet class . . 

 and morgana worked until it was time for her study group job. once again she is looking after about five children while their mothers read and discuss books about waldorf parenting and schooling. today she did finger knitting with the children.

 i made a new soup for dinner tonight: asparagus soup with pearled barley. 

 global warming sign number two of the day: fan blowing in the window.

discussion this night centered on how warm it was, and nutcracker rehearsals. chanda is dancing as a flower and as a skater. she's very happy about this.

getting warmer . .

we've been reading several books about rome. morgana is in the middle of augustus caesar by genevieve foster (a reference i obtained from eva, thanks for posting eva!) and chanda has been reading about pompey in plutarch's lives of the noble grecians and romans. i hope they will switch books by next monday. morgana also just finished a book by madeleine polland, an author i know from my teenage years: city of the golden house. i'm in the middle of reading it now, and will turn it over to chanda when finished. it's an historical fiction novel about a young slave from britain who travels to rome with his master, a commander in the roman army, and their encounters with the teachings of peter in the time of nero. i've really been enjoying it.

yes. it's been very warm. we had ice cream today at eataly. 

chanda went to ballet and i went with morgana to work on her modern dance piece for the family matters performance in december.

she worked well and finally set about 30 seconds of her dance that had been only improv before.

summer beach bedroom