Gratises

The girls in Palmgarten have a busy evening after school. They will come home around 4:00 and grab a quick snack and then they have a couple hours of freedom. The girls can use this time to check Facebook, do homework (not a favorite activity), go to sports or play practice, or hang out with the guys in Maugenhard dorm.

Here "K" is updating her Facebook with all of her cool pictures for the Junior Normandy Field Trip. Then at 6:15 we eat the wonderful food the chef from Sudexo cooks for us. After dinner we have gratises. This is the German word for free. And since all of the dorm students have a chore that they do for free we call them gratises.

Here "KD" is joyfully washing the pots in pans as she jams to her music on her IPOD.

Right after dinner the girls try to get in as much time on the Internet or shall we say facebook as possible. "E" and "S" want you to think they are doing homework...really they are on facebook!

"D" is cleaning up the dishwasher area. She has already pushed through quite a few loads of dirty dishes. After gratises are done, we have "study hours" from 8:00-10:00. The girls are either in their rooms or working in the computer room on homework. During this time I have a bit of down time.

I need to be available to the girls during study hours if they have homework questions or need something, so I find a comfortable spot and read! What a wonderful way to end the day. Then at 10:00 the girls come out, grab a quick snack or yogurt or toast and at 10:30 they are off to bed.