Testing my resolve

This year, I decided to go simple with my New Year's Resolutions.  No insane, unattainable goals (run a marathon in June!  lose 50 pounds!), but simple things, like start counting calories again, exercise more, drink more water, cut down to only one pot of coffee a day.  I also resolved to be more patient with my husband and son, and to try to not stress about little things so much.

I almost broke all of my resolutions January 1st.

The first issue was that the first day of the new year fell on Sunday.  Which meant that, instead of sleeping in and having a lazy day off from work, I had to get my butt in gear to get to church.  And I had to do all this without my typical morning pot of extra-strong black coffee.

When I got to church, it became obvious that my resolutions about patience and not stressing so much were going to be tested.  We were low on volunteers for children's church (because, duh, New Year's), so we were going to have to combine all three classes:  nursery, preschool, and elementary.

The end result was myself and three other volunteers being responsible for 21 kids.

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Part-time Parent

As I so often mention, I often teach preschool children's church.  And what's so exciting about it, is nothing is ever routine.  I don't always have the same group of kids, and even "regulars", kids I've taught for months, can still surprise me.

I just plain, love toddlers, too.  I get to be around kids ages 2-5, when the world is still new and they're still excited to be learning about it.  And, although I normally don't know them as well as I'd like, I feel such appreciation for the parents who trust me with their little ones on a regular basis.  For a couple of hours a week, they let me take on their role.  I feed their kids, help them to the potty, and instruct them.  And it's a responsibility I appreciate being entrusted with.

I knew this past Sunday was going to be a great lesson days in advance, when I saw the schedule.  I enjoy all the volunteers with whom I serve, but some combinations just work better than others, and I was very happy when I saw who the other two volunteers for this week were.  I ended up letting one of them lead the lesson, because it was one I wasn't sure how to teach dynamically.  (I'm better with puppets and funny voices, and there were no puppets.)

Though there were mishaps, as always, we ended up having such a great day.  Two things in particular happened that just melted my heart.

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Adaptation is my primary survival skill.

After having the prior week off, I was so happy to get to spend time with my children's church preschoolers again this Sunday.  I was especially excited when I saw the lesson plan:  Daniel in the lions' den.

When trying to keep the attentions of multiple 2 to 5-year-olds, stories involving animals are a big help.  Especially fun and/or scary animals like lions.  (Little kids love roaring and growling.  Of course, so do I.)

I asked one of the other volunteers if she would be comfortable reading the part of Daniel for me.  She admitted she hadn't read the lesson, but reluctantly agreed.  So far, so good.

Waiting for class to start, I was very excited to see some kids who hadn't come in a while, some real sweethearts I'd been missing.  We even had extra volunteers, including two older-kid assistants.  Still so far, so good.

We played with toys for a while, then it was time to clean-up and listen to our Bible story.  That was when I realized the problem.

No lesson materials.  No props, no game materials, no stickers.

And no coloring sheets.

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