Although they had a few minor temper fits, I am soooo glad I decided to register them for this event. I'm not sure who enjoyed it more, them or me! (or would that be I? I spent a couple minutes debating which was correct & gave up!) I was so proud of all the memorizing the girls did (ahhh what a yoyo can entice a kid to do!) and how they participated in the lessons & answering questions & even knowing some answers! One of the lessons was about miracles and how we can't accomplish these ourselves & need His help. I read the story about David & Goliath & then asked the kids if David did it all by himself. Honey piped up that God had helped him. Another little girl answered that Jesus had helped. Now this is in the Old Testament & plus it was our bible from home so she knew Jesus' name was nowhere in this particular story but I didn't want to make the other little girl feel bad. We'd been talking about Jesus all week so it would stand to reason he might have been involved right? I was just going to let it go but Honey KNEW it was wrong and wasn't going to let her slide. "No it was GOD" and the other little girl repeated that Jesus had helped too. Honey started to get visibly upset, NO! not Jesus, JUST GOD helped him!" Her voice actually took on a frantic note & her face was getting all scrunched up in frustration and tears were forming! She takes her bible stories seriously and this chick was screwing it all up!!! I was able to get by with "sometimes Jesus helps us and sometimes God helps us..." and moving on quickly to another topic!!
I think I enjoyed seeing the involvement that went into VBS. There were entire families that came to volunteer. I had one mom who helped us with our group of little ones, her son volunteered for the gym activities, & a couple of her daughters helped with other groups & her youngest daughter was an attendee I think. Even the guy whose mom "voluntold" him seemed to be really into it at the end of the week. The first day, the gym activities for our group were a little beyond their abilities and another day they brought in a bunch of the playgroup toys & let the kids just play on those rather than trying to organize a fancy game. Later that same day, he saw me & wondered if the change of activity had been an improvement. He had also noticed that the little girls were quite intimdated by the big teenage guys and he felt a bit bad about that & made sure not to crowd them or get too close to them after that. And let me not forget my co-leader Sarah who impresses the crap out of me! I was there because my kids were there & I wanted to help make their week fun. Would I have spent a week of my vacation on it if I had NO KIDS??? Hmmmmm, I guess I don't know but she did! Some days after VBS she went to the library and volunteered there too. One day I needed to make a stop at the grocery store & was going to give her a lift home and then run my errand and she decided that coming shopping with us would be more fun than hanging out at home & offered to come with us. Totally above and beyond the call of duty! I know Sarah's a regular reader here so Sarah, hats off to you for being a caring, helpful and generous young lady!
Something that I also found vey impressive was that some of the kids from our church invited their friends to come help them and we had several teens who don't even go to our church! They came, they helped, they memorized their verses and they enjoyed it. I thought it was awesome to see their enthusiasm & involvement.
By the end of the week, the girls had drawn a couple extra helpers who had them running and dancing and playing. It was wonderful to know they were being well attended to and entertained and looked after. On the last day, not only did I have my trusty Sarah by my side, two other young ladies were with me at the wrap up party in the afternoon. They took charge of the girls, helped me get them changed into their swimsuits and took them with them on the slip & slide so I didn't have to get wet. I hadn't thought about them not wanting to go by themselves. I figured they'd see everyone else having fun & just jump in. Sarah, Victoria, Anna & Alexandra took them by the hand, waited in line with them, probably a few times each, only to get to the front and have them chicken out & change their minds! They'd just go to the back of the line, wait for another turn and try again. They were soooo patient & determined to get those kids sliding. Sweetie was the first to give in to the temptation of the slippery slope but didn't last long before getting cold. I was in charge of making sure the bigger kids waited their turn so I didn't really get to see her sliding but did catch the other 2 a few times later on.
Anyway, I'm so happy we went to VBS, got to know some of the youth a bit better and let the girls get a glimpse of "school" & be involved in this amazing week. We got a CD of all the songs they danced to all week, plus another CD of pictures from the week. Great take aways!!!
Totally worn out! a good indication of a great day!
1 comment:
Glad you were able to get up *so* early and make it to VBS! :)
See you soon - woohoo!!
Kara
Post a Comment