This the power of the cross...

September has flown by. The air now has a crisp to it, the leaves are brilliantly changing, and the days are getting shorter one by one. Josh and I are staying busy between his work in the welcome center and the dorm, my work at Kiddie Kampus, ministries at church, and so forth. We're enjoying life though. It's great to be married to the one God planned for you and to be living a life together led by Him!

Now onto what the title of this post hints to...

All week at Kiddie Kampus I have been teaching the Bible lessons. The lessons for the week have all had a theme of prayer. Monday was about Jonah praying in the whale to confess his sins, yesterday was about Nehemiah praying for help to rebuild the wall, and today was about how Jesus prayed for Himself and others. So I'm going through the story and the kids are listening (most of them anyways!) and one thoughtful question that was asked was, "Why did Jesus have to pray when He is the one we pray to?" What a thought for a 3 year old, eh? Then we get to one of the flashcards from the story that shows a picture of Jesus and above him are three thought bubble type things with pictures in each. One had a picture of the disciples, one had a picture of people of today, and one had a picture of Jesus hanging on the cross. They were each picturing times when Jesus prayed or things He prayed for. We get through the lesson and after Bible time is snack time so half of the kids are sent to go wash the hands in preparation for snack. While the kids are back washing their hands I look through the flashcard pictures from the story once again with some of the remaining kids. As we are looking one boy asks if we can go back and look at the picture of the cross. So we look at that picture and this little boy is enthralled with this picture. He asked, "Why is he on that cross? Why is there blood on him? Why doesn't he have clothes on? Why are those nails in him?" I proceeded to answer his questions as simply and lovingly as I could. I explained to him that Jesus had to die on the cross so that we could go to Heaven one day and be with Him and how the people took his clothes from Him and the nails were there to hold Him up on the cross and He bled because it hurt a lot. He continued to stare at the picture of Jesus on the cross and I could just see the emotion and questions flowing across his face. Well the time then came for the rest of the kids to go wash their hands and I headed back to the sink with them all. Back at the sink this little boy was still thinking about the cross picture. He said, "I don't want to go on a cross like that." To which I replied that we don't have to go on a cross because Jesus did it for us. After thinking about that for a moment he asked, "So how do we get up to Heaven?" I first replied by saying how we have to tell Jesus we are sorry for the bad things we have done and we have to believe on Him. To which He interrupted me by asking, "How do we GET up there?" I told him Jesus will come back and bring us up through the clouds. He thought about that for a minute and replied, "Ok, but I'm scared to do that." I said it won't be scary because we will be with Jesus. With simple trust he said, "Okay."

That right there is why I love my job. I truly pray that this little 3 year old boy will continue to have questions and a desire to know about the cross.

"This, the pow'r of the cross:
Christ became sin for us;
Took the blame, bore the wrath—
We stand forgiven at the cross."

A day in the life of a preschool teacher...

6:40 am - Get woke up by a text asking if I can come in asap to cover for sick coworker.

6:55 am.- Clock-in at work (impressive, I know).

7:30 am - Eat a blueberry muffin with the kids eating breakfast and listen to conversation on why or why not muffins and peaches are good.

8:00 am - Wonder how long it's just going to be me with 14 three year olds?!

8:15 am - Let the kids lose out on the playground.

8:30 am - Help arrives!

8:35 am - Take screaming and thrashing child from leaving parent.

9:00 am - Corral the kids inside for Library Reader.

9:05 am - Sing songs with kids instead, since Library Reader went to the other class first.

9:25 am - Serve morning snack of yogurt to kids asking, "What kind of ice cream is that we're having??"

9:30 am - Library Reader arrives and reads during snacktime.

9:55 am - Split kids up into groups to play in centers.

9:57 am - Console those kids who ended up in a center they didn't want to be in.

10:10 am - Teach kids in Drama Center who are pounding at the tool bench how to use the screw driver to screw things in instead of always using the hammer (score!).

10:12 am - Watch boy hold blocks as a microphone and walk around the room belting "Baa, baa black sheep," "Old McDonald had a Farm," and "Twinkle, twinkle, little star."

10:30 am - Release kids out onto the playground again.

10:32 am - Instruct child not to hit friend.

10:38 am - Instruct child to share toys with friend.

10:40 am - Instruct child not to take toy out of friend's hand.

10:50 am - Comfort child who fell down.

11:15 am - Call kids in to wash hands for lunch.

11:20 am - Serve pizza, pineapple, veggies, and cottage cheese to kids.

11:22 am - Instruct kids to only take one piece of pizza.

11:26 am - Assure kids that it's okay if someone takes all that's in the bowl, I can fill it up.

11:30 am - Clean up a cup of spilled milk.

11:32 am - Scarf down my own pizza.

11:40 am - Clean up another cup of spilled milk.

11:50 am - Spread out cots around room.

11:55 am - Excuse kids who are finished to go potty, get their blankets, and head to their cots.

12:00 pm - Fix blankets, put on sheets, zip sleeping bags, and say "goodnight" and "I love you" to kids.

12:02 pm - Tell kids who are talking they need to go to sleep.

12:10 pm - Fill out observation chart for each child.

12:20 pm - Fill out daily sheet for each child.

12:35 pm - Am impressed that 16 out of 18 kids are sleeping!

12:40-1:40 pm - Sit and keep myself from falling asleep, search the internet on my phone for ideas for next weeks' lessons, continue to be impressed that all 16 kids are still sleeping.

1:44 pm - Laugh as child sits up wide awake and exclaims, "Where did the other teacher go!?!"

1:48 pm - Allow those that are awake to get up and put their blankets away, and read a book or do a puzzle quietly.

1:55 pm - Assist the kids in waking up and getting their shoes back on.

1:57 pm - Listen to a conversation by kids who are looking at a book about bees - Child 1: "Bees make honey." Child 2: "How?" Child 1: "They poop it." Child 2: "OoOoh."

2:00 pm - Wake up the final few kids who are still sleeping.

2:05pm - Get the kids seated for an afternoon snack of cookies and milk.

2:12 pm - Back out to the playground we go!

2:28 pm - Go down the slide with child on lap and child behind me.

2:20 pm - Order chicken nuggets, fries, and chocolate milkshake from "McDonalds."

2:21 pm - Am asked if I want a toy with my meal. Me: "Sure, what kind of toy?" Boy: "Batman." Me: "Do you have any girl toys?" Boy: *thinks for a moment* "Yeah, we have a button you can push in." Me: "Oh. Thanks!"

2:30 pm - Instruct kids to take turns on the bikes.

2:32 pm - Comfort child who hurt his finger and take him in to get a bandaid.

2:40 pm - Listen to child "call the cops" on friends for coming into his McDonalds - Boy: "I'm going to call the cops on you!" Children: Run away, taunting that the cops can't get them. Boy: Picks up pretend phone, "Hi cops. You need to come get some people."

2:45 pm - Listen to a complaint from child that another child bit him.

2:46 pm - Address afore mentioned child who bit - Me: "Did you bite him?" Child: "No." Me: "You didn't bite him? Did you do anything to him?" Child: "No I didn't do anything." Me: "You didn't bite him? Did you touch him?" Child: "It was *other child!*" Me: "*Other child* was not even by you two. Did you bite him?" Child: "Well, he pushed me." Me: "Then what did you do? Did you bite him?" Child: "Yes."..........

2:48 pm - Sit with above child for a couple minutes.

2:50 pm - Comfort another child who fell and hurt his knee, and take him in to get a bandaid.

2:51 pm - Laugh as hurt child runs out the door to show his friends his cool "tatoo" bandaid.

2:55 pm - Push child who needs help on bike.

3:04 pm - Next worker arrives and I get to go home!

3:12 pm - Collapse on couch at home and share day with my husband. :)


Ready for round two (well, actually round five this week) tomorrow!