The Post Where I Vent To Keep From Killing An Innocent Person

Oh my heavens. I am still hot. And actually, the more time goes by and the more I think about it, the hotter I get.

It doesn't help that I have got a killer headache from taking my medicine late b/c I forgot to take it before we left for church....then on top of that, we didn't have time to stop and get me some caffeine before church.....or like, you know....breakfast, so I was wrestling with the desire to eat the munchkin's snacks during the whole service. Things are somewhat improved now, as I'm enjoying a lovely can of Dr Pepper and took my medicine as soon as we got home, but the headache is taking awhile to go away.

However, in an attempt to be somewhat positive, today has been MARGINALLY better than yesterday. Also, looking over at my wonderful sweet hubby who is currently sandwiched between the very chatty young man who stayed with us last night and the little munchkin who lives with us, I do count my blessings that he is patiently entertaining the two of them without complaint (although when I started to take a picture of the KC sandwich on the loveseat he did stage a loud protest and I immediately gave in, since he is....you know.....entertaining the two of them right now and I'm pretty much home free at this particular moment....LOL).

Okay....I'm going back to my vent now cuz I really need to get this off my chest before I blow up on someone who doesn't deserve it.

I found out around 7 last night that I am teaching the 3-5 year old sunday school class this morning. First off, it is something that I have never done before. I've helped other teachers in the older classes a couple of times, and I regularly work with the pastor's wife to keep the babies-3 entertained during Sunday School (which doesn't involve any kind of lesson except playing kids music and keeping them from killing each other while they play with the baby toys in the nursery), but I've never actually "taught" a Sunday School Class on my own. And we weren't even close to being able to get home so I could pull something together. So I got up this morning and flew around, getting ready, trying to come up with an appropriate lesson for the 3-5 year olds at church, getting the munchkin ready, combing the young man's hair, and trying to keep the two of them out of KC's hair so that he could finish studying for HIS Sunday School lesson which was way more involved (since he teaches the adult sunday school at church).

So I do a desperate, quick yahoo search on sunday school lessons 3-5 year old.

Dear God, thank you, thank you, thank you for making men smart enough to create the wonderful invention called the internet!!! And also, thank you for the incredibly kind people who post sunday school lessons and activities for panicked desperate people like me to use. Amen!

So I found this really interesting lesson on ladybugs. And I love ladybugs. After today, I really love ladybugs. Unfortunately, the lesson plan didn't warn me that it would only take 5 minutes and the coloring page and activity would would bring it up to about 15 minutes, leaving me with 30 minutes to come up with something to do. I could have done the craft, which would have probably taken the rest of the 30 minutes and worked out great, but I didn't have the supplies, I didn't know what the regular teacher kept in the classroom, and I didn't have time to get it all together.

Really, none of that was the problem though. I'm creative. I improvised. We managed.

Here are some of the problems I had with this.

#1 - minor really, but somewhat disturbing: the first thing they wanted was to each have a piece of candy from the candy bucket. Duh? NO!

#2 - another minor, they didn't want to listen to a lesson, they wanted to play with the play doh and raid the prize bucket. Hello! And the aggravating thing is that when I said no, they went ahead and helped themselves. Well, one of them did. The other ones weren't regulars in this class and were clueless like me about the prize bucket. So I took the goodies that the one pulled out of the bucket and divided them between all the kids.

#3 - the most disturbing....and not so much disturbed at the child, but disturbed b/c I know where they're learning these habits. The munchkin was in Sunday School with me this morning. She's three now, so she's going to be in that class, but she's technically not supposed to move until the quarter is up when all the people who have had birthdays that quarter move up to the next class. But I took her with me this Sunday. So we're sitting there in SS and I ask if anyone wants to pray and this one kid says, "can we pray for my brother? Are you her mommy now? Where's her other mommy?"

Ooh I'm getting hot again. She caught me off guard and I wasn't sure how to answer that in front of the munchkin without making it worse. So I look at the munchkin and she has this LOOK on her face. Oh great. She understood the question. I am trying to be nice, so I answer the other kid and say, I'm her mommy, right munchkin? And the munchkin, who normally answers that question with a firm "uh huh!" just looks down at the floor. I look at the other kid and trying to control my frustration, I say okay, let's get back to SS!

Not 15 minutes later after we've talked about ladybugs and how they are helpful and how they save plants by eating the bad bugs and how we should be helpful and nice like ladybugs....we're getting ready to color the ladybug sheets and the kid comes out with the same exact question only more forceful. "Where's her OTHER mommy?" Oh, I was ready to blow! I started to answer nicely and said, "home" and then I decided, no, I'm not taking this. So I said something to the effect of (and still nicely) "That is a rude question. Do you think it's being very ladybug-like to ask questions that hurt other people? That doesn't make people feel very good. We need to be helpful and nice, not rude, and questions like that are rude, okay? It's really none of your business." And then she says "why not?" And I'm like, just color, okay? ARGH!!!!!

Now I realize that children are innocent, but this child's parents are not known for their tact. AND, not only that, but we specifically requested to the entire congregation (including this family) before we ever got any children placed in our home, to please refrain from those exact kind of questions. I should have known. Really. I mean, you can't tell those kids if you're planning a surprise party b/c they will go tell the person who is supposed to be surprised. Yeah, that's happened, too. Some of the other kids have asked us in front of her if she's our FOSTER child, although we specifically requested not to hear THAT question either, but that doesn't bother me QUITE as much b/c she's still too young to understand that term. However, other children who are older that may be placed with us WILL understand that term, so I wish these parents would have this discussion with their kids. If it continues to happen, I will personally talk to the parents myself. It's just SO irritating. UGH!

Okay. The movie that they were watching is over, so I should go now. Oh yeah.....and surprise of all surprises, the munchkin was absolutely enthralled with the movie......which was STAR WARS. AHHHHH.....a girl after daddy's own heart. I must say that I hope this turns into a permanent arrangement!!! And NOT just because she liked Star Wars. Hahaha!

Vent over. I feel better now.

By the way, Public Service Announcement here: if you have children, please have a chat with them about foster children and how much it hurts even the little ones when you ask them painful questions about their REAL moms and dads. Thanks!