Easter, working mom and illness

All the topics to come ...

It's amazing how much can happen in one week. For starters, I LOVE being a working mom. Having the satisfaction of a productive day is fulfilling for me. It is a different productive than at-home momminess. On the flip side, I'm so bummed, my kids go to bed too quickly after I get home - after all, they need their sleep to wake up so early nowaday (8am). All in all, I think we can pull this off. My working for our family was necessary (I have the majority of the student loans anyway). I'm excited to also build my career. Even if I am building it slowly, sporatically, starting late and from a different direction than most others, I'm happy. I blame it on the way I grew up, in a single-parent home who had a successful career. The difference is, I am blessed with an incredible husband and an understandable, patient companion. Evenings are fun, too. We get to be together as a family, have dinner, play together until bed and call it a day. I love balance and think I might have found it, for now. Unfortunately, we also have to worry about sick time. That realization came all too quickly for a new beginning at a new job.

Monday morning our new babysitter called and said her boy was sick. I could bring the kids over if I was ok with them getting sick. Well, what choice did I have? First day of TRAINING, not something you can just skip. So, I went to work, kids went to daycare. Tuesday the babysitters daughter got sick, Wednesday my son got sick, Friday I got sick and today my daughter got sick. All who is left is my husband. Oh, boy! He has to teach this Sunday, no way I want to take that responsibility. Hehehe. Hopefully, he'll be just fine. The blessing of it all is that it is only a 24 hr stomach flu. Could be worse.

As for Easter, I completely spaced writing about it. It was one of the more successful holidays our little family has had so far. We did something a little different this year to keep the meaning of the holiday alive and to help our son understand the holiday in a more meaningful context outside of bunnies and eggs. We hid the eggs around the house - the kind you open to find goodies inside. Half of the eggs were filled with candy, a quarter of the eggs were filled with slips of paper and candy and the last quarter with both candy and paper. The paper had scripture references, games, discussion questions, videos to watch. It was fun. My son was excited to open each one, read the questions, do the fun things (pin the egg on the bunny, egg races, etc.). I think we even got the who, why and what of Easter figured out. After we went to church, where my husband and I teach Primary (6-7 year olds). I was ready to give up after we were given the other 6-7 year old class - which combined is such a terror and a haphazard class. Most of the time I wonder what the point is when the kids aren't listening, not sitting, all the like and if the spirit is even teaching. It is difficult to stick with it. Then I realized, each Sunday we struggle and each Sunday, as soon as we are done (the same minute), everything floats away and we forget what we just went through. We go home, have dinner and life continues until the next Sunday when we remember, as soon as we get into opening exercises. What a blessing that is. The Lord is looking out for us to such a tiny degree that the overwhelmingness of teaching other people's children is not so overwhelming. This Sunday in particular was the most difficult so far. After opening exercises two of the three biggest challenges booked it down the hall in separate directions while my husband was struggling with an overly tired daughter and a line of other children in our class getting mish-mashed on the way to sharing time. What a disaster. Is there no concern for the kids that other teachers would help each other by looking after their own class or helping other children stick with their class. Having twelve bored, active children to two worn out adults with a screaming child just doesn't seem fair. We got the kids sat down in Sharing Time and I abandoned my husband. They seem to do better in Sharing Time than in class or opening exercises. Also, there is a line of Primary workers that sit in the back and look for ways to help teachers - I LOVE that. So I knew my husband could handle it. I set up our classroom since it was going to be full of different activites and we were watching a clip. By the time I got into Sharing Time again, the kids were getting out of control. I stepped in, we finished Sharing Time and headed to class. That is when my testimony of the Lord's help in our calling grew exponentially. As soon as we got into class, silence! I had prayed so many times, this lesson was so important to me. I felt the strength of the Lord so strongly and His help in that room with each sweet child. It was amazing. My husband had to take our daughter out of the room because SHE was being the distracting basket case. The lesson was awesome. We watched part of an LDS DVD where not a word was spoken. Not a sound was made. We had pictures, scriptures, chalkboard lessons, coloring pictures. It was amazing. In the end, to recap, I did the egg idea in class as we did with our family earlier that morning. Each child opened an egg, read the question, we discussed or just answered the slip. I filled their egg with jelly beans and asked a child to give the closing prayer after we colored our lesson pictures. The most amazing thing, happened then. One of the harder children in the class has Ausbergers. He isn't hard at all, unfortunately, he has been labeled that way by former teachers and so upon the induction of new teachers, the label continues. Anyway, when I asked one of the children to give the prayer, this special child got down on his knees in the most humble, natural of ways. I was so touched, I followed his lead. At which point, all of us were on our knees listening to the sweetest prayer I have ever heard given in our class before. The spirit was truly there. I gave all my thanks that moment and held back tears of joy and of gratefulness. How amazing. To "be as a child" is our goal, but to see their example is our joy!!

The rest of the day was pleasant. Ham dinner with family, the arrival of visiting family from out of town and the perfect way to start a new chapter in our crazy lives.