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Preschool is FUN!
Yesterday was such an unexpected good day. It was the first day back to school in two weeks, since last Monday was a holiday. It started off horribly. Even the night before was horrible. Every time I mentioned going to school, Bug would well up with tears. She saw me packing her lunch and started crying. She saw me getting out her school clothes and she started crying. In bed at night as we prayed for a good day at school, she started crying. All the next morning it was tears tears tears…it ripped my heart out.
I don’t want to teach her that she can cry and throw a fit to get her way but these tears of sadness really made me second-guess my decision to put her in school so young. Does she really need it? I’ve heard so many arguments on both sides of the fence. I feel like I’m getting blisters from riding the middle of the fence like a bucking bronco. What to do, what to do…
But we toughed it out and went to school anyway.
Luckily for me, one of my friends was visiting the school yesterday. She was observing to see if she wanted to put her daughter in Bug’s class. I didn’t know you could do that or I would have signed up too. I didn’t even know my friend was there until later she emailed me several photos of Bug in class having the time of her life.
There was Bug in the middle of music class smiling from ear to ear as she beat a bowl with a spoon. There was Bug sitting with her classmates all lined up in a row, listening to storytime with rapt attention. There she was on the playground going down the slide with confidence. There she was on the teeter-totter playing with her buddies. Every picture was of Bug having fun and none of them were posed.
Bug likes school. I have proof now. I’d include the photos but I need to protect the privacy of the other children so you’ll just have to take my word for it.
Then after school we stuck around to play on the massive playground they have and chat with another mother who is a friend of mine. When it was finally time to leave Bug waved to the playground. “Bye preschool!” she said. “See you next Monday!”
Does that sound like someone who is too young to go to preschool? I don’t think so. In fact this morning she woke up and asked if we were going to school today. I had to tell her no. Now she’s crying because she wants to go to school. I know you guys all told me she’d come around. I just didn’t know it was going to be like this.
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The Bible Conference
Happy New Year! Did you see my new banner? No? Empty your cache and refresh your browser. There it is. Anyway before I go off rambling about the super duper invites I’m designing for Bug’s super-duper-puppet-show birthday party coming up, I think I better say a few words about the bible conference I attended over Christmas weekend.
I usually hate to talk about this stuff because I know some of you will write me off as one of those bible-thumping lunatics and the rest of you will sigh and shake your head that I’m such a coward always shying away from writing about spiritual things because it’s not the popularly accepted thing to do. And then there’s part of me that is embarrassed to admit that I probably only took in about ten percent of what was going on because I was trying to keep my toddler in line and I was distracted by the secret-coded notes my ten-year-old niece was passing right by me. (By the way, my niece may be a bad influence but she is totally clever.)
So we stayed in a fancy hotel, we ate more cookies and I drank more coffee than I really should have… I saw old friends that I haven’t seen in three years or more and I learned some things. I don’t feel like this is the place to discuss them. (Not to mention I don’t want to admit how dumb I am.) But I’m coming around to the fact that I shouldn’t hide that I am a Christian anymore. I know. There goes my readership. But I have to be honest. This is me. Silly fickle me.
I’ve had so many years that I doubted my faith. I was “saved” when I was very young and didn’t really know there was anything else to believe. Then my whole world turned on it’s head when I left the church in my twenties. I didn’t want anything to do with any kind of organized religeon. I’d seen the evil that it (and myself) could do. The Da Vinci Code sent me for a loop. Could Jesus be married? Could the bible be re-written to suit the Catholics in power at the time? I still question everything. I’d say you are a liar or in extreme denial if you don’t.
But I’m coming around. It doesn’t all make logical sense in my head. I still worry that faith is part of my brain’s elaborate plan to fool me out of being afraid of death. But I’m letting go of that. I was raised to trust in Jesus to get me through. I was raised to read the bible for encouragement. Sure it’s sentimental because it reminds me of the safe harbor that was my youth but maybe I want that safe harbor for my kid too. And then there’s the part about prayer. I don’t understand it. It works. I’ve prayed my way through trial after trial and every time I am amazed that somebody up there, who has a million zillion other things to do, actually heard me.
So that is that. I’m sorry if I bored you to tears and you’ll never want to come here again. I’m sorry if I disappointed you because I’m not going to relay what I learned from reading Hebrews 10. I just felt like I had to say something because it happened. I went to a bible conference for three days and it was good for me. I’m not going to be walking door-to-door handing out tracts but I am going to examine why I’m so hesitant to be a Christian in this crazy world. It’s part of who I am. It’s how I want to raise my daughter… maybe I need to just own up and not be so afraid to be a fool in other’s eyes. Maybe I’ve been a fool for hiding it.
A funny thing though: Many of the people at the conference know that I blog. It’s sort of embarrassing but it keeps me on my toes thinking about all the different personalities that will read what I write. So it sort of amused me when I was picking up my free muffins for breakfast that a girl standing nearby whispered to her friend that she wondered how much of this conference would end up on blogspot.com. I don’t blog at blogspot.com and I wasn’t really going to blog about the conference at all. It’s part of my mixed-up private life that I don’t want to discuss with five hundred of my closest imaginary friends. But when she said that, I had to write something. If only just to smile and say, I heard you.
Also? Baby Bug enjoyed it thoroughly. I can’t say the same about her first experience with hot rollers though.
p.s. top photo taken by Bug
