Last night I went and helped out in AWANA at the church we’ve been going to here in Columbia. I initially volunteered by talking to the children’s directory but after I did, I almost regretted doing so. Working with the children every week for 1 1/2 hr can be quite rewarding but very tiring, especially after spending all of your other hours with a toddler. Yesterday I actually was looking forward to it though. It was a bit odd at first. Game time was first and as I was standing behind the children on their game line, it was almost surreal. I barely knew only 2 people in the entire gym and the rest of the people were not even familiar faces. I wondered why I was even there. When we got to handbook time and I started working with the children one on one, I remembered what it felt like to work with 8 or 9 year old little girls that adore you. There is something special about that age with girls. They are so willing to please and everything you do is closely watched. They are easy to love. The teacher I am helping out is in our Sunday School class. She is due in a few months and I am helping to take her place. I’ve liked her ever since we started going and I can tell we have the same style of handling the children. Very sweet, but expects a lot out of them. I really liked council time. The guy doing it was very animated and just the fact that I never have to teach it was even better. At the end of the night the other leaders asked how I liked it. I told them how odd it was to go from knowing everyone and their cousin to knowing absolutely no one. It was good to hear that they knew no one when they started either. I guess I figured everyone else knew everyone else. I think this will be really good for me. I’ll feel like I’m more a part of the church like we used to be, I’m doing something that has a good purpose and I get a break every Wednesday night!
Emma has been very clingy lately. She has definitely not been napping well and I think it’s because she doesn’t want me to leave her. She’ll be sound asleep and when I put her down, she is grabbing hold of me like there’s no tomorrow and screaming. It took 3 times for me to put her down/calm her before I could leave her in her crib for a nap today and then she only napped for 30 minutes. Tonight, she was obviously tired so I rocked her for a few minutes and then laid her down. She cried of course but I am trying to start being a little more strict at night. Three nights in a row I’ve let her cry it out after rocking her some. Last night she didn’t cry for more than 30 seconds. Tonight she held out for about 5 minutes. Not bad really.