Vacation Bible School Adventures, Day 1

Today was day one of five...

and it wasn't all that bad.

I have fifth-sixth graders, 14 of them. 10 boys, 4 girls. Usually I have more problems controlling the girls than the boys, but praise the Lord for these angelic girls! They were no problem!

The boys, however, were another story.

There was one "problem child" who stirred up trouble amongst the rest of the boys, and I was constantly saying things like "Brian, get off the table." "Brian, please don't paint Nicholas' face." Etc. He was never where he was supposed to be. My class had the most kids today (of course, LOL), and they were the loudest. Jenn, the VBS director, walked around to each class and was amazed at the size/noise level of my kids...so hard to keep them quiet. At least they did respect me when I was talking--after we established the "No talking while Lesa is talking" rule. :)

Thankfully, I had one of my former junior high youth, Chris, (he moved--and is in high school now), and one of my current junior highers (Bella--pronounced Bay-a) in there with me. They were wonderful! Actually, my morning was immediately better when Chris and his sister Erica showed up, because I hadn't seen them in over a year...they were definitely two of my favorite youth! Such awesome kids! They will be here all week. Praise the Lord!

The Bible study, the Japanese language lessons (LOL--I only taught them 5 phrases, but they loved that!), and the craft (with the exception of paint ending up on faces) went really well. The morning flew by!

I'm exhausted, but content. I feel much better about VBS after the first day, which I knew would happen--now that I know how things are done at this church.

Now it's time for more preparation for tomorrow, and hopefully more sleep tonight than last night. :) But you know, it really is worth it. It also is reminding me of why I work with youth! :)