I quit!

No, not blogging, you’re still stuck with me! My last day at the daycare will be September 1. I am so glad to be done with that, although I am very grateful that God put it in my path when He did. Working just a few hours every day really helped us get some bills paid. But I was getting more and more frustrated with the job. I’m just not cut out to be a preschool teacher! If I were, I guess that would have been my career path in the first place. It’s ironic, I homeschool my own children, but 4 hours with 6-8 toddlers was making me batty! Not to mention illness (I’m home sick today with something I picked up there), it’s almost impossible to ask a parent at the door to take their sick child back home and skip work that day — particularly since most of our parents are single parents. But as soon as one child has a hacking cough and fever, you know it’s going to hit everyone in the room — including you!

Then there’s the time away from my family. I told C I was doing this to help our family, and that the minute it became a detriment to my family I was out of there. The girls hate it there — they’re 6 and 7 (Jasmine will be 8 in December) — it’s just too boring for them. This summer might have been better, since they have a school-age program, but 3 of the 8 kids in that class are completely out-of-control siblings who are rotten to each other, disrespectful to the teacher, and pick on the other kids. Plus there’s the 7yo with the rage disorder. They actually had to physically pick him up and carry him from one room to another b/c they needed to consolidate classes. He was so angry, he knocked a large sand table completely over! My girls know to stay out of his way, and they’re not the types to tease him to distraction, but still they could end up collateral damage. They were also bringing home some mouthiness and general rotten attitudes. Not all of it was “bad influences”, but I think some of it was also just not enough Mom time. Most of my morning is spent getting ready for the afternoon.

Homeschooling has pretty much gone out the window except for those opportunities when we can discuss ideas on the way to work or around the house. Yesterday was the difference between a mirage and oasis (they were a little confused which was real and which wasn’t), and they even learned what a metaphor was (the red room is an oasis of peace in the cacophony of noise at Children’s Outreach).

Anyway, all that bubbled up into this post, which my friend Tammy from church read. She e-mailed me to say that she wasn’t sure what she was going to do with Joey when she went to school in the fall and VOILA! Another gift from God just in the right timing. I’m going to watch her son for her, for considerably less than she’d be paying most places, and I can stay home with my own kids! He and Monkey Boy have already hit it off, MB is asking me everyday when Joey is coming to play. I’ll be making about half what C was paying me — BUT there’s more! The mother of the triplets two houses down from us (also from church) stopped by to drop off a bag of clothes for Pink Pixie and mentioned to Squid that she might be starting a new job and may need someone to watch the girls after school. Nothing’s solid yet, but looks like another answer to prayer.

I know there will be new challenges with more kids in our little house, but I know that we will work them out. For now, I am just counting the days til September, 21 to be exact!