Cheerios are made to play with, right?

I was on Facebook this morning and saw this funny idea where a dad put Cheerios on his sleeping baby in a tower formation. 

So I thought, why not try this out with preschool when we are awake? 

It didn't turn out too well...the kids got irritated with how easily the Cheerios fell. Instead, I decided to let the kids cover a child in Cheerios?  

Each kid grabbed a limb to cover in Cheerios. The youngest didn't understand to put them in a like so they were scattrered on his leg. 

The fact the kid out Cheerios down to his fingers was funny. 

They decided to even cover his chest and stomach with cheerios, they started with his neck. If only you could see the face of the child being covered with cheerios. It was priceless!

It was also the last day we would be doing preschool before our summer groups came and would have to use the room as sleeping quarters. So! We had a time of cleaning the room, pushing furniture to the back of the room, and mopping. The kids each got a rag soaked with water and soap and the kids mopped the floor in any way they wanted. They had a blast!

Bring on these summer groups! Can't wait to see what amazing things happen here. 

I Challenge You to a Sword Fight

Sometimes, I have to let go of my love for order and let the kids go a little crazy. 

Today happened to be that day. 

For some reason, my classroom has a lot of pool noodles cut in half. The kids grabbed them and started to sword fight in the classroom. When more than 2 kids joined, I took them outside. Boy, did they have a blast. 

The kids ganged up on eachother, on me and my teen helper, and we even attacked the house parent that was going to the giant 15 passenger van. When we attacked the house parent, he grabbed our extra noodles and started fighting us around the parking lot (no worries, we are the only one using it, and we watch carefully when we are doing activities in the parking lot).  The kids lost :p

I love these kids that challenge me to better myself and my love for order. 

Hospitals....are no fun.

This is about as personal as I can ever get on a public surface.

Today, my boyfriend was taken to the ER. I won't go into details on what happened or what will happen. He is okay though!

However, the minute I heard that he was in the hospital, I couldn't keep myself from freaking out. Tears constantly at the surface threatening to spill over at the slightest thought. It was not only because of his hospitalization...

Three and a half years ago, the last time I had visited a hospital for something negative, my mom was miscarrying my sister, Zoe. Matter of fact, both times I have ever been in a hospital for negative reasons, my mom miscarried a baby. (She only has miscarried two).  When we were heading for the hospital after my mom miscarried Zoe, my dad practically had to drag me out of the house kicking and screaming because I didn't want to relive the experience I had as a 5 year old. But I did it, and I wouldn't ever trade the opportunity to hold my 18 week old sister with her little fingers and toes....her body that was as big as my hand.

With both horrible hospital visits, I was beyond scared to go see my boyfriend. I couldn't help visualize those two times with my mom...what if something horrible would happen to my boyfriend while being at the hospital? But then that's what made me go. What if something happened that took him from me, and I never went to see him? I would have hated myself.

This is probably a very rambling post. But I hope it helps you. I hope it helps you face your fears. I hope it helps you face your negativity. Be there for those you love.  I promise you, you won't regret it.

Lizards, and Snakes, Oh My!

I have a friend who owns a ton of reptiles....4 snakes, a bearded dragon, and also has 24 rats! She breeds her own rats as food for the snakes but also keeps some as pets.

Today, Laura (the owner of the pets) and Hannah came out to Naomi House today to share the snakes and bearded dragon with us. The kids were SO EXCITED!

This child was so nervous to touch the bearded dragon. The second she touched it, she jumped but realized that she liked the poky skin. 

Our youngest tater tot was in love with the snakes. She won't even go near a goat, but would pet the snake as long as she was allowed. She kept petting Dante the corn snakes scales with such happiness. 

The youngest one also loved petting Thresh. The second Laura pulled him out of the pillow case, the kids were in awe. One of the kids even yelled 'Holy Moly Bologna' which made us all laugh. She also has a rainbow boa that is not pictured that the kids thought were so pretty. 

Even the teenagers enjoyed seeing the animals. 

Lastly, Laura brought out a snake skin that her pregnant snake had shed. She let the kids tear off a piece to keep. They wore them as bracelets until it broke. 

Laura was also beyond gracious to answer all the questions the kids had (and there was a lot). She knew so much, and the kids learned a lot from today. 

Let's Trace Ourselves!

I have learned that children love tracing themselves and drawing what they look like, no matter the age. I'm 22 and still enjoy it haha. So for today, we traced ourselves on huge paper and colored it!

This kiddo colored himself red. I can't get over how cute he drew his face. When he saw it hanging up, his face lit up with excitement and he started petting his creation. 

When this little one was coloring himself, he decided to color his shirt. He actually made it look like Batman! (see below picture)

See! How cute is his Batman. It's a Lego Batman. It even has the claw hands. And a Batman symbol. 

On a random side note, she wrapped herself in a nap may and thought it was hilarious. She walked like a penguin 😄

And this little one. She hugged the picture of herself. 

As I have said a ton of times, I can't get over how cute these kids are. 

Preschool Play!

Let me tell you....this morning, I was really stressed trying to think of how I was going to manage kids ages 1-6 in a classroom designed for young children. Somehow, I managed with the awesome help of one of our preteens. 

My helper of the day took it upon herself to make an awesome enclosure to our ballpit so the balls did not go all over the room. I think we have a future engineer on our hands!

The little girl had fallen and hurt herself. The boy came to her and started telling her a story from the book to help her calm down. How sweet! 

We had a long music session! All the kids joined in on the percussion instruments and danced away. Talk about cute!

Our youngest tater tot played for the longest time on the piano. He would start dancing while playing. Every time I went to get a video, he quit. But oh man was it cute!!!

Tambourines are truly meant for hats, right?

We found some alphabet magnets and used it to play with! This crazy smart kid was able to tell me what the letters were and their sound when putting it on the board. 

My helper decided to play basketball with the ball pit and it's container. I love their creativity!

Volunteer Groups

Groups are such a blessing!

They entertain kids with games and activities such as crafts and nail polish and doing hair. They fix things up around our property such as weeding the crazy amount of weeds that grow, or fixing appliances and building cabinets. Don't even get me started on all the yummy food they make for us! You name it, and groups will do their best to help.

In these pictures, a group member had taught our kids to lasso. Several of the kids absolutely loved it and started to lasso toys and dragged things around, thinking it was the coolest thing in the world.

But as mentioned before, groups that come to Naomi House as a mission team are amazing and help us do things we normally wouldn't be able to do! Praise God for these people.