Megan Engelhardt

I spent most of my time this week walking around one room.

It’s our church’s Vacation Bible School week. We are often out of town during VBS. This year our schedule changed and we were able to be home, so I volunteered to help with the Bible lessons.

I’ve been helping with VBS since I aged out of attending, so probably – 12? My sister and I did Bible stories together, and I also ended up helping with the skits at the beginning of every session.

I don’t know how much you know about VBS skits, but I tell you this, lovingly – they are bad. They are always bad. But sort of endearingly bad.

This chicken is one of the brightest stars in the skit this year, second only to the teen who is a tumbleweed who gets standing ovations every day.

My kids helped me decorate our room. They art better than I do. K4 made this very nice panorama of a desert.

K2 decided we needed a mascot and made a bird skeleton with a cowboy hat and a sheriff’s badge. His name is Jeff.

He has a sidekick who is a snake. His name is Jeff II.

(K2 approached just now and said “What do you mean sidekick? Jeff II is his friend. He’s also the deputy.”)

There is also a cactus.

This child is clearly mine.

I made these cardboard doors. Functional and not great, which is about par for the course for my art skills. The crosses and fish are for identification purposes. There are lots of groups of kids, so each group gets a color and a symbol. There are multiple rooms for Bible stories, for crafts, etc. Our doors are marked with the groups that are supposed to be with us. I’ve been enjoying the company of Orange Fishes, Yellow Fishes, Red Fishes, Blue Fishes, Red Crosses, Blue Crosses, Yellow Crosses, and Orange Crosses.

I’m very glad I decided to volunteer. I’m tired, and the first few days were *hot* in that room since the eastern US had a lengthy heatwave. I continue to not be able to make meaningful connections with “typical” church ladies for a variety of reasons. But I have been making good connections with the kids. I have remembered that I while I am not good at, say, people in general, I am very good at talking in front of groups. I’m getting lots of steps in daily. And I’m gaining a reappreciation for plain PB&J sandwiches.

(The church provides the volunteers with snacks during our break time. Ours is at the end of the day, so I’ve been snagging a half of a PB&J after we’re done with kids and let me tell you, there’s something about a nonfancy sandwich that really hits the spot sometimes.)

The thing I’m enjoying most from this week, though, is refinding joy that has been missing for a time. It was a long, rough winter. There have been a lot of things weighing on my mind in a lot of different areas. This week, for three hours every morning, I let myself forget about all of that and sing some banger VBS songs, tell some good stories, act a little goofy, and collect additional children (three of my son’s friends called me “Mother” today).

(Here’s K3 also proving that he’s my child by pretending to get hit by the prop train.)