Ah, Primary

The last two weeks have been rocky.  I have these two little boys - each is a handful, but manageable if only one is there.  Together, they really stretch my patience.  On top of both boys being there (which I assume will be the norm now that summer vacations are over), we have had "active" sharing times.  I know, I complained previously about sharing times that are above their heads, and thus boring, because it is hard to keep them still and quiet.  This is the opposite end of the continuum; they get so wound up they are bouncing off the walls before we get to the classroom.  We actually had a shoving fight, because the member of the presidency doing sharing time handed the box of crayons directly to one of the girls in my class, who happens to be very territorial.  She thus concluded that she was "in charge," and insisted the other children should ask her for a crayon and wait for her to get it out of the box and hand it to them.  She might have actually succeeded in controlling the crayons, too, except she was busy coloring her own picture and so thought they should wait for a crayon till she was ready to entertain their request.  Meanwhile, the counselor (who just got called and is also new to the ward) is looking at me like she can't believe I have this little control over the tiny monsters.  (We do have a long way to go, but the others keep telling me they are improving so much and not to give up  - but then again, maybe they are just thrilled to have found a sucker who will stick it out?)

One of the little boys is a notoriously fast colorer.  I compensate in our actual class by either having the foamy stickers for them once they finish coloring (they could do those for hours), or bringing a set of lacing cards they can play with (which they also could do for hours).  But I guess they thought in sharing time that no one would have time to finish.  Well, this child tends to select one color and cover the entire page with it in about 30 seconds.  And when he finished, he decided to entertain himself by throwing his flip-flops in the air.  Which shouldn't be acceptable anyway, I know - but I could have probably ignored it at that point if he were better at catching them on the way down.  He wasn't, which meant they were hitting other kids in the head.  So after "NO" didn't work once, I caught the next one he threw up and just held it.  Predictably, the next one was aimed at me - which I also caught and held.  Predictably, this precipitated a temper tantrum.  I was trying to get him to be quiet and look at me for one of those "You can have them back if you promise not to throw them anymore; if you throw them again, you won't get them back" speeches.  Only he won't calm down anywhere close enough to listen, and somewhere in the midst of gathering him, his flip-flops, and myself to take this whole show out in the hall, he absolutely nailed me in the nose with his head.  Fortunately, not broken (I'm pretty sure, anyway), just a little swollen and painful to blow or wear my glasses.  Anyway, there I am with my eyes watering and nose running and seeing stars, and he turns around and looks at me all accusingly and announces "You hurt my head!"

We finally made it to class, which was very out-of-control, but at least at that point I can decide to abort whatever isn't working and change tracks.  We actually spent some time washing the room with wet wipes - which had nothing to do with the lesson, but they found highly entertaining.  I might have been more up to the challenge if my nose weren't still smarting!

So we get to the end of class.  I'm feeling quite woebegone and failure-like, and our little room looks like a tornado has hit it.  I just want their parents to come take them away so I can clean up in peace and go home for some tylenol and a nap.  And you know how something always seems to happen to make you keep going, just when you're about ready to quit?  Last week the lesson was on tithing, and we made special little envelopes to hold our money until we got to church.  When she came to pick him up, the mother of my biggest monster told me that he got some money this week and just had to find his special envelope to put it in for his tithing.  So apparently something is sinking in somewhere along the way.

Of course, being a little monster, it turns out he actually threw a total tantrum about it, because he's not very articulate even when he's not upset, and his mother had no idea what he was talking about for the longest time.  :)

(I should add for the record, that I'm really rather fond of all my kids - I would just strongly prefer some of them in a setting other than primary!)