(It’s guest post Friday! Here’s one from Shelle Lenssen- a wife, mom, and full-time laboratory geek. She writes a family blog, Lenssen Acres Almana, covering humor, parenting, faith, DIY, home improvement, gardening, hunting, etc. If you want to write a guest post for SCL, here’s how!)
The 5 Kinds of Church Nursery Volunteers. – By Shelle Lenssen
As a parent of a loud and energetic two-year old daughter, I am so grateful to have a clean, safe, well-staffed place to take her on Sunday mornings while my husband and I enjoy the church service. (Okay, so I dunno who I’m kidding; we’d appreciate a not-too-scary looking cell supervised by anyone other than the flying monkeys from Wizard of Oz, as long as it meant an hour and a half of toddler-free time.) Since she’s been attending church nursery faithfully her whole life, we’ve gotten to know our friendly nursery volunteers pretty well, and they seem to fall in these five groups:
1. Parent volunteers who are there solely out of a sense of obligation.
Hey, I’m not picking on you. This category is listed first because I firmly fall here too. Sigh, you know how it happens. You take your baby down to nursery for a few months, blissfully enjoying a sermon without having to run out to deal with spit-up or an emergency diaper blowout, then one Sunday the nursery greeter casually asks if you’d ever consider volunteering as a nursery worker. You sign your name, fill out the background-check form, and take the necessary training. You dutifully show up when scheduled, but we all know you wouldn’t say you were “called to this mission field.” The nursery greeter called us in this particular instance, not God.
2. Grandmothers.
I love my own grandmothers very much, and I really, really love grandmas who volunteer in the church nursery. They are happy to sit and rock a crying baby or patiently read Bible stories to an easily-distracted group of toddlers. The craziness and chaos of a room full of littles doesn’t seem to faze these battle-hardened child veterans who, despite being bitten and vomited upon, lovingly refer to each child as “precious lamb” or “sweet angel.”
3. The newlywed couple.
They’re adorable. Freshly married and still glowing, they use their hour-and-a-half church nursery shift to determine if they’re ready to have a baby. They figure if they can work together to take care of someone else’s kids, taking care of their own should be no problem, right? Newlywed nursery volunteers beware: My daughter is always on her very best behavior for you. It’s as if she knows the continuation of her species is dependent on her actions. She’ll smile bigger, laugh easier, sing more adorably, and hug you tighter than anyone else. Because she knows, oh yes, she knows what you’re contemplating and she’ll do everything she can to convince you having your own 24:7 child will be just as delightful as watching mine for 90 minutes on Sunday morning.
4. Enthusiastic high school or college girl.
You know this girl. She’s an education or early childhood development major (or will be), and she just has a way with kids. She doesn’t mind being turned into a human jungle-gym and children randomly run up to hug her. She takes the Bible songs DVD home to learn all the words and practice the hand motions and enthusiastically sings and dances with the kids during her shift. She’s happy to fill in for you when you need to miss your scheduled nursery time and will sometimes pop in just to see if more help is needed. She is universally loved and appreciated. She also makes a great babysitter, so get her contact info as soon as possible so you and your spouse can plan a date night.
5. The Pastor’s Wife.
This should be a given, really. If the pastor’s wife isn’t already the church nursery coordinator, she is one of the most scheduled volunteers. I think it’s part of the unofficial job description that any pastor’s wife (senior, assistant, music, youth, it doesn’t matter, none are immune) must spend a minimum number of hours per year in the church nursery. When nursery attendance unexpectedly spikes one week, or there is a mass nursery-wide meltdown, all volunteers inherently understand they must grab hold of the nearest pastor’s wife and trust her to guide the nursery ship through these rough waters.
Those are the five categories I know.
What types of volunteers work in your church’s nursery? Have you ever volunteered in the nursery?
