YMCA Day 3

I had a new battery in my car and ready to go at 8:15 am on Monday. I was ready to deal with kids for the next three hours. When I arrived to the Y, there was one baby in the nursery but a supervisor was already handling him so I went to the gym. These kids were quite a bit younger than the ones from last week and there were fewer too! I met a girl who was probably my age that had gone to Stuebenville. I haven't been, but I asked her if she knew some people that I know that have gone. She was an experienced babysitter, but seemed kind of shy with the kids. I stood there a minute after talking to the girl and a little girl came up to me with a pacifier in her mouth and looked at me. She took me by the hand to a wall and chose a Dora the Explorer book for me to read to her, next thing I know there are four kids sitting around me and listening. I added some storytelling skills to it and got the kids involved in saying "Swiper, no swiping!" and other well-known phrases. Then, a lady who worked at the YMCA for a while asked if the children wanted to jump rope. She had me take the other end and we played "Snake" and simply tried to jump rope. I didn't see where some of these children would be able to jump rope and they couldn't even walk steady. Snack time was more successful. I joined a few girls that were coloring and they were telling me what they got for Christmas. About ten minutes later, I was called to the nursery. There were three babies, a boy was crying, the girl was quiet, and the other boy was pretty quiet, however, the mother was dressing him up to take him home. The babies that were left were both five months old. The supervisor at that time had me keep the girl distracted while the supervisor changed the boy's diaper. I gave the girl a rattle toy and she loved it. I helped her while she was drinking out her bottle because she couldn't hold it yet. I would hear little burps and spit up sounds and I'd turn her towards me and she had spit running down her onesie. The supervisor said, "She does that." I responded, "Oh, that's nice." The baby began to whine a little , I found that she likes to face people, so I was in an odd position while holding the baby so she could see me. The boy continued to cry... loudly and we couldn't figure out the problem. I was trying to get the girl to sleep, but the boy had problems. The YMCA policy is that we must call a parent if a child cries more than 15 minutes. The mother happened to be in the cardio room and she came down. She figured that the boy was hungry. And that was the exact problem, he was quiet. Two minutes later, the girl starts crying. The supervisor told me that the mother didn't leave any food, which we suspected the problem was and she was there for 2 1/2 hours. Then children from the gym began to come after they ate lunch. Some only contributed to the madness in the room. A boy was arguing with another boy about a toy. The others played with stuffed animals, a Barney guitar, and "kitchen." I was done at noon. I was a little tired, but had more of a headache than anything. It was still fun.