Sacrificial Hospitality: Week 3 RESULTS

Well, unfortunately (ha, ha!), our weather was just too beautiful this past week! I did not have a cold or rainy day available to me to complete my Week 3 Challenge. But I didn't let that stop me! Unloading several children is never easy, rain or shine.

I had to run some errands in town this morning anyway, so it was the perfect opportunity to swing by the school for morning drop-off! My first errand (delivering a few bags of clothes to Goodwill) couldn't be completed until 9 am when they opened anyhow, so meeting the mommies in the parking lot at 8:30 worked out just fine for me.

First of all, let me just say that this ended up feeling like the most self-indulgent "sacrificial act" I've done yet. Don't get me wrong- I still like the idea and think it's an important way to help! But, the simple fact is, I know a lot of these parents and they hadn't seen me in awhile so, in reality, it turned into a gab fest and a whole lot of gushing about my baby arriving June.

Because, while I was definitely enjoying the conversation and attention, it didn't really feel like hospitality-- I worked hard to seek out parents I did NOT know. I found three different families (two mommies, one daddy) who had other children they were trying to juggle while gathering their preschoolers.



And you know what?

They were THRILLED. Absolutely amazed at how much easier it was to only shepherd the one child inside (although, ironically, none of us realized it was easy when we only HAD one child!). In fact, the dad I helped had this to say-

"We should form a volunteer co-op! I could definitely stop by Monday mornings because that would work with my work schedule. We could make a schedule and wouldn't that make it so easy for everyone?"

Now, the thing is, I live 17 miles from town so I can't really commit to being on a regular volunteer schedule. However, I do know I will be happy to stop by the preschool and volunteer a few minutes of "watching kiddos" whenever I have errands to run. If I hadn't been chatting so much (oops!), the whole gig took less than 15 minutes. I can certainly fit that into my day! And I will tell you this... the very fact that my actions may have started some wheels spinning and may ultimately result in a simpler morning routine for several families makes me very, very happy.
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How about in your neck of the woods? Did you find a way to make an everyday errand simpler for someone? I'd love to hear about it.

Be sure to stop by later today to find out what my Week 4 Challenge will be!

To read about why I'm doing all this, please see this post.