Our church is Gilcomston South in Aberdeen, Scotland.

Sunday was a funny one at our church. As usual, Luke felt horribly betrayed as we left him in creche. Rebekah, on the other hand, was in rare form and was quite excited about Sunday School, which involved going upstairs from the creche with all the children too big for creche but not big enough to sit thru church. So, they go upstairs, meet with the pastor (who Rebes refers to as “that guy that teaches in our church) for a pre-talk, then follow him down and into the sanctuary for the children’s address. This has always been interesting- Dominic (our pastor) has a great British accent and is proud of being a Yorkshireman, working in that reference any possible time. Rebekah was doe-eyed her first time in big church and was delighted upon spotting Mommy and Daddy in the balcony, waving madly to us every 3 seconds. Now she is accustomed to the procedure, and we get a sweet smile and wave, but not much more attention. We are quite certain children’s church will never be the same after Rebekah figures out that raising her hand gets her the microphone. That day has not come yet (just saying it makes me feel nervous).

Anyway, recently Lily has joined the ranks of too-big-for-creche and those 2 little towheads are starting to wreak havoc on our sweet, formal congregation. This past Sunday, I was literally behind a column during our worship time, so I couldn’t see the front well. I’m not sure if I saw Josh’s face of astonishment, felt his elbow in my side, or saw Lilly’s dad bolting down from the balcony first- whichever it was, or more probably the combination of the those 3 events, made me peer around the column to see my daughter and her pal lifting their hands and dancing all over the stage! NO ONE raises their hands here, much less participates in interpretive dancing. Yikes. So, with 4 “excuse me’s” to get out of my aisle, I hustled to the front and practically dived to catch both girls, now aware of imminent danger and thus fleeing in opposite directions. With cat-like reflexes, I did wrangle them up and shoo them out the side door, as I fleetingly caught several snickers and saw “that guy that teaches at our church” getting a good chuckle. Not wanting to make the girls think that church (and therefore God) are not joyful places, I simply told them that dancing on-stage was distracting from the serious worship song. Not too surprisingly, the girls were not brought back out with the rest of the children for the baptism at the close of worship. Go figure.

(in the comments, my friend, RO, added how well I re-entered the front of the church.  I didn’t even think about it, to tell you the truth.  I was ushering them out the door on the stage back to the creche at the same time that the children were dismissed.  So, I just got them in line and turned around to sit back down.  I didn’t make eye contact with anyone, I can tell you that.  And, I was wearing one of my favorite skirts and pair of boots, so at least I was maybe fashion forward during my shameful walk back to my chair….?)

On a funny side note, the church creche was kind of crazy. Kate asked if it was due to extra children. Without flinching, Marjorie, the pastor’s wife, said, “Oh, no. It was all the crazy kids of the American post-grads.” What my charismatic girl and screaming son weren’t what you expected when you signed up for duty? Um, sorry?