Volunteering

I'm way behind in my blogging again; I apologize.

So I am really loving this volunteering at Texas Children's Hospital. The way it works is every week once I clock in I go to the patient board. On the board there are slips of paper for children that need visitors. You are supposed to pick a few, pack a bag of stuff to play with, and then go see if they are in need of a visitor at that time. I tend to usually pick all the babies first, then kids under the age of 5. I just love the little ones! Every week I have gone so far, I have spent my evening holding a number of babies, then playing with another child. This week however, was different.

This week when I went I checked the board and took all the babies as usual. Plus, I took the slip for a little boy I have played with every week since I started. I started on the highest floor and made my way down. Every last one of those babies was sleeping! I kid you not! My last stop was to see the little boy, but he was sleeping too. Seeing as how I had no patients to visit, and a lot of time to kill, I figured I'd just ask a nurse if she knew of anyone else who might like a visitor at that time. She directed me to the room of a 13 year old boy. Normally I wouldn't pick a kid that age to visit, I don't know what to say to them! But, I had just asked her who needed a visit, so how could I back out? So I poked my head in and asked how he was doing. He immediately told me to come in because he was so bored by himself. I ended up staying in there playing star wars video games with him for an hour. He was so much fun! When I left he was so grateful that I had hung out with him for awhile. He was all smiles and must have said thank you like 20 times.

With the little ones you know they have fun, but they can't really express gratitude like someone older can. It made me feel really good. Next week, I think I'll pick some more older kids to go visit ... along with some babies of course, how can I give up that?!? hehe