Help!

The two youngest girls, KitKat and Sunshine, have been throwing some hard questions at me lately. On Saturday, while we were at the lake, Sunshine walked to the end of the dock and hopped on the Sea-Doo without her life-jacket on! When one of the adults said something to her, she immediately jumped off the Sea-Doo and ran to put on her life-jacket. It was obvious that she had forgotten. However, I still felt like I needed to punish her if for no other reason than to make an impression on her so that she would never forget again. I also went into a little more detail than I wanted to about what could have happened had she fallen into the lake. I knew I was entering dangerous territory, but it scared me that she was out there without her life-jacket, and I really wanted to scare her. So I explained to her that if she had fallen in, she would have gone to the bottom of the lake and Mommy and Daddy would not have been able to see her and she would "drown." She asked, "What's drown mean?" I said, "Well, you die." She asked, "If I die, will I go to Heaven?" I replied, "Yes, you will go to Heaven." She tilted her head to the side and looked me in the eye and asked, "So... Heaven is at the bottom of the lake?" It is so hard to explain some of those concepts that seem so simple yet are very complicated to explain. Case and point: Example #2:

KitKat found a little tree frog while we were at the lake. She found some bugs and dirt and put them in the bug house with her frog. Froggy came home with us and she cleaned out its house and gave it fresh water. She was so responsible with the frog that I complimented her several times. Yesterday afternoon, she said, "I'm going to go on the porch and play with my froggy." About an hour later she came back in and said, "I had to bury my frog in the dirt. I wanted him to smell good so I sprayed him with that spray and he quit breathing. So I buried him in the dirt. But he'll go to Heaven." I didn't get into the whole "Frogs don't have souls" debate with my five year old, so I just let it go. (But I did, however, investigate the "spray" a little further. It was American Girl Apple Blossom Body Splash. Poor froggy.) Well this morning, she played outside for a while then came back in and said, "Guess what! I dug up my frog and he was still there. So he didn't go to Heaven." I still didn't want tot debate with her about frogs not having souls, but I did explain that when you die, your body stays in the ground and your soul goes to Heaven. She walked away without a word. I wondered what she was thinking.

Speaking of thinking, that reminded me of one more story. A few weeks ago, KK asked me, "Why does God make bumble bees?" I explained to her in a very simple way (because I hardly know myself!) that bumble bees help make the flowers grow. She sat there for a second and then said, "God sure is a good thinker." Yes he is!

So I'll leave you with two more stories that I received in an e-mail from my dad yesterday.


A Kindergarten teacher was observing her classroom of children while they were drawing. She would occasionally walk around to see each child's work. As she got to one little girl who was working diligently, she asked what the drawing was. The girl replied, 'I'm drawing God.' The teacher paused and said, 'But no one knows what God looks like.' Without missing a beat, or looking up from her drawing, the girl replied, 'They will in a minute.'


A little girl was talking to her teacher about whales.The teacher said it was physically impossible for a whale to swallow a human because even though it was a very large mammal its throat was very small. The little girl stated that Jonah was swallowed by a whale.. Irritated, the teacher reiterated that a whale could not swallow a human; it was physically impossible. The little girl said, 'When I get to heaven I will ask Jonah'. The teacher asked, 'What if Jonah went to hell?' The little girl replied, 'Then you ask him'...

Have a great week!