I was in charge of last week’s Daisy Scout meeting, and our topic was, “Make the World a Better Place”.  I must have Googled that phrase along with “Daisy Scout Activities” 100 different ways, and every website suggested we plant something.  Forget that it’s perfect bulb planting weather.  Forget that we have a school surrounded by land and a very flexible administrative staff who would allow us to plant just about anything short of a cactus…who am I kidding?  They’d love a cactus!  Then they’d design some extraordinarily informative unit on Deserts and the kids would make intricate desert dioramas, naming their own deserts while inventing a new cactus species that oozes gold and cures cancer.  But I digress.  I’M NO GARDENER.  I think this point has been established.

Hearing my Father in my head saying, “Sometimes Lori, you’ve got to dig a little deeper”, I decided to take his advice literally for a change.  I bought bulb planters; 20 to be exact, along with many tulip bulbs and 20 pairs of gardening gloves.  Everything was on clearance, so at least that felt natural to me, but when I held up the planter and tried to show a roomful of first graders how it worked, I felt like a big, fat fraud.  I’ve never planted a bulb in my life!

Then, as if Jesus were taking mercy on me, a little girl asked, “Do we get to keep our bulb planter?!”  Well, yes, of course.  I wish you could have heard the collective gasp of excited anticipation of 18 little Daisy Scouts who sounded like they won the lottery.  AND, ANNNNDDD, you get to keep the gardening gloves!  WHAT?!!  ARE YOU SERIOUS?!  THE GLOVES TOO!!!  THIS IS JUST TOO MUCH MRS. SARA’S MOMMY!!

Really?  And we sit around like fools thinking they want toys and a trip to Disney.  These kids want to dig in the dirt.  It’s not rocket science…why do we make it so hard?

I have the proof.  Here are 18 girls, not a single head up, not a single mind wandering.  They put in 70 tulips faster than you can say Trick-or-Treat.  They would have planted twice that amount if I had them.  Will they come up?  If they don’t, it’s not for a lack of trying.  These kids took their task quite seriously.  I’ve heard from several parents that the girls came home, announcing they had gardening to do over the weekend.

I inspired children to plant things.  Good Lord, it must be cold in hell tonight.  Look out-cha windows ladies, because pigs are taking flight.  Parenting can be such a zany trip, can’t it?  I wonder what I’ll get to be next week.  I hope I get to be rich, because I haven’t tried that on for size just yet…