Acting your age - but staying a fun person.

Now. We hear this a lot from our parents. My parents used to tell me to ‘act my age’ all the time. I hated it. This was before I became 18. But once I did, my parents seemed to know that I can switch between acting ‘grown up’ to being childish.

 Now, I never want to fully grow up. I love loving life and playing with children and joking around. But thanks to someone who used to work in my youth group. I saw that you can balance it. And be a fun, crazy fangirl. And also act like a ‘grown up.’

 I work with kids and my youth group. So, I am pretty much always around children and teenagers. I love it! But, you do need to find that balance between. Acting grown up and being crazy.

My personality is this.

Crazy, love to laugh, will do stupid things just so people will laugh, outgoing, introverted (depends what is going on), caring, emotional, hopefully a good sense of humor….

 So yeah! I love to laugh. I get it from my parents and my uncle Robert. (Who is the strangest person in the world…. )

 But, I work and have school. And working with kids, they need to know that they have a grownup who can care for them. So, it is hard to find a balance at first. And with babysitting. The parents need to know that you can handle what happens. BUT, you need to be the type of sitter who the kids want to come back and play with them.

One little girl I babysit for is an only child. So when I sit for her… oh gosh. One day we played ‘tornado’ we made a tent in the living room with chairs and got sleeping bags. We got in the sleeping bags and when she yelled ‘tornado!’ I grabbed a side of bag and we shook ourselves like the tornado was shaking us.  Then after we got tired of that game (And our hair was sticking up everywhere) we went to her room to play ‘swimming pool’ on her bed. We got on her bed and ‘swam around’ on our bellies. I love this child!

The mom is awesome! I will tell her about the games and she is like. “Yeah… We play that often”

 (As you will see… My kids will be spoken about a lot.)

 But you need to find that balance of being ‘out of control’ and ‘Grown up’. Be fun! Oh my gosh my friends and I…. We get crazy. But I am comfortable around them. Because I know if something should happen. They can handle it. If something happened and I got hit by a car. I know they would do the right thing and call 9-1-1 and keep me safe until they arrive.

 So… search your heart. And start thinking about how you act around other people. I may not matter too much now. But it will once you get a job and start working.

~Emily.