Hey, we have a great idea! For the World's Greatest Backyard, we want to make sure it is easy for people to get their beverage of choice, of course. In addition to the greatest grapevine, we are definitely going to include the hydration station, with lots of flavoured water (a huge hit btw) and then we are going to have the specialty bars, and the beer stations with our great local microbrew from Granville Island Brewing, but what about that lemonade stand? Wouldn't it be great to have some kids?
At this point the event planner / mother in me feels a small start of... was that panic? Maybe as I seem to have stopped breathing. I definitely don't want to have to worry about kids at the largest most pressure filled event for our peers of all time... thinking, thinking... what is the right response... stalled completely by the next question, "What about your kids? They are adorable!". Now, every mother wants to hear exactly those words, your kids are adorable. uh - oh, there is only one thing to say... "let me ask them!" I say brightly!
So I asked them if they might know any kids who would be interested in working at this large, important event, and their hands shot up. OK, I guess we will try this. My daughter was especially keen and asked if she could come and spend the whole day with me setting up. Sure, why not, we can use more volunteers, so she did. The first question, as we loaded into the car at 6am was "So Mom, is there like a main person who is in charge of this event tonight?" Apparently my children, who have traveled to exotic destinations like Quebec City and Beijing with me on programs, have no idea what I do!
Well in the end, it was a fantastic day, and the joy of having a junior volunteer, is when you ask them to do anything, they RUN. Think about this high productivity booster, and how can we harness that? I generally discourage running on-site, but in this case, we had a lot of ground to cover.
At the end of it all, they were adorable, and helpful and it was indeed a pleasure to bring my kids to work... and if you had any lemonade at the MPI WEC10 Welcome Reception, you got to meet them too!
Next time they want to be on the trampoline though!
love the idea : ) Charlotte is only 2 and a half.. but for sure she will help me later.
ReplyDeleteVero Hébert from Quebec City