lunch buddy

One of the organizations my team volunteers for is A Child's Place. They work to erase the impact of homelessness on children and their education. They provide snack bags, tutors, uniforms, hygiene and anything else that may help the child have more of a normal school experience. I volunteer with them throughout the week as a lunch buddy. My lil lunch buddys name is Queen and she is the sweetest lil 1st grader you will ever meet. She loves, pineapple, doritos, ice cream cake, reading, art and the class bunny. She doesn't like green beans, ants, white milk or math. She's very quiet and a bit shy but she is starting to get more chatty as each week goes by. I try to get there early so I can hang out in the classroom for a little while before lunch. She has an amazing teacher who is creative and really loves the kids. I wish I would have had him for a teacher! Last week we stayed in the classroom and had lunch while reading books and talking. I kinda liked that better than sitting in the cafeteria because there are always a million kids trying to compete for my attention and it's a bit more difficult to talk to Queen.

Today we had some really wonderful chats. She asked me if we were friends and I told her of course we were! She told me that we should promise each other that we will be friends so we shook on it and did this fun lil hand clap diddy to confirm our friendship-it was the cutest thing! I was wearing a necklace today that was made by kids in India and I bought it from a friend who is trying to raise money for an orphanage there and Queen kept talking about how much she liked it so before I left I gave her the necklace. She got the biggest smile on her cute lil face and then reached out and hugged me so tight. She told me that she would wear it all the time so she could remember me being her friend and eating lunch with her. I love this little girl.