The Churchpark

A couple of months ago, when we were in the throes of moving and life transitions, poor Lily Grace was suffering with terrible separation anxiety.  It was never worse than when we were at church.  I don't know what it was about, but Bob and I didn't get to attend a full church service for well into 2 months.  We laughed about it because we seemed to always win the "bad kid lottery."  If you are scratching your heads, its where you're sitting in church and that little number starts flashing at the bottom of the screen.  You could be in the middle of a sermon, but when the lottery flashes you have to get up and go.  Oy, that was Bob and I so many times that I ceased to be embarrassed about it.  I started walking down the aisles with my head held high like, "Yeah, thats my XR6, I win today!"  There was just no two ways around it.  Sadly, church started having a stigma around it and when we would pull in, Lily would start the water works.

So one day after church Bob and I had a parental brainstorming session and my Sales/Marketing/Problem Solving husband came up with a brilliant beyond brilliant idea, the churchpark.  You see, Lily LOVES the park and all its playtime fun.  You say park and her little face just lights up.  So Bob and I took on the greatest rebranding campaign of our short parental lives.  We aggressively started referring to church as the churchpark. "Lily are you ready to go to the churchpark? Oh look, there is the churchpark!  Lily we are gonna go play at the churchpark! Churchpark, CHURCHPARK!"  Call it manipulation, call it smart parenting whatever, but by golly, it has worked.  Since we have moved, we have gone to a new church every Sunday.  Lily cannot wait to go to the churchpark and tells us so non stop.

 We have not won the bad kid lottery once and normally we have to spend our energy convincing her that "no you can't stay at the churchpark all day."  The rebranding has gone so well, that Lily talks about going to the churchpark all week and will go to whichever church with whoever wants to take her and not miss Mommy or Daddy one bit.

Bob says it's his greatest career achievement to date: Rebranding the church.