Learning Life at TLC!

Life goes by fast at TLC when you are surrounded by love laughter and happiness. It is definitely not the easiest thing to do with the long work hours and short breaks but it is well worth it to see these children being so loved and taken care off with huge smiles on there faces. My first month at TLC was crazy from being told I was getting training for the first two days of me arriving to jumping straight into TLC life the following morning at 6am.
I got a early wake up when the other volunteers knocked on more door at 5:30 in the morning explaining to me that the training wasn't happening and that I was incharge of 6 grubs who where from the age of 7 months to a year for the morning routine. This routine included waking up, bottles, baby cereal, bathing and change time then finally putting them all back into there beds for a nap.
This would have been easy however they missed one important piece of information - I was alone!
The crazy thing was I had only met these children the evening before so I barely even knew there names... and I was now incharge of them all.
It was all going peacefully until I realised the bathroom where the baths where was nowhere near the grubs room! Carrying 6 babies into a bathroom bathing then changing them can be a bit hectic when your all alone and you can't leave them in two different rooms at once.
Luckily my dad came to help out towards the end of my shift with the grubs then helped out for the rest of that week as TLC was short of volunteers. We would start at 6am have a couple hours break if we we're lucky then work past 7pm as 7pm was our finishing time but we wait till all the babies and children in our group are asleep to help nightshift out whilst they complete wishy washy.
Wishy washy is different for nightshift to day shift as you have to try to complete more tasks:
cleaning the bobbit
sweeping and mopping floors
washing drying and folding laundry
washing up and sterilising bottles, teats and cutlery
changing sterilization buckets
making sure kitchen is tidy
cleaning out fridge
bins including the nappy bin and slop bucket for pigs

-All whilst babies are waking up and screaming
The nesties need feeding every  3-4 hours
If a baby wakes up they need rocking back to sleep
and bottles and breakfast need to be made for the following morning.

Once I got to know all the babies Names, Likes and Dislikes I was then able to complete nightshift. This is where you get to learn the different babies cries so you can run to them quickly with the correct milk bottle or dummy. It was a serious learning curve when you know what they love and hate it makes life a whole lot easier.
Life at TLC can alternate between being the most peaceful place to the craziest it all depends on your daily schedule. We are given our schedule the night before so that we can prepare ourselves for the following day- The first few weeks I was basically changing between grubs and wishy washy whilst getting to know all the other babies and children ranging in age between a couple of days old to ten years.
It was the best way to get to know everyone at TLC by just jumping straight into life in Johannesburg as I picked up the daily routines quicker and settled in faster :)