Family Home Evening Deluxe

Around General Conference time in April, Dave and I decided Jessica was ready to join us for little scripture lessons on Monday Family Home Evenings. She loved singing "Do As I'm Doing" and "Popcorn Popping on the Apricot Tree", and listened as we read from the Illustrated Scripture story books. Besides identifying "Jesus!", it seemed she liked being with us, but she didn't seem to remember anything we read.

But one day the thought came to me: "It's not fair to my family to spend lots of energy planning creative activities for other church members, or designing fun teaching strategies months in advance for my piano students, yet throw something last minute together for my kids' spiritual education." So I started planning some fun family time. Starting with this gem from my childhood, which I've been playing at the start of our F.H.E.: "Hey Everybody It's Family Night"

Hey Everybody it's Family Night

We'd better take the phone off the hook

Hey Everybody it's Family Night

I've already got the family night book

Hey Everybody it's Family Night

Don't anybody go away

C'mon Everybody to Family Night

I've been waiting for this all day

Hey Everybody it's Family Night

I washed my face as good as new

Hey Everybody it's Family Night

I have a special part to do

Hey Everybody it's Family Night

There's a treat as yummy as can be

C'mon Everybody to Family Night

If you hurry you can sit by me! 

Week 1
Dave was out of town at "man camp" (rafting with his brothers & Dad in Georgia). Jessica and I read the story from our illustrated children's Bible. Then we watched Disney's Fantasia 2000 "Pomp & Circumstance" clip, with Donald Duck as Noah's assistant. We agreed to watch it twice; with the surround sound blaring, I always tear up at the end when Donald and Daisy find each other--and Kathleen Battle hitting those high notes--sniff--and the rainbow----thank you composer Edward Elgar! It was our favorite video of the whole month. Jessica learned how to say "boat! boat!".

Then we both colored a rainbow picture downloaded from our church's kid website: www.lds.org/friend.

As we colored, we half watched/half listened to a cute video "Build an Ark", which you can also print sheet music. ("I can be like Noah, yes I can be prepared...When the rain starts to fall on me, I'll be ready for that day".)

For a treat, we had ate a pile of marshmallows, because we like them, Dave wasn't around to protest.


Week 2
I checked out "Baby Miracle Noah" from the library (which turned out to be an awful Baby Einstein's wannabe). We tried to teach her to say "Noah" with no success-ah.

During the movie we made foam people. I bought a kit with multicultural kid cutouts with stick-on clothes at Micheal's. (It looked faster than cutting out flannel people, which I still want to do eventually.) Dave and I tried to make them look like Bible characters, and Jessica ripped their limbs off.

Then we assembled chocolate rice crispies with rainbow M&Ms. They don't look as perfect as the picture on someone else's blog, but they were good enough for consumption.

Jessica was only interested in chocolate; we couldn't get her to even try a marshmallow rice crispie.

Week 3
This week's video was the real Baby Einstein Noah. I don't know how good it is, since I had a tennis game I couldn't reschedule, and when I came back, the movie was over, Dave was asleep on the couch, and Jessica was playing in her room. (I watched it later; it's mainly "world animals in videos and puppets, interspersed with a few paintings of Noah's animal ark".)

Then I made a quick paper boat taped around our short bathroom hallway. Dave helped Jessica collect pairs of animals, and she learned how to answer the question "How many ducks/lambs/lions?" "Two!" We got dressed in costumes, and put all the animals on the "boat". Then we held up an umbrella, and squirted water on ourselves with a spray bottle and said "It's raining! It's raining!" Jessica was getting claustrophobic, and kept breaking out of the boat. It took me so long to get this picture, we had to cheat out a smile by asking "Show me happy!" (which is how we get all these big cheesy smiles.)

We cut out Jell-o jiggler animals and called it a night.

After Jessica went to bed, we planned our date for our 11th anniversary.


Week 4
I get so excited for Monday night to come! This week we watched "Noah's Ark", a library DVD narrated by James Earl Jones. There's lots of story embellishment, and 30 minutes was a long time for Jessica to hold still.

We were getting close to bedtime now, so we planned to have the treat cook during our activity. We showed Jessica how to assemble banana boats with chocolate chips and marshmallows. Her response was "Eat?" and stuffed the toppings in her mouth. They were pretty good, even if they were not pretty.

Then we painted pictures of rainbows, which Jessica can now say well enough for me to recognize. Dave and I really enjoyed the nostalgia of a Crayola paint box. 

But Jessica wanted mainly rub her page to pieces with a wet brush. Seeing that, we had an 6-second Parent Board meeting; the minutes reading-- Financial CEO: "How about getting one of those paint-with-water books?" Purchasing Manager: "Done."

But I'm learning how exhausting it is! After Dave gets home from work on Mondays, and we eat dinner immediately, and get family night started with a song and prayer. We corral Jessica on our messy craft & treat, and clean up, we're exhausted. I make plans for the adult lesson and activity, but we usually just plop down on the couch and just listen to a religious message online, and try to stay awake.

This week's lesson was an interview of a non-LDS author who wrote about the Book of Genesis.

Week 5

We had little time for family night, and I was ready for an easy night. Jessica taught our Noah lesson this week. I handed her pictures and told her where to put them and what to say. It sounded something like this: "No." "uh." "Boat!" "Two!" "Ren." "Fud." "Renbow." Well said, babe.

 We sang: 

• "Up and Over and Down" (Janeen Brady, about Rainbows)
• "I Like to Look for Rainbows" (Children's Primary Songbook, #103)
• "I Will Build an Ark" (Marianne P. Clark)

We ate Mother's brand circus cookies, (Dave's favorite---with the pink and white frosting and rainbow sprinkles) and put Jessica to bed. Dave and I played Yahtzee, and listened to Elder Bednar's April 2011 Conference talk: The Spirit of Revelation, during which one of us fell asleep. Inspiring and relaxing.

I'm pleased with our fun Family Nights. I haven't decided about next month's theme--Noah was so easy. I'm debating between topics like God made my body, who are the prophets/apostles (before General Conference), the Creation, or sheep (Jesus is the Good Shepherd, Ammon defends sheep, Nativity shepherds). Got any other ideas?