This last Monday we had a really great family home evening. It was one of the simpler ones we have done, and thats ok!!
Wanting to focus on gratitude I told the story of the 10 lepers. I always try to tell the story in my own words so the kids can understand a little better, but I think its really important too to read directly from the scriptures and help the kids understand that too. Skylar was really touched by the story, and couldn't believe only one man went back and said thank you. We talked about how we want to be like the one that told Jesus thank you.
Then I showed them the gratitude jar I had made. I am sure many of you do something similar, I think its a great reminder :) I just took an old formula can, decorated it with scrapbook paper and ribbon, and filled it with strips of paper and a pen. Then we all went around and said something we were grateful for. Now every night at dinner we do the same thing, and so far it really has brought a special spirit of thankfulness and gratitude into our home.
Question:
As I was bearing my testimony to my kids and expressing my love for my family, I got a little emotional :) My daughter asked why I was crying and I told her that is how I feel my Heavenly Father and Jesus talking to my heart. She said she felt like crying too, but she wasn't sad. I explained that she is just like me, that is Heavenly Father and Jesus talking to her heart, telling her the things we learned about were true and expressing his love for her. I believe we can't make our children have spiritual experiences, we can only create the proper environment for them to occur, and when they do help our children recognize them. What are some things you have done to help your children understand feeling the Spirit??
Thursday, November 12, 2009
Pumpkin Family Home Evening
Hey everyone! Was October as crazy for you as it was for me? I can't believe we are already working on being halfway through November! We did a REALLY fun fhe that I wanted to share. It was simple, but made the point and my 4 year old is still talking about it. We did this before Halloween, but if you still have some pumpkins laying around...go for it!!
Lately Skylar has been having a little trouble with lying. I think its pretty normal and part of a stage she's in, but still, I felt like it needed to be addressed and I think fhe is the perfect place for that. So for this one I got two big pumpkins. I cut the tops off of both of them and scooped the guts out of one, and left them in the other. Then I made up a silly story about two pumpkins, Patty and Perry. Both cute pumpkins made some mistakes and told some lies, but Patty said she was sorry and tried very hard to not do that any more. Perry didn't say he was sorry and kept telling more and more lies. I then talked about how Perry felt inside when he kept lying, and how Patty felt when she apologized and didn't lie anymore. Then I had the girls stick their hands into the pumpkins, Perry was yucky and dirty, and Patty was nice and clean. I asked Skylar what she wants her insides to be like, you can guess her answer.
It was really, really fun and a good visual for something I am always trying to explain. You could also definitely use this for repentance or a lot of other things.
Then we topped off the night with homemade pizza shaped like a pumpkin and these fun candy corn desserts. They are just butterscotch pudding, banana cream pudding, with some cool whip on top!!
Lately Skylar has been having a little trouble with lying. I think its pretty normal and part of a stage she's in, but still, I felt like it needed to be addressed and I think fhe is the perfect place for that. So for this one I got two big pumpkins. I cut the tops off of both of them and scooped the guts out of one, and left them in the other. Then I made up a silly story about two pumpkins, Patty and Perry. Both cute pumpkins made some mistakes and told some lies, but Patty said she was sorry and tried very hard to not do that any more. Perry didn't say he was sorry and kept telling more and more lies. I then talked about how Perry felt inside when he kept lying, and how Patty felt when she apologized and didn't lie anymore. Then I had the girls stick their hands into the pumpkins, Perry was yucky and dirty, and Patty was nice and clean. I asked Skylar what she wants her insides to be like, you can guess her answer.
It was really, really fun and a good visual for something I am always trying to explain. You could also definitely use this for repentance or a lot of other things.
Then we topped off the night with homemade pizza shaped like a pumpkin and these fun candy corn desserts. They are just butterscotch pudding, banana cream pudding, with some cool whip on top!!
Sunday, October 4, 2009
I love October!!
October is now coming in a VERY close second to my favorit month, December! I love this time of year for so many reasons, and one of them is all the fun opportunities it gives me to do some fun things with my kids. This year I made a fun little advent calendar to count down until Halloween.
This was made out of a 24-count muffin tin covered with square magnets. I am excited to use this to make our Halloween season a blast! Behind every day we will either have an activity or a little surprise (like stickers, etc) I think we will do an activity every other day, just so I can keep my sanity:) I thought I would post all the activities so you can use them too! I do have to apologize, this will be my longest post EVER! :) We will be starting this on the 8th, since my magnetic calendar only has 24 days on it :)
Make monster mouth snacks and serve peanut butter to dip in (www.familyfun.com)
Ghost footprint craft. You use a 12x12 piece of paper and dip the kids feet in white paint. Then they make a footprint on the paper, the heel is the ghosts face and the toes are the bottom. Super cute!
Adorable pumpkin pie bites! (www.bakerella.com)
Decorate our own witches hats with boas, glitter and anything else!
Make Nutter Butter ghosts
Make glitter pumpkins (www.sistersstuff.blogspot.com)
Make bread bowls shaped like pumpkins and have soup in them for dinner. Check out www.theidearoom.blogspot.com, they look SO cute!!
Make these cute pipe cleaner spiders (www.familyfun.com)
Go to the library and read books about Halloween
Make these simple pumpkins out of rolls of toilet paper and fabric and take them to our neighbors (www.sisterstuff.blogspot.com)
Make mini caramel apples
Such a fun month, right?! These are just the little things we will try to do every other day to really enjoy the season, I hope everyone has a fantastic October!!
This was made out of a 24-count muffin tin covered with square magnets. I am excited to use this to make our Halloween season a blast! Behind every day we will either have an activity or a little surprise (like stickers, etc) I think we will do an activity every other day, just so I can keep my sanity:) I thought I would post all the activities so you can use them too! I do have to apologize, this will be my longest post EVER! :) We will be starting this on the 8th, since my magnetic calendar only has 24 days on it :)
Make monster mouth snacks and serve peanut butter to dip in (www.familyfun.com)
Ghost footprint craft. You use a 12x12 piece of paper and dip the kids feet in white paint. Then they make a footprint on the paper, the heel is the ghosts face and the toes are the bottom. Super cute!
Adorable pumpkin pie bites! (www.bakerella.com)
Decorate our own witches hats with boas, glitter and anything else!
Make Nutter Butter ghosts
Make glitter pumpkins (www.sistersstuff.blogspot.com)
Make bread bowls shaped like pumpkins and have soup in them for dinner. Check out www.theidearoom.blogspot.com, they look SO cute!!
Make these cute pipe cleaner spiders (www.familyfun.com)
Go to the library and read books about Halloween
Make these simple pumpkins out of rolls of toilet paper and fabric and take them to our neighbors (www.sisterstuff.blogspot.com)
Make mini caramel apples
Such a fun month, right?! These are just the little things we will try to do every other day to really enjoy the season, I hope everyone has a fantastic October!!
Wednesday, September 16, 2009
Rainforest Week!
Hello everyone! It's been a while, but we are back! This month at Skylar's preschool they are learning all about the rainforest, and she has been really intigued by it. I thought it would be a great time to do some fun things at home with her, and also a great way to work with my 2 year old on numbers and colors.
One fun thing I thought of doing would be going to the grocery store and picking out some exotic rainforest fruit that we don't normally have like mango, kiwi, papaya, star fruit, etc. Then have a little fruit buffet and talking about which ones we like the most.
Another fun idea I found on Everything Preschool is to make our own rainsticks. I know the kids will not only love making them, but driving me crazy by playing with them nonstop :)
One thing Skylar has loved learning about is frogs. She was full of facts about tree frogs so I thought this next treat would be tons of fun:
Too cute, right? You can thank Familyfun.com for that one! :)
I also wanted to work with my 2 year old, so I colored a bunch of these frogs different colors and then laminated them. We are using them to learn colors and to work on counting (1 pink frog, 2 orange frogs, etc.)
Finally I found this cute craft idea on Familyfun.com. I am using my handy Cricut to cut out a bunch of leaves and flowers, then you just get a long piece of green yarn and sandwhich it between the flowers and leaves to make some fun vines. Then I think we will hang it on the girls door so they can enjoy it for the whole week!
One fun thing I thought of doing would be going to the grocery store and picking out some exotic rainforest fruit that we don't normally have like mango, kiwi, papaya, star fruit, etc. Then have a little fruit buffet and talking about which ones we like the most.
Another fun idea I found on Everything Preschool is to make our own rainsticks. I know the kids will not only love making them, but driving me crazy by playing with them nonstop :)
One thing Skylar has loved learning about is frogs. She was full of facts about tree frogs so I thought this next treat would be tons of fun:
Too cute, right? You can thank Familyfun.com for that one! :)
I also wanted to work with my 2 year old, so I colored a bunch of these frogs different colors and then laminated them. We are using them to learn colors and to work on counting (1 pink frog, 2 orange frogs, etc.)
Finally I found this cute craft idea on Familyfun.com. I am using my handy Cricut to cut out a bunch of leaves and flowers, then you just get a long piece of green yarn and sandwhich it between the flowers and leaves to make some fun vines. Then I think we will hang it on the girls door so they can enjoy it for the whole week!
Wednesday, July 15, 2009
Outer Space Week
I am excited for this one!! Next week we are learning and doing things all about Outer Space. Since my kids are still pretty young, I think we will mostly focus on the moon and stars, but maybe throw in some planets and meteors too :)
At the beginning of the week we are going to make paper mache planets. I am really excited for this since I have never done it before. We will make them on Monday so they have a couple of days to dry before we paint them.
Another craft is too get a paper plate and let the kids glue pasta and dried beans on it. Then once they have dried you cover the plate with aluminum foil and it looks like the moon with lots of craters.
At one point in the week I will be making this for dessert...
You just make a chocolate cake and bake it in a glass bowl. Then you crush oreos in the frosting and at some whole ones to look like the craters.
The activity I am looking forward to the most is this...
You simply make a few different stamps out of potatoes and then stamp away! I got this idea from Family Fun. First you stamp in white paint and then you let it dry and stamp over it with the glow in the dark paint. We are going to make these for the kids on Thursday and then they can wear them when we go to the planetarium later in the week.
Lastly we are going to make meteors to play with out of styrafoam balls. You just cover them with aluminum foil and then attach crepe paper as streamers. Then we can go outside and throw them around! Hope you all have a great week!!
At the beginning of the week we are going to make paper mache planets. I am really excited for this since I have never done it before. We will make them on Monday so they have a couple of days to dry before we paint them.
Another craft is too get a paper plate and let the kids glue pasta and dried beans on it. Then once they have dried you cover the plate with aluminum foil and it looks like the moon with lots of craters.
At one point in the week I will be making this for dessert...
You just make a chocolate cake and bake it in a glass bowl. Then you crush oreos in the frosting and at some whole ones to look like the craters.
The activity I am looking forward to the most is this...
You simply make a few different stamps out of potatoes and then stamp away! I got this idea from Family Fun. First you stamp in white paint and then you let it dry and stamp over it with the glow in the dark paint. We are going to make these for the kids on Thursday and then they can wear them when we go to the planetarium later in the week.
Lastly we are going to make meteors to play with out of styrafoam balls. You just cover them with aluminum foil and then attach crepe paper as streamers. Then we can go outside and throw them around! Hope you all have a great week!!
The Creation FHE
For once I am actually a little bit ahead of things, so here is the fhe we are doing next week!
Since our theme for next week is outer space I thought the Creation would be a great fhe to have. Online I found a really fun idea to help the kids learn what different things Heavenly Father and Jesus created on the different days.
First you print out these letters 1-7. Then I backed them with cardstock and cut them out. Then as you talk about each day you have the kids glue on things that represent that. For instance cotton balls for clouds, pictures of animals, stars and a moon, etc. My kids are really hands-on, so I hope this will help them to remember and understand the beautiful world we live in :)
After we do that I want to quickly talk about how Man was created, and to teach that I will simply get out the playdoh and have the kids use a cookie cutter in the shape of a person. We will talk about how even though we are using the same type of cookie cutter, everyone's person will be different, and that no matter what color, or size we are all children of Heavenly Father!
Since our theme for next week is outer space I thought the Creation would be a great fhe to have. Online I found a really fun idea to help the kids learn what different things Heavenly Father and Jesus created on the different days.
First you print out these letters 1-7. Then I backed them with cardstock and cut them out. Then as you talk about each day you have the kids glue on things that represent that. For instance cotton balls for clouds, pictures of animals, stars and a moon, etc. My kids are really hands-on, so I hope this will help them to remember and understand the beautiful world we live in :)
After we do that I want to quickly talk about how Man was created, and to teach that I will simply get out the playdoh and have the kids use a cookie cutter in the shape of a person. We will talk about how even though we are using the same type of cookie cutter, everyone's person will be different, and that no matter what color, or size we are all children of Heavenly Father!
Sunday, July 5, 2009
Beach Week
What a fun week we have planned!! Especially since we are ending the week with a trip to a real beach :) Since we are going to visit family in California the end of this week I thought there would be no better time to do some fun activities that will get the kids excited for surf, sand and sun!
The first activity we are doing is making a Beach in a jar. I have a bunch of cleaned out baby food jars that we are going to fill up with sand, pebbles, shells and grass (seaweed) to look like the beach. Then we glue the lid on and spray paint the tops gold. I think the kids will love shaking these up after and looking at them.
I also bought the biggest pasta shells I could find, and the kids are going to paint these however they want. Then we are going to talk about how just like their shells are all different, no two shells are the same. I am excited to use this activity as a way to reinforce colors with my almost 2-year old.
It's also so fun to talk about some ocean life so aside from going to the aquarium, we are going to do a fun little octopus craft. All you do is put paint on their palm and four fingers, then have them stamp their hand twice to make a cute octopus :) My kids love anything to do with fingerpainting, and it will be fun to work on counting with all the legs.
Now for the most fun part: the treats!! :) Tomorrow we are making beach cups, these are simply clear cups filled up with vanilla pudding dyed blue with food coloring (water) crushed nilla wafers (sand) and gummy fish/sharks. But what I am most excited for is this...
This adorable thing is a cake!!! You simply get a new sand bucket, bake a round cake of your choice. Then you cut it into strips and layer them in the bucket, a layer of cake and then a layer of pudding. Yumm!! Then you top with crushed cookies to look like sand and add some candy shells. Isn't that too fun?! I can't wait to make it for my kids, they will just love it :) Have a great week everyone!
The first activity we are doing is making a Beach in a jar. I have a bunch of cleaned out baby food jars that we are going to fill up with sand, pebbles, shells and grass (seaweed) to look like the beach. Then we glue the lid on and spray paint the tops gold. I think the kids will love shaking these up after and looking at them.
I also bought the biggest pasta shells I could find, and the kids are going to paint these however they want. Then we are going to talk about how just like their shells are all different, no two shells are the same. I am excited to use this activity as a way to reinforce colors with my almost 2-year old.
It's also so fun to talk about some ocean life so aside from going to the aquarium, we are going to do a fun little octopus craft. All you do is put paint on their palm and four fingers, then have them stamp their hand twice to make a cute octopus :) My kids love anything to do with fingerpainting, and it will be fun to work on counting with all the legs.
Now for the most fun part: the treats!! :) Tomorrow we are making beach cups, these are simply clear cups filled up with vanilla pudding dyed blue with food coloring (water) crushed nilla wafers (sand) and gummy fish/sharks. But what I am most excited for is this...
This adorable thing is a cake!!! You simply get a new sand bucket, bake a round cake of your choice. Then you cut it into strips and layer them in the bucket, a layer of cake and then a layer of pudding. Yumm!! Then you top with crushed cookies to look like sand and add some candy shells. Isn't that too fun?! I can't wait to make it for my kids, they will just love it :) Have a great week everyone!
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