Family Fun

 I decided to do a "Back to School" Night for Savannah's dinner before starting Kindergarten. I decorated the table all fun for the girls!
 I made them little placemats, place cards, and pencil treats. They're mentos wraped in consruction paper and tin foil with a hershey's kiss at the tip!
 Of course Abigail had to join in on the fun even though she's not starting school!
I made a chalkboard sign for her to hold in her First Day of School Picture :) I printed this printable off of Pinterest...sorry, couldnt find the link...I do not own credit for this!
I couldn't find the links for any of this lesson actually, but know that I can't take credit for some of these printables. The 7-up lesson also came from pinterest. It talked about different uplifting ways to start your day and week. Eric and I talked about each one with Savannah and how she could be good in school if she decided to adhere to this advice. 
 The banner idea and words are also not mine, however, I did make my own graphics (I usually do). We talked about each one of these and how she can do each one while we ate dinner. The folder was for her to put her "important" papers in.
They enjoyed the night and especially their treat! 
 Oh my stars, where has time gone. My precious girl is already in Kindergarten? Say it isn't so! Savannah started a magnet school this year. She is very lucky to have gotten a slot in such a wonderful school. I just wish it wasn't so darn far away! Doesn't she look super cute...and excited?! :)
 This FHE was about being A"Cow"ntable for things. We started out the evening with a walk to see some cows near our neighborhood.
 I think this is such a sweet photo of Abigail and Daddy!

"Hi Cows!
 I got the idea for the lesson HERE. I used an oatmeal canister and covered it in some construction paper and painted it to look like a barn silo. The little cow is a magnet from our fridge.
 I made the girls masks and instructed them to "Moo!" whenever the scenario I read represented being accountable for something.
I got the cow clip art from google and made up several scenarios, but a few of them came from the blog. 
 I think they enjoyed the game and we got the point across to Savannah. We worked on tying the lesson into daily activities with her throughout the week.
 Even little Miss Abigail got in on the action! There goes her tongue again :)
 For the treat we made cow cookies using oreos and white chocolate. I had some black food coloring to make the spots with.
I think they liked them! :)
 This evening our lesson was on the Brother of Jared. We "camped out" by the sea for four years.
Eric shared the story of how Heavenly Father confused the people and made it so that they could not understand each other. We learned about how the family of Jared had to leave town and camped for many years. So we told the story in a tent "by the sea" and watched a short clip of the Brother of Jared on you tube. 
Click HERE to watch the You Tube video. They are preparing to build the barges which the Lord has commanded them to do in order to cross the ocean to get to the promised land.
 My girls didn't know what barges were so we played a quick matching game and I showed them the picture what the barges might look like.
 This was something Abigail could do really easily. The graphics were obtained from THIS website.
 Then we went into a dark room and lit our stones just as Jesus had touched each stone so that the barges could have light. We reminded the girls that the barges could not have windows because the glass would be shattered and they could not have fire because the wood would burn. This was what the Lord provided so that they could see inside them. Following this portion of the lesson, Savannah shouts, "That was awesome!" Eric was hiding a flashlight under his arm and any time the girls touched these glass stones he would turn it on. I got the idea HERE.
 Next we built a barge! We learned that eight barges needed to be built so the Lord touched 16 stones so that each one could have a lit rock at either end of the barge. First we glued our "lights" to either end of our barge.
 After sealing it shut with some glue we began building the wood for our barge. As you can see, it was a rather colorful one using some of my old preschool popsicle sticks. They loved it!
 We made it nice and strong so that hopefully it would float.
Next we carefully placed it in the "ocean"....
It worked! 
The barge floats!
 They tried to sink it just as the waves of the ocean would, but it did not sink.
Following that we had "Barge" cookies that were served on the sea. I used jelly beans to imitate the stones. Silly, but they thought it was fun.
 They loved them! But what toddler doesn't enjoy a good chocolate chip cookie?
 Savannah didn't waste any time getting that treat in her mouth :)
 To keep the theme of lighting our way in the dark going, the girls took their bath with glow sticks! So fun! Their ocean was lit and they played for almost 20 minutes before I had to go "rescue" them.
That would be my two little hoodlums. Good night ya'll! 
Tonight's FHE was about "Spiritual Crocodiles". We watched the "Spiritual Crocodiles" video on YouTube by Boyd K. Packer, then had a quick lesson from the scriptures in Jacob. Following our lesson I sent the girls on a hunt for crocs! I made them some cute binoculars with toilet paper rolls, yarn, and popsicle sticks. 
 Hubby set the crocodiles all over the living room and they had to find them with their binoculars
 Little miss was so excited to find her first crocodile. These cards had phrases such as "Not obeying your parents" or "Tattling and fighting" on them. These are spiritual crocodiles that can tempt us and take a bit out of our spirits and testimonies.
 Savannah found some!
 I love that they actually used the binoculars!
 I especially loved how happy it made them. Hubby got into too and talked like he was from the Outback and said things like "Crikey!" hehe

My girls are goofs!

Then I put together two crocodile kits so that they could assemble them quickly during our FHE. I used egg carton and toilet paper rolls again. Little paint and glue....
 Voila! Crocodiles!
 This Family Home Evening lesson was a spin on Tangled and being a Daughter of God or Royal Princess. The girls got dressed up in their princess clothes and took off on an adventure.
This tangled mess is Rapunzels hair. However, you see, it represents Satan's power to present to us along our paths certain trials and tribulations. If we have our end goal in sight, AKA Heaven, we can make it back to live with Him again.
So I had the girls follow the path, ensuring not to let each kink in the path slow them down.
Abigail kind of just tore her way through with her crown.
They loved the adventure!
I love their silly faces!
I put together some cards for them using graphics I found on Pinterest. (Just look up Tangled FHE and you'll find them) and put a "lock of hair" in the card to remind them that Satan's path can try to slow us down, but we are Daughter's of God and can make it through.
Our oldest has been tattling so badly lately. So much so, I decided it was high time to create a lesson centered around it. I found this "Tattle Monster" idea from http://ptskjohnson.blogspot.com/2012/08/tattle-monsters-fhe.html and used it as part of my object lesson. We read the poem and discussed the difference between tattling and reporting. We used real scenarios so that the girls could better understand. I told them that if they wanted to tattle on someone to me that I would say to them that they needed to say it to the Tattle Monster or not say it at all, I don't want to hear it.  It was a short fun lesson. Chocolate chip cookies finished off the evening and hopefully my oldest will stop telling on my youngest. I can hope right?
This was a short simple FHE. I'm still trying to find the website where I got the graphics and idea from but the concept behind the lesson was in choosing to be obedient unlike when Jonah decided against listening to the Lord to counsel the town of Ninivah. So we made little stick people and created scenarios where they had to choose to obey or not...if they didn't, they were swallowed by the whale. So, "Whale" You Choose to be Obedient?
 This evening we learned about the Plan of Salvation. I had put together this for my Sunbeam lesson and because of the time and effort, figured I should use it twice. In order to make my girls understand the Plan I put together a step by step walk-through tour for them. I set it up in the hallway to symbolize a timeline. The very first stop....Premortal existence.
 I used some wax paper to represent the spirit and how "we can't see it"...when we come to Earth our spirits get a body....hehe.
 I used wax paper again for the veil. We taught them that when they walk through it they can't remember the premortal existence. Then they come to Earth as a baby.
 As you can see, they thought this was funny. They died and went to heaven.
 We talked about judgement and how we can either go to Spirit Paradise or Spirit Prison based upon our actions while on Earth. Earth is just a test. Fortunately, my girls pounded the gavel and said, "The fun one!"
 We then quickly discussed the different Kingdoms...Savannah thought Outer Darkness was timeout. "Yes, my dear, a very looooooong timeout."
 Next, I made a file folder game by using the printable found on this website http://www.sugardoodle.net/Nursery%20Program/L03/Plan%20of%20Salvation%20File%20Folder%20Game.shtml
and laminating it to a folder. Eric helped me color them and cut out the pieces. The girls had fun matching the events to the plan.
 After that we colored these sheets found from this website
http://www.sugardoodle.net/joomla/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=816&Itemid=5

 
Finally, out treat was chocolate covered bananas. As you can see, we related the bananas to our spirit which gets a body--the chocolate. Then we decorated them to show that we are all different, unique, and special by using sprinkles. The lesson was a hit! 
For Family Home Evening we had a lesson about Choosing the Right and learning to follow the rules. For the object lesson we set up a driving course since the girls just got their power wheels for Christmas and want every chance to use it. So I made this stop light, some orange cones, and cut up some yellow strips to guide them down the path. We taught them that just like there are road signs to help us get down the road, there are rules to help us be happy.
 These are the road signs we learned about and used to drive safely. I got this clipart from
http://ptskjohnson.blogspot.com/2012/03/liahona-family-home-evening.html
 Staying on course!
 It was a hit! They loved it!
What a fun way to spend the evening!
 
This past Monday for FHE we opened our annual time capsule. I've created my blog since we first started our family time capsule. In it there are five envelopes; a family one and one for each individual family member. In the individual envelopes we we write down our goals we want to try and accomplish for the year. In the family envelope there are index cards that say things like "Favorite Family Memory of 2012" or "Biggest Challenge of 2012". We have six of these cards. On the backside each family member gets to write what they think about that topic. So each year we reopen our capsule and read the goals and memories we set a year ago. We talk about how well we met them and reset new ones. It's kind of fun to realize what was important to us a year ago and see how well we improved. It also makes us realize how important it is to stick to our goals. So we updated our cards and put them back in there to open next year. We keep old cards in there so that we can go back each year to see how far we've come.
We heard about this "Nights of Shimmering Lights". There is a small forest totally decked out with lights, tunnels, displays...the whole nine yards. In the center is a field with a few vendors, hot chocolate, Christmas movies, and Santa! We opened up the sun roof and stood up through it and the girls sat on the roof. We drove through it a couple times...it was so neat! The girls loved it :)
We bought an annual pass to an interactive science museum, MOSI. THEY LOVE IT.  Here's my little musicians!
 Savannah's preschool put an enormous amount of effort, time and planning into a production titled, "Walk Thru Bethlehem". Everyone was dressed like the olden days, they had camels and donkeys, lines were memorized, and the entire walk thru was an elaborate remake of a small city.
 It was a very neat experience for us. We really enjoyed it and are thankful to all the people that put it together.
Happy Birthday Baby Jesus.
 
Tonight we played a Christmas version of "Don't Eat Pete". I downloaded this cute reindeer board from http://preparednotscared.blogspot.com/2011/12/dont-eat.html and covered each reindeer with an M&M. If you've never played "Don't Eat Pete!" Here are some quick instructions....
Send one player out of the room. Remaining players decide which one they don't want eaten. The other player returns and begins eating until they pick up the forbidden character and everyone shouts, in this case, "Don't eat Rudolph!" The kids get a kick out of it. Oh the suspense!
 It's been a while since I've done a formal Family Home Evening lesson with the move and all. So crazy the past few months! I've been in this house 2 weeks, so I had to get on it! Since it is November we are learning about gratitude as a family...through service. I got a lesson off one of my favorite FHE blogs and incorporated their calendar into our lesson. Every day we show gratitude by an act of service. It just so happened that making cookies for our neighbors was on the list....so we did! Savannah said she was thankful for her teacher so she also made some for her! We love it here!
I got the calendar from: http://thegoldenseven.blogspot.com/2010/11/thanksgiving-and-service-fhe-lesson.html
list
 
The Lord commanded Nephi to go and get the plates, from the wicked Laban inside the city gates. Lamen and Lemual were both afraid to try. Nephi was courageous and this was his reply. I will go, I will do, the things the Lord commands. I know the Lord provides a way, he wants me to obey!...
Sound familiar? FHE this week was about getting the gold plates and being brave like Nephi. We dressed the kids up like Nephites and wrapped scarves around them. Our good friend was King Laban with his gold crown and my daughter and her best friend were Lamen and Lemual. I do believe they are much cuter! We played a game where Nephi had to make the hard journey to get the plates from the King. They had to make the trek across the treacherous living room while everyone threw pillows at them and had to wrestle "the King" for the plates. I cut up some cardboard and spray painted it gold and held it together with some old gold ribbon I had. Our activity was writing our own "gold plates"...er...silver. I used tin foil with a soft backing and they wrote or drew the Nephi story using colored pencils. For treats I made some gold plate scriptures using Hershey nuggets with the evening's scripture theme on it. Cute eh? It was fun!
Hooray for Pioneer Night! I used my Great Uncle Clark Kelly Price's painting a inspiration for Pioneer Night! We taught our girls that pioneers are people who have sacrificed many things for their beliefs and that they have left behind paths for others to follow. To kick of the night we built a beautiful log cabin with pretzel sticks. A lot of "sweat and blood" was put into building our home. Then we taught them that Mormons were persecuted for their religious beliefs and that they had to leave their homes. Next, we told our oldest that she had to leave home and pack a bag with things she thought were important. She said she wanted toys, water, food, and her blanket. So we headed downstairs and filled a bag with blocks. Then we made her march up the stairs to the main level. It was a little tough for her, but she managed. Then we filled her bag with 2 water bottles and 3 cans of food and told her to head upstairs to her bedroom to get her blanket. This was where she really struggled. It taught her that the pioneers not only had to leave their homes, but they had to take all of their prized possessions with them. She realized that she wouldn't be able to take everything so to lighten the load she had to leave things she loved behind, just as the pioneers did. This Oregon Trail journey for her was tough! We then discussed how the angry mobs destroyed their homes and precious things. We pretended our youngest was the angry mob and destroyed the log cabin. She is good at terrorizing and destroying things!! Our oldest did not understand why we had demolished something worth so much and something that much love and dedication was put into. She actually was mad at me! It taught her another powerful lesson that the world and many people might try to "persecute" us for our beliefs and destroy things we love, we must stay strong and endure...just as the pioneers did.
Welcome to the Popcorn Olympics!  We invited some friends over for this one! It. was. awesome! First, we played "Don't Eat Pete!" by placing a piece of popcorn on several different characters, one person left the room while everyone decided which one was "Pete", they'd return and eat until they picked up the wrong piece and everyone would shout, "DON'T EAT PETE!" The kids LOVED it! Then we played the Popcorn toss by tossing popcorn into each others mouths. Next we played the popcorn race by blowing through a straw at popcorn and whoever was able to get their popcorn the farthest won that one. We played a couple other games to round out the evening. What a fun night with friends! 
I got this lesson from: http://inkablinka.com/2010/07/popcorn-family-home-evening.html
 
This evening we had a fun lesson about the power of prayer. We discussed the way our bodies should be to properly pray; for instance, we must kneel down, fold our arms, bow our head and close our eyes. We taught our girls that when they pray, they are praying to Heavenly Father and Jesus so that they must be respectful. For fun, we made a "magic carpet" for kneeling on to say our bedtime prayers. We went out for a walk like Joseph Smith did and found a rock to paint. Our prayer rocks will go in our pillows so that at nighttime we "bonk" our heads when we lay down...so, we'll remember! Then we leave it on the floor so that when we wake up we step on it and say, "Ouch! Oh yeah! I need to say my prayers!" Then, for my favorite part, we made Prayer pretzels! Why you might ask? Because pretzels cross their arms like they're praying!
To make the pretzels I simply used some refrigerated Pillsbury bread sticks. Roll them in between your palms to create a longer skinnier string of dough. Roll that around in some sugar and cinnamon.Then to form the pretzel, form a circle with the ends meeting up top. Grab the ends and pull down to form an X and press the edges into the bottom. Bake at 375 for 9 minutes. Then dip in hot caramel! Yummo!
Tonight our FHE lesson was all about Friendship and doing good things for our friends. We learned how to be a good friend and how to find friends. We filled out a puzzle of a little girl and with each piece learned how to do just that.  "We look for the good in others" using our eyes. Then we did a matching game to discover 14 ways we can be a good friend. One of them said to bring ice cream to a friend when they feel better. Well, instead of ice cream, we made cupcakes and brought them to our friends who were just getting over the stomach flu. But because a package of course makes 24...we decided to bring them to many friends....just cause. It was a great lesson for Savannah that sometimes we can do nice things and not expect anything in return. It was fun surprising everyone with random cupcakes!
Family Home Evening was a continuation of Easter. We went on a nature walk with Jesus!  We had to find some specific items on our nature walk that were symbolic to Easter. First we found a tree branch that symbolized the palm tree branches the city people waved at Jesus when he entered the city. Next, something prickly to represent the thorny crown. Then we had to find something made out of wood to represent the cross; for this, we identified that the bridges were constructed of wood. Next, we found something no longer living...a very old dead hallowed log to remind us that Jesus died for us. After that we had to find white linen for which Christ was wrapped in when he entered the tomb. Abigail's jacket was white! Then we found a large rock to represent the massive stone used to close the tomb. Finally, we had to find something living. These gorgeous red flowers were very much living. Gorgeous indeed. The "living" object reminds us that Christ was resurrected and surely lives!


Family Home Evening was all about doing your fair share and how doing your part can make the burden seem lighter. First we did a puzzle of a house. Each piece of the puzzle had a chore on the back. Each one we did together. Once it was complete not only was the puzzle complete, but the house was in order because we all did our share. Next we had an object lesson. I labeled a bunch of cans with chores and responsibilities and put them in a laundry basket. After asking my darling three year old to pick it up, she quickly realized what a "heavy burden" carrying all those tasks alone was. We then evenly divided all those responsibilities into three separate bags and taught her that when everyone does their part, the load is much lighter. Finally, we told the story of the Little Red Hen and learned that when everyone pitches in, then everyone gets to enjoy the reward. So, everyone helped me make bread...everyone got to enjoy it!
 What a fun way to learn about repentance! We read the story of Noah and the ark and how the Earth was washed clean of wickedness through flooding the earth. I put together a little story picture slider of the Ark for Savannah to retell the story herself. We happened to have a Little Fisher Noah's ark and used that for our object lesson. We all know the story; two animals of every kind loaded aboard. Our treat? Animal crackers! Yum!
 This lesson was a little more on the simple side but it was a good message. First we read the story of the Good Samaritan and how even though many other walked past a man in need, the Good Samaritan had it in his heart to take the poor man in and help him. We're teaching our girls to love everyone. We made little puppets for each member of the family and picked one puppet at a time. We asked our oldest how we could show love to that person. "We can show love to Daddy by packing a lunch for him everyday." "We can show love to Mommy by helping her do the dishes."...and so on.
 This is probably one of my most favorite FHE's EVER. I got the idea to to do Operation Teamwork off a website I'll list later, using Despicable Me. The mission was to clean the house, but I had also found this fun laser tag activity on the internet as well and wanted to combine several "missions" for the evening instead. We invited some good friends of ours over for the momentous occasion and assigned all the kiddos as Secret Agents. Mission one was to work together as a team to assemble and deliver food to the sector of the Owens Family residence. We made homemade pizza and will a at least half a dozen different toppings, each child was responsible for loading on their portion to complete the pizza. It was delicious. Mission two was the actual lesson where we discussed the importance of teamwork and growing together. We used the story of the minions in Despicable Me to teach that working together can get the job done. To add that spiritual twist, we also discussed the Strippling Warriors and how they worked together so well that at the end of battle, not a single warrior was missing. The third mission was to reach their "true minion" but the path was not an easy one. They had to work together, even helping the little ones to get through a route of laser beams. They made it! And they got to enjoy some yummy cupcakes with twinkie minions!
 What a fun time we had! This was in honor of M Week and Cars & Trucks theme week for Preschool. We invited some friends over for a Movie and Milkshakes to watch Cars the Movie, eat in box cars, and have hamburgers and french fries for both dinner and dessert. We drew the number 95 and a lightning bolt on four pieces of construction paper and let the kiddos decorate it, cut it out, and taped that and some headlights to their "cars". We let the kids eat at the drive in! The french fries are sugar cookie mixed rolled out and cut with a pizza cutter, spread out and dipped in red colored frosting as the ketchup. The hamburgers are yellow cupcakes cut in half with a circle cut out of a brownie. I just used the cap to one of my daughter's bottles. The condiments are simply more colored frosting. Wa-la! My favorite was the M is for Milkshakes part. Mmmmm...Ice cream!

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