Family Home Evening Inspiration

I came across this article today in the Meridian Magazine and wanted to share:

Welcome, Welcome 2010!
By C.S. Bezas

Many homes celebrated Christmas this past week. But how much of a focus was on the birth of Him who came to redeem, even Jesus Christ? Perhaps the reality of His advent has not been seen by some hearts. Do your children understand how anciently His coming has been foretold? This Family Home Evening lesson uses a set of binoculars, a piece of paper and the scriptures to bring to sight Christ's earthly presence in the minds of your children. Time for some FHE Fun!

Opening Song: #46 Who Is the Child?

Opening Prayer: By invitation.

Devotional: Time for a quiet moment of testimony sharing. Has a scripture touched the life of anyone in the family this past week? Simple moments like these can be some of the sweetest in the weekly lives of children. Powerful and potent, a weekly FHE Devotional (or even a nightly one) can arm our children with strength in this virulent and dangerous world.

Activity:

Items needed:

• binoculars (easily obtained through a sports fan or a hunting friend)
• piece of paper
• scriptures

Ask a child to come forward and look through a pair of binoculars. Then ask, "What do you see?" How can the power of binoculars change our vision? In other words, how do they help us see something more clearly that is far off? Allow everyone in the room to try out the binoculars.

Ask another volunteer to come forward. Hold a piece of paper flatly and in front of their face, obstructing their vision with it. Now let them roll it into a tube and look through it. How does rolling the paper into a tube help them focus on the important things in the room? Let the others try it also.

Hold up a set of scriptures. Ask how the scriptures help a person to see distant things more clearly. What must we do so that the scriptures work for us, helping us see ourselves and life plainly? How do we sometimes prevent the scriptures from working for us? (see this resource and also 1 Nephi 18:12-21) How does prayer, sincere desire and repentance help our scripture study?

Application:

In closing, ask "What is the most important message the scriptures hold?" Once family members have shared their important thoughts, share that the knowledge that Jesus Christ is real, and actually came to earth, will shape their lives more deeply than any other thing. This is the visual clarity scriptures hold for each life. And once each person uses their scriptures effectively, the reality of Jesus Christ remains focused and eternity draws close...just like the binoculars brings far off items into closer view.

To finish off the lesson, select three for four scriptures from the following list to show Christ's coming had been known for ages and had many witnesses (the full table is available at this link).

• Isa. 7: 14 (2 Ne. 17: 14) virgin shall conceive, and bear a son.
• Isa. 9: 6 (2 Ne. 19: 6) unto us a child is born.
• Micah 5: 2 Bethlehem . . . out of thee shall he come forth.
• Matt. 1: 23 virgin shall . . . bring forth a son . . . Emmanuel.
• Matt. 2: 1 Jesus was born in Bethlehem.
• Luke 1: 31 bring forth a son, and shalt call his name Jesus.
• Luke 2: 11 unto you is born this day . . . a Saviour, which is Christ.
• John 1: 14 (John 1: 3) Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us.
• Rom. 1: 3 Jesus . . . made of the seed of David.
• Gal. 4: 4 God sent . . . Son, made of a woman.
• 1 Ne. 10: 4 (1 Ne. 19: 8; 2 Ne. 25: 19) six hundred years . . . God raise up among the Jews even a Messiah.
• 1 Ne. 11: 18 mother of the Son of God.
• 2 Ne. 26: 3 signs given . . . of his birth.
• Alma 7: 10 he shall be born of Mary, at Jerusalem.
• Hel. 14: 4 sign . . . before he is born.
• 3 Ne. 1: 19 day that the Lord should be born.
• D&C 20: 1 since the coming of our Lord . . . in the flesh.
• D&C 76: 41 he came into the world, even Jesus.
• D&C 93: 4 I . . . made flesh my tabernacle.
• Moses 5: 57 (Moses 6: 57-62) Son . . . should come in the meridian of time.

Closing Song: #42 Away In a Manger

Closing Prayer: By invitation.

Refreshments: Candy canes stirred in hot chocolate could serve as an excellent refreshment for tonight's Family Home Evening. The sweet treats are abundantly available at this time of year and this link explains the fables and legends behind them.

Merry Christmas!

So how was your Christmas? I hope it was filled with the Saviour's Love and many blessings for your family. I meant to post this YouTube clip last week but life got pretty hectic for a while there. So here it is. Sit back, listen and enjoy...

Temple Lights

Our Relief Society bus trip to the Hamilton Temple yesterday was just wonderful. Those of us who wanted to do a temple session did so, while the others toured the visitors centre down below. We came out of the temple just in time to hear the choir start singing. It was a childrens choir this night and their voices were beautiful. It's been a few years since some of us had seen the temple lights, so it really was a lovely experience to be there again with friends. This is a photo I found on the net, because I forgot to take my camera. I saw Nancy with hers though, so we'll see if she can get us some copies for the blog.



What a great time we all had, and going down and back on the bus enabled us to relax, enjoy the ride and spend time talking and laughing with our fellow sisters. I hope we do this again next year - I'll be the first to book my seat.

Christmas Craftiness

I had a lot of fun at our last RS Activity. Making Christmas decorations is always a good activity to do, and I could see that everyone who attended had a good time.

We had 3 mini classes. The first was helping Sister Talisa prepare decorations for our Ward Christmas Party. She is a very organised lady our Sister Talisa, and she had a production line working in no time, managing to complete all the decorations by the end of the evening. Yay! Thanks to everyone who helped out there.

The second class involved making the cuuuutest little lollipop angels with Sister Irene Lee Lo. I need a photo of that too, so if someone has one can you send it to me please? I could see the sisters proudly carrying around their wee angels afterwards, and wished I had time to participate in that class.

The third class was with me, making mini gingerbread houses out of biscuits. This was a lot of fun, (and challenging for some when their walls collapsed due to incorrect construction). All was rectified though, and we had a wide range of little houses covered in icing and lollies by the end of the night. I had a case of laryngitis that night too, so my instructions were probably not as well heard as they would normally have been, but the sisters did really well. I had to keep reassuring them that the first attempt was rarely a masterpiece, and that their 2nd attempt at home would be much better. :) Here is the house I did, and a non-lolly version my husband created. I love the little snowman in his front yard.



I took my camera to the activity with me, intending to photograph the sisters houses, but completely forgot. Sorry! For the houses we just used the Budget Brand "Nice" biscuits. They're rectangle shaped, already sprinkled with sugar, and they don't break easily, so perfect for making houses. The icing is just icing sugar, food colouring, water and a little melted butter. You don't want the icing too runny or your decorations fall off. What do you think? Cute huh.

There are soooo many cute crafty things on the net. Here are some of my favourites you should try with your kids. Click on the title or the photo to go to the various websites with instructions on how to make them:

Candy Cane Reindeer (These are the ones my kids made last week. Super easy.)


Paper heart ornaments


Paper flower ornaments (Note: the instructions say to use double sided sticky tape, but I used a regular glue stick and it worked fine)


Cardboard star (made from a toilet paper roll believe it or not)


Christmas mice ornaments Mmmm, cute and tasty...can't beat that.


Reindeer Craft Treat Holder (This photo is actually of the reindeer my 3 year old and I did. Her hand prints make up the antlers on the bigger pot).


Marshmellow snowmen treats (I'd love to try this one but for some reason I just don't have the knack of melting chocolate. Not in my genes apparently)