Tithing

So sorry I've been slacking on this the last couple weeks!  Life has gotten soo busy!  But I'm not complaining.  Promise!  On with the show.

We all know it's important to pay our tithing. My parents taught this to my siblings and me from a very young age. I think that's the reason today that I don't even bat an eyelash when my husband or I hand over that check, even though we don't really know how we're going to pay the mortgage this month. It helps that my husband is rather firm on this principle as well, and that he makes out most of the checks... I just have a mild heart attack when the check clears the bank. =) Nonetheless, somehow we still have a warm house, food in our belllies, clothes on our bodies and gas in the car (most days). So, here's a Family Home Evening guaranteed to help your kids remember the principle of tithing.

Things You'll Need: Copy each family member a page of coins. It may be helpful during the activity for each person's coins to be a different color. If you decide to do that, make sure you copy each person's page on a different color of paper... Seems obvious, I know, but I didn't and wished I had later on. Cut out the coins and put each person's in a separate baggie or envelope. Get or make some typical FHE refreshments... they will be part of the activity before they are refreshments though. Then get or make one of your family's favorite desserts or each family member's favorite candy bar, but don't let anyone see it or know that it is part of your family home evening plans. Go to the Dollar Store and get a few treats or small toys. Take some envelopes and write "Tithing" on them. Decide whether you want to make each thing worth it's own price or if you want everything worth the same amount. If you want each thing priced differently (a little more 'real-worldly') then go ahead and write the prices out.

Scripture: D&C 119:4

Song: I'm Glad to Pay a Tithing, Primary Children's Songbook, Page 150

Lesson: Begin the lesson talking about what tithing is. Tithing is willingly giving one-tenth of our income back to the Lord and His purposes. What can and should we pay tithing on? In the days of Joseph Smith and the pioneers, tithes were paid on anything the Saints were able to call their "income". Sometimes that was ten percent of the eggs their chickens laid or ten percent of the beef they raised. It all depended on how each family met their individual needs. Sometimes it was paid in money. Today, tithing is paid mostly in money. Where does our tithing go? Members turn their tithing donations into their local leaders, who then transfer it directly to the Church Headquarters in Salt Lake City. Our tithing helps "to build and maintain temples and meetinghouses, to sustain missionary work, to educate Church members, and to carry on the work of the Lord throughout the world."* What do we get if we faithfully pay our tithing? D&C 64:23 says, "Behold, now it is called today until the coming of the Son of Man, and verily it is a day of sacrifice, and a day for the tithing of my people; for he that is tithed shall not be burned at his coming." We will be blessed and protected if we obey and follow the principle of tithing.

Activity: After you have talked about the importance of tithing see how well your children understand the concept. Hand each member of the family their individual baggies or envelopes. Tell them that they have all just gotten paid. Pull out your bag of goodies from the Dollar Store and lay your treasures out for all to see. Exclaim that the store is now open and that your family members are free to purchase the goodies with their coins. While everyone's eyes are wide and wonderous from the new toys and treats set out the envelopes you labeled "Tithing". Go get the standard FHE treats and set them out as an option, too. Another idea is to have all of this already set up on the kitchen table and to lead your family into the kitchen after you hand out their coins. Spend 15-20 minutes letting everyone spend their coins. After all the coins are spent, gather the envelopes you labeled "Tithing" and see how many family members remembered to pay their tithing. Tell them that because they remembered to give back to the Lord they will be blessed. Sometimes the blessings are saved for us until the next life, but sometimes we get them in this life. Pull out the super yummy dessert you had stashed away and tell them this is their blessing. Everyone who didn't remember to pay tithing can eat some of the first dessert, while only those who remembered to pay their tithing get to reap the blessings!

Treat Ideas:
This will all depend on your family. If you make rice crispy treats as your first dessert, have ice cream sundaes or something a little more grandiose for your "blessing".

Click on the picture and it will make it full size. You can print it from there. You can scale it up to 125% and they will all fit on one page, depending how big you want them.

*http://www.lds.org/ldsorg/v/index.jsp?locale=0&sourceId=e141f73c28d98010VgnVCM1000004d82620a____&vgnextoid=bbd508f54922d010VgnVCM1000004d82620aRCRD

Family History

The most obvious and probably one of the easiest Family History activities is to make a family history chart. Yes, it is a lot easier for me to say that than it is to actually do it. But this will definitely get you started.

Things You'll Need:
A copy of "My Family History" for each member of your family  (Printable Below)
Colored Pencils or Crayons to color your trees with
General Knowledge of your ancestors back 3 generations

Song: Primary Children's Songbook, Page 94 - Family History, I Am Doing It

Lesson:
If you know any stories from your grandparent's childhoods, tell them to your children. If not, tell them stories from your childhood. Let your children tell of some of their favorite family memories, even if it just happened yesterday.

Activity:
Give each family member a copy of "My Family History". Help each person fill out their chart with information relevant to them. Your kids' will pretty much all be the same, except for their names. Mom's (and Dad's) will be different though. Talk about the differences, what generations are and how families are joined through marriage.

Treat Ideas:
Homemade Cookies, Caramel Popcorn, another one of your family's favorite desserts, or a special family recipe you enjoy.

Click on the images to make them full size. You can print them from there. There is a page for girls and one for boys.

Temples

So, my Mr Right and I just celebrated our 1st Sealing Anniversary last week, so I thought an FHE on temples was appropriate.  And EVERYONE loves fieldtrips, right?

Prep:  Get enough pictures of the temple for each family member.  Your choice on sizes and with or without frames.  There are some resources below.

Lesson:  Sing the song, or read the words, to I Love To See The Temple from the Children's Songbook, page 95.  Talk about it.  Here in the US we have quite a few temples now, and there are more and more being built all the time.  The number of temples have increased dramatically in the last few years.  Younger children probably won't be able to comprehend having to travel days or weeks or even months and having to sell everything you own or saving for years and years to get to a temple.  I wasn't even in a situation like that, but some people have been.  The farthest we've ever had to travel to the nearest temple was about 4.5 hours.  How blessed are we now?  We live 15 minutes from the temple.  I don't have any great stories about people sacrificing it all to attend the temple, but I know we have all heard them.  Explain to your children that the blessings we receive in the temple are so much more valuable than worldly posessions that some people have been willing to sell everything they own just to go to the temple one time.  Discuss briefly the blessings we receive in the temple: promises from Heavenly Father, the opportunity to receive exhaltation, and the opportunity to be forever families.  Talk a little about baptisms for the dead and how important they are.  Point out the inscription on every temple above the doors.  What does it mean?  Why is it on every temple? 

Activity:  If you live near a temple, take your family there and walk around the grounds.  You won't be able to go through the gates, as they are locked on Mondays, but the same sweet Spirit can still be felt.  If you don't live near a temple make a plan to visit the nearest one on a future (but not too future) weekend.  If you go on Saturday, the gates will be open and your family can walk on the grounds.  Please remember to be reverent and respectful, as temples are sacred and holy.  Before you close, hand each member of you family a picture of "your" temple (the one nearest you or any other temple that is special for any reason).  Tell them to hang them in their rooms where they can see it every day.  If you want to provide frames, more power to ya!  The Dollar Store has cheap, decent frames (and if they do break, it's only $1 to replace it).  Order prints from Deseret Book, Seagull Book, or the Church Distribution Center website.  You can also pick them up at any physical location of each of those links, of course.

Treat:  Rice Crispy Treats.  Shape them into a temple shape if you'd like.  =]

Feel free to use these images if you'd like, but please limit them to personal use.  Please do not repost these images without permission.  If you use these images for other projects or crafts send me photos! (whilehewasnapping[at]gmail[dot]com).  I'd love to see what you do with them.  I'll even feature your project on my 'crafty blog,' whilehewasnapping.blogspot.com.  Thanks.

Melodious Monday - The Music Choice

We finished up the Be's... Hooray!  It feels so great to accomplish things!  So, moving on.  Today's FHE is on music.  My little boy LOVES music.  He will stop what he is going and run around the other side of the sofa, totally enthralled when the right commercial comes on... what brings him running???  The music!!  It has absolutely nothing to do with the actual commercial, it's all about the music.  And he's only one!  Music can have such an amazing effect on us.  But it can also be detrimental.  Let's get started.

Prep:  Go through your iTunes library and select a play list of songs you enjoy.  Use YouTube to find brief clips of some heavy metal and music you may not have in your library.  Or check out your teenagers CD/MP3 collections...  I know when I was a teenager I didn't always choose the most "Spirit-Inviting" music...  Choose about 5 different songs, all different genres, for your list.  Include Church music as well as music you may not approve of.  It'll help get the point across.  Promise.

Lesson:  Hand out a piece of paper to each member of the family.  Help your younger kids, if needs be.  Play a short clip, 10-20 seconds, of each song you have chosen.  Ask each person to number their paper.  Tell them to write down one or two words for each clip that describes how they feel while they are listening to the song.  When you have finished playing the clips, talk about the different things you felt during each song.  Which songs made them feel good inside?  Encourage your family to choose only music that is uplifting.  "Music is an important and powerful part of life. Don't listen to music that drives away the Spirit, encourages immorality, glorifies violence, uses foul or offensive language, or promotes Satanism or other evil practices" (For The Strength of Youth, "Music and Dancing," p 20).

Activity:  Choose 3-5 songs out of the Hymn Book or Children's Songbook to sing as a family.  Or choose a new song to learn as a family.  If someone in your family is musically talented and can accompany, ask them to do so.  If you have accompaniment on CD's, use those.  Or you can find some super useful resources HERE.

Treat:  Nilla Wafer No-Bake Cheesecake.  It's WAY yummy!  Click HERE for the recipe!

Mother Dear

I hope everyone had a fantastic Mother's Day on Sunday. I had every intention of doing this post then, but I ended up coming home sick from church, so that put my plans on hold. And yesterday, my husband begged me to do laundry before he left for work. Apparently, I'd been neglecting it somewhat... He was out of clothes. Oops. I forget he doesn't have as much clothing as I (and our son) do.

This FHE focuses on moms. I realize not all families have the same make-up, but for the sake of this post I'm going to use the family model of a father, mother and children. So, enough rambling, here we go!

Things You'll Need: Construction paper, pens, markers, scissors, stickers, crayons, and the like.

Song: Primary Children's Songbook, Mother I Love You, Page 207 (You moms may need some Kleenex... this one always makes me teary).

Scripture: Alma 56:47–48.

Lesson: This lesson focuses on our mothers. Look up "Mother" in the Topical Guide and read it with your family. Discuss what an important role mothers have. What are some duties of mothers? What does your mother take responsibility for in the home? In my family, my responsibilities are rather traditional: cooking, cleaning, and taking care of the kids while my husband goes to work. However, I have a sister-in-law that has been the one to go to work since her husband's company downsized. Her role isn't not the same as mine, but she is a stellar mother. Moms have different roles in different families, but in every family a mom is a teacher. Little children learn from watching others. And who do they have the most opportunity to watch? Their parents. And if Mom is lucky enough to get to stay at home with her little copycats, they have almost unlimited access to do as Mom does. Ask your family to share something they have learned from Mom.

Activity: Give your family 15-20 minutes to make a card for Mom out of the art supplies you previously gathered. Mom can make a card too... but she should write out the card for her mom and then mail it. How cool would that be for her mom to get a nice card in the mail?!?

Then, play a few rounds of "Mother, May I?"

Treat: I would recommend Mom's favorite dessert. Or some delicious, yummy brownies. Moms always like brownies.

Follow the Prophet

How can we follow the prophet if we don't know what they've counseled us to do?!? Here's the perfect chance for your family to learn. This is a quick and simple lesson. 4pm Monday afternoon? You're starting dinner and you remember: It's MONDAY! Quick! What'll we do for FHE? Well, here's a quick idea that you can pull together while that casserole cooks.

Things You'll Need: Go to LDS.org and search for the name of one of our prophets. It'll bring up a list of a bunch of talks they've given or small biographies about them. Choose one and print it out.

Song: Primary Children's Songbook, Follow the Prophet, page 110.

Lesson: Read the talk or story you previously printed off. Discuss it with your family.

Activity: Make homemade Ice Cream. If you have an ice cream maker, go ahead and use that. If not, HERE is a recipe for homemade ice cream in a zippy bag! If you are doing a "mini-series" of sorts, you may have to rotate treats and activities. If you read a brief biography, find something that our prophet enjoyed doing and do it, too.

Treat: Your Homemade Ice Cream, of course!

Serving The Missionaries

Who gives more service than our missionaries? They spend all day, everyday in the service of our Heavenly Father. Take a few minutes and tell them that you appreciate their willingness to serve. If you have military members in your ward or family as well, take time to let them know you're thinking of them.

Things You'll Need: Paper and pens to write letters. Candy and other treats to send the missionaries. As many boxes as you have missionaries or service members in your ward/family/ect.

Song: Primary Children's Songbook, I Hope They Call Me on a Mission, Page 169

Lesson: If you have a returned missionary or a veteran in your home, have them talk about what it's like to be away from home for a long time. I'm not talking about swapping war stories, but have them tell what it's like to not get to see your family every day, or to not get to talk to them on the phone. Especially stress how special the letters people sent were.
If you don't have someone to share those experiences, talk about what you think it would be like to not be able to see your family everyday and to only talk through writing letters. You would like to get any letters you could!

Activity: Write letters or notes to each of your missionaries and service members. Fill a box with goodies for each of them. Seal them up and make sure they get mailed! Your missionaries and soldiers will appreciate it so much!

Treats: Celebrate the missionary lifestyle and go on splits... Banana Splits! Load up your dish with ice cream, toppings, whipped cream and a yummy fruit topper! Enjoy!