Faith Is Like a Little Seed

Last month in primary our weekly sharing times were centered around the fourth article of faith, which reads:

"We believe that the first principles and ordinances of the Gospel are: first, Faith in the Lord Jesus Christ; second,Repentance; third, Baptism by immersion for the remission of sins; fourth, Laying on of hands for the gift of the Holy Ghost."

As a primary the children planted a few seeds and the plant was brought back each week to see how it had grown. As we did this I thought, "Hey! I can do that too!" (I really did think that with exclamation marks attached).

So, I went on my merry way to the grocery store one evening that week and bought all the stuff to plant our own little seeds. I have to tell you, I was clueless. This was the first experience that I have ever had with planting anything. The selection of soil alone had me staring in amazement. Who knew there were so many options for putting your precious plants in and how on earth was I to know which one to select. Well, being on a budget I went with what was in the smallest bag and also the cheapest. I was only planning on four small pots - so the 25 pounders were at least giving me one easy way to cut my options. I won't even begin to explain my distress when I came to the seed and potting varieties. Lets just say that I was there for a bit longer than I had originally intended.

Well, I finally selected some daisies and cosmos. I didn't even know what a cosmo was until I saw a pretty picture of it with a nice friendly label on top on the seed envelope - this was truly proving to be educational.

We did a simple little family home evening on what it means to have faith and we planted our seeds. I must say that it has been really fun to do. Every time we go out to water our little plants we have a little chat about how we have to build our faith in Jesus Christ with prayer, and by keeping the commandments, and with scripture study so that it will grow strong just like the seed needs water and air and soil to grow. I can't really attest to how much of it is seeping into their little brains. They are usually more concerned about getting equal opportunities with the watering can; but, I tend to try to have faith in the fact that these little lessons are the basis for something much bigger. :)

So there you go. A trip to the grocery store and you're good to go with your next family home evening. Oh, and if you are worried about not remembering to water your plants and letting your little seeds die just like every other plant you've ever tended; no worries there, your children will be so thrilled with the whole thing that they will be asking to water them at least five times a day.

FHE - Prayer

I am going to try and get back in the habit of posting what we are doing for some of our Family Home Evenings. (I don't know that I really deserve to say "get back in the habit" due to the fact that I have only posted two or three of our lessons . . . )

I kind of envision being able to create a blogbook of sorts that includes all of the family home evening lessons that I create. I think this would be something great to pass on to my kids. It can be time consuming to gather all the materials and to study different sources to create a whole lesson. 99% of what I put together is a combination of other people's ideas, but it would be nice to still have it all back in one spot. (And lets be honest, I also want to cheat and recycle lessons that the kids are a fan of . . . repetition is a kids best friend AND a busy moms delight.)

I will begin each lesson with "The Inspiration". This is just the inspiration behind the lesson for that week. (There isn't always an inspiration, I tend to usually fly by the seat of my pants, but I find that if I AM actually being vigilant that there is usually something that happens in the week that can easily be turned into a family home evening.)

So here it is . . .

INSPIRATION:

This week's lesson is on praying. Kenzie has gotten a little bit wiggly lately during almost all prayer times - which is to be expected of a three-year-old; but Garrett and I still thought that it might be helpful to talk about some of the reasons why we are reverent during prayers and practice the right way to pray. We really want her to come to understand that prayer is a wonderful gift from our Heavenly Father that she can treasure and use at any moment in her life.

SPIRITUAL PREPARATION:

• The following preparation suggestion was taken from the church nursery manual Behold Your Little Ones: Through prayer we can talk with our Heavenly Father. We tell Him we love Him, we thank Him for blessings, and we ask for help for ourselves and for others in need. We end our prayers in the name of Jesus Christ. Prayer is one of the greatest blessings we have while we are here on earth. (See Matthew 6:9–13; Alma 34:18–27; 3 Nephi 18:19–21.)
• I also read a talk from President Henry B Eyring that is FULL of inspiration on the reasons why prayer is so vital for the protection and guidance that I want so badly for our children. The talk is entitled "That He May Write Upon Our Hearts". Click HERE for the link.

PHYSICAL PREPARATION:

• Flip chart for opening song (look under opening song for more specific directions)
• A picture of Jesus giving the Sermon on the Mount such as picture number 212 in the Gospel Art Picture Kit. Click HERE for a link to this picture. (see item number one of the lesson to see how this will be used) - I liked a suggestion from page 15 of this months Ensign that is talking about sharing the scriptures with your children. It was suggested by one mother to print a copy of the picture for each family member to se and handle to help encourage excitement about what you are talking about.
• (optional) A notebook and stickers that your child has picked out (see item number four in the lesson for more information)
• Paper and crayons/colored pencils for each family member (see item number five in the lesson)
• The girls and I are going to make the brownies to take to neighbors earlier in the day so that we can be ready to deliver them right after the lesson, but you could make them as a family too if you want! It is just close to bedtime around here and I didn't want to add the extra thirty to forty minutes of brownie making time to the FHE when the kids will be getting close to the extremely grumpy hour.

OPENING SONG: I Pray in Faith, Children's Songbook pg. 14 Click HERE for a copy/link.

• visual for the song: Page 19 of the nursery manual Behold Your Little One's had a little flip chart that you can create and use as a fun visual/interaction for the second verse of the song. Click HERE for a link to the lesson. Simply click on the chart under preparation (NOT THE ONE UNDER FLIP CHART) and a window will come up to print it out right there.

SCRIPTURE: We are currently working on memorizing James 1:5 as a family. If any of you are interested in the word document that I put together for a visual for this scripture I would be happy to email it to you. Just leave me a comment and I can pass it along. I have no idea if it is possible to post documents to a blog?

LESSON:

1. JESUS TAUGHT: Roll play and discussion with the Sermon on the Mount.

Hold up a picture of Jesus teaching the Sermon on the Mount and ask:

"Who is this?"

Talk about how this is Jesus and all of his disciples.

"Do you know what a disciple is?"

(Answer: a personal follower of Jesus.)

Briefly teach about the Sermon on the Mount in a dialogue/discussion similar to the following: (See Matt 6:5-15 for the Savior's teaching on prayer)

"This picture shows Jesus giving the Sermon on the Mount to all his disciples. They gathered on a mountainside and He taught them lots and lots of things about how to be happy and follow Him. Do you see the mountains? Where are the mountains?

One of the things that Jesus taught His disciples on the mountainside was how to pray. He taught them them to pray in secret and not to pray for everyone to see. Can we pretend to pray secretly without anyone else seeing?" (Have the whole family to pretend to go into their bedroom or a closet to pray all by themselves and while you are pretending explain to everyone that when we pray we get to say very special things to Heavenly Father that are only between us and Heavenly Father.)

After you have pretended to pray in secret you could talk about how some prayers we say all together as a family or all together as a church, but we don't do this to brag about how good we are and for the whole world to, but to be better at worshipping our Father in Heaven.

Show the picture of the Sermon on the Mount again and continue

"Jesus also taught during the Sermon on the Mount that we start our prayer by recognizing our Father in Heaven by name. Then we can pray for things like help to be forgiving, help to get the things that we need to be comfortable, and help to not be tempted by Satan. What are some other things that we can pray about?"

2. SING A SONG

Sing the opening song with the flip chart and repeat it a few times allowing everyone a turn to flip the chart open during the appropriate times.

3. QUESTION AND ANSWER

Ask some or all of the following questions and talk a little bit about each one.

So what do we do with our bodies when we pray?

Can you show me what it looks like when we pray?

Why do we sit reverently when we pray?

4. APPLICATION: Reverence Bag

Garrett and I were talking about ways to make sacrament meeting a little bit less wiggly and I thought it might be fun to try a reverence bag of sorts. I have set aside some toys and books that are a little bit more quite (i.e. the magna-doodle things, small flannel board, sticker books, small dry erase boards, the sewing string boards, colored pencils, gospel board books, old friend magazines, and toys that don't make noise for Jorydn.) On Saturday night we are going to try to get in the habit of packing our reverence bag by picking some of these items from a box that I have set aside and putting them in her bag. As part of this we will start a little scripture journal for her. I am going to take her to the store tomorrow to pick out a journal or binder of the cheap sort that we will call her scripture journal and I will also let her pick out some special stickers. On the inside flap of the journal I will make a chart that she can place a sticker on every time that she sits ALL the way through a prayer during sacrament meeting or family prayers. We will present this book and chart to her during family home evening. We will tell her that the journal is something that she can have during scripture study and during church to draw pictures or write words about what she thinks or feels or hears. We're hoping that this will add a little fun reminder to pray without wiggling all over the place . :)

5. DRAW A PICTURE FOR THE SCRIPTURE WALL

Pages 12-15 of this months Ensign has some great stuff on teaching our children from the scriptures. One of the ideas for young children is to have a scripture wall where you display pictures that have been drawn by your children with statements underneath about what their picture is showing. I think I am going to try this starting tonight. I will get back out the picture of the Savior at the Sermon on the Mount and we can all draw a picture of what we see and talk about what we are drawing while we go along. Then I will glue Kenzie's to some card stock or construction paper and we can start our own scripture wall in her toy room. We will write a little statement at the bottom summarizing what the picture shows and try to refer back to these pictures throughout the weeks to come.

ACTIVITY:

We are going to take brownies over to some of our new neighbors in our cul-de-sac to more officially introduce ourselves to them.

TREAT:

We are going to save a plate of those brownies for our own treat! :)

Just Sharing

Found this on surgardoodle this afternoon and I am excited to use it this year.

It is a years worth of already made FHE lessons that tie into this years primary theme!

Check out the link here.

FHE: Reverence

At some point or another on Sundays MaKenzie seems to really enjoy running through the church screaming at the top of her lungs. Hopefully todays lesson on reverence will help a bit . . . here's hoping!

Reverence

Opening Song

"Reverently, Quietly" Children's Songbook p. 26

Resources

• August 2008 Friend Magazine "I Can Be Reverent" by Diana Eckersell Janson. Copy and paste the following link:

http://lds.org/ldsorg/v/index.jsp?vgnextoid=21bc9fbee98db010VgnVCM1000004d82620aRCRD&locale=0&sourceId=e648dd48c4a6b110VgnVCM100000176f620a____&hideNav=1

Lesson Materials and Preparation

• Print out the activity from the link above onto cardstock. Cut out each page and turn it into a book or a flannel board activity
• A felt board
• A picture of a child folding their arms
• Ingredients for “Disappearing-Marshmallow Rolls”

Lesson

1. Go through each page of the story “I Can Be Reverent” and have your child repeat the words of the story and do the actions together as a family.
2. Show a picture of a child folding their arms and explain to your child that we can be reverent at church each week to show Heavenly Father that we love him.

Activity

"Disappearing-Marshmallow Rolls," Friend, Apr. 2003, 31


You will need: eight large marshmallows, 1 tube (8 ounces/ 226g) refrigerator crescent-roll dough, a cube of butter/margarine, and 1/2 cup sugar mixed with 1/2 teaspoon cinnamon.

Ask a grown-up to melt the butter. Coat the marshmallows with the melted butter, then roll them in the cinnamon-sugar mixture. Enclose each marshmallow in a section of dough, pinching the dough to completely seal the marshmallow in.

Ask a grown-up to bake the rolls as directed on the tube.

FHE: The Plan of Salvation

Here was this weeks lesson on the Plan of Salvation. See the post before this for an explanation of why this is here. :) Also, does anyone know if you can just upload a word document to your blog? Then the whole lesson is in the right format with the bullets and everything and it looks a little bit neater (yes, I know, the anal neat freak is coming out in me . . . ).

The Plan of Salvation

Opening Song

"I Will Follow God's Plan for Me" Children's Songbook p. 164 - 165

Resources

January 2008 Friend Magazine "My Life is a Gift; My Life is a Plan" by Linda Christensen. Access by: www.friend.lds.org and click past issues, or copy and paste the following link:

http://www.lds.org/ldsorg/v/index.jsp?vgnextoid=21bc9fbee98db010VgnVCM1000004d82620aRCRD&locale=0&sourceId=427cf44804d17110VgnVCM100000176f620a____&hideNav=1

January 2008 Friend Magazine Coloring page Access by: www.friend.lds.org and click past issues, or use the following link:

http://lds.org/ldsorg/v/index.jsp?vgnextoid=21bc9fbee98db010VgnVCM1000004d82620aRCRD&locale=0&sourceId=eb6df44804d17110VgnVCM100000176f620a____&hideNav=1

Lesson Materials and Preparation

Print out the activity from the link above onto cardstock. Cut out each shape and use a hot glue gun to attach felt to the back of each shape so that the shapes can be used on a felt board

Print out a coloring page from the link above for each family member

A felt board

Pictures of the children as newborns

Pictures of family members who have passed away

A picture of the earth

A picture of Christ's second coming

Lesson (this LOOKS long all typed out, but it is really only 3 or 4 minutes max)

1. Hold up the figure that says "Premortal Life" and ask your child to say "Premortal Life". Briefly explain that our premortal life was when we did not have bodies and we lived with Heavenly Father and Jesus. One of the things that happened during our premortal life was that Heavenly Father presented a plan to us that allowed us to return to him, but he needed a helper to fulfill that plan. Satan and Jesus both volunteered to help. Satan wanted all the credit for himself, while Jesus said that Heavenly Father could have the credit. Satan convinced a lot of people that his plan was best and he was sent away. Allow someone to place the "Premortal Life" figure on the felt board.

2. Hold up the newborn pictures that you have gathered and talk about who is in the pictures. Then briefly talk about how we were all born and received a body here on the earth. Hold up the figure that says "Birth" and have everyone repeat it. Allow someone to place the "Birth" figure on the felt board where it belongs.

3. Hold up the picture of the earth and talk about what it is. Briefly explain that we are here on earth to receive bodies and learn all kinds of lessons like how to keep the commandments, how to have a testimony, and how to be a family. Allow someone to place the "Earth" figure on the correct place on the felt board.

4. Hold up the pictures of someone you know that has passed away and explain that everyone will pass away at one point while they are on the earth and then they will go to the spirit world. Place the "death" and "spirit world" pictures on the board where they belong.

5. Continue in a similar way until you have briefly explained each figure.

6. Bear your testimony of the plan of salvation.

Activity

Everyone colors their own copy of the coloring page and read the statement at the bottom together.

Family Home Evening with a Toddler

Does any of the following sound familiar?

Monday night rolls around and it is time for FHE. It seems to take all of your strength and imagination just to get everyone sitting down in the same room, and you still have prayers, music, and the lesson to get to. The song seems to go well since your child knows all the words to "I Am a Child of God" and lets you know it by screeching the words at the top of her little lungs. ( I really shouldn't say "little lungs", that seems to imply that its not very loud.) During the prayer your child actually bows her head and folds her arms, but she chants Jesus' name through the entire prayer. Then comes the lesson that you have worked so hard to prepare, we'll just leave that one to your imagination . . .

I don't know about some of you, but I for one have found it a little bit difficult to find toddler friendly family home evenings. When it was just Garrett and I, it was easy. We would just work our way through different manuals, listen to lectures on C.D., or read from the Ensign for our Family Home Evening lessons. Now that there is a little girl involved you need the visuals, the activities, and the fun finger plays and songs to go along with the lesson. So, I have been saving all of my family home evenings and organizing them by subjects into large manila envelope. I thought I would share the lessons that I am creating with all of you. I put the lesson into a word document each month anyway so that my kids can one day have access to all the stuff I put together, so I figured, why not post it here too? Now, I can hardly take credit for half of the stuff that I do. I get plenty of help from the Friend, the Ensign, from the new nursery manual, from all the primary manuals, and from many other websites that I will share as well. I simply take a little from each to get what I want in the end.

Some weeks I must say that my preparation feels like it goes to waste. Kenzie seems to be in her own world wanting to watch a show, grab the visuals and run, or try and engage us in a wrestling match; however, I know it will all pay off in the end. The First Presidency Message in April's Ensign by President Eyring was very inspirational:

"We have the greatest opportunity with the young. The best time to teach is early, while children are still immune to the temptations of their mortal enemy and long before the words of truth may be harder for them to hear in the noise of their personal struggles.

"A wise parent would never miss a chance to gather children together to learn of the doctrine of Jesus Christ. Such moments are so rare in comparison with the efforts of the enemy. For every hour the power of doctrine is introduced into a child’s life, there may be hundreds of hours of messages and images denying or ignoring the saving truths.

"The question should not be whether we are too tired to prepare to teach doctrine or whether it would be better to draw a child closer by just having fun or whether the child is beginning to think that we preach too much. The question must be, “With so little time and so few opportunities, what words of doctrine from me will fortify them against the attacks on their faith which are sure to come?” The words you speak today may be the ones they remember. And today will soon be gone.

"The years pass, we teach the doctrine the best we can, and yet some still do not respond. There is sorrow in that. But there is hope in the scriptural record of families. Think of Alma the Younger and Enos. In their moments of crisis, they remembered the words of their fathers, words of the doctrine of Jesus Christ (see Enos 1:1–4; Alma 36:16–19). It saved them. Your teaching of that sacred doctrine will be remembered."

While it may feel like a roller coaster now and all that you feel is happening is that you're regurgitating a lesson on a topic that you already know inside out, you will be surprised what will sink in. Just a few weeks ago we were have a lesson on Joseph Smith and the first vision. That particular night was quite frustrating. I had attached several figures to popsicle sticks in order to reenact the first vision. All Kenzie wanted to do was snatch the sticks away from Garrett and I and try to pull them apart (I had used bright blue tape as an adhesive and she was quite intrigued by it). The lesson felt rushed and confused and Garrett and I just sighed in relief when it was all over. I was shocked this week when I was putting the figures and the other pictures from the lesson away to have Kenzie walk up and point at the pictures and say "Prophet Joseph" loud and clear . . .