Sunday, October 19, 2008

Repenting FHE Slacker

I have to admit that I have not been the best at putting on formal Family Home Evenings (FHE). When we first were married, we were together on Monday nights and read scriptures together in the mornings. Now that we have kids, our FHEs were just doing our normal day-to-day activities on Monday night. I guess I had the same philosophy as my parents had - we're all home together doing something and that is what counts - whether it was yardwork, homework or eating dinner.

Now that Cadence is getting older, I want to be better at having FHE's with a prayer, gospel lesson, a fun activity and a treat, of course!

Last week we started our new FHEs. I want to make these fun candy apples and designed a lesson around that theme. We read from Cadence's Book of Mormon reader about the tree of life and the fruit found thereon it. Then we painted pictures of a tree with fruit. Following that, we dipped mini-caramel apples. I got the idea from my favorite blog, Little Birdie Secrets, who got it from Family Fun magazine. Though messy and not going the way I planned it to go, it was still fun. Chris used a melonballer to get out chunks of apples. Cadence and I dipped them in melted caramel and rolled them in toppings - sugar/cinnamon mix, sprinkles, coconut, and these round little candies. Let's just say I love the taste of caramel and apple!!! Yummy!
I recommend that if you try this activity, you follow the directions of either of the two websites. If you are wanting to use caramel, use the caramel sheets (like on Little Birdie Secrets)
instead of melting the cubes of caramel. It was messy, sticky, hot (Cadence got slighty burned playing in it) and I had to keep reheating it to make it stick to the apple. If you want to do chocolate, butterscotch or peanutbutter chips, follow Family Fun.

Next, we were going to play a rousing game of Candyland. That is Cadence's favorite game at the moment, but we were busy cleaning up and getting de-sticky-fied.

The evening was fun and I look forward to doing more repenting from being an FHE slacker.

4 comments:

Stephanie said...

I have recently started really pushing FHE at our house too. (This is Peanut... BTW) It is TOTALLY my favorite part of my week. I look forward to it all week long. I'm sure it's not always going to be as easy as it is now (the kids love it too) but I figure if I start young then when they get old and rebellious I might have a prayer of keeping it going. Anyway, I found a blog with great FHE ideas (let's face it, the hardest part of this whole thing is keeping the kids entertained). Check out http://fheplanner.blogspot.com/
They have really good ideas and update pretty regularly.

Katey said...

What a good little mom you are! I'm so proud :)

Cadence has the most beautiful little eyes in the last picture. I can't get over just how adorable she is!

Brooke said...

you are such a cute mom. I have always been an FHE slacker so I admire your diligence!

highdeekay said...

I love the new nursery manual at lds.org. I love that I can print pictures for coloring as well as the ones that are part of the lesson. It is so much easier to think of lessons that work with toddler development. I HIGHLY suggest it. If you can't find it, look under primary.

I may have to try the caramel apples. I love the taste of the two together too!