Until I came across this post. Thanks, Lindsey! I totally hijacked the idea and set it into motion tonight at our Family Home Evening. This idea really made things easy for me, kind of like a template. Bob was so happy to finally be tackling this, that of course he agreed to a test drive.
Honestly, my expectations weren't too high. We've been focusing on studying the life of Christ and the scriptures, and "fun games" (their words) have been few and far between lately. Trying to find a suitable time balance between learning and having fun. But I digress...so my expectations weren't too high. In fact, I foresaw much weeping and wailing and gnashing of teeth.
But man, I was wrong, and it was awesome! The kids really got into the spirit of things. Hannah promptly came up with Moses 7:18 for our guiding scripture at the top, which we decided was much more appropriate than any of my suggestions. Apparently, she's picking up all sorts of things in seminary this year, since I don't think we've looked at this particular scripture lately as a family.
Then, we started looking at attributes for our acrostic (the letters of our last name). Everybody got into this one. Unfortunately for Sariah, I could not figure out how to work "hippopotamus" in for the H. Sometimes it's rough being 4 years old. But hey, she knows what the letter H is for, right? Seriously, though, Bob and I were so pleased with the kids' suggestions. They know more about the gospel than we give them credit for.
And voila! we have a win for FHE. Everyone was happy. I know, it's unheard of.
Ok, so tonight I did spend a bunch of time prettifying the whole affair, and adding some scripture references. With teens and toddlers in the same household, I wanted our mission statement to be simple, but to have some depth to it for the older ones to think on; hence, the scripture references. And I wanted things to be cutesy enough to hang on the wall and not be ashamed of it.
Truth be told, I'm pretty excited about it!
I love it! It is beautiful too!
ReplyDeleteThat is beautiful. I think it is amazing when our children show us what they know. They are so very smart aren't they?! Thanks for sharing.
ReplyDeleteIsn't family night wonderful? I absolutely love the values your family picked. Hooray for crossing something off your to-do list! (If it's anything like mine, that's a huge accomplishment.)
ReplyDeleteOh, and maybe your daughter can have her own little copy with sayings like "A happy hippopotamus leaves hateful things unsaid" (although that might defeat the purpose of a "family" product, so never mind).
ReplyDeleteWhat a great mission statement! Thanks for sharing it, and how excited your family was to work on it.
ReplyDeleteThat is REALLY excellent! I love it!
ReplyDeleteThis is fabulous! Maybe in a few years we can do this too ... for now, they'll have to stick with the one Doc and I made up: "We can do hard things!" & "Can't have fun till the work is done!"
ReplyDeleteWell, when you put it that way, a family mission statement looks a lot more possible. Even for my crazy kids. Yours is lovely. Thanks for sharing it with us.
ReplyDeleteThis is awesome and beautiful... Zimbelman may be challenge... trying to incorporate a Zebra and all...
ReplyDeleteWow! That turned out great!
ReplyDelete