General Conference Train!

"General conference is a semiannual gathering of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (Mormon). During general conference weekend, Church members and others who are interested gather worldwide in a series of two-hour sessions to receive inspiration and instruction from Church leaders."

from: lds.org

Want to watch General Conference?

(October 3rd and 4th)

Click HERE. 

General Conference has become such a special, sacred time for me.

I am amazed, every year, at how perfectly the Lord answers my prayers and inspires me through the words of His modern-day prophets.

We started this tradition several years ago, and have continued it each Conference. My kids love it, and it is a very simple way to help them hear what is being talked about.

General Conference Train!

First, I cut out rectangles from some different scrapbook papers. Then I cut out a bunch of small circles out of black paper for the wheels. I printed several pictures of each of 9 topics often discussed in General Conference and glued the wheels and pictures onto the rectangles. And those are the trains!

 When the kids hear one mentioned, they get a train car that has that picture on it and put it up on our wall using sticky-tack. 

The purpose of this is NOT to get the kids to sit completely still during Conference. I don't think that's even possible with little ones---but it has worked very well in getting them to hear what is being said. They don't listen to every word, but often while they are playing quietly (and NOT so quietly) they will hear a word that sounds familiar and they get so excited to put a train on the wall! 

I figure that's a step in the right direction. :)

They are constantly adding to the train during each session of Conference, and it gets very long. My kids LOVE trains--so a constantly expanding train is perfect for them. You could also do leaves on a tree, fish in the sea, stars in the sky, petals on a flower, or whatever your children are interested in. :)

The 9 topics are:

1. Jesus Christ

2. Joseph Smith

3. Temples

4. Baptism

5. Prayer

6. Prophets - Thomas S. Monson

7. Family 

8. Scriptures - Bible, Book of Mormon

9. Missionary Work

I've also created several blank trains for when the kids hear another topic they recognize and want to add to the train.

If you'd like a copy of these pictures, I'm happy to forward them at no cost. Just email me:

littlefamilyfun@gmail.com

I have them both in black & white and in color, so I'll send both. Included are 5-6 pictures of each of the 9 topics (note: for the topic: Family, I just used a picture of our family. I'll take that one out so you can add a picture of your own family.)  AND all 15 pictures of the Prophet & Apostles as a bonus. :)

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Power & Strength

I have been thinking about how amazing it is that through the Lord we can accomplish anything.

So many times in our lives, we tell ourselves that we can't do something. We limit ourselves.

"I can't do this."

"I can't handle this."

"I can't ____."

But our Heavenly Father loves us and wants us to succeed! 

When we turn to our loving Father in Heaven, 

pray and ask for His help, He will give us power and strength.

Instead of facing our challenges with discouragement,

we can face our challenges with a smile and say, 

"I can do this!"

Because with God, ALL things are possible.

Beloved of the Lord

I love this quote by Elder Hales. You can find the full talk HERE.

I have felt the love of God in my life so much recently. 

I have felt His hand guiding me, encouraging me, and strengthening me.

And what I have felt is just a glimpse.....

I'm so grateful.

Children's Singing Time Game: Tic Tac Toe!

I was in charge of our Primary Singing time at church a few weeks ago and decided to play a simple game of tic-tac-toe to help us practice a song. It was so easy to put together, the kids had fun, and we got a good practice on one of my favorite songs!

Supplies:

• Construction paper in Red and Blue
• Scissors
• Tape
• Chalk

Prep Work:

1. Draw an X on a piece of red construction paper. Cut it out and trace 5 more onto more red paper.
2. Draw an O on a piece of blue construction paper and do the same thing.
3. After they're all cut out, put them in a bag with some tape and chalk and you're all ready to go!

Singing Time!

I wanted to practice the song, "My Heavenly Father Loves Me" (Children's Songbook, pg.   ). I think kids learn songs well when they sing them over and over. This game was a way to sing the song over and over and not get bored because we had a fun game going on at the same time!

First, I drew a tic-tac-toe grid on the chalkboard, and taped up the X's on one side of it, and the O's on the other side. 

I split the kids into 2 groups: Team X and Team O.

Here's how it worked with the younger kids 

(Jr. Primary, ages 3-8).

The younger kids don't know this song very well, and the song is kind of long, so I chose to break it up into parts. I sang the first 1-2 lines of the song, and then had Team X repeat those lines. Then I did the same thing with Team O. So the kids got to hear and/or sing the same line 4 times. Repetition is key. :)

After both teams heard and sang that line, then I chose 1 person from each team to come up and place an X and O on the board. Then we went onto the next line, and so on.

It took about 4-6 turns before one of the teams had won. At the end we sang the song all the way through.

We even had enough time to play another round!

*Note: A few of the younger kids are a little bit more sensitive to winning and losing, so I made sure to have each team turn to the other and say "good job" to show how to be a good sport. :) Luckily for us, both teams each won a round so everyone was happy. 

Here's how it worked with the older kids 

(Sr. Primary, ages 8-11)

The older kids know this song pretty well. They even know the second verse!

So instead of the repetition, I played a fill in the blank game with each team.

I went through the song in order and said a line to the song. Wherever I stopped the line, they had to tell me what the next word was. 

For example,

"Whenever I hear the song of a _______,"

(the answer is BIRD)

After each team got a chance to fill in a blank, I chose 1 person from each team to come put an X and O on the board. Then I did it all again.

When the game ended, we sang the whole song all the way through. :)

Again, we had enough time to play another round, and AGAIN, both teams each won one round.

Hooray for Singing Time!

♫

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FHE: Be a good example

Here is a quick and easy Family Home Evening lesson you can whip up in a snap.

We live far away from Grandparents so we going to try to facetime them once a month and have an FHE together. We did this one last week and it was a success!

(This would also be a fun and easy Primary or Nursery lesson.)

Supplies:

• 1-2 pieces of yellow construction paper
• 1 piece of orange construction paper
• scissors
• marker
• tape

Prep Work:

1. Cut strips out of the yellow paper.
2. Cut a big circle out of the orange paper.

3. On the orange circle, write these words from the scripture Matthew 5:16: "Let your light so shine!"

Lesson Time!

1. With your family, read Matthew 5:16 (You can even work on memorizing it if you want!)
2. Tape up the orange circle on the wall.
3. Hand each person 1 or 2 yellow paper strips and have them each think of ways they can let their light shine, and be a good example of Christ to others.
4. Then one by one, tape the yellow strips on the wall all around the orange circle:

5. Ask your children what they see now. Answer: The SUN! Talk about how when we do good things and try to be a good example, it shines like the sun. Other people will notice it and will be blessed as we live as our Heavenly Father and Savior want us to. And we will be happy. :)

Do you like this idea?

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Daily Change

I love the message of this video so much, I just had to share it!
I know that our lives have a much greater purpose than we realize.
Though we are not perfect, through our Savior, Jesus Christ, we can change and become better than we are now.
It's a subtle change, that comes gradually through praying to our Father in Heaven, studying the word of God, and seeking for truth and light in our lives DAILY.

If you are seeking for truth and light for your family, I invite you to look here:
What do Mormons believe?

Moments That Matter Most

This video is so inspiring.

I have been feeling, lately, the importance of giving more time and attention to the things that matter most to me --- i.e., my children, my family.

Each moment spent with our loved ones--big and small--matter and are such a blessing.

:)

Teaching Family Values

This is the 2nd activity in our "Family Unity" theme. We did this for Family Home Evening to talk about how these core values can strengthen our family. 

These 9 values come from "The Family: A Proclamation to the World" where it states:

"Happiness in family life is most likely to be achieved when founded upon the teachings of the Lord Jesus Christ. Successful marriages and families are established and maintained on principles of faith, prayer, repentance, forgiveness, respect, love, compassion, work, and wholesome recreational activities."

Prep Work:

• Cut a white piece of paper (or cardstock) into 6 rectangles. On each rectangle, write each letter of the word FAMILY.
• Cut out 9 big triangles from different colors of construction paper. On each one, write each of the 9 values mentioned in the paragraph above: faith, prayer, repentance, forgiveness, respect, love, compassion, work, and wholesome recreational activities.

Here's what you do:

• Sit down with your family and lay out all the papers you made. Tell them we are going to build a house. Have them put the letter rectangles in order to spell "family" (3 letters on top, 3 on bottom).
• Then tell them there are 9 different roofs for the house that can help the house be strong---with words of things we can do to help our family be strong.
• Have a child choose one roof at a time and put it on the house and talk about how your family can develop that value. For example: "What are some ways we can show that we LOVE each other?" 

•  Do this with all the values. OR you can focus on 1 value each week or each month--and make 1 goal as a family for how you can implement that value into your lives.  

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Touching the Hearts of Our Youth

What Matters Most

Faith in Times of Weakness

I have had a bit of a rough day today. I have been impatient and stressed with my children and have felt the enormity of my weaknesses as a mother. I prayed fervently to my Father in Heaven to help me and tonight I came across this video -- a message which filled my heart with joy and hope. I have faith in eternal things. I know God lives and is aware of my personal struggles and weaknesses. I know He can and will give me strength in the face of all of life's challenges.

A Father Indeed

Life.

Happy Mother's Day!

I was trying to find the perfect quote about Motherhood to share this Mother's Day, but after a horribly imperfect day as a mother, everything I read just made me feel like a big fat failure. 

Then I saw this video, and I cried. 

I cried tears of sorrow for my endless weaknesses, mistakes and imperfections as a mother.

But mostly I cried tears of joy and hope in remembering that I am not alone--that with the Lord's help, I can do this. 

Bad days (like today) remind me that I cannot do this on my own --- I'm too impatient, too selfish, too exhuasted, too clueless. But my loving Father in Heaven already knows that and can strengthen me where I'm weak. I will rely on Him forever.

Happy Mother's Day!

No one perfect way...

(Quote from THIS talk.)

File Folder Games: Sundays

Sundays are special because we get to go to church and learn from the scriptures.

And we can also learn at HOME! 

You can use File-Folder Games as a fun way to teach your children about the scriptures and faith-building principles.

Supplies:

• File Folders
• Pictures of scriptures stories (You can use printables, pictures cut out of church magazines, or anything else you think might work! The printed ones I have below were ones I printed & colored appx. 13 years ago as part of a goal I had in my Young Women's program to make fun Family Home Evening games for my future family! My hard work paid off!)
• Scissors
• Glue or tape
• Marker

Here's what you do:

• Create a file-folder game using whatever pictures you were able to find. Your kids can play with these independently, or you can have a little lesson to go along with it. 
•  Here are some examples:

Bible Picture Match-up:

People in the Bible Match-up:

Sailing to the Promised Land Puzzle:

Noah's Ark Matching:

Book of Mormon Matching:

(what's the Book of Mormon? Click here.)

Pass-Along Card Matching:

Teaching children about the Resurrection

Here's a simple way to teach about the Resurrection of Jesus Christ to young children:

Supplies:

• A picture of Jesus after he was resurrected. (the picture above comes from the Gospel Art Book)
• A glove

Here's how to teach::

1. (Put the glove on your hand) - Many years ago, Jesus lived on the Earth. He taught us how to love and obey, and he made it possible for us to someday return to live with our Heavenly Father again.
2. (Take the glove off your hand) - When Jesus died, his spirit left his body. His body stayed on the Earth like this glove, and His Spirit went up to Heaven. 
3. After 3 days, Jesus was resurrected! His spirit came back to His body (Put the glove back on your hand), and it would never be separated again.
4. Jesus Christ is our Savior and Redeemer. He made it possible for us all to be resurrected. When we die, our spirit will leave our body. But someday we will be resurrected and our spirits will return to our bodies. If we obey God's commandments, we can live with Him again and be together with our family forever.
5. (Bear your personal testimony of Jesus Christ and the Resurrection).

I love to teach my children about the Savior. Life is hard. Where will they find hope when they face heartache & death of loved ones? -- Happiness when they face adversity & despair? -- Peace when they face sorrow & confusion? In all of these moments of my life, I have found true hope, happiness, and peace in my Savior, Jesus Christ. I know He lives and that death is not the end. I want my children to know this too.

Learn more about our beliefs in the Savior:

Facebook.com/Mormon

Youtube.com/Mormon

Mormon.org

General Conference Activities

"General conference is a semiannual gathering of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. During general conference weekend, Church members and others who are interested gather worldwide in a series of two-hour sessions to receive inspiration and instruction from Church leaders."

from: lds.org

General Conference is coming up (March 31-April 1) and I am very excited! 

It can be difficult for little ones to sit still for so long. Here are some ideas that can help:

General Conference Train!

(For details, click HERE!)

And:

General Conference Activity Bags!

(For details, click HERE!)

Prayer

It's funny how all through my 3rd pregnancy I felt fairly confident about bringing another child into our home. But the first night in the hospital after I had baby #3, I began to feel a small amount of panic and fear about if and how I was going to be able to be a good mother to 3 kids. I turned to the scriptures for comfort and came across a simple yet profound statement by the prophet Moses, 

"I will not cease to call upon God . . ." (Moses 1:18) 

In that moment I felt so strongly that this was my answer, and determined that this would become my mission statement as a mother. I am grateful for the feelings of inadequacy that I often have as a mother. It's these feelings that remind me to turn to the Lord for help, strength, patience, and guidance, which I inevitably receive in abundance. 

And knowing how inadequate I am, 

"I will not cease to call upon God."

Learning Binder

I've been wanting to create a Learning Board to learn and review basic things with the boys, but realized that in our small and humble home, I didn't have a good place to put it! So, I came up with a more sleek but similar idea:

A Learning Binder!

It is a simple 1/2 inch binder with sheet protectors to hold all of the things I want to review with the boys for that week. After looking on the internet at different board ideas, I made a list of the things I thought were most important and fun for my boys right now. And here they are (also refer to the pictures below):

1. Gospel Learning -- I took pages out of The Friend magazines we have accumulated. (a magazine for children published by the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints) You can also print things from the magazines. Click here. Each week we have a story or 2 that we will read and talk about each day. Teaching my children to have faith in Jesus Christ and His Restored Gospel is important to me, and this is a simple and fun way to do it each day! 

2. Letter of the Week -- LM has been very interested in writing letters lately, so with the letter of the week he gets to practice writing that letter in upper and lower case. LB has some Leap Frog fridge magnets of the alphabet that sing and say what letters they are. So he gets to play with that while we review the week's letter!

3. Shape of the Week -- We have a shape that I put in a sheet protector and then the boys look at the page of shapes I made (by cutting up flashcards) to find that shape!

4. Color of the Week -- Similar to the shape, I put a piece of construction paper of the color of the week in a sheet protector and the boys look at the page of colors (made from construction paper) to find that color.

5. Animal of the Week -- This is a fun way to help LB learn to copy sounds. We pretend to be the animal by acting it out and making the sound it makes. 

6. Sight Words -- This is a fun way to get LM started with reading. I choose 5 sight words for the week and each day LM learns a new one. He then uses the word page I created to find the word of the day. At the end of the week, I made word searches for him to search for the 5 words he learned that week.

7. Worksheets -- I have several preschool workbooks that I bought at the dollar store that cover different concepts. So each week, I tear out a few pages and put them in sheet protectors. We review the worksheets together using a dry-erase marker.

8. Weather -- I made a chart for the week (Mon-Fri) for us to post what the weather is like for the week. The weather pictures I found in the Microsoft Word clip-art folder. I printed them off, laminated them, and put them in a pencil pouch.

9. Calendar -- LM is very interested in knowing what day it is and how many days until something, so I put a calendar in the binder to review with him each day. It was just a calendar I got free somewhere. :)

Here are the pictures of all the things I described above:

Not pictured:

• We start our Learning Time by singing a song from the Primary Children's Songbook.
• We end our Learning Time with a special activity -- a craft, learning activity, etc. (which I post on the blog)

And that is all there is!

Here are a few reasons I've loved it so far:

• It's easy to create. Like I described above, I mostly used things I already had -- Church magazines, flashcards, construction paper, workbooks. The binder is simply a place to put all these things together.

• It's quick to change things out. On Monday mornings, I take the old stuff out of the binder and put in the new week's stuff. This only takes about 5 minutes. 

• I'm trying to do it in the morning before the day gets to hectic and I get too tired. It usually takes about 30 minutes or less for us to sit down and go through the binder.

• And best of all, the boys LOVE it!! LM starts kindergarten next year, and has several friends that are in school. He calls this his school and gets so excited when I say it's time for school! (I love that enthusiasm!)