The Art of Homemaking: Family Home Evening

I love family home evening but if you saw what our family home evenings look like you'd probably wonder why the heck why. When Sarah was a toddler we began doing family home evening. Lessons were simple back then, usually just talking about a picture of a scripture story.  Her favorite was the Good Samaritan or "owie" as she called it. For weeks after that lesson, no matter what we talked about in family home evening, she would pull the picture book away from us and search until she found "owie" and want to hear the story again.

It was a few years after that, I think Henry was a baby, when we were having another family home evening. It was getting more difficult to gear a lesson two small children with differing attention spans and activity levels. But the lesson was going comparatively well and must have been reverent enough for me to have a strong spiritual impression. While I watched Justin and the kids talk together, the words so clearly entered my heart of "This. This is what you need to keep doing."

We keep doing. Some FHE lessons have been great. A few have ended with banishing a child or two to bed. Most have been a struggle to keep everyone out of others' personal space. Let's be honest, a large part of our energy is keeping each child sitting up. I've had to reflect on that witness more than once for the courage and patience to keep going.

You know, I just realized how instructional it was of the Spirit to testify to me that I was doing the right thing during an ordinary, not especially profound family home evening. The standard was set mercifully realistic that night. All I need to strive for is the simple and sincere family nights like we had that night. I can do that.

These coloring pages are from a FHE a few months ago. We've been studying The Proclamation on the Family this year and this night's lesson was about the temple. I had each child write down three years. The first was the year that they would turn 12 and be able to go to the temple and do baptisms for the dead. The next year was when they turned 18 or 19 years old and would be able to go to the temple in preparation for a mission. The third date is the year that James turns 18. 2034 is the earliest year that the six of us can be together inside the temple. It's our family goal: At the door in 2034.

I can testify that family home evening isn't just the prophet's program but the Lord's because the Spirit told me so. But since then, I can testify that family home evening is good for my family and will become more vital as my children grow and the influence of the world grows in their lives. I can keep doing.