Catching Up....

I teach Primary at church, it's like Sunday School. The kids are six years old and I really enjoy teaching them. I try to keep things interesting because it makes it fun and keeps them quite. I am also thinking it helps the kids to remember the lessons.

Here are some ideas I used around Valentines Day.

First: this was my gift to the kids. It is a bag topper stapled to a sandwich baggie. You could fill the baggy with anything. I chose this big heart for the message, but one of the kids is allergic to all types of sugars and he had to have pretzels in his. The clipart of the Savior was found at sugardoodle.net and the blue heart is a Microsoft word clipart image.


Second: Lessons are best when kids can participate. I had several "case scenarios" that the kids had to tell me if they were good choices or bad choices. I typed the red numbers in Microsoft Word and used a circle punch to cut them out. Laminate, if possible, and place on a tray. Put a cookie on top of each number. The kids select a cookie and answer the question that corresponds to the number underneath the cookie they chose. You could use graham crackers or even felt cookies like these. This idea would also work well for Family Home Evening.

Oreo Chocolate Bark

I discovered a new blogger this week! It's Leigh from Your Home Based Mom. She has an amazing collection of recipes including: Oreo Chocolate Bark. I knew it would be a simple enough Christmas treat that I could make with the kiddos. How do YOU eat an Oreo? Well, here is one way... and it's not holding back on taste or calories!

After our FHE (please read more about that in the next paragraph) we followed Leigh's recipe. (We used chocolate melts, white and milk chocolate, AND the peanut butter is a must!) We then placed our pan of yumminess in the fridge and read two chapters out of The Titan's Curse while it hardened back up. The kids cannot believe their eyes: chocolate, more chocolate, peanut butter and Oreo cookies! I was going to resist a piece, after all running (yep, I said running) on the treadmill today was HARD and it wasn't going to be for nothing! Nope it was for a 1" somewhat squarish piece of Oreo Chocolate Bark. It was very, very good and we're going to have to share some LOVE. Don't you wish you were our neighbor?

Speaking of love, that was the theme of our FHE tonight. I read the chapter on Love in the book A Christmas Treasury for Latter-day Saint Families. These quotes are especially nice to ponder:

"Christmas is more than trees and twinkling lights, more than toys and gifts and baubles of a hundred varieties. It is love. It is the love of the Son of God for all mankind. It reaches beyond our power to comprehend. It is magnificent and beautiful." - President Gordon B. Hinckley

"One of the remarkable qualities about God's love for us is that not only do we experience it as validating and affirming, but it also produces growth and change in us. It literally moves us forward, toward Him and our own eventual exaltation. It is a sculpting, correcting, and purposeful kind of love." - Virginia Pearce

We talked about how love is one of Jesus Christ's characteristics and we are asked to love others as he does. Each day this week we are writing down a reason we love each other and placing that slip of paper in the appropriate family member's stocking. Next week we will read them as a family. Trying to stir up some love and create some bonding.

Preparing for General Conference

I am really looking forward to the spiritual nourishment of General Conference. I saw something on SugarDoodle.net that I thought would be a great way to have my kids participate more fully in General Conference. It should also help them remember the names and faces of the Twelve Apostles. Have you seen this? Now, if only I could find my printer in this mess...