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Daddy is in his recliner rocking back and forth, trying to get his lil’ man to sleep while feeding him a bottle, but falls asleep himself.  I usually have to wake him up to take Cole from his arms so I can put him down for naps in the crib.

Dave works so hard for our family during the week, I figure he deserves a nice long nap on the “Day of Rest.”

I love him….

Hannah has insisted for the past few months that she is too old for afternoon naps like her younger other and sister, so she has “quiet time.”  It consists of her doing various activities that can invite the Spirit and help her remember why this day is so special.  She loves to color, draw, write….anything artistic.  She works on accomplishing her goals in the Faith in God book. And if her sister is persistent enough with her pleadings, Hannah will read to her.  Hannah is a great storyteller. She brings the words in any book to life when she reads to her brother and sister.

I swear, I put Josie to bed for naps one minute, and the next I’m hearing her whisper to Hannah from her top bunk of their bunk beds, “Hannah will you read a story to me?”  And Hannah tells her to come down onto her bed and they snuggle up to each other under Hannah’s blanket and the reading begins.  I love to sneak peeks into their room after a half hour or so because what I find is there faces about 3 inches from each other, fast asleep.  My angels….my sweet, beautiful daughters.

Cole loves to play with Hannah and Josie’s plush toys…I often put one in his crib with him when he is sleeping.  As he has gotten older, he’s started to reach for things.  His smiles are still toothless, but beautiful.  He brings a whole new light to our family.  And we feel so sacredly blessed to be his parents.

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It all started with two loaves of banana bread that turned out perfectly!

We ate almost the whole first loaf for breakfast. My plan was to take the second loaf to our church social that evening – I was so excited! Beautiful and delicious banana bread isn’t easy for me, and having it done ahead of time was miraculous.

Later that morning, I was working intently on a very important document on my computer when my five year old came and asked if he could have some more banana bread.

I uttered the fatal words, “Sure, just a second,” fully intending to finish quickly. We all know where good intentions lead! Mine led to a sweet voice at my elbow, “Look, Mom!”

I turned and gasped. “You’ve ruined my banana bread!”

As I grabbed what was left of the banana bread from his hopeful hands, my son’s face crumbled before my eyes, and he ran to hide in the pantry.

Turning to take my banana bread – my now mutilated banana bread — to the counter, a poster on the fridge caught my eye. It was a poster I made with a picture of this same little boy hiding behind a glass of spilled milk – a poster I made to remind me of President Thomas S. Monson’s counsel:

“Never let a problem to be solved become more important than a person to be loved.”1

Sobs were coming from the pantry, and I began to sob, too. I had let my anger over my “beautiful” banana bread – my temporal, temporary banana bread — become more important than my tender-hearted boy!

I knelt with him in the pantry, and apologized with all my heart.

“I love you more than banana bread!” I tried to reassure him – hard to do when a little one’s heart is breaking. Taking a deep breath, I asked, “What can we do to fix it?”

He looked up, hope returning to his eyes. “Well, we could…,” and he started listing ideas.

Going back to the banana bread together, I realized there was actually a lot left, despite the great abyss he had scooped from the middle. We got a knife, and a pretty bowl, and began to cut it into bite-sized chunks, like store samples. The bowl was soon filled, and thankfully, feelings were on the mend.

No one at that church social will remember that dish of banana bread.

Except for me – I’m trying to be sure that I never forget it!

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We have a family tradition that started because I needed one day of the week to be a no-brainer when I was planning menus.  One day a couple years ago, I decided that Fridays would be pizza nights at our house.  We like to make pizza together, and since not all of our kids have adventurous taste buds yet, we usually make more than one kind each time.

This night, we each made our own mini-pizzas.  I gave the kids a ball of dough and they helped roll it out and loaded up their own pizza with toppings.

After dinner, clean up is quick (one of the bonuses of pizza night!) and then we either play games or hunker down in the family room to watch a movie together.  This tradition started just because I was trying to simply our life and has become something everyone looks forward to each week.

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In the video, you will see scenes of elderly people in care centers who are worshiping together. In many areas, local LDS Church members assist in providing church meetings for residents of the centers and their loved ones. It’s a touching thing to worship in this context, where the simple principles of the gospel are shared with truly childlike people.

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“True greatness…always requires regular, consistent, small, and sometimes ordinary and mundane steps over a long period of time.”  –Howard W. Hunter

A “house of order,” isn’t that what we all want and hope for? It is a righteous desire of mine but am continually challenged to find more effective and creative ways to keep order in our home with five kids and a busy life. This post is not so much about “chores” as it is about finding “tools” that help manage our home with greater efficiency and consequently with greater order. With order in the home, comes more love, more understanding, more service, more kindness and more needed balance.  I have found one tool that has really helped our big family.

When I hear an idea about parenting or motherhood that I like and seems to bring balance into a busy family life,  I hold on to it, massage it and if it fits…then I implement what fits in our home. Chores are something that are not necessarily my favorite to implement, but I feel they are essential nonetheless. In our house, chores play a big part of our daily life and help bring order and happiness to our home, in addition to providing valuable opportunities to teach important life lessons.  Teaching the children responsibility, self discipline, the value of joy after having accomplished a task and eventually learning the principle of self governing, is paramount. Since my family is still relatively young, I am hesitant to portray too much confidence in this arena because the verdict is still (way) out on our family…regardless that does not stop me from trying to succeed and love hearing about other families strategies as well.

I grew up with lots of brothers and sisters and much was expected of us in our family to keep “order.” For a period of my youth we lived in Elvis Presley’s drummers old house, down the mountain from Lake Tahoe. We had a big house, 2 acres of land, horses, cows, a garden, dog, cat and LOTS of grass. My mother knows how to work harder than any man or woman I know. I have vivid memories in the sweltering heat raking dirt and rocks for hours on end. As a kid, I thought she was just plain mean, working us nearly to death (or so I thought), but later in life I learned she loved us greatly and was teaching us a very important principle of responsibility and success. I also learned to appreciate the value of working together as a family and serving those that I loved. (see Mosiah 4:14-15)

In my family we have designed a specific chore system that works great for us however is not for everyone. I highly encourage every family to have some sort of consistency with their house hold responsibilities. To find the right ebb and flow requires some creativity and a great deal of commitment.

An old favorite author/professor PhD Glen Latham had a philosophy that I have long since adopted, it is the idea of letting your children “self instruct” (as much as possible) and “do not tell them things they already know.” We have implemented this strategy in several ways, one of which  has been particularly effective.  With five children, sometimes communication becomes easily taxed. With the hustle and bustle after school, I so often make the mistake of saying something to one child… thinking that because I can see the other children in my peripheral, they heard it also…that is rarely the case.  SO to eliminate much of the after school confusion, scheduling, and expectations we simplified things and came up with our “Dailies” (term used regularly in the film business). [See samples below.]

After the initial after school reunion with hugs, kisses, snuggles and visits about their day, and a snack to appease their starving little tummies, I refer them to their “Dailies” where it is expressed in bullet form each child’s responsibilities. (Of course you have to use common sense and be accommodating on occasion especially with our oldest son who is increasingly being assigned more time consuming homework.) At the bottom of our “Dailies,” I address what Mom and Dad are doing and if there is anything they need to be aware of as it pertains to Mom and Dad. We have one child in particular that really protests when we “go out” and does not like surprises, he would like us all to be together all the time and do nothing other than have den parties with him, so this gives him ample warning so he can emotionally prepare himself for our temporary separation.

Self-governing is a great long-term goal and will eventually come… until then, this has been a great tool in implementing the consistency and flow of household responsibilities. Dr. Latham was also a big believer of recording data and tracking progress and provide positive reinforcement. For people who love lists, this is a great system. I love lists and so do my kids, it is very satisfying to track progress and scratch things off my list when we have succeeded. Also by way of reward I will use this as an opportunity to recognize something special/helpful they have done for our family, they love this public acknowledgment. There are so many underlying blessings embedded within this structure.

I can not say enough how helpful these “Dailies” have been in creating a house of order.  Instead of me repeating five different times what our afternoon plans are or what my expectations are for each of the children, I simply remove the unnecessarily language and defer them to their “Dailies,” then all that energy can be saved to talk about more enjoyable things. Never again will a child of mine say… ” but Mom…I didn’t know” or ” you did not tell me that!” This small and simple thing has yielded great dividends!

A home with order, is a home of peace and happiness. A home where everyone does their part is easy… not always in execution but in results. A home where children are learning responsibility and self governing tools, is hopeful.  Life where there is progress, is rewarding. This is defiantly one tool we will stick with!

“An important element of doing the best we can as parents is to provide loving but firm discipline. If we do not discipline our children, society may do it in a way that is not to our liking or our children’s. Part of disciplining children is to teach them to work. President Gordon B. Hinckley has said: ‘One of the greatest values . . . is the virtue of honest work. Knowledge without labor is profitless. Knowledge with labor is genius’ (Teachings of Gordon B. Hinckley [1997], 704).” – James E. Faust, “Dear Are the Sheep That Have Wandered,” Ensign, May 2003

“Our house is to be a house of order. “To every thing there is a season, and a time to every purpose under the heaven” (Eccl. 3:1). Such is true in our lives. Let us provide time for family, time for work, time for study, time for service, time for recreation, time for self—but above all, time for Christ…Then our house will be a house of order.” – Thomas S. Monson

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Saturday is a special day at our house. My kids call it “the day Dad stays home from work to play” day.

We try to get out every Saturday for a family activity.

Sometimes we go hiking. These pictures were taken while hiking in Yosemite, CA last summer.

My kids are always looking for bugs and animals to catch while on the trail. One time, my daughter caught a lizard.

Another favorite place to go on a Saturday is the beach. Here is my husband doing his best Indiana Jones whip crack with a piece of kelp he found on the beach.

What a find!

Babies love the beach.

We always seem to amuse the locals.

Sometimes, we go to museums. In these pictures we were visiting the California Academy of Sciences. It is a very kid-friendly museum. I cannot recommend taking a young family to a King Tut exhibit or a fine art museum. When we tried to expose our children to culture and art, my four year old daughter kept exclaiming loudly, “This is soooooo boring.” while rolling her eyes. So, we stick to museums that are geared to the 8 and under crowd now. Maybe we’ll try the fine art museums again in a few years.

Other Saturdays, we stay home and craft. My husband is a great crafter. He made stained glass hearts and flowers for all of his girls on Valentines Day. My daughters love to paint.

We love mini trips together as a family. We pack picnic lunches or find local foods to try. We try to keep a flexible agenda in case we find something cool along the way that looks even better than what we had planned. We always keep a sturdy stroller, sweatshirts and diapers in the car because we never know where the fun will take us!

Family trips can be a lot of work for parents, but my husband and I always find we smile more on Saturdays than any other day of the week.

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For more Family Friday posts, please click here.

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~by Melanie

I love to listen to men sing. This Sunday, I heard the best men’s choir ever. I was ironing my son’s white shirt and my husband was helping our boys, ages 4 and 7, get dressed for church. The three of them were singing “How Firm a Foundation” which is a Hymn that the children learned in Primary last year.

“How firm a foundation, ye Saints of the Lord,

Is laid for your faith in his excellent word!

What more can he say than to you he hath said,

Who unto the Savior, who unto the Savior,

Who unto the Savior for refuge have fled?

Fear not, I am with thee; oh, be not dismayed,

For I am thy God and will still give thee aid.

I’ll strengthen thee, help thee, and cause thee to stand,

Upheld by my righteous, upheld by my righteous,

Upheld by my righteous, omnipotent hand.”

(LDS Hymn #85)

It was sweet to listen to my husband teach my children through song the things that he and I both know: that if we have faith, we can turn to our Savior for refuge when times are tough. And times will be tough. I can’t even imagine the challenges and evils that will face our children as they grow into teenagers and adults. My husband and I hope that as they are young, we will be able to give them a “firm foundation” in the gospel.

We hope to send them out into the world with the knowledge that they are children of our Heavenly Father, who loves them and that even when times are hard or we make mistakes, He wants us to come to Him in prayer and He will comfort us. It is a huge responsibility that we have as parents and so we teach them often. We hold Family Home Evening, daily family scripture study and prayer. But just as important are those unplanned times, when they have questions or when we feel prompted by the spirit to share our testimonies with them about the gospel.

And sometimes the teaching simply comes when we’re getting ready for the church and a song pops into our heads.

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“…we rejoice in our conviction that our family is bound by eternal ties that cannot be severed by death…. Our great hope is that reflection on the lives of Rebecca and Rachel will spur all of us – those close to us and those unknown – to consider more fully the eternal plan that a loving God has for each of His children. Many have questioned, ‘How can they bear it? How can they go on?’ We testify that the atoning sacrifice of our Savior, Jesus Christ, is sufficient to overcome our deepest sorrows and heaviest burdens. When our strength is depleted, we are certain that He will shoulder the weight of our sadness. Saturday’s services will reinforce this faith, and we invite all to participate in what is sure to be a spiritually-uplifting and life-affirming day.”

Video Courtesy of KSL.com

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~Answer by Michelle**

This is a great question. One of the things that I love about being Mormon is the focus on family. We receive guidance and counsel that I feel make a significant difference in our family life. I was thinking tonight about how grateful I am for what church teachings regarding family life have done for our family. It isn’t about a list of rules in my mind; it has become a way of life that enables us to feel God’s influence and power in our home and our lives, and helps keep us focused on keeping our family strong.

Following are some of the things Mormon families are encouraged to do regularly. At the end of the post, I include some links to content on our site where women talk about these different practices.

Usually on Monday nights, most Mormons have what we call Family Home Evening (or Family Night). We sing and pray and learn and play together, and usually eat treats, too! We try to be deliberate about not scheduling other things on Mondays whenever possible. We do a wide variety of things together. We enjoy discussing gospel principles and finding fun ways to teach them. This is a great opportunity to talk to our children about things that may be concerning them, or us. We’ll sometimes plan schedules, too. Our children love playing church music charades (a guessing game where you act out what the others try to guess — no talking allowed!). Another favorite activity is “doorbell ditching” — making a treat and then delivering to someone in our neighborhood by ringing the doorbell and running. (The goal, of course, is to not get caught!) We also have gone bowling, played basketball, played board games. Last week, we went to visit a widow from our former ward whom the children consider as another grandma. We love Family Night. Try it, you’ll like it — tailor it to whatever suits your family!

We are encouraged to have daily personal and family scripture study and prayer. Family Dinner is also encouraged (which usually includes a prayer as well). These rituals help us stay focused on bringing God into our daily lives and into our homes, and in learning more about the gospel of Jesus Christ together. I have felt a real impact in our home with the practices of reading the scriptures and praying together. I feel blessings of peace, love, understanding of truth, and eternal perspective as we do these things. I love hearing my children talk to Heavenly Father and discuss and ask questions about what we are learning as we read. In our home, we focus most of our reading on The Book of Mormon, although, of course, we like to learn and read from other books of scripture as well. We also try to read the most recent General Conference talks together to help keep the current counsel of living prophets and other Church leaders fresh in our minds. I shared some of the ways we try to make scripture reading memorable and enjoyable here.

I can’t say enough about family dinner, either. Again, if this isn’t something you do, I’d say give it a try. Research has shown its benefits (see links below, and see a video about this topic here).

Sunday is an important day for Mormons — a day focused on faith and family. The usual routine on Sundays includes our church meetings. How each family spends the rest of the day can vary somewhat. In our home, we love just being together, relaxing, playing games, watching inspirational videos made by the Church, talking, reading, writing in our journals, doing family history work. We also looooove going to Grandma and Grandpa’s! Our goal is to make Sundays different from the rest of the week. Except on rare occasions, Dad doesn’t do work. Mom isn’t running around doing errands or laundry. Sometimes Sundays will include additional church gatherings, meetings (if our callings require it) and service. We do our best to try to stop the usual routine and try to rejuvenate our spirits and our relationships so we can tackle another busy week. (We all tend to lament the end of Sunday. We love Sundays!)

We are also encouraged to have fun and to be creative in our families. In 1995, our leaders published what is called The Proclamation to the World on the Family. This document delineates many important teachings regarding family (a topic for another day). A simple phrase from that document reminds us that wholesome recreation is an important part of family life.  The Family Fridays posts we have are designed to explore the many facets of family life, including the things we do to laugh and play and enjoy life together, from birthday parties to family vacations, as well as the day-to-day moments. Family fun often involves extended family as well, such as with family parties, family reunions, and other activities. Every family also develops its own family traditions that can enrich family life.

Now, please don’t misunderstand — we Mormons have our family problems just like anyone else! But just like anyone else, we find that making time for fun family activities can be a really good thing…and also help give us opportunities to learn to work together and love each other.

A broader facet of LDS family life includes doing family history (genealogy). This not only helps us learn more about our ancestors, but is important to us because of our belief in eternal families — in family relationships being able to exist beyond “death do us part.” A central element of our faith includes doing vicarious ordinance work (like baptisms and eternal marriages) in our temples on behalf of our loved ones who have died. This work broadens our perspective on family, helps us face trials and the loss of loved ones, and brings a spiritual power into our lives.

I am so grateful for the family rituals we are counseled to have in our family life. I feel they have blessed my family in so many ways, some of them immeasurable but nevertheless tangible. Our family is far from perfect at doing these things, and we are far from perfect as people, but I feel that participating in these practices helps us be better and draw closer to God and to each other.

—

To hear more from Mormon women about the above topics, see the links below:

Family Home Evening:

Family Home Evening
Family Friday: Notable Quotables
Family Fridays: Family Home Evening

There is more information and some resources here on the Church’s official website.

Family Scripture Study and Prayer

We Believe: Family Scripture Study
Portraits of Mormon Women: Rebecca
Family Fridays: Amen, Sister!

Family Dinner

Family Friday: Dinner Together

(As a sidenote, you might be interested in some research that has shown the tangible value of family dinner — for parents, for children, even for corporations! Read more here (article includes ideas for making family dinner happen in your home). This research, conducted by Brigham Young University professors in conjunction with IBM, has also been mentioned at The Wall Street Journal’s Front Lines, U.S. News and World Report, and Slate Magazine.)

Sunday Worship and Family Time

Ask a Mormon Woman: Why Do Mormons Go To Church For So Long?
Ask a Mormon Woman: What Do Mormons Do On Sundays?

Family Fun and Creativity

Family Fridays: Jane’s Family Fun
Family Fridays: Camping
First Person: How I Create as a Mom
Family Fridays: Hiking Together
More posts on family fun, traditions, etc. can be found here, here, and here.
(From a BYU Women’s Conference Sharing Station) Finding Fun in the Family Tree

Family History and Temple Work

Finding Family is Fun
First Person: Touching the Temple
We Believe: Perspective

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**Please note: The answers in “Ask a Mormon Woman” reflect the thoughts, perspectives, and experiences of individuals. Although here at Mormon Women: Who We Are, we strive to have our content consistent with the Church’s doctrine and teachings, we do not speak officially for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. For official information about or from the Church, please visit www.mormon.org or www.lds.org.

Have a question you would like to ask? Send an email to us at gmail, with username ‘mormonwoman’

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