FHE FUN

So, our latest and greatest FHE activity has been reading a conference talk each week and trying to apply it to our lives. Danny and I used to do this when we didn't have any kids, but once Macie entered the picture we fell off the Conference-for-FHE-bandwagon (our little kids + long conference talks = disaster). Most of our family home evenings with the kids have consisted of MANY MANY songs, a VERY SHORT lesson (usually a picture from the gospel art kit, or a story from The Friend magazine), and ACCOMPLISHMENTS (to be discussed later in this blog).
Well, just before President Hinckley died, one of my friends from book club (thanks, Clarinne!) asked all of us if we knew what President Hinckley had asked us to do during the last conference. I realized that I didn't know, and made a silent goal to find out the next day. What I read (President Hinckley's last conference admonition) was this: "We encourage you again to read the talks in your family home evenings and discuss them together as families." So, the very next FHE we started! And (a little surprisingly) it's been easier and more enjoyable that I thought it would be. No more kids + conference = disaster!
Well, a couple of weeks ago we read President Eyring's talk, the one where he had the prompting "I'm not giving you these experiences for yourself. Write them down." And we talked about keeping a family journal (ie -- our blog) to record the special things that were happening in our lives. So, here's our first real attempt at our "weekly" journaling. Here's our format for these FHE entries:
1- list our ACCOMPLISHMENTS for the week: we each take a turn to share with the family the best/most exciting/most rewarding/amazing things that have happened to us during the week. Just to warn you ahead of time, Reid always says that his weekly accomplishment was "I played fun games."
2- list our favorite quote from the conference talk we studied that week.
3- list any other fun stories or going-ons in the Gunnell family.
How's that for a star-studded line-up? We'll start tomorrow. Ka-chow!

And, in case you were wondering, our favorite quote from President Eyring's talk "O Remember, Remember" was:
"As I would cast my mind over the day, I would see evidence of what God had done for one of us that I had not recognized in the busy moments of the day. As that happened, and it happened often, I realized that trying to remember had allowed God to show me what He had done."