WITHIN THESE WALLS

Ustue - Ssmoot

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WITHIN THESE WALLS Strength and Unity in Family Traditions These are a collection of our favorite family traditions. Most of them are tried and true with a few coming from other sources. President Harold B. Lee said, “Remember always that the most important of the Lord’s work you and I will ever do will be within the walls of our own homes.” (Published text of 1973 motion picture, “Strengthening the Home,” pg.7) Since family is the central unit of the gospel, we place high priority on family traditions to build unity, growth and love. As families spend time together, traditions will be created without even realizing. Hopefully, these ideas will help you start or continue your own family traditions. Choose a few that are tailored to your family’s needs. They do not need to be elaborate or expensive as long as you do something to create memories and feelings of love that will bind you through eternity. Family Reunions/Vacations * Reserve a facility, campground with pavilion, church, home, etc… and center your theme around President Hinckley’s “B’s”. Make a large sign that reads “Proud to “Bee” a (insert your family name), that can be hung in a common area where everyone will see it often. Use a bumblebee as a fun way to cement the idea. Make smaller signs with each of President Hinckley’s “B’s” on them that can either be hung near your large sign or put on stakes to go in the ground. Have an opening meeting to introduce your theme. Have ...

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Publié par	Ustue
Nombre de lectures	32
Langue	English

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WITHIN THESE WALLS Strength and Unity in Family Traditions These are a collection of ourfavoriteMost of them are tried and truefamily traditions. with a few coming from other sources. President Harold B. Lee said, “Remember always that the most important of the Lord’s work you and I will ever do will be within the walls of our own homes.” (Published text of 1973 motion picture, “Strengthening the Home,” pg.7) Since family is the central unit of the gospel, we place high priority on family traditions to build unity, growth and love. As families spend time together, traditions will be created without even realizing. Hopefully, these ideas will help you start or continue your own family traditions. Choose a few that are tailored to your family’s needs. They do not need to be elaborate or expensive as long as you dosomethingto create memories and feelings of love that will bind you through eternity. Family Reunions/Vacations * Reserve a facility, campground with pavilion, church, home, etc… and center your theme around President Hinckley’s “B’s”. Make a large sign that reads “Proud to “Bee” a (insert your family name), that can be hung in a common area where everyone will see it often. Use a bumblebee as a fun way to cement the idea. Make smaller signs with each of President Hinckley’s “B’s” on them that can either be hung near your large sign or put on stakes to go in the ground. Have an opening meeting to introduce your theme. Have a special musical number or opening song and prayer. Let children or grandchildren each take one of the “B’s” and give a short talk on it (First Presidency Message, “A Prophet’s Counsel and Prayer for Youth”, January 2001 Ensign). End with testimony from head of family in charge or patriarch of entire family. As part of the reunion, for younger children, have relay games and crafts. One craft to go along with the theme: Make bread dough or use a frozen recipe and shape the dough into a beehive. Make your own mold out of foil that resembles a cone. Spray the foil with cooking spray. Roll out chunks of bread dough with hands to look like snakes and mold them around your foil, make sure you have seven rings on your beehive and you leave a small opening at the top. Bake at 350* for 15 minutes or until a golden brown. Let cool. With a foam or regular paintbrush cover your beehive with Modge Podge to make it hard. Let dry for several hours. The children can decorate it with paint, stickers, etc… Let them write with a permanent marker one of the “B’s” on each of the seven rings of the hive. You can also purchase small craft bumblebees that can be strung on wire and poked in through the top of your beehive to make them look like they’re coming out of the hive. * Ropes course that teaches family unity by working and playing together. We went to a course in Provo, UT (clasropes.com) for a oneday reunion. We met at 8:00am and divided into groups led by trained individuals. We broke for a family lunch, then resumed our groups until 5:00pm. We used their amphitheater and pavilion for dinner and games, then ended the night with a family fireside to tie it all together.

* Martin’s Cove Pioneer Trek. This could be a one to three day reunion depending on the amount of time you have. Throughout the entire time, stress stories of your own ancestors regardless if they came across the plains. There are campsites that can be reserved. Look on the churches’ website at lds.org under “other”, then click on “Places to visit”, click “alphabetically”, click on “Mormon Handcart Visitor’s Center” and all the details will appear. * A family vacation we love is, St. George, Utah. We spend most of our time four wheeling, and swimming. We also like to go to the temple, visit the church history sites along the way and the sites right in St. George. Again, look on the LDS church website at lds.org for details. We have a favorite spot that we hike to every time we go. We have carved each family member’s name in the red rocks there and then the date that we were there. The important thing about a vacation is not where you go but to make it consistent and do something that is the same every time you go. * Family History Reunion  Learn about ancestors as the theme of a family reunion. Assign different family members to read about and then act out certain ancestors’ lives. Create a Tshirt with your family tree on it for each person to wear. We were able to create a family tree with photos of our ancestors on one side of our family. We sang songs about family history as well, some with made up words. * Humanitarian Projects  Do a humanitarian project together that would take a few hours to work on and deliver the finished projects to the Humanitarian Center or other humanitarian organization. Many of these projects are very “doable” for younger children. Here in Utah, a child has to be 14 years old to participate at the LDS Humanitarian Center, but they will often give you projects that you can take home and do together as a group or family. * Day Trips Only  Vacation with younger children by going on day long trips to wonderful places in your state or area. There is a book entitled “Fun with the Family in Utah  Hundreds of Ideas for Day Trips with the Kids” by Michael Rutter that I love. It encourages daily trips for younger families in order to simplify the experience. There are likely similar books for other areas in and out of the country. * Books on Tape  There are endless numbers of wonderful books on cassette tapes or CD’s that can be purchased or checked out from the library. When we travel, we like to listen to these to keep us from getting bored. Some of our favorites include the “Harry Potter Collection”, “The Children’s Book of Virtues” by William J. Bennett and any of the “Chicken Soup for the Soul” books. There are also talks for teens on tape that are fabulous as well. We always bring along a set of headphones for the driver if it’s late or the kids are tired of listening. * License Plate Phrases and other Games  Come up with silly phrases using the 3 letters seen on license plates around you. Try to be the first one to come up with the best phrase. Or have a race through the alphabet by looking on signs, license plates, etc…for each letter. The one that gets to Z first wins. Games are fun and will provide a relief from the constant questioning of, “Are we there yet?”

Daily or Frequent traditions In addition to family scripture study, family night, and family prayer, here are some other ideas of ways to build unity through daily or frequent traditions. * Read the scripture and quote from President Hinckley’s book Stand a Little Taller that is outlined for each day of the year. It gives you and your children a great thought for the day, and can initiate a wonderful discussion. *Ask your children each day when they come home from school or before bed what their favorite happening of that day was. This allows them to focus on what was good about their day instead of what went wrong and allows the parent to identify with that child. * Try having each person in the family, including parents, give at least one sincere compliment to a family member each day. Hopefully this practice will spark everyone’s desire to give more. * Once a month, have a project that every member of the family can be involved in. This could be yard cleanup, spring cleaning, canning fruit, jams, vegetables, etc, community or service project, or any special home project. Be creative, it will give each member a sense of accomplishment and ownership. * Each month on fast Sunday have each child think of someone who is in need, whether it is a friend, family member, ward member or themselves to fast for. Open your fast as a family after your last meal, and then close it as a family. Ask them if they felt anything during their fast or had answers to prayers. With this purpose in mind, each child will have a greater desire to fast the entire two meals. * Library Time  Visit the library together often and check out books that you can read together as a family. Look for books that go along with the month or holiday coming up. Put the list of books checked out on your refrigerator or bulletin board so that when it is time to return them, you can remember which books were checked out. Bedtime is a great time to pull one out and read a chapter together or just read a fun picture book. * Walking with a child, just the two of you.... to catch up on their lives  When the weather is nice I enjoy walking outside. By taking one child with me, I have the opportunity to talk privately with them about what they are experiencing in their lives. They are always so much more open when they know that nobody will be listening in or interrupt. If one of us feels discouraged, we will often take turns recounting our blessings until we reach home. After a while, we have to really think and it really changes our attitude. * We sing “Happy Birthday” in “10 part harmony” to friends and family members all over the country early in the morning on our “Speaker Phone”. The reaction we get from the Birthday “Person” is always a treat to hear!!!

* The Cookie Drawer  “The tradition of our cookie drawer began nearly forty years ago and continues today. We keep a drawer in the kitchen stocked with cookies, and the neighborhood children are free to come over and knock on the door anytime to be invited to the cookie drawer, where they get to pick ‘one for each hand.’ Even the teenagers have stopped by over the years, using the cookie drawer as an excuse to seek some counsel and encouragement.” This tradition was shared by Ardeth Kapp in a wonderful new book called “Traditions” by Kimberly L. Bytheway and Diane H. Loveridge. This may be best used by grandparents because I know if I had a cookie drawer in my house currently, my children would leave it virtually empty and I would be filling it up on a daily basis. * House Hunt  This tradition is used as often as you’d like to do a clean sweep of the house. I tell the children, young and old, that they have 20 minutes to go room to room and pick up everything that belongs to them. In 20 minutes I then let them know that their time is up and I can go room to room and put in my large garbage bag anything that was left out. I then can choose to do whatever I want to with the items, such as give them to a thrift shop, throw them away or keep them for a week or more. This will get everyone scurrying around quickly to clean up their belongings. Spiritual/Sabbath * Sunday rotations are a fun way to unify and give children some activities to keep them busy on Sunday. Divide your children into groups of two or three. Rotations may include journal writing, watching a church or scripture video, writing letters to missionaries, extended family or friends, reading an article from the Friend, New Era, or Ensign (make it age appropriate), working on personal progress, duty to God or Gospel in Action, or playing a gospel game. Spend about 1520 minutes on each rotation to keep interest. Keep it to four rotations so that it lasts only an hour to an hour and a half. Your children (especially young ones) will look forward to this time each Sunday. * Twice a year, after General Conference have an extended family night, or if you do not live close to family, invite ward members or friends for a discussion. Assign each family member or friend to choose their favorite talk to take notes on during the sessions. Come together as soon after Conference as possible and share your ideas. This will help cement what our leaders and prophets are teaching and give us a greater desire to live the gospel. Plan a meal or have refreshments to go along with it. * When each child in our family turns 12, we take them to the temple nearest our home along with any siblings who have already turned 12 and do baptisms for the dead. If you let the patron at the temple know you’re coming in as a family, they will let you gather in a room and talk to you about baptism’s, have a prayer, read some scriptures and really make it a special occasion for your family. * Participate in any of the church sponsored pageants that are held around the U.S., or go see them as a family. Look on the church website at lds.org for dates and times that they will run through the summer. Nothing will bring you closer than to experience the spiritual events that happened in the Book of Mormon and early days of the church. Your

children will have a deeper appreciation for their heritage and hopefully understand the legacy they have been left. * Attend as mothers and daughters, or fathers and sons, the General YW, Relief Society, or Priesthood meetings held throughout the year. If you live in Utah, make it a tradition to go to the Conference Center, if not, go to your local stake center. We like to invite extended family or friends and go to dinner afterwards and discuss what was taught and how it can be applied in our lives. My children look forward to it every year. * Family Scripture Marking  The family takes a few minutes on Sunday to mark scriptures. Each person looks up one of their favorite scriptures, the family all turns to that scripture and read it together. The family member explains why this is meaningful to them and each one marks it. This is a way of teaching younger children how to “look up” scriptures as well. The youngest children use an inexpensive set of scriptures and crayons. * Conference Priesthood Session  When the men and young priesthood holders in the family go off to Conference on Saturday night, it is a tradition for all us gals to have a “girls night out”. We get a bite to eat at our favorite ice cream spot and catch up on each others’ lives. Grandma, aunts and cousins who live near enough are all invited. * Father Interviews  On a Sunday once a month have Dad interview each of the children to see how they are doing. This is a great way to keep track of how each one is doing in every aspect of their life. * Gratitude Journal  My sister started a tradition in her journal each night by writing at the end of her entry a special “gift from God” she had received that day. It helped her focus on what she had been blessed with that particular day and how God’s hand had played an important part in her life. Others have suggested listing 5 blessings that they have received that day that they feel particularly grateful for. This can help us focus on the things we DO have, instead of what we DON’T have and think we need. Having an “attitude of gratitude” can really change one’s perspective on life. * Sunday Music  This is a common tradition many of us have, but sometimes forget to do. In Utah there are numerous radio stations including KSL’s “Sounds of Sunday”, by the Mormon Tabernacle Choir. The music can include anything that is uplifting or spiritual. Beautiful music sets the tone of the Sabbath. Christmas * In an effort to simplify our Christmas, several years ago, we decided that each child would receive only three gifts. The gifts of the Three Wisemen: gold, frankincense and myrrh. Gold represents a fun gift, frankincense represents a gift of clothing, and myrrh represents a gift of knowledge, such as a book, computer learning game, etc. Our children have learned not to expect a lot and there is meaning in what they receive.

* Each year, choose a family, or individual in need to provide Christmas for or provide their Christmas dinner. There are also humanitarian projects such as quilts, and hygiene kits you could put together as a family that can be given in your community or outside the country. Allow your children to contribute money they have earned to the project and involve them as much as possible. They will find more meaning and realize how blessed they are. * Take a family vacation during Christmas break in place of presents. Pack the children’s stockings for Christmas morning and fill them with goodies and some extra cash for spending money on the trip. Our older children have especially loved this. To pacify the younger ones, we try to take special notice of things during our travels that they have really liked and purchase a couple of items that they can open on Christmas morning from Santa. If the item is larger, we take a picture of it and put the picture in their stocking and let them know it is waiting at home. * Before you put your Christmas stockings away, during Family night, have each member of the family write on a piece of paper a goal for the coming year, or their gift to Jesus Christ for the coming year. Then put your papers inside your stockings and enjoy reading them when they are unpacked the next year. Measure how successful you were, what would you do the same or different. * Wrap up 25 of your favorite Christmas books or stories  Each night a different child chooses a book and unwraps it to be read by the light of the Christmas tree and candles. If you don’t own that many books, check some out from the library. Begin on December 1st. * Pixies  The day after Thanksgiving we draw names with our children and keep the name drawn a big secret. From that day until Christmas Eve we do acts of service for that person, including trying to form a better relationship with them. On Christmas Eve we reveal the person we have had and give them a gift and let them know how much we love them. Keeping it a secret is fun and often we do acts of service for someone else to confuse family members. * Candy Trains  An elderly sister in our ward who had never married “adopted” our younger children and for Christmas each year she would come over with all the ingredients to make an adorable candy train. Cover a board or an upside down jelly roll pan with tin foil. Use any brand of vanilla frosting as your glue. Put the frosting in a cake decorators’ bag or tube to work with. Use orange sticks and rope licorice to make the track. A regular size 3 Musketeer bar is used to make the engine. Cut it so that one side is 2/3 of the bar and the other 1/3 of the bar. Place the smaller piece up on top of one end of the larger one to form the engine. Put a chocolate bell on the top of the smaller piece. Stand the back of a small foil covered chocolate Santa on top of the large bar against where you placed the smaller piece and the bell so he is looking toward the cars. Use 2 or more sugar wafers stacked on top of each other for the additional cars. Use Life Savers for the wheels and load the cars up with a variety of candies. Some of the candy we have used are Runts, Gummy Bears, small marshmallows for hills of snow, stick pretzels, Christmas M &Ms and other favorites. Get creative and have fun.

* Good Old Fashion Caroling with Santa hats  We began this tradition when our kids were young and some of them love to go and others don’t, so we learned through trial and error that it is best to invite whoever wants to come, but not insist everyone come or it could end up in a big family fight. We deliver gifts to neighbors and friends we rarely have a chance to see. * Neighborhood Party for the “Less Fortunate” Instead of delivering a gift to every family in the neighborhood, the adults in the neighborhood get together one evening in December. We take turns hosting the party each year. Each person brings their favorite appetizer or treat to share with the group and it gives us an opportunity to meet and get to know our neighbors better. A basket with envelopes is available for each one to put their donations into the amount you may have spent on your neighbors “gifts”  and the donations are sent to a needy family or group decided upon by the host couple. Service * Each year, we tie quilts for the Churches’ Humanitarian Center, either with our own children or as an extended family. When we have finished them, we take them directly to the Humanitarian Center and have a tour of the facilities. We are shown a film of those receiving humanitarian aid that is extremely touching and are allowed to see the vast service that the church gives around the world. The church is constantly making improvements, so it is exciting to see the changes each year. * Once a month or quarter, take those in your family who are old enough to do baptism’s for the dead. Stress what a great service they are providing to those who have gone before them. * Each summer when our children need more to do, we have them sign up at the local community hospital as a volunteer. This has been a very rewarding experience as they build relationships with the patients. Age requirements are usually 14yrs. and up. * Help a parent, grandparent, aunt, uncle or neighbor do their personal history on video. Help edit and add pictures and music. What a treasure this will be to posterity as they visualize and hear their ancestor. * If you are a Utah resident and live within a reasonable driving distance, participate as a volunteer at This is the Place Heritage Park. Sign up to go at least once a week during the summer. It’s a great summer activity where your children can also be involved. Contact information: Visitor’s Center 8015848326 or 8015821847 * Family Scripture Marking  Take a few minutes on Sunday to mark scriptures. Each person looks up one of their favorite scriptures, the family all turns to that scripture and reads it together. The family member explains why this is meaningful to them and each one marks it. This is a way of teaching younger children how to “look up” scriptures as well. The youngest children can use an inexpensive set of scriptures and crayons.

* Conference Priesthood Session  When the men and young priesthood holders in the family go off to Conference on Saturday night, it is a tradition for all us gals to have a “girls night out”. We get a bite to eat at our favorite ice cream spot and catch up on each other’s lives. Grandma, aunts and cousins who live near enough are all invited. * Father Interviews  On a Sunday once a month have Dad interview each of the children to see how they are doing. This is a great way to keep track of how each one is doing in every aspect of their life. * Gratitude Journal  My sister started a tradition in her journal each night by writing at the end of her entry a special “gift from God” she had received that day. It helped her focus on what she had been blessed with that particular day and how God’s hand had played an important part in her life. Others have suggested listing 5 blessings that they have received that day that they feel particularly grateful for. This can help us focus on the things we DO have, instead of what we DON’T have and think we need. Having an “attitude of gratitude” can really change one’s perspective on life. * Sunday Music  This is a common tradition many of us have, but sometimes forget to do. In Utah there are numerous radio stations including KSL’s Sounds of Sunday by the Mormon Tabernacle Choir. The music can include anything that is uplifting or spiritual. Beautiful music sets the tone of the Sabbath. Special Occasions/Other Holidays New Year’s * To bring in the New Year, at midnight we have a scrumptious breakfast. Sometimes we invite friends or extended family. We call it a “Good Sport Breakfast”. We decide on a menu with several categories, such as: Utensils, Beverage, Cereal, main course, meat, eggs, etc, you can add whatever you like. We assign each category a number and make up unusual names for the food we will be serving in each. We try to keep it to two or three items in the food categories so it doesn’t become overwhelming to the cook. We come up with around 20 different utensils that can be used for eating and give them unusual names as well. Each person is handed a menu and circles one item in each category so that they end up with a utensil and a full course breakfast. Each food category also has what we call a “zonk” menu item. This would be something that is maybe not the children’s favorite like Cream of Wheat in the cereal category. It’s fun to see everyone’s faces as they see what they have chosen. Two rules we have: everyone is a good sport about what they’ve ordered and they have to at least try anything they don’t like. The best part is watching everyone eat with wacky utensils. It has become a family favorite. Valentine’s Day * On Valentines Day, write a love note to each family member and leave it on their bed with a treat and small inexpensive gift.

St. Patrick’s * We like to start St. Patrick’s Day with a green breakfast. Add green food coloring to whatever is prepared. This delights the whole family. We also like to do a green dinner with as many naturally green foods as we can come up with. Another fun activity is our annual “Grab for the Gold”. Fill a wide mouth mason jar with pocket change that’s been collected through the year and add a few dollar bills and one five dollar bill. The children draw numbers and the child who has #1 gets to put his/her hand in the jar first and grab as much money as their hand will hold, we continue until the last one has had a chance for a turn. They get to keep whatever is in their hand. Easter * Before Easter, have an Easter egg hunt with real hard boiled eggs and plastic ones filled with goodies. Have one “golden egg” hidden as well. Either paint a plastic egg gold or wrap it in tin foil, just so it looks special. Inside the egg put a tendollar bill. This makes the hunt a lot of fun. Birthdays * On your child’s birthday, make them king or queen for the day. They receive breakfast in bed and don’t have to do any jobs the entire day. At the end of the day, do a “Circle of Love”. This is where the birthday child sits in a special chair and everyone in the room says what they love about that child. Mother/Father’s Day * On Mother and Father’s Day, wake mom or dad up with breakfast in bed. This is especially fun because the children always help. Make a candy bar card on a poster using the names of the candy bars to tell what you appreciate about them. After church, make sure mom or dad does not help with dinner or dishes and have children give them a relaxing foot and back massage. The Fourth of July * Our city has a small parade that goes down Main Street starting at about 9:00am. Before going to that, we have a big breakfast and invite a different family to come over and eat and celebrate with us. After eating ourselves sick, we gather around outside and have a 1015 minute devotional. We hang or have someone hold the flag and recite the Pledge of Allegiance and have 1 or 2 speakers share a patriotic message. We sing “The Star Spangled Banner” and sometimes have a talent from the children. It puts us in the spirit of what this holiday is really all about. Memorial Day * Observing this day can instill in all of us a real appreciation for our ancestors and the lives of joy and pain they experienced. Read about the life of an ancestor or two whose grave is close by. After reading and discussing their lives, visit the cemetery and place

flowers on their graves. Take a minute to read what is written on their headstones. Talk about what you’d like to have written on your headstone and why. Halloween * Our neighborhood is always haunted by a Phantom ghost around Halloween time. He brings us goodies each year and leaves a note with a big ghost on it telling us to find three other families to “Phantomize” or to take goodies to. In turn we ask each family to do the same. We leave the note up on our door so that the other neighbors will know we were already visited by the Phantom. Thanksgiving * Put blank posters up in the home where you are eating that day. Have everyone write what they are thankful for on the posters for all to see. * In the middle of each table put a quote or some bit of interesting information on a card about the pilgrims who came to this land for religious freedom. Stand the card up by doubling it over. Baptisms * This is such a special and important day that can be remembered forever. After the baptism, invite the extended family and friends to gather at your home or the church for something to eat. Take pictures and enjoy one another’s company. If it is a girl who has been baptized, we present her with a baby doll dressed in white or wrapped in a white blanket and discuss how a new baby is similar to being baptized. For example, you are both dressed in white, both clean and pure and you have both been “born” or “born again”. You are also both very close to Heavenly Father’s heart. If it is a boy, we present him with a small tool kit and compare each tool to the child or what the child can accomplish in the future. For example, a hammer is used to drive nails into wood. It is forceful and strong. It accomplishes something that a softer or weaker object could never do. Just like a hammer, a young boy can be driven to do great things. He can be faithful and strong and accomplish great things in his life if he allows Heavenly Father to help him. Come up with your own comparisons. Elder L. Tom Perrysaid, “Build traditions in your families that will bring you together, for they can demonstrate your devotion, love, and support for one another. For each of the members of your family, these events would include blessings of children, baptisms, other priesthood ordinances, graduations, and of course marriages. If distance, missions, or ill health prevent (family) reunions, write one of those special letters that will be treasured in family histories. Sharing these (and other fun) occasions as a family will help us build a foundation established upon a rock.” (Ensign, May 1985, p. 23)