Conference Activity Tree Follow-Up

Howdy all! How was your conference weekend?? I was surprisingly able to actually sit and listen through most sessions! My oldest toddlerette generally stayed in the office with Hubby and I (we watch Conference via the internet on the computer) and colored her pictures and leaves, while the youngest kidlette mostly ran through the house creating a disaster for us to clean up in between sessions. Lovely. But it really was an enjoyable weekend and an insightful one as well.

The kids had fun with their Happy Fall Tree Leaves: writing, coloring, cutting, etc. But when it came time to review the conference leaves with the kiddos (we did this for FHE), I realized one big problem: there were way too many leaves and way too little attention span to accomplish this task. Whoops. Time to rethink the plan. So in case you ran into the same problem, here is how we are solving this dilemma. We took the time at Family Night to finish coloring and cutting any leaves that hadn’t been done yet and then we chose one talk to focus on for the week. (We happened to choose Elder Scott’s talk about the scriptures.) We talked about his talk (obviously in very basic terms for a 4 and 2 year old) and then set a goal as a family related to the scriptures. We made it a week-long goal and then at the end of the week, the girls will each get to take their leaf for Elder Scott down. Then, next Monday for Family Night, we will pick another talk or two to discuss and set a goal for those, and on and on till we’re done. This way we’re not trying to talk about all the talks in one sitting. (Was I seriously thinking that was possible??!) A nice side bonus to this is that it kind of has our family night’s taken care of for the next little while. If you have older children, you could let them take turns being in charge of choosing a talk to discuss at Family Night and letting them lead the discussion. It may be good to let older children set their own individual goals as well, instead of making everything a family goal. Obviously, you can decide which would be better for your family.

Well, again, I hope everyone had a wonderful weekend. And I hope the upcoming weeks and months find your home filled with the Spirit as we try to follow the words of the prophets.