Thirty Days of the Family Proclamation--part 1

I follow an inspiring blog written by Jocelyn Christensen (a friend of the Randy Stay family). It's called We Talk of Christ, We Rejoice in Christ. (Click on title for the link--it's worth it!) In January she did a great activity with her children--she took a phrase from the Proclamation on the Family each day for thirty days, and did an activity with them to reinforce the principle. I knew I wanted to do it with my children, so this summer, we have! I have changed a few of the activities to help my family, but most of what we've done has been from her blog, so I will link to her pages through the titles of each day as I show what we've done so far.

Day 1: "Marriage between a man and a woman is ordained of God"
For this day, I gave each of my kids a frame which they decorated. Then I taped a copy of the Proclamation on the back, and we take it down each day and underline the phrase of what we are talking about that day. As they were decorating, we talked about how God gave us marriage, and it is designed to be between a man and a woman. This seemed pretty clear to them. They understand (especially the older ones) that people in the world choose other ways sometimes, and we don't criticize or stop loving them because of their choices, but the way God designed marriage is between a man and a woman.

Day 2: "The family is central to the Creator's plan for the eternal destiny of His children"
We made cute family trees--link found on her blog. (Scott passed off a few Scout and Faith in God requirements for that one!) I was going to post a picture, but I realized I had all our full names written on them, and I try to avoid publishing those...

Day 3: "All human beings--male and female--are created in the image of God"
We had a nice discussion about how we can know what God is like because we know what we are like, and we are created in His image. We made "resist silhouettes" that day, and I liked how they turned out so much that I might complete the family...

Day 4: "Each is a beloved spirit son or daughter of heavenly parents, and, as such, each has a divine nature and destiny."

For this day, we talked about how when we did our family trees earlier, that was where our physical bodies came from. Our spirits, though, would have a much smaller tree--only one branch, from Heavenly Father to them. Our spirits really are directly from God, and because of that, we have huge potential. For the project, we made paper robots. They don't have a spirit, so they can only do what you program them to do. Not like us! (These robots, by the way, took a LOT of time to make--and the kids weren't able to help make them, like I had planned, because they were too complicated. But they loved playing with them afterward!)

Day 5: "Gender is an essential characteristic of individual premortal, mortal, and eternal identity and purpose."

We talked about what gender means--how we are boys or girls. My three-year old Caytie is especially interested in pointing out who is a girl and who is a boy. We discussed that we have been girls or boys from before we were born, and we will continue to be the same after we die. And we talked about how there is a purpose for being a girl, and a purpose for being a boy. For our activity (instead of doing the file folder activity Jocelyn did), we made placemats. We talked (as she did) about how each piece of silverware has a purpose. You can probably eat a meal with just a fork, but it's better with the knife and spoon to do their parts, as well.

Day 6: "In the premortal realm, spirit sons and daughters knew and worshipped God as their Eternal Father and accepted His plan by which His children could obtain a physical body..."

For this day we made plaster casts of everyone's hands, to remind the kids of what their physical bodies were like in the summer of 2010. (They're not painted yet, so no picture...maybe when they're done, and I happen to remember...)

Day 7: "...and gain earthly experience to progress toward perfection and ultimately realize their divine destiny as heirs of eternal life."

I gave them each a popcorn kernel, and asked what they thought was inside. We had a discussion about what their potential is, and how they have so much as children of God. We made little boxes with mirrors inside, so they could open them and look at themselves, to remember their potential. And, of course, we ate popcorn.

Day 8: "The divine plan of happiness enables family relationships to be perpetuated beyond the grave."

Families are forever! I love the results of this activity (although it was again one I did mostly by myself, though the girls did help brush on the Mod Podge). It's a family memory game. (Click on the link above for instructions.) I was able to find pictures of all great grandparents (all of who have passed away) and grandparents, and Ben and me as children, and added a few of our children as well. The game is going to last for a long time, and the kids really like to play with it.

Stay tuned...we will continue through the summer!