Tonight’s Family Home Evening was taken care of by the kids. Corinne volunteered to conduct as she does almost every week. She loves being in control, and she does a great job moving things along, much to the frustration of the person giving the lesson. Jillian was relating a story from the August Friend when Corinne interjected:
“Thank you, Jillian. That was a great lesson. Now we’ll turn the time over to…”
“Corinne! I wasn’t finished!”
“I know, but that’s enough talking. It’s time for the game.”
We asked Jillian to finish her lesson on repentance and she did a great job. Afterwards she thanked Corinne for being reverent. Corinne admitted:
“I wasn’t really listening. I was just waiting for you to be done. Let’s play the game now.”
Evan asked: “Great. Are we playing bubble/fairy/farmer tag?” (a mixture of the types of games we play when the little girls are in charge.) No, not this time.
Jillian almost lost us as she explained the rules of the game she made up to go with the lesson, but we agreed to try it. She had put a lot of thought into it and even made a “tangerine” prop. We found ourselves running around the basement trying to avoid being tagged by the tangerine tree. If the tangerine touched us, we were frozen in place and waited for Mrs. Baker to hug us before we melted into the floor or we’d be the next tangerine tree. Have you ever played that game before? Probably so, but it was our first time and we actually enjoyed it. I should have taken a picture but I was too busy trying to dodge the tangerine.
The fun ended too soon for Corinne and she begged for another game. When we wouldn’t accommodate her, she collapsed on the floor and refused to conduct the rest of the meeting. We continued without her. When it was time for the closing prayer she raised her head and asked:
“Dad, what was I sad about again?”
“We wouldn’t let you play another game.”
“Oh, yeah.” 
She puts head down and starts crying again while we all try to control our laughter so we can pray. And then we adjourned to the kitchen for some Snickerdoodle Casserole. Just ask Evan for the recipe—it was really tasty!
5 comments:
Wow! I wish I could be a part of your family nights! Ours are much less exciting, and don't much resemble yours except for the sobbing on the floor part. That's usually a part of every FHE somewhere. Maybe the kids will grow someday and we will be able to get a little more sophisticated...
yeah, that is quite a high standard of FHE's you're setting for the rest of us. we've never had a game quite like that, but we do get an interpretive dance by berkeley with each song that we sing, and then once we're all done singing, she sings the song again as a solo!
Personally, I like the melting into the floor part. Very nice touch, Jill. Otherwise, it would be little more than glorified freeze tag. I'm sure it's a good sign that Corinne was able to be suitably sad again once she was reminded of what made her sad. I think that shows that she is very committed to her convictions. She'll go far.
That glimpse into your family made me happy. Thanks for sharing.
This a great story. In fact, Eden keeps asking me to tell her the story about Jillian and Corinne at Family Home Evening. It's a bedtime favorite now...
We love your family!
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