My Story (Parent and Husband Approved!)

I was raised in a strong Latter-day Saint family where my parents embraced the lifestyle. From my perspective, we did everything we were “supposed” to do pretty well . . . except two things. My parents just couldn’t seem to master having consistent, harmonious family home evenings or scripture study. They tried various things, but nothing really worked. In the process, we had a lot of unpleasant experiences, especially with family home evening.

You see, my mom had the idea that it was her job to prepare a lesson and my dad’s job to cheerfully call us all together (without having to be reminded) every Monday night (no other night was acceptable). We children were supposed to rush to their sides the moment we were called, participate attentively, and never interrupt. The problem was that Dad hadn’t caught the vision, and neither had most of us kids.

So what really happened was that Mom would occasionally prepare a lesson with great enthusiasm. While she finished pulling her final materials together, she would tell dad to round us all up. Eventually everyone would reluctantly stop what they were doing and gather in the living room. We would start with a prayer and song, but as soon as Mom began the lesson, we kids would start irritating each other. Mom would get upset and scold us. By then dad was often already dozing on the couch. We’d run through the whole scene again a couple of times, except that Mom would sometimes nudge Dad awake so he could scold us too. Finally, Mom would jump up and run out of the room in tears. We’d get one last scolding from Dad, then we’d all leave feeling pretty unharmonious.

Things got harder as we got older and started working and participating in after-school activities. Eventually Mom and Dad just gave up on having organized family home evenings.

But I always loved the idea because, although we had a lot of rough family home evenings, we also had some great ones. I loved snuggling with my oldest brother during family time. When the lesson was over, my brothers and dad would wrestle and laugh together. I absolutely loved our family trips to a nearby canyon park; exploring and playing with my family in such a beautiful place was heaven for me as a five-year-old.

I also remember some good family scripture times when I was little, though scripture time fizzled out before I was graduated from elementary school. I remember loving when my parents read us children’s scripture storybooks, and I enjoyed taking turns reading scriptures at an age when I had to be told that hell wasn’t a swear word in the scriptures and that I could say it in good conscience. In short, I loved relaxing and playing with my family and just being together. I actually really needed that downtime to reconnect with my family no matter how old I was.

I knew I wanted my own family someday, and I knew I wanted us to be happy and close. I believed I would be responsible to teach my children core values and moral boundaries, but I also yearned for family closeness, love, and fun. I believed family home evening and scripture study were great ways to accomplish this, so even though we didn’t always have them growing up, I definitely planned on having them regularly when I had my own family.

Because of my family’s experience, I realized that I might very well have to take the lead when it came to family time. I hoped my future husband would help gather the kids and participate in the discussions and activities, but I kept my expectations low.

When my husband and I were engaged, I asked him what he thought about family home evening and scripture study. He assured me he was planning on having them as a regular part of our family life when we had children. It was a huge relief for me to think I wouldn’t be totally on my own.

But after we were married and had our first little girl, my husband was so busy making a living and his schedule was so unpredictable that family home evening and scripture time just didn’t happen. When I talked to my husband about it, he told me he couldn’t consistently be home for family nights because his work schedule was too random. He also didn’t see how a planned family night or planned scripture time would make things any better than they were, since our family already spent quality time together and one or the other of us regularly read scripture stories to our daughter.

He was right, of course, that we did lots of good things as a family, but we weren’t reading the scriptures together as a family, and we weren’t having the kind of thought-out family home evenings I’d dreamed of. There was no routine I could count on and no gospel focus. I knew I wanted to have regular family home evenings and scripture study when my children were teenagers, and I knew we needed to establish the habit while the kids were little. Plus, it sounded like something fun we could all look forward to—if I could figure out how to pull it off, that is.

I wanted to have family home evening and scripture study so I could teach my kids important things as well as develop the closeness I wanted so much. So I owned my desire and decided to take it to the Lord.

One day while my baby was taking a nap, I felt the time was right. That afternoon, the house was peaceful and quiet. I gathered my scriptures, a notebook, and a pen and sat in my favorite study spot where the sunlight was shining through the glass door onto our kitchen table. I placed my books and pen on the table, sat down, and gazed at nothing while thinking about my situation. My toddler was like the Tasmanian Devil, speeding around leaving disasters wherever she went, creating messes for me to clean up all day long. My husband was pushing himself hard at work and came home tired and irritable most of the time. The endless housework, yard work, cooking, cleaning, laundry, diapers, and taking care of my energetic child left me exhausted. The only one ever interested in doing anything in the evening was my daughter. My husband and I just wanted to fall over somewhere and go to sleep.

But I believed things could change. I didn’t get married so I could do mundane chores, cook all the time, and clean up after a little person all day. I got married for the joy of it.

As I sat there, I pondered 1 Nephi 3:7: “I will go and do the things which the Lord hath commanded, for I know the Lord giveth no commandments unto the children of men, save he shall prepare a way for them that they may accomplish the thing he commandeth them” (italics mine). I knew God had commanded parents to raise their children in light and truth and that family home evening and scripture study were the main strategies our leaders had encouraged parents to use. I believed God would hear and answer my prayers because I was trying to fulfill His commandments and follow the counsel of His servants.

So I prayed my heart out. When I finished, I opened my eyes, relaxed, and turned to my scriptures. Within seconds, ideas rushed into my brain: “For family home evening, keep it short, play every time, and do it whether your husband is there or not. Use the Gospel Art pictures for lessons and read from the book Stand a Little Taller for family scripture time when you are all together for breakfast.”

The inspired answers I received came to me over the course of about ten seconds, but those ten seconds changed my family’s life forever.

I followed my inspiration and immediately found success. I bought Stand a Little Taller, which provides a quote by President Hinckley along with a scripture for each day of the year. At breakfast, I read the quote and scripture for the day. Though it was short, it was enjoyable, and I loved knowing we were establishing the habit of family scripture time.

I also bought the Gospel Art Kit, which at that time had stories and information about each picture printed on the back. When family home evening came around, no matter how rough a day it had been, it was easy to grab a picture, read the story, and play with my daughter. When my husband was home, he participated. When he wasn’t, we did it anyway. And my daughter ate it up. She became our number-one family-home-evening fan. Her enthusiasm was very encouraging!

We followed that pattern for a few years, and it worked marvelously, but after our second daughter turned two, an interesting thing happened. I noticed that my older daughter was growing up and asking more thoughtful questions. At five, she still had a very short attention span, but I could tell she was thinking more deeply about things.

As I thought about how we could teach her gospel principles at a deeper level but in a practical way, I began to envision exactly what we needed—a resource that introduced a topic during family home evening, accompanied by short scripture verses for each day of the week on that same topic. We could spend a good amount of time introducing and discussing the topic at family home evening and then reinforce it with the short scripture verses throughout the week.

I knew it would work perfectly! So I got online to find that perfect resource because I thought, “You can find anything online, right?” Wrong! I was shocked! I couldn’t find anything like it.

I couldn’t believe it. The Internet had failed me! There were books with family home evening ideas, and there were scripture storybooks, but they were sold separately. I also saw online resources for family home evening, but I knew I’d have to spend hours trying to find even a few that might work for my family. It was overwhelming for me to even think about searching for appropriate family home evening ideas, for who knows how long, when my time was already maxed out. Plus, that didn’t give me the correlating scriptures for the week.

Since the book I wanted didn’t exist, I realized I would have to create it. So I designed a handbook tailored toward families with young children who had super short attention spans, just like my children’s. And my kids loved it! In fact, we all loved it. Using my book, I could pull off a great family home evening in a flash every time. And we could read the short, accompanying scripture verses while everyone ate breakfast together. It was lovely. Family home evening and scripture study became smooth sailing.

One day while visiting teaching, my friends and I started talking about the challenge of having family home evening and scripture study with small children. The friend we were visiting had a four-year-old and a two-year-old, and she was experiencing many of the same frustrations I had. I offered her some lessons from my book, and she gladly accepted. A few weeks later she came up to me at church, and excitedly started telling me how my lessons were transforming her family’s experience. She now loved family home evening and scripture study with her kids. I was so happy!

When I learned that my ideas were making a difference and that more people wanted copies, I decided to publish my book so I could help as many families as possible transform their experiences with family home evening and scripture study. My book FHEasy is set for publication in November of 2016. [Update – click here to check it out on Amazon!]

But more than wanting to help parents meet their responsibility to teach their children, I want to help families experience love and closeness and have a wonderful time just being together.

I hope my book, public speeches, online programs [upcoming as of the last update], and blog help bring an abundance of love, fun, and closeness into your home.

Happy Home Evenings!

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