Tips For Making General Conference A Success With Kids

• Start preparing early. Introduce the general authorities in a personal way. Use this countdown and learn about one each day. Watch the “LDS Apostles song” on youtube- find a few fun songs to get to know them. They are more likely to listen to people they recognize and know something about. 

• Have things ready, but try to wait until they start to struggle. They are capable of listening and want to spend time together. Have a few things set apart for different sessions. If one thing isn’t working, try another. Keep activities simple, things the kids can do without help from you. 

• Have realistic expectations. To keep it a positive experience, I recommend not making them listen to the whole session. Recognize your child’s attention span, extend that with a few activities, but let them go be noisy in a different room when they are done. They’ll come back for other sessions or even when they’re ready again. 

• Make it a party! Treats and special food is a great way to bring excitement. We make cinnamon rolls. We eat chips or popcorn. We fill a treat cup with small treats and every time one of the first presidency gets up to the pulpit, they get to have a treat. Change up the room where you watch in some way so it’s different than other days.

Here are a few other links I use:

http://heapahoopla.com/tag/general-conference/

https://www.google.com/search?q=conference+bingo&espv=2&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjpj4jo2v_SAhVIImMKHeWsCg0Q_AUICCgB&biw=1455&bih=655

http://www.momshavequestionstoo.com/list-of-preschool-general-conference-activities/

What Prayer Can't Do and how it relates to Disney's Aladdin FHE

The Genie in Aladdin is ALL POWERFUL. He can control the universe. 

But there are a few things he WILL NOT do.

Just like the Genie who is not real, we have an ALL-POWERFUL God, our Father, who can do all things! But there are a few things he will not do. Consider the talk by President Uchdorf "Fourth Floor, Last Door." He says:

Faith is powerful, and often it does result in miracles. But no matter how much faith we have, there are two things faith cannot do. For one, it cannot violate another person’s agency.

The second thing faith cannot do is force our will upon God. We cannot force God to comply with our desires—no matter how right we think we are or how sincerely we pray. 

We discussed these two things and then some examples of prayers he could answer and prayers he couldn't/wouldn't and why. And in closing our Family Night from the same talk:

Faith means that we trust not only in God’s wisdom but that we trust also in His love. It means trusting that God loves us perfectly, that everything He does—every blessing He gives and every blessing He, for a time, withholds—is for our eternal happiness.

With this kind of faith, though we may not understand why certain things happen or why certain prayers go unanswered, we can know that in the end everything will make sense. “All things [will] work together for good to them that love God.”

All will be made right. All will be well.

We can be certain that answers will come, and we may be confident that we will not only be content with the answers but we will also be overwhelmed by the grace, mercy, generosity, and love of our Heavenly Father for us, His children.

President Nelson's Scripture Challenge

*I just updated this to include a link to the full document at the bottom of this post. I am so excited so many have joined me in doing this challenge. I know we're blessed for following counsel from the leaders of our church. If the link doesn't work, feel free to email me at ashleyjaggi at gmail.*

One of the leaders in my church issued a challenge in January to read all the citations about Jesus Christ as listed in the back of the scriptures and promised those listening that if they would proceed to learn all they can about Jesus Christ, their love for Him and for God’s laws would grow beyond what they could currently imagine. This seemed overwhelming and I quickly gave up. But then he posted that he did this in just 6 weeks and gave us an idea of how in this post.

Here is the picture he posted. There are 2,249 citations in the scriptures we use.

Now that he made it more concrete for me, I'm going to try again. I plan to break it into 90 days, which is 25 citations a day. I copied the citations into a word doc similar to the printed sheets he used to help me keep track. I can send them to you if you'd like. :)

Here is a link to the full doc. I printed the first page separately as a reference throughout and then the pages 2 to 30 front and back.

Want to join me?

Ponderize

I enjoyed our church General Conference this past weekend. One of the speakers gave members a challenge to ponder and memorize a scripture each week. He said

"I invite you to “ponderize” one verse of scripture each week. The word ponderize is not found in the dictionary, but it has found a place in my heart. So what does it mean to ponderize? I like to say it’s a combination of 80 percent extended pondering and 20 percent memorization.

There are two simple steps:

First, choose a verse of scripture each week and place it where you will see it every day.

Second, read or think of the verse several times each day and ponder the meaning of its words and key phrases throughout the week."

In an effort to encourage my children to also begin to ponderize, I created a puzzle that they can write their scripture on the back of a puzzle piece and put it up on a picture of themselves to symbolize how they are putting on the Armor of God through their scripture memorization.

The picture is a coloring page from here (waycoolbibleschool.com) and the jigsaw puzzle from here (birdscards.com).

I'm going to have them choose a topic they want to learn more about and we'll look for a scripture or scriptures together.

General Conference I Spy

Here's one more General Conference Activity. I've used so many that other people have done so here is my little contribution. We're excited to try it tomorrow! Let me know if you want me to send you the doc. Happy Conference. :)

General Conference I Spy Activity

General Conference I Spy Activity Page 2

Gospel Principles for Kids Lesson 11: The Life of Christ

The Life of Christ

This is a great lesson in the manual. Click here for the full lesson. However, I felt like one lesson to cover the life of Christ was not going to work for our family. I decided we'd do a timeline of the life of Christ. I found some great New Testament timeline cards on this website. There are 3 sets. Birth to Zacchaes, Holy Week, Empty Tomb to Ascension. If you click on them it will automatically download them. I also have them in a single email if you want to contact me with subject: New Testament Timeline Cards. It states these can be used for classroom or personal use.

Here is the website again for those who don't like links: http://catholicblogger1.blogspot.com/2009/11/birth-of-jesus-to-ascension-cards.html

I found a white roll of craft paper at walmart in the craft aisle that is like 3 'x 30' for $3 or $4 that we'll cut and put the pictures up on as we talk about the events in His life.  We'll also try to cover the topics put forward in the manual as we talk about His life.

I liked the artist depictions so also found this book on Amazon:

There is a companion volume entitled The Parables of Jesus for kids. 

So we're taking a break from the manual while we do this. Sorry for those who are following along. Hopefully we'll be back soon!

Gospel Principles for Kids Lesson 10: Scriptures

Scriptures

We had a good time with this lesson. I pulled out all the scriptures that we use in our family scripture reading as well as some flannel board stories. The kids were excited when the saw all of those things. 

The Scriptures Are Available to Us Today

I showed them a map of the world and talked about how God speaks to people in every land because we are all His children and He loves everyone. I showed them where the Bible was written, then the Book of Mormon. We then talked about Joseph Smith and how he also kept a record of revelation from God and it is called the Doctrine and Covenants. I pointed out to them the areas where that record was written. 

2 Nephi 29:11 For I command all men, both in the east and in the west, and in the north, and in the south, and in the islands of the sea, that they shall write the words which I speak unto them; for out of the books which shall be written I will judge the world, every man according to their works, according to that which is written.

I then asked the kids what their favorite scripture story is and we took turns telling our favorite stories from the scriptures.  

I ended with my testimony about why we have scriptures and reminded them of the story of Lehi sending his sons back to wicked Jerusalem for scriptures and how if we want to know what God wants us to do we need to study and learn from the scriptures.  They are our guide back to Him.

Quoted material, titles and headings come from the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints Gospel Principles manual. Scripture and pictures come from lds.org. Click here for the full lesson.