FHE - Family Home Evening

What is Family Home Evening? The question was recently posed by one of our fellow bloggers and so I decided to answer it with a complete explanation. The following is an official definition by our church from mormon.org FHE all text in red is my own commentary on the subject.

Family home evening is a special time set aside each week that brings family members together and strengthens their love for each other, helps them draw closer to Heavenly Father, and encourages them to live righteously.
In 1915 President Joseph F. Smith and his counselors in the First Presidency began a Churchwide effort to strengthen the family. They called on parents in the Church to gather their children once each week for a "Home Evening." Families were to take time to pray and sing together, read the scriptures, teach the gospel to one another, and participate in other activities that would build family unity. As you can tell from our many FHE blog entries it's not what you do that is most important but that you do it together.
In 1970 President Joseph Fielding Smith joined with his counselors in the First Presidency to designate Monday night as the time for family home evening. Since that announcement, the Church has kept Monday evenings free from Church activities so families can have this time together.
Latter-day prophets continue to urge Church members to give highest priority to family home evening. Imagine if all families throughout America spent at least one night together, what a positive effect it could have for us all. They have promised that our dedication to this program will help protect our families against the evils of our time and will bring us abundant joy now and throughout the eternities.
Although family home evening should begin and end with prayer, it is not intended to be a formal class. In a statement regarding family home evening in 1915, the First Presidency said that "formality and stiffness should be studiously avoided, and all the family should participate in the exercises."
Family home evening can be held by every family and in a variety of different ways. Whether you have children in the home or are a family of one, the resources available on this site can help you plan and prepare successful and memorable family home evenings.
I hope this provides all some insight into why we do what we do, FHE.

Daddy & Daughter Luau

Our local church ward (congregation) held a daddy & daughter luau which really turned out to be a real blast. We attended it with our neighbor Sean and his daughter Kara, who are also members of our church.

The food was just perfect, they had build-your-own kabobs with options like pineapple, red bell pepper, chicken, steak, grapes, strawberries, and ham. They served pineapple up-side down cake to boot. We ate well.

To obtain optimal experience we were asked to bring towels to sit on while we ate. This was to represent the Hawaiian custom of sitting on straw mats. Regardless of customs, the girls thought the idea of sitting on their Disney towels was a very awesome idea.



The night continued with authentic Hawaiian dancers.

After their very nice presentation they gathered all the children on to the dance floor to teach them how to dance as well.

The girls looked so cute out there dancing like "Lilo" as Neleha put it.

What would a Luau be without the limbo. Molly did very well following the line under the limbo stick but Neleha saw no need in following the crowd. She just kept circling right around the guys holding up the limbo. She did not stand in line but simply kept going under the limbo stick as quick as she could and as often as she could.


Us dads had a great Hawaiian time with our little daughters.

Springfield History Museum

As one of the girls' reward for completing the local summer reading program at the library they received a certificate for a free gift at the local history museum.

They had a few choices to pick from and they both decided on yo-yo's. After they received their prize we checked out the museum which, although was small, detailed a great deal of local history.


One exhibit the girls enjoyed was the civil war kids dress up area. Here they were able to don some replica attire worn during the civil war.

Another exhibit described how a local slave during the late 1820's was able to buy his own freedom and his families freedom by handcarving ox yokes. He then moved to Independence, Missouri and continued his craftmanship by opening a store selling yokes. Kristy and I thought about the possibility that he may have certainly made yokes for some of the early members from our church who predominately lived in that area during that time era.

A last exhibit allowed Molly and Neleha to do some hands on work with stone grinding corn meal. We certainly had a good visit to our local history museum.

Fishing with Miss Molly

I decided that I would spend Molly's last two Friday mornings before she started school with her fishing. She was very excited about the idea. So we got up nice and early and headed out to Springfield Lake.

Molly started out the trip by sitting on the bottom of the canoe but she soon gained enough confidence to over come her fear and sit on the seat. She was so happy to be sitting where grown-ups sit in the canoe. She is a brave little girl, that is for sure.

We enjoyed a very beautiful calm morning on the lake. Apparently the area was so relaxing that the fish were still asleep as we did not get even one bite.

But we did spot a deer walking on the shore line. We really thought the experience was fantastic to watch a deer casually walk along rooting around for food. The deer probably thought it was nice to watch a couple of humans out fishing on the lake.

No fish this trip......there is always next week. I must say I sure enjoyed fishing with my Molly.

Back to the Zoo: Zoo Keys and Feeding the Animals

Our recent visit to the Dickerson Park Zoo led us to learning what a zoo key was. We purchased one when we got our pass but on this visit we actually used it.

Basically at every exhibit there is a box and when a zoo key is inserted a message is presented about the exhibit. It's like having a guided tour of the zoo. I think Molly likes using the key more than actually listening to the message though. She only gives it about 20 seconds and then moves on to the next exhibit to use the key again.

Our favorite part of the zoo is being able to feed the animals, the actual interaction is what we are after.

On this trip they had a baby goat and a chicken in the feeding area. Our girls flocked to them with all their food.


The giraffe tower is the highlight of the animal feeding experience. Our girls love getting up close and personal with these most majestic animals.


On our way out of the zoo one of the peacocks decided to show off, a very beautiful sight indeed.