2013 Family Theme

This is our family theme/motto for 2013.
We are a little late starting it this year, but we decided to make a tradition of picking a family theme and focusing on it throughout the year.  I think in the future we will introduce the new theme at our back to school feast.  But for this year, better late than never right? I am so excited about this theme:
I Can Do Hard Things.
The goal is to talk about it often and relate as many teaching moments back to it all year long.

I love my kids and I feel an overwhelming need to arm them the best I can before I send them out into the world. Most especially I want them to learn how to be capable people and to develop "self control".  I want them to know that more often than not, the things they want will take hard work and determination to get. I also think this is a wonderful thing for Tyson and I to work on as well. In the chaos and business of life, we look for the quick, easy and low maintenance. 

It is good to remind ourselves sometimes that we need to stretch ourselves and make goals that require hard work to achieve. 

To kick off this theme, Tyson prepared a family home evening lesson to introduce it to the kids.  It was super cute. He had the girls stand up and asked them first to put a hand on their heads. Then he had them put their other hand on their stomachs.  Then he told them to jump up and down.  This they could do pretty effortlessly.

He then had them start to pat their head and rub their tummies while jumping on one foot.  This was not so easy.  He then asked the girls if what they were trying to do was easy and they gasped and said "no".  He said that they could learn how to do it if they kept practicing and that just because something is hard doesn't mean we can't do it.

He read to the girls from the illustrated Book of Mormon Stories and told them the story of Nephi building the ship. Throughout the story he kept questioning the girls about if they thought certain things would have been easy for Nephi.
I really think they understood what he was explaining to them.

We told the girls our theme and had them each say it a few times. 

We made a list and each of us picked 3 things that we thought was hard that we wanted to focus on or accomplish this year. One of mine was keeping a family journal (i.e. this blog). So far so good!

Ava's List

1- Learning to read

2- Learning to ride a bike

3- Stop Whining

Claire's List

1-Stop sucking her thumb

2- Learning to swim

3- Stop Teasing

Tyson and I's are kind of personal so I won't list them here but we are excited to have something to work on as a family.  I have the theme displayed where we can all see it and be reminded.

Also the girls were so good and stayed focused.  

It was our best FHE yet!