B-2-S FHE & First Days : 2009 Edition

On our last "summer vacation" weekend, we held a special FHE called "Back-2-School". The kids had seen me making preparations here and there for about a week, so they'd been anticipating all the fun surprises. I'm happy to say it was a huge hit and loads of fun!

I found some cute (cheap!) decorations at the Dollar Store (streamers, cut outs for the wall) and we used our Little People Bus as our centerpiece.

After prayer, we started our lesson by singing "The Wheels on the Bus". (This could very well have been the highlight of Carson's evening!) Then we had a lesson talking about the things we can do to be good students and also tips on how to make new friends. We broke into two groups, each group listing their ideas. After reviewing everyone's suggestions, we picked our favorite ones and made an official list. Those lists were then posted on our FHE board upstairs (a magnet board specifically used to display something that brings to mind our most recent FHE lessons--hopefully it helps carry the lesson on throughout the week as a reminder).

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Then we had dinner, Cafeteria-style, of course! We all had trays and walked through the "line" along the counter island. The menu was delish and old-school, as you can see in the picture below!~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Following dinner, two teams went on a treasure hunt! Halle and Wyatt had written clues, and had to use some serious teamwork to figure some of them out. Daddy and Carson had clues with pictures (I had gone around the house, photographing different locations for clues). It worked very well and Carson felt special that he got to participate and pretty much be able to do it by his big-boy-self. Here's team "Hyatt" finding their treasure: a huge gift bag full of school supplies for all three kids, plus some items they could take to their teachers (kleenex, hand sanitizer, crayons, pencils, etc.). There was also a storybook for each child about going back to school. It was fun to sit and read through them. My favorite was the story which told about a girl who is nervous and scared about the first day of school. You never see her...just parts of her, like her feet as she puts on her shoes, etc. At the end you realize it's not a girl at all--it's the teacher who has butterflies about her first day back to teaching school! Gave some nice insight that maybe the teachers get a little nervous, too!

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Carson found his treasure hiding behind the blanket rack. It was a special dessert: School Bus Twinkies! Next time I will use the miniature oreos, as the regular ones made our buses "monster trucks", but it didn't matter...they still tasted very yummy! (And can you get any more sinful than TWINKIES and OREOS???
Hello, Calories...Hello, Heaven!)We ended our FHE with a common tradition: Father's Blessings.

I'm so grateful for the priesthood Brett holds and the worthiness he has to use it. It is an incredible gift in our lives, being able to start a new year knowing the Lord has been asked to help you specifically in that area. We have great kids--they are bright, energetic, and caring. But it's wonderful to know the Lord is on their side, by their side, in their day-to-day activities.

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Breakfast First Day of School:
Waffles & Strawberries with a tall glass of OJ

Halle loves going to her beautiful new school, and loves even more the fact that she can walk there with her friends! It was hard for her mama to let her go on her own, but she's done fabulously and has also proved that so far she can be trusted to go straight there and back (even in a timely manner!). I have such a cool daughter!

Halle's teacher, "Mrs. H"
~~~~~~~~~~Wyatt is a "senior" in preschool this year.
Next year he will graduate and move onto greener
pastures in kindergarten! For now, however,
he's enjoying being back with Miss Amy and making
new friends the hopefully will be right there with him
next year as he changes to the 'big school'.