Family Night is something that we instituted in the Reeder home almost two years ago. We’d gone through an Advent Devotional (provided by my parent’s church) that Christmas, and the kids had so much fun with it, I decided we should make it a weekly occurrence.
I had often tried to have bed-time devotions with the kids each night before tucking them in. I found that, at most, we could make it three nights in a row before “life” got in the way. So I thought, why not change the nightly devotions to a weekly devotional, with a special activity to help reinforce the lesson? And that’s how Thursday evenings became Family Nights.
I would try to think of something fun to cook, and plan a special dessert for Thursdays…something to make the night “special” and out of the norm for the kids. Then we would do our devotion, complete our activity, and gather round the TV to watch SURVIVOR! (The kids STILL love that show… even though sometimes Mama has to explain why certain people’s mid-sections and rears are “blurry”…) ;-)
Then late last spring, I saw something over at Heather Whittaker’s blog that caught my eye. She does THEMED family nights!! HOW FUN IS THAT!?!?! With this new inspiration, I started trying to think of ways to implement different themes into our Thursday night plan.
Then summer came…and, alas, Family Nights didn’t happen too often because we traveled a lot, and when we were home I tried to keep everything low-key and simple. I would have “illusions of grandeur” every once in a while that I was going to get the thing going again, but each time I fell miserably short.
Enter August. With the beginning of school, a new schedule, and a determined resolve, I decided it was time to not only start having Family Nights again, but to KICK IT UP A NOTCH!! So we did.
I changed the night to Friday because family and Friday both start with “F”…no, not really…but it makes sense doesn’t it? ;-) I changed it to Friday because I wanted it to be more relaxed (not having to worry about an exact bedtime) and I thought it would be a great way to kick off the weekend.
Our first Family Night of the “new year” was our Back 2 School night. It was SO FUN and the kids LOVED EVERY MINUTE OF IT! Since then, we’ve had themes such as Football Night, Spaghetti Western (Cowboy) Night, and last week’s Pajama Party Night (see slideshow below).
I try to post about these each week, because, as I said in yesterday’s post, both of our extended families live out of town, and I want the grandparents to be able to see what their “little darlings” are up to. Not only that, but I figure if I can glean inspiration from another blog (Thank you, Whittaker Woman!) so can you!!
(My Mama taught me all about sharin’, y’all… and this would make her so proud!) :-)
Speaking of sharing: I’m trying to think ahead so as to address some thoughts or questions you may have about this Family Night gig, and I think I’ve thought of a couple. (How many times can you use a tense of the word “Think” in one sentence?!?) :-)
Do we have a theme every week?
No. Frankly, that would wear me slap out!! (In case you haven’t noticed I am a bit OCD… and I tend to let things that aren’t supposed to, stress me to the max!) Some weeks are much simpler than others. One week we just ordered pizzas and declared it a “board game” night, playing Candy Land and Monopoly Jr. Other weeks we have played Wii Sports together after a “kid friendly” meal, or just popped popcorn and watched a movie. The point is to BE INTENTIONAL about spending time TOGETHER as a family.
What happened to the devotional aspect?
Well, I’ve gone back to my original “hit and miss” nightly plan. We use THIS book, but you can find plenty of others at your local (Christian) bookstore. We read an excerpt each night before bed-time prayers, and somehow I try to incorporate one of the “application” ideas into the plans for that week’s FN celebration. Do devotions happen every night? I wish they did, but at least I can say we’re working on it. :-)
How do I come up with this stuff?
What can I say, I have a very vivid imagination! Ha ha!! Honestly, I get a lot of my ideas from other blogs (like I mentioned previously) and some just pop into my head. When I think I have a good idea, I usually Google it (using the terms “family” or “children” in the search query) and see where it leads me. You can also find a lot of stuff at this website.
What am I planning for this week?
This week will be our very first FNO (Family Night OUT)! Since KISA is out of town, I am treating the kids to dinner and a movie: High School Musical 3. I really don’t know which of us is more excited! It’s all the kids have been talking about all week!
So there you have it… that’s the who, what, when, where, why, and how behind our Family Night adventures.
Do you have a Family Night? Don’t, and wish you did?
Please leave a comment below, and share your thoughts/ideas/questions.
3 comments:
I will have to run this idea by the man again. I've always wanted to do something like this, but so far it's never happened. When he's away, the girls and I often do something special, but it would be nice to have those evenings when he's HOME, too!!
Awesome.
This is a wonderful post.
Thank you.
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