Family Nights - Contentment

We decided we wanted to do family nights.  So finally I sat down to fill in our calendar.  I wrote in "Family Nights" on one of my husband's nights off.  A while back I bought several books from Focus on the family - Family Night Tool Chests.  These books are amazing resources.  I highly recommend them because they make doing this - easy.  The one we used for this night was Christian Character Qualities.  They also have age adjustment suggestions if you have older kids.

Here is how our night went.

I quickly read over the lesson.  I gather the materials.  There were three pretty simple activities with this night.

The first activity was called Mine!  

I set three bowls out and had one large bowl of coins.  They had to run to the large bowl and grab one coin and get it into their own bowls. Whoever was touching their own bowl when the timer went off got to keep the coins.   The problem was they rarely touched the bowl so you can guess what they said when the timer went off and they weren't touching their bowls - "That's not fair!".   The scripture we read was Luke 12:13-21.  I did explain to them about grace and mercy after the activity and I told them I was going to allow them to keep a little of their money and put it in their chore jars.

The next activity was called "How Much Do I Need?"

We turned out all of the lights and I read about Paul being in prison by candlelight.  They loved having the lights out and then I asked them questions that were in the book.  The verses were Phil. 4:11-13 and I Tim. 6:7-8.

The third activity was called "My Favorite".

In this activity I got a box and had the kids each bring a favorite toy and put it in the box.  My daughter came up to me and whispered, "I don't want to bring Marie Grace."  Marie Grace is her American Girl doll and she wasn't sure what we were going to do with the toys - maybe give them away????  In the end she did bring her and I was proud of her for that.

We discussed that sometimes we all place too high a value on our possessions.

Once we ended we asked them all one thing they learned.  We closed in prayer and had each of them pray.

It was a simple, fun way to get across a good character lesson.  We plan to do these each week!  I can't wait for the next one.