As much as I love my beloved BYU, I really hate what it did for my family home evening participation. Growing up, FHE was a big thing in our home. We did it every week and I got used to telling people that I couldn't do things on family night.
Anyway, I was thinking about this because I really hated going to FHE when I was in singles wards. It was always inconvenient, it felt like a chore, and (the obvious) it wasn't with my family. And I get why they do it--they want people to get into the habit, and they want people to have a surrogate "family" (or something). But I really hated it. And I hated being assigned as the "mom" for my group. I'm pretty sure that real-life moms don't call their children up to ask them to bring treats and to just please, for the love of all that is holy, show up so that it's not just you and the awkward "dad" sitting together in your living room.
All that said, Robbie and I don't have family home evening. Ack! We have great intentions but Robbie mentors middle schoolers on Monday nights, and I often have Monday night classes, so we don't get home till about 8:30 or later. And moving family night to another night just seems silly because every night is family night for the Hamills. Also, I hate the thought of singing an opening song. Is that weird? I have these weird THINGS that I have a hard time getting over, and one of them is public singing (when it's just a handful of people). But whatever.
Does anyone else without kids here have FHE? What do you do? (Or what did you do before you had kids?) Because other than dueling laptops at the same table, we don't really have any official Monday night activities.
And, you know, I should probably improve on that sometime soon.
Does "make a family night" count?
ReplyDeleteI completely know what you mean. Given our current circumstance, we're rarely in different rooms anymore, so we're having Family Time 24/7. I feel really bizarre about singing a song with Andy and having a lesson for some reason because we sing songs (OK, Andy sings songs and I sortof hum along) and talk bible frequently enough without designating a night for it. But still. I'm hoping that once this baby gets big enough to notice what we're doing, I'll have no excuse. But until then, I'm not going to feel too bad about it. I prefer to think of our current situation to be more akin to missionary companionship (scripture study, prayer and all that) than full on FHE.
ReplyDeletecourtney, i just LOLed. keep it clean please.
ReplyDeleteha.
ReplyDeletegrowing up we always called it "family night" and when FHE became the official title, i, too, ceased to enjoy it. nate and i used to have a family night, and we'd have an agenda like someone had the dance, someone had the poem, and then we took care of items of business. we didn't do a song.
but, yeah, now i have class on monday nights so it's paused for now. i don't really see how having family night with a baby will be any more normal--it's not normal until your kids can talk, right? but oh well. we'll probably start again as soon as the semester is over.
Matt and I try to have FHE. By try I mean we write it in our planners every Monday. We probably actually have FHE 50% of the time and when we do we laugh through the entire song, read an Ensign article from the most recent Conference Ensign, and conclude by driving to McDonald's for an ice cream cone. My love of ice cream keeps us trying.
ReplyDeleteOn the flip-side I'm with you, when are you not having FHE when its just the two of you?
Ok, I have the exact same problems with BYU family night, and also, no-kiddos family night with the husband. I really don't feel too bad about it, though.
ReplyDeleteI think Sam and I have had FHE about twice in our marriage. I'm pretty sure that needs to change, since I am supposed to be modeling good behavior for Bria or something.
ReplyDeleteAlso, I hate small-group public-singing too. Let's abolish it.
we have the same lesson every week, but i always learn a lot.
ReplyDeletewe make it a point to do something outside of the apartment on mondays, like watch a movie or go for a walk or eat a crepe. just making sure it is quality time together rather than just being together in the same room makes the difference. says the girl who has only had family night 3 times in marriage.
and ps at utah state fhe sucked just as much, and maybe more because i was an FHE mom and my "husband" thought it was a sign when we were called and we should get married. ugh. talk about an awkward semester of calling avoidance.
FHE is tough to schedule when there are only two of you. Dad and I spent our first several FHE's writing thank you notes.
ReplyDeleteIt's tough now with just the two of us once more - we usually watch a movie together - which we actually enjoy.
So go for a walk or plan a trip to Europe or make frosted graham crackers and dunk them in milk!!
but DO something!!
We had good intentions by saying we would discuss a conference talk every monday..but that hasn't really happened yet so I guess I don't have advice..dang.
ReplyDeleteI get together with two friends (who are married) and we read the eternal marriage manual and discuss. Then we eat dinner and have dessert and play a game. Totally relaxed.
ReplyDeleteIn our combined lesson on Sunday, some guy gave a really great lesson about using the Preach My Gospel manual as an FHE tool...ha ha!
ReplyDeleteI was always against FHE in singles wards. Although strange coincidence...Ben's brother was my FHE "dad" at USU. Ben and I didn't meet until about a year later and we eventually made the connection.
We always had really informal family nights when we were first married. No awkward singing. Just random gospel discussions. And a treat. But we have that most nights. (The treat, not the gospel discussions.)
Now we have a 4 year old that always reminds us to have FHE.
Courtney's comment was very funny.
ReplyDeletehahaha... sarah, in rob's defense, every time we have had FHE (we were consistent for about the first three months of marriage) he has made us use the manual. ok not "made" us but he likes it better than the fhe manual.
ReplyDeleteI don't even remember how many times I had that calling but it was at least four. It's the reason I got married. The last time, when we lived in the pink house, there was one night when it was just me and one guy I didn't know at your favorite bishop's house, and all they did was talk about Craig Ferguson.
ReplyDeleteMy suggestion is have it with with other married couples. Maybe once or twice a month. It would be more enjoyed and think of the the fun you could have. Friends are greeeaattt!!! This is Aunt Mary on Donna's blog.
ReplyDeleteveron, i forgot how much you loved that calling.
ReplyDeleteCourtney wins for best comment ever. EVEEERRRRR
ReplyDeleteBah humbug to you and your small-group public-singing hate. What's not to love? Especially when it is Primary songs. Maybe when you have kids you will enjoy it more. Or maybe not. Either way, I am going to make you sing hymns with us at Thanksgiving again! (OK, I won't make you, you and Robbie can sit out.) What about Christmas caroling? Any better?
By the way, who says you have to sing at family home evening anyway?
Matt and I have gone back and forth with family night participation. We did get better at it after having kids because by then he had started working pretty long hours and it was nice to carve out the time, plus once Theo was able to talk he enjoyed it too. Lately we have not been as good at it, but the pattern we have gotten into over the past year or so is:
-opening prayer and song with the kids
-tell a brief scripture story with pictures (something from the gospel art kit or Theo has a few scripture board books)
-closing prayer and kids go to bed
-we get out our planners/calendars and talk about the coming week (this is crucial for us; whenever we skip family night we inevitably have schedule conflicts that week because we forget to tell each other about stuff)
-maybe one of us shares a thought or scripture
-but generally we just end up talking about whatever.
It's nice. Easy to get out of the habit, though. When we were first married we were really good about reading scriptures together every night, that lasted about 3 years or so and then we had kids and have not done it with any regularity since. You win some, you lose some.
BTW I never went to FHE groups in college. bleah. Except for when Hester was an FHE mom and made me go.
Tim and I always have FHE but most of it is a planning/budgeting session where we go over what we have going on that week. I guess we only budget once a month. For the lesson we either read a conference talk or we read something from True to the Faith (nice and short) and then we chat about it. We do sing, but only because Tim humors me. I don't think we ever have FHE for more than 30 minutes. We do it right after dinner.
ReplyDeleteIt's nice to not make it a production. It's easier to do but you can still spend the time together and think about spiritual things.
And yes, Courtney wins!
Ben and I sing. It's funny and Ben is a better singer than me but I still belt it out, one day it will get better or I'll blend in with our children. One thing that Ben and I started, but still haven't finished,is to read the Proclamation to the Family and base our lessons on a different sentence or concept in the doc. It was nice and I love the proclamation to the family so really studying it has been fun.
ReplyDeleteWe meet once a month with other young married couples in the ward too. It's a good switch up.
We traced out profiles once on black paper. Haha Ben's looked like a hunchback. They are hanging up in the study room, I look up at them and see my hunchback husband.