I must say....I am SO excited about this family home evening. It was very simple to plan and it will be simple and quick to execute as well. Plus my kids will love it because we are going to be watching part of the new Disney movie "Tangled"! Here's a few things you need to make this family home evening work :) 
These are just little signs I made up for the kids that I will print out and have sitting next to their crowns.
I don't know about you but I LOVED this movie! As I was watching it for the first time last week the story struck me as so profound. Let's see if this sounds familiar: a beautiful young girl is born of royal birth. However, as she gets older she is told lie after lie to try and keep her from fulfilling her full potential. She struggles between believing these lies or going out on her own and finding out who she really is...only to learn she truly is the daughter of the King. HELLO!! I couldn't keep the tears from coming as I thought about this beautiful message. We are ALL daughters and sons of a King, and once we are sent to this earth it is so easy to forget. Satan is everywhere around us, trying to deceive us, tear us down, and doubt our divinity at every turn. By listening to these lies we become trapped, and it is only when we realize these lies for what they are that we can fulfill our true missions on earth and rediscover our divine heritage.
What a powerful message to teach our children!! We are going to start off the night by watching the scene in the movie where Rapunzel asks her "mother" if she can go out into the world. The "mother" then goes on to fill her with doubts and tells her lie after lie to keep her from leaving her and finding out the truth.
After we watch that clip we are going to relate the story of Rapunzel to our story. We are going to talk about how we are daughter's of our Heavenly Father, a King, and how Satan will do everything in his power to lie, deceive and scare us to keep us from reaching our divine potential.
Now for the fun activity. I thought this would be a great activity for the kids to try and distinguish the lies that Satan would have us believe, and the truths we can receive from a loving Heavenly Father. Remember that yellow yarn you needed?? Here's why! :)
The yellow yarn is of course representing Rapunzel's hair :) I am going to take that yellow yarn and have my husband string it ALL through the house. The catch is every few feet the yarn will break off into two pieces going in different directions. Attached to the yarn will be something Heavenly Father wants us to know and something Satan would have us believe. Whichever one is the truth from Heavenly Father will lead to other questions whereas the lie from Satan will lead to a dead end. We will have these crossroads in the yarn several times throughout the house and finally they yarn will end in my bedroom tied to my bed. On my bed I will have the crowns for all the kids with signs that say both "Daughter of a King" and "Son of a King." The moral is if we listen to our Father in Heaven we CAN reach and find our full potential, as daughters and sons of a King.
These are just little signs I made up for the kids that I will print out and have sitting next to their crowns. I hope you all have a wonderful week and enjoy this family home evening...I can't wait! :)
31 comments:
Hi - my name's Nicki and I saw the link to your FHE plan for Tangled. It was sooo cute and clever that I had to do a quick post on my blog for it. Hope you don't mind (I linked to yours) - but it was too good not to share! I wish my son was still young so we could do this! That Daughter of a King song/CD by Jenny Phillips is one of my faves and fits this FHE perfectly as well! Anyway, thanks for sharing your ideas with the world! It was awesome!
love this! Thanks!
LOVE LOVE LOVE this!
So cute! I know my 3 girls will love it! Thanks for sharing!
Found your post through Pinterest and I just wanted to say I too saw the hidden meaning in this movie and loved it so much, but you creating a wonderful, thoughtful and memorable FHE idea out of it is just plain awesome! Thank you so much for your talents and sharing it. I am going to do this with my kids and I also think it is a great idea for a YW lesson or activity!
I found your post through Pinterest and while I love the movie I had never thought of it that way before. What a GREAT idea! We may adapt this idea for a weekly Relief Society meeting and tie it into a lesson from the Daughters of My Kingdom book that was a gift from the 1st Presidency. Thanks for getting my creative juices flowing!
We had another family over for family night and this was great! They said it was the best their children have behaved for family night before! It was short enough that they didn't lose focus, they had a blast on the 'treasure hunt' part of it. and then had fun running through Rapunzel's 'hair' (I used yellow curling ribbon) and breaking through it like a runner in a race afterward. I attached it to all the doorknobs in the hallway with a little card at each doorknob. If they made the wrong choice and went to the wrong door, the card was blank. I told them it was the stupor of thought we get when we disregard the promptings of the Holy Ghost. It was awesome! Thanks for this!
The Tangled analogy is also used by post and ex Mormons who have seen through all of the lies that the church promulgates. They then realize that they're not as crappy as people as the church would have them feel.
Ah, yes, Tangled is an excellent analogy to the Church. A hyper-protective "mother" who says that the world is "evil" and "out to get you," and that you must never leave or you'll die.
Then, once you do leave, you realize the world is so beautiful! So gorgeous, full of light and wonder, and not this horrible thing that will destroy your soul.
So, yes, I agree. Excellent analogy to our relationship with the LDS church.
Why do you have to make something positive into a negative. Sounds to me that you two previous people are not really happy unless you bring others down. What is wrong in teaching children about their worth as a person. It really doesn't have to do with the Mormon church. Catholics too want to teach their children to believe in themselves and not to believe what the world would have them think of themselves. All religion aside this is a great concept to teach younger generations. Instead of teaching children how to accuse, blame, and put down others as the two previous comments have been. I am sure this persons children will grow up more confident, happy, and a better contributing member of society because their parents are willing to teach them with love about how to love themselves. I sure hope my kids marry their kids because I would want my kids in a well adjusted relationship with people who care about other.
LOVE this! it has Wednesday night activity with my YW written all over it!!
oh, and haters just seem to want to hate! But they do it anonymously, I see! haha. Don't let it get you down! Your blog is great.
I am no hater. I love the idea of teaching our children they are princes and princesses of a heavenly king, but the use of Tangled is a little bit ironic because most ex-mormons find the story a great metaphor for their experience with the church.
Mother Gothel = the church
Perfect analogy. Think about it. "The world is so scary...don't go out there." "Mother knows best!"
I realize that active Mormons will not understand this, but once you have, like Rapunzel, stepped outside of the tower, you realize that much of what you were told was a scare tactic and untrue. The world is a great place, full of light, full of great people, full of things to experience, enjoy, and share. Full of our brothers and sisters.
The tower is a safe place and that scary world will never hurt you in the tower. And then you realize the world isn't scary.
Great blog. Thanks for sharing.
This sounds like something we did at a youth activity, ages and ages ago! (Way before this movie came out...haha) But we had to follow strings all over the church. Way fun!
I had a similar experience of thoughts watching Kung Fu Panda...
LOVED this! Thanks so much for sharing. I have three girls all at the age of loving this movie. And to the Anon. person, I just really don't get it...I feel like my relationship to the Savior and others all around the world has only been enhanced because of the teaching and support I received at Church. Maybe you were brought up differently or had other negative experiences? Anyway, I just wanted to say thanks!
Oh I almost forgot, I have a free printable at my site: www.lilyandthistle.blogspot.com that goes along with this perfectly! :)
Sorry totally not trying to take over the comments section...forgot the link! http://lilyandthistle.blogspot.com/2010/07/turning-thrift-store-frame-into.html
I totally agree. I taught my kids this months ago.
Anonymous:
As members of our church, we are taught to not judge others who are not of our faith.
As Elder Uchtdorf recently said, "Don't judge me because I sin differently than you."
I believe it is best to know everyone around you and not judge them or even label others members or non-members, inactive or active.
We each are loved by our Heavenly Father and that is the biggest part of being on earth, learning to love one another despite differences.
Your experience in the church must have been difficult, for as with all humans, members of the LDS faith are not perfect. They may not drink or smoke or be indifferent to religious teachings, but they can fall subject to many temptations. Sometimes those temptations can hurt the feelings of those around them.
Yes, I am LDS and I absolutely understand the feelings of guilt when a mistake is made. A lot of times that guilt comes from within and not from members of the church.
God NEVER wants you to hate yourself for your mistakes. Guilt is the first feeling to recognizing that an unhealthy choice has been made. Next is apologizing and repentance. Repentance includes forgiving of ones self to begin to feel love once again.
If you are feeling guilt, perhaps you need to look inside yourself to apologize and ask forgiveness, rather than look outside the church to try to validate or justify those actions that made you feel guilty to begin with.
We just did this tonight -thanks so much for sharing your great idea! My kids got really into it... it was awesome!
I love this! Great idea and thank you for sharing. As I was reading your intro, I was reminded of a favorite saying of my college bishop. He raised three daughters, and loved the quote "Don't you know every little girl is a Princess?" from the movie/book "The Little Princess."
Don't forget that her special power comes from "the sun"
Thanks a lot we have had a lot of struggles over the last few years with foster children and illness. I have fallen away from doing our FHE and truelly miss them. I have been trying to find something that will inspire me to get back in the grove and havent had any luck. I wanted something that would be simple and hold my childrens atintion longer than 2 seconds now that they are not used to it anymore. This worked wounderful and helped with their struggles with the issues our family have had over the past little bit. My older child even come ip with the link to the fact of being in the world but not of the world because even with the ugly.things their is so much beauty. Thank you for your creativity and you sharing.
I'm a born again Christian and I am so doing this with my three year old girl :) love this idea !
Yes!!!!! I love tangled and this would be perfect for a young women's lesson! thanks!
THIS IS THE BEST!!!
Being an 11-year-old looking for a short, fun FHE this blog really saved me!
May I just add:
Best- Idea- EVER!!!
You anonymous people who say the Mormon Church is lying--
Your Loss.
Great idea! Boy, I was raised without religion and joined the church when I was 20 and I have to say that nobody ever tried to "scare"me into not being a part of the world. I've been on both sides and he LDS church definitely doesn't teach or believe that the world is an evil place or that people outside the church are evil. The leaders of the LDS church encourage the youth to befriend all and reach out to all people through the internet as well as in other ways. Anonymous you must have had a bad experience with an imperfect person- go figure! I am sorry for your negative experience, or that you were misinformed. And your right, the world is a beautiful place and I don't know a single LDS person that would disagree with that.
I can't seem to find the printable for the daughter of GOd . I'd love to uses it for my activity day girls .
I don't know what "Church" the hater comments on this thread are talking about. The Church I belong to asks me to test every doubt by seeking personal revelation for myself. I love it. You guys should try it. It is so much better than just following men. I love having revelation from a higher source. The name of my Church is The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. Loved this FHE. Thank you for sharing.
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