Victory!

You know those Family Home Evening Victories that sometimes seem to be so far and few, and yet, when they happen, wow!

For several years, our kids have always anticipated FHE, but the last little while it has been a lot rougher than normal. Last Monday, about 2/3 of the way through FHE, it was a huge mess. 3 of us were still participating, but one was in the kitchen, glaring and making snide remarks, another ran crying into the other room. I had the activity and I was ready to call it a night, skip activity and dessert and just put everyone to bed. When I vocalized my thoughts, the kids decided to grudgingly change. We had to say another prayer to get back on track. Once the anger in the air had mostly dissipated, I shared an experience I had when I had prayed to know WHO to serve and HOW to serve them.  Noah told me later that he loved the story. Made me so happy!  I feel like the Holy Ghost was testifying to him as I shared. 

My activity was that we would put on a timer for 10 minutes and run around the house, doing as much "secret" service as we could. The kids were so excited and my heart just swelled when I saw that Noah had left a note on his sisters' bed with 2 suckers. The oldest two have a bad case of sibling rivalry that often translates into fighting, snide remarks or impatience. When the 10 minutes were up, EVERYONE was happy. The whole atmosphere in the home was transformed. I found Noah helping his sister organize her desk in her room, even though they were supposed to be getting ready for bed. Moments like these are so rare. Amalie was beaming, because truly she adores and looks up to her big brother. Even this morning, everyone was still happy and Noah slipped me a sucker to put on Gabriel's bed to find later. Even little Andre had 4 love notes in his crib.  Noah's was funny, it said at the bottom, "you can rip this if you want." Since Andre is at that fun stage of loving to rip papers up.  

It is amazing as I look back to see that the adversary was working hard so that we would not have this joyous and testimony building experience.  And I honestly was ready to thrown in the towel, but because I'd taken extra time to be prayerful and plan out the activity, I was determined to do it.  I'm so glad we did.  What a wonderful experience for all of us to experience the pure love and joy that come from serving others.