Our Family- Family Ways

 by Cheryl Merrick

We tried to teach our children how to live so they could be happy and become loving, responsible people. This is why we read scriptures, had family prayer, displayed gospel pictures, watched inspiring shows, and did fun activities together. 

We tried to teach that every person is unique with their own special gifts and that no gift or person is better than another.  We discouraged disparaging comments, hitting, competition, and bullying, and encouraged supporting each other.  Of course, developing positive qualities takes time and maturity. Often I felt like our children were on a teeter-totter. When one child felt good about themselves, the other felt bad. It is a hard lesson to learn that everyone and everything doesn’t revolve around you.  We watched as our older children learned to love as they helped to care for their younger sister and brother. Having a baby in the house, united our family and focused attention on someone besides themselves. A baby brought peace to our home.

Another thing we encouraged was to attend the dance and school performances, baseball and soccer games, pinewood derbys, church and scout award presentations, and anything else that was important to a member of our family. In our home there was space and materials for our developing artists, dancers, and musicians, and for our sports players, builders, readers, and writers. It was exciting to see the very different talents they each had. 

We tried to have many different types of things our children could do such as supplies to create art or crafts, blocks, logs, sheets, clothes pins, and legos to build with, musical instruments, books to read, dress up clothes and puppets to stage performances, music to dance to, and balls, rackets, swings and other equipment for sports. 

What we didn’t allow was our children to spend much time in front of the TV or Nientendo game. When our older children were younger, children played outside whenever they could. By the time we were raising our last child, the world had changed and many children just sat staring at the TV screen from the time they got home from school to the time they went to bed at night. We stayed with our decision not to watch TV during the day unless we were sick. Even at night, our children had to have all their school and house work done before they could watch. Our children always seemed to have plenty to do and I enjoyed seeing them develop their talents.  

What all our children did a lot of was read. Garrett read from a fun book and the scriptures each night while the kids and I cleaned up after dinner. This was a time we really enjoyed together. If we ever forgot, our kids would ask us, “When are we going to have the reading?”

Sometimes we liked to have special dinners. When we had stir fry, we all dressed up in oriental clothes. We had a few formal dinners with china and stemware. My favorite dinner was the time we had a dinner where we all draped sheets over our clothes like togas in Greek god style, sat at a low table, ate ambrosia (fruit and coconut), and watched a video about who we are, why we are here, and where we can go after this life. 

One thing our kids really enjoyed was their dates with Dad. Garrett would take a child out to eat and they would talk. The kid got to choose the place and what they wanted to eat. They were always begging for “Date Night”.

One thing we had to deal with was that we almost had two families. A way we coped with the wide age range was to have a small yard within our larger yard for the young children. It had a sandbox, swingset, small patio, and a small rope swing attached to the tree. The young children could also come in the back door, but they couldn’t go out the gate. Not only was this area close to the house, I could see all of it from the window. The younger children always wanted to go and do what the older kids were doing, but they were from seven to eleven years younger and just got hurt.  With their own yard, the younger children could be outside with their older brother and sister and still be safe. 

A special thing Garrett did was that he organized, played with, and refereed basketball and touch football games with our children and the neighborhood kids. Once a very competitive girl went through the basement window. We were glad that no one was hurt and replaced the small window with plexiglass.  

We tried to encourage love within our family by kneeling together each night by our sofa and praying for each other. We also tried to encourage gratitude by thanking our Heavenly Father in prayer before each meal for the food He had given us. 

Another thing we did was to teach our children to pay tithing. We wanted our kids to learn to share and not be selfish, so we explained to them about giving back to God one out of every ten coins they had received so that this money could be used to help other people. We also showed them how to save part of their allowance and set up savings accounts for them at the credit union. 

Garrett and I learned so much raising our children. It was a great opportunity for us to grow and develop more faith, patience, and love.  It is satisfying for us to see that our children have become strong, capable, loving adults.