Family Fun Night gone wrong...

For many moons my daughter has been nagging me about Family Home Evening.  I'll admit right here and now that we haven't really done it in a very, very long time.  Why?  Because I hate it.  There...I said it.

When my kids were young, I tried...really, I did.  I made cute little family home evening packets that I slaved over for the whole week in preparation..and I always made treats.  We didn't sing, because, basically,that is torture to me and no one wants to hear me sing...but we always had a lesson.  Wait.  I always had a lesson prepared.  Then we'd all sit down to start and after a chorus of "stop touching me" and "he's putting his feet on me" and "I never get to do ANYTHING" and "when do we get to have treats" along with lots of screaming (most of the screaming was coming from me) crying (probably mostly coming from me as well), running around, climbing all over the furniture and each other, and frustration I would give up, give each of them a treat, then eat the rest myself and swear I was never going to do it again. The end.

Now, here I am with my daughter asking me why I don't do it and bugging me to start.  I always make up some flimsy excuse and blow her off.  Then, this Sunday she comes home with a brown paper sack and says she has an activity for Family Home Evening.  I reluctantly agree to let her try, laughing to myself but secretly hoping everyone has grown up enough to not act like they did way back in the days when I was trying.

I saw her decorating the sack (and I have to admit, I knew what she was planning because my sister had taught the same lesson in her Young Women's group on Sunday so I was prepared).  She dutifully cut up strips of paper, and wrote everyone's name down...then went looking for a shoe box to use...and soon she was ready.  Fast forward to the end of dinner.... The conversation went something like this:

Me: Okay, everyone come to the table.  Savannah has a Family Home Evening activity.
Colby: Why?
Me: Because she wants to.
Colby: But why?
Me: Just stop asking and come sit down. (He stays at the computer with headphones on.)
No one comes to the table.
Me: Hey!  Savannah is waiting.  Everyone get over here.
Dylan: Why?
Me: Shut up and sit down already and she'll tell you!

Signs of frustration are creeping all over Savannah's face... Finally everyone comes to the table and she places the shoe box in the middle.  She instructs everyone to silence their phones and place them in the box.  The conversation continues...

Me: Mine is charging because it's almost dead.  Can it stay on the counter?
Colby: Mine is by the computer, but it's already silent.
Patrick: Mine is all the way in the bedroom.  I can't even hear it from here.  Do I have to go get it?
Dylan is texting. The only phone in the box is Savannah's. She looks like she's going to cry.
Savannah: Can everybody please get their phone now!?
Colby: But why do I have to? I'm not using it or playing with it.
Dylan: Hold on I'm almost done.
Me: EVERYONE GET THEIR PHONE IN THE BOX NOW.
Patrick: Do I really have to go get it?

So with the phones all safely tucked away, she told us that she had prepared a family fun bag.  Everyone was supposed to write things they like to do with the family and put them in the bag. It doesn't take relaying the entire conversation to tell you that the whole thing was met with grumbling, protests, sneers, jeers, and poor Savannah looked like someone had killed her dog.  Since she didn't explain that we were going to be drawing the slips out to actually DO these things, some of the suggestions were a little out of reach...like Go to Disneyland.  And Colby and Dylan just boobed that they couldn't think of anything until I yelled at them that we do fun things all the time and why couldn't they just write some crap down?

When all the slips were FINALLY filled out (which took WAY longer than it should have) she informed us that every week we would draw one out and do it.  So we drew one out.  It said "Play Buzz" (a  quiz game for Playstation--and a mighty fun one at that)  Savannah went to set it up and we all moved to the family room so the arguments could resume.

Colby: I hate playing Buzz with five people.  We should play with four.
Me: We can't do that or someone doesn't get to play.
Colby: That's okay because it isn't fun with five people.
Me: But it's supposed to be FAMILY fun...you can't leave someone out.
Colby: Leave out Dylan.
Dylan: Hey Colby!  That wasn't nice.
Colby: But it isn't fun with five people.
Me: We're playing with five people and that's final.
Colby: Then I don't want to play. 
Me: You're playing!  We're all playing!
Patrick: Colby, you're playing so just have fun!
Colby: I can't have fun playing with five players.  The game isn't as good.  The end is stupid.
Dylan: Stop arguing and pick your character.
Colby: Savannah can not play.
Savannah: This was my idea in the first place! Stop it!
Me: We're all playing.  Pick your character.
Colby: Maybe we should have a tournament.
Me: We're all playing...just stop arguing!

He continued to argue through the first couple of rounds.  After that he played, but his heart wasn't really in it.  And when it got to the end he reminded us (many, many, many times) that the ending with five people is dumb.  Then everyone left to clean the church except me and Braden.  I turned on a crime show....it was far less antagonistic.

Savannah expressed her exasperation to me later.  She found the whole thing terribly frustrating.  I only had one logical response for her:

"Welcome to motherhood."