We looked forward to our first Daddy's family reunion all year long and after months and months of planning and preparing for it, it finally came!! Woo hoo!! Jon's sister, Elizabeth, volunteered to plan the first one and it was a major success!! The theme she chose was "Armor Up!" and centered around us all thinking of ways we could fend off and defeat the evil, adversary and darkness in the world today by putting on the whole armor of God, as talked about in the scriptures, Ephesians 6:11-17:
"Put on the whole armour of God, that ye may be able to stand against the wiles of the devil. For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places. Wherefore take unto you the whole armour of God, that ye may be able to withstand in the evil day, and having done all, to stand. Stand therefore, having your loins girt about with truth, and having on the breastplate of righteousness; And your feet shod with the preparation of the gospel of peace; Above all, taking the shield of faith, wherewith ye shall be able to quench all the fiery darts of the wicked. And take the helmet of salvation, and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God."
We were able to host the opening introduction night at our house and it was one of my most favorite parts of the whole experience! We were introduced to the theme, listened to some scriptures and powerful quotes on putting on the whole armor of God so we can be strong as individuals and as families, watched uncle Austin act out the difference between wearing our "armor" and not wearing any at all with the fiery darts shot at him by Grandpa (quite fun and entertaining to see!!) presented our individual family shields, and split up into colored groups- shields, helmets, swords, breastplates, and more and divided up into stations where we made fun memories and learned how important it is to ARMOR UP!!!
Station 1: Strenthening our family- Aunt Beka was in charge of the craft where we made picture frams from popsicle sticks and decorative tape to remember that strengthening our family can keep us strong!!
Station 2: We built super strong bridges with gumdrops and toothpicks to find the best shapes and engineering construction to withstand a stack of books! My yellow team (Michael, Juan, Katelyn, Samuel and I won this part!! Thanks to those smarty engineer minds on our team!! All we needed was a little of Uncle Ben's expertise and our bridge may not have fallen at all, even with 5 plus books staked on after 5 mintues too! Go orange team!)
Station 3: Building Rockets & Setting Our Goals High to Make it Back to Heavenly Father Some Day
Station 4: Coloring on Our Family Flag (or Title of Liberty!!) (aka tablecloth that we can pass around each year and put our reunion logo on it to remember each one!)
Station 5: Using Our Armor to Fight off the Fiery Darts of the Adversary Nerf Battle! This was probably the kids favorite one, it was intense, high energy and they liked each taking turns with the fantastic armor built by Uncle Austin himself! Super fun! Yay for putting on the armor of God!
Look at all these smiles!! These are some of our most favorite people all combined under one roof, it was such a wonderful time!! We missed Ben and Carli, who couldn't make it because they were touring the new Book of Mormon videos set and scenery (Carli's dad is producing the videos for the church) and couldn't reschedule that. Also, Daddy had to go to the airport to pick Ben and Carli up, so he didn't get to participate very much either....But, we made the best time we could and one of my most favorite parts was working together in small groups, ALL WHILE singing to the reunion cd I had prepared including all sorts of disney songs, the fight song, don't stop believin and more!! Just absolutely LOVED hearing everyone pelting out all the words and singing and creating/crafting/playing together! I felt like time stood still and we were all so unified and enjoying ourselves under the same roof, it was magical and it was so much fun, love these memories and smiles to remember forever!
Oh yeah, and we had Austin-built life size Jenga blocks to play too to show how important it is to be careful builders of our fortifications to keep from crashing our towers down! Cute idea huh!
Hooray for the armor of God, families and armoring up!! We were in for an exciting next three days!!!
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