2nd Annual Madsen Family Back-To-School Night

If you remember (and I'm sure you do, because I know you're all obsessively remembering every detail about my family) (ha!), last year we started a new tradition in our family: back-to-school night.  We have a special dinner, talk about the upcoming school year, and then have a special Family Home Evening lesson where we introduce and talk about our new school year theme.

If you remember (and I know you do!), last year I took lots of pictures of the event.  But this year?  Ah, um, not so much. 

Three.  I took exactly three pictures.  And they were all before we even started. As in, this afternoon as I decorated and got things ready while the kids were at someone else's house.

In my defense, they are pretty awesome pictures.  Okay, no, not really.  But also in my defense, I spent the hour before dinner at the school's open house, filling out a bajillion forms and dropping off the 239 school supply items I had to buy for each child. 

It was a little busy.

So we sat down to dinner and the kids were all super excited and bouncy because a) I made one of their favorite meals - spaghetti and meatballs (with homemade marinara sauce, made from tomatoes from my garden, thank you very much), and b) Spencer and Josh's lunch boxes were at the table and they knew that there was a surprise inside.

They could barely sit through the prayer before they tore them open to discover Mario Brothers t-shirts for the first day of school.  SCORE!

*Side Note: I feel the need to explain that I am not really a big fan of t-shirts with cartoons and figures and junk all over them.  I can't help it.  But my kids are.  A lot.  And although I used to try to get a good polo or other cute shirt for the first day of school, I have given up and now let them wear a new t-shirt that will make them very happy.  Because is it really worth the fight to get them into a shirt they don't really want to wear and thus make them grouchy for their first day of school?  No.  It's better to let them wear some ugly cartoon t-shirt and have them be happy and not mad at momma.  So I'll just have to swallow my t-shirt snobbery tomorrow while I take their first day of school pictures.*

We had a rather wild dinner, followed by an even more wild clean-up.  This, in turn, was followed by some rather lengthy time-outs for Spencer and Josh.  I think they were just a bit too excited.

Lance gave a good lesson about the 2,000 stripling warriors and how they were brave and courageous because they had strong testimonies of the gospel.  We then introduced this year's theme:

Lance and I both felt that this would be a good theme for the year, as the boys are in particular need of courage lately.  Spencer has always been something of a scaredy-cat when it comes to trying new things. (And it's usually silly little things - not big things, as you'll see in later posts.)  And Josh needs all sorts of courage when it comes to new places and situations.  Heaven only knows how he'll act tomorrow when I take him to school.

Did the lesson and theme sink in?  Will they be strong and courageous throughout the school year?  Heaven only knows. But it's a good way to start the year.

By the way, I'm still trying to decide which sign I like best to put up on our wall.  What do you think?