Family Home Evening

We have tried, literally, for YEARS to start doing family home evening regularly as a South family. With a family this size it is near impossible to find a night that we can all meet. We have made suggestions for a night to meet, but then someone always seems to say that's a bad night for them. Jared has a box of a variety of MRE's (Meals Ready to Eat) for our food storage that he wanted to try out to see which ones we like. I told him repeatedly that they sounded horrible and I would probably starve to death before eating them, but he insisted that if I got hungry enough I would eat them. So I had a great idea...why not get his brothers over to help sample them! I sent out an email saying that we were having family home evening at our house and we'd love to have everyone that could make it come. In the end all 20 of us were able to get together on St. Patrick's Day for a food storage family home evening. Joyce brought a few MRE flavors that we didn't have and Jeremy brought some 10 year old wheat to grind and make tortillas and cookies with. Jenn tied it all together nicely with a lesson about being prepared, both spiritually and temporally. I had asked her to do a thought, but she must have been inspired to know that we didn't really have much planned for a lesson so it turned out great.

Grandpa, George holding Kayla, and Jacob in the back. Jason, Maddie and Sadie sitting on the table.The wheat grinder.

The wheat after it was ground.

Jeremy grilling the tortillas.

Tawnie trying out a tortilla w/chicken.

Jared trying to decide if he liked the MRE that he was sampling.
Jason not so sure about the one he is tasting.
Tawnie, Mindy, and Jennifer.

All the kiddies feet.

Tyler

Brynlie and Grandma South


Larkyn kept the three girls entertained by doing cheer leading moves with them. Kylie is already asking when Larkyn can come back and do more with her.

Boxes of MREs.

Looks like dog food, tastes like dog food...

Saying good bye.

The tortillas were okay to eat, especially with food on them. The MREs on the other hand...gross!!! I can save you all time and money...do not buy them. The only one that most people agreed was not too bad was the Chili Mac. The worst two were the clam chowder, which stunk up the whole house and was described as smelling like power bait, and the one that I think was maybe beef w/mushrooms. That one was described as having the same taste that your mouth does after throwing up. That night after everyone left Jared told me that he didn't know if he could eat MREs, even if he was starving. Now that's saying something! The definite highlight of the eating experience was the chocolate chip cookies that Jeremy made. They were really flat and kind of grainy, but they were actually pretty good. Especially since there were TONS of chocolate chips in them. Dang it...I just realized that I didn't get any pictures of the cookies. Oh well. There aren't any pictures of me either. It was great fun getting everyone together and hopefully we will be able to keep this up every month!