A fun activity

On Saturday I did my last Primary quarterly activity. We are changing responsibilities, as I've been doing quarterly activities for more than 3 years and am simply getting a bit burned out, although I've had a lot of fun doing them. Once again I am sharing the idea, in case anyone can use it (or file away just in case).

I wanted this activity to reflect the theme for the year, "My Eternal Family." I also wanted to play on the building theme that is reflected in the theme song of the same name. This is what I came up with: The Family Home Depot.

Our slogan was "Building an Eternal Family? You can do it. We can help." We basically divided the church into several "departments" you'd find at Home Depot. The invitations were a "building permit."

We started the activity as a whole group in "New Employee Orientation." I divided the children into 4 groups, which were the groups they rotated with to the different departments. In New Employee Orientation, I did a team building activity where each group had to say our slogan as loudly as they could. Then we rotated to the departments, which were:

1. Tools and Hardware. This was my department. I taught about how the prophets give us tools to help us build and strengthen our families. I searched President Monson's conference talks from the past several years, and found 8 points he made. I typed these up, and taped them onto 8 tools:
and I hid the tools around the church, and sent the children on a tool scavenger hunt. I gave them an empty toolbox to collect the tools, and a list of clues to help them locate the tools. When they found each tool, they had to read the spiritual tool taped on it. When they brought me back the full toolbox, they each got to take one of these from another toolbox. I got pictures of Pres Monson, stuck them on cardstock, put the list of spiritual tools on the back side, and attached a ruler to remind them to determine how their families measure up:

2. Lighting Department. The purpose of this department was to teach the children the importance of having the light of Christ in our lives and following his good example. We filled a room with lamps, and then covered the windows with foil so the room was initially very dark. The children sat on the floor, and were told a story about a girl who makes a lot of good choices. With each good choice, a lamp was turned on until the room got very bright. The children each got to take home a candle with a scripture attached to it:

3. Outdoor/Garden Department. In this department, the children each got to make a darling family tree craft. They could choose from a variety of treetops, and then wrote family names on leaves and glued them on, along with a ribbon to hang it. These turned out SO CUTE!

4. Customer Service Department. Here, the children were taught the importance of saying, "How Can I Help You?"to family members. Then they did a chore relay, where they were divided into teams and had to race against each other as they folded towels, sorted garbage and recycling, properly set a table, and cleaned up toys.

5. We all ended together in the Kitchen Department, where the children were able to "build" their own ice cream sundaes.
This activity was a huge hit, the kids were still talking about it in Primary the next day. It was super fun, and I'm glad it was a success, but as always, glad it's over!