Our local, family heroes

We had an awesome family home evening last night so I thought I would share.

We started by asking the kids who were some heroes they knew of.  We got the expected Iron Man, Captain America, Batman, Hulk responses.  So we asked what made those characters heroes.  The kids came up with all kinds of great answers about fighting for justice and strength and muscles and taking care of weaker earthlings.

We pointed out that those individuals are all pretend so we asked about who people today think of as heroes.  The kids talked about soldiers and political leaders (that surprised me a bit) and we brought up famous athletes and movie stars although (happy mother moment) my kids weren't too impressed with those people as heroes. 

We talked about what makes a real hero, someone we should look up to in our lives.  It was a wonderful little discussion.  Everyone took part and came up with good ideas, Ellie even raised her hand and said "prayer" five or six times which was great.

Then Gavin suggested that his best hero was Heavenly Father which was a perfect transition to where we wanted to lead the lesson.  We talked about spiritual heroes and who we should look up to as the hero for our spirit.  The kids threw out names of prophets and scripture stories and we talked about what made each of them a hero in their own way.

Finally, we asked the kids to think about people they actually know, people who are a part of their everyday lives who are their heroes.  You could see the wheels turning as they considered that heroes don't have to be epic characters with impressive feats under their belts.  I think this was a new idea to most of them.  One more time we talked about what makes a hero for us, every day, as part of our regular lives.  Then we asked the kids to choose one person who they personally know who is a hero to them, someone they can look up to and try to be like and we drew pictures captioned with reason that person is a hero.  They are posted on our living room closet and I think it is a fabulous little gallery.

Not every family home evening lesson really hits home for the kids, but this one did and it was a beautiful thing to see.  Here's a bit of our artwork.

G chose our bishop because he believes in
Heavenly Father.

Aubrey chose her friend Hannah because she is kind to
everyone and dresses modestly.

Logan chose stumpy, fat leg Mom as his hero so I hugged
him (that kid sure knows how to get me).

Our gallery of heroes.