Contributed by: Kim Hill

 

We had a great activity last night, and I thought I would share it with you and your website.

 

I needed to plan a value night for the girls, and our month’s theme was knowledge.  I wanted to teach the girls a skill, but also focus on something spiritual.  I remembered a family home evening that I did in college and used a lot of other inspiration.

 

Testimony Seeds (Knowledge).

I brought in a bunch of gardening/potting equipment (i.e. a bag of dirt, small garden scoop, garden gloves, watering can, spray bottle, several packets of seeds, peat pots, etc.) and arranged them on a tarp the table.  I had the girls tell me what these items were used for.  Naturally, they all guessed gardening.  I explained that a lot of times in the scriptures, the prophets or Savior used agriculture/horticulture and nature to help teach the gospel because it something that everyone could relate to.  I had each girl look up a different scripture relating to plants, trees, sowing, etc. and share it with the group.

 

Next I shared three of my own scriptures--amazingly enough, none of these were duplicates of their scriptures.  I used Alma 32:28, John 15:1-6, and Matthew 13:1-9.  I explained the meaning of these scriptures: that we need to always be gaining a testimony of or greater understanding of the gospel, no matter what principle it is and also that we are all dependant upon Jesus Christ for our spiritual life, etc.

 

Then I had each girl take a small piece of paper and write on it some part of the gospel they wanted to grow in or gain a greater testimony of.  They folded it up twice and placed it in the bottom of a small peat pot (used for starting seeds, available in the garden section of any -mart or K-Mart).  We wrapped the outside of the pots in foil so they wouldn’t leak everywhere.  We then added seed-starting soil in with some water and planted our seeds.  I let the girls use three seeds each because, while the seeds of the gospel will always grow when nourished, flower seeds aren’t a sure thing.  I used Morning Glory Seeds because they will grow to be beautiful flowers and because they are also vines (to tie in my scripture references).  I gave the girls instructions on how to care for the seeds and plants (germinate them in the refrigerator overnight, then cut off all but one of the plants once they start to grow, etc.).  Then I gave them the important rules for caring for these seeds.  I explained to them that new seeds need care, but they were only allowed to water their seeds with one teaspoon of water a day (they are small pots, so it’s enough) but ONLY if they have worked on their goal that they wrote on their paper.  (The girls gave a little gasp!)  But they all committed to doing it and I can't wait to follow up with them!

 

Then I decided to teach them a bit more about plants and their care and taught them how to repot a potted plant.  None of them had ever done it before!  I couldn’t believe how much they were fascinated by it!  Afterwards, I bore my testimony about planting seeds myself and how it has given me my testimony and how I knew it would work for them if they tried the experiment themselves.

 

It was such a fun activity!  I hope you enjoy it!

 

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