Mormon moms, what's in your quiet bag?

Question

I have an almost 17 month old and I am just trying to survive this last month before we send him to nursery (and Sacrament meeting after that of course), but I'm about out of ideas. What's in your quiet bag? What have you found does *not* work?

Answer 1

I always found that food and drinks made my kids more wound up, and tended to make a mess.  So I don't bring snacks, only bottles for infants.

Toys - I found stuffed animals or figure toys always made my kids want to start talking and making pretend noises (like horse noises for their ponies) or have the various figures interact.  So I got rid of all of these from my quiet bag.

Cadisney is correct - the felt sets you can get from places like Deseret Book are great and stick to the benches.  But they can get kinda pricey.  To save money, I bought all the Primary Visual Aid Cutouts from the distribution center, some clear contact paper to laminate the cutouts, and glued small pieces of sandpaper to the backs.  My kids love them, and they work almost as well as the felt (just not as flexible).

I also went online and copied coloring pages from various Friend issues and print my own coloring books for the girls to work on during sacrament.

My kids also always enjoyed looking through the Friend, even when they couldn't read.  My two youngest can't read yet, but once my oldest could read the articles in the Friend w/out help, she was not allowed to play with the other toys in sacrament.  So she would sit quietly, reading Friend articles.  Once she turned eight and was baptized, she lost the Friend during sacrament and is now expected to sit quietly and listen to the talks.  If she can give me a summary of the talks (just remembering a joke someone told counts), she gets ice cream after sacrament.

My mom made my girls some really easy quiet books that they LOVE and still use.  She bought a small 4x5 photo album from Walmart with a soft, plastic cover (so it was durable in the quiet bag) and instead of filling it with pictures, she filled it with the small Mormonads you can get from the distribution center.

Story books tended to cause problems because the kids wanted me to read them, so I couldn't listen to the lesson or talk.

When all else failed, my kids always liked it when they're Daddy would pull them into his lap, open up his scriptures, and whispering, read into their ear from the scriptures.

Note:  I found my kids were much more compliant about playing quietly in church if I didn't take them out of the room and let them play.  For example, if they were being taken out of Sacrament because of being noisy, instead of letting them run around the foyer and play, they had to sit on a chair with their arms folded.  But if they were reverent and stayed in Sacramant, they got to play with their quiet bag.  This took some effort at first, and I had to stick to my guns, but eventually, the decided on their own they much preferred staying in Sacramant.

Answer 2

Joseph Smith was not a prophet.

Answer 3

What works with one child, will not work with four! lol.  Toy cars do NOT work... they fight.  All kinds of "quiet toys" do not work... the kids fight over them, too.  Actually, hymn books seem to keep them occupied for quite a while... but they fight over them, too, lol.  Hmmm... what works?  I don't know.  I give up.  I take the 20 month old outside, and breastfeed him before he starts yelling up a storm. Sometimes, I've got no energy to deal with it all, so I just take them all in the nursery room and wait till sacrament is over!

Paper and pens works for the older children (5 to 7 y/o).  Also, important to give them good food, and no artificial additives (or tomatoes or citrus) from Friday night onwards.  That way they should be nice and calm during sacrament.  Good in theory, but hard to practice. ♥

P.S.  Oh, it was so gorgeous yesterday!  My baby (20 months) was sitting on my lap, holding the hymn book.  When the singing started he sung out really loudly in his baby talk!  I was so proud!  I'm so glad he and two of my other children love singing, even though they're so little.  Now, I've just got to get the love of music going in my second child, and we can all sing and play together!  YAY!  (My hubby loves to sing in choir, too, but needs other voices to help him keep to his part.)

I remember when i was little, we never had much to keep us amused in sacrament meeting.  But my Mum (who came to church on her own with 5 to 8 children) always wore jewelery, and gave that to us to play with.  I always looked forward to the hymns, when I was a kid.

Answer 4

Nothing that makes noise! cheerios, sippy cup, and some things to look at:boardbook, noiseless doll/toys, favorite blanket/object.

Answer 5

i have these folders i made- you can use ready to make ones from the church book store or do what i did which was cheaper.  i took file folders, and put magnets on the inside where puzzle pieces would go,  then i printed out pictures, laminated them and cut them into puzzles.  i put corresponding magnets on the pieces and keep them in a ziplock bag.  for the younger ones, i used matching cards from dltk.com and glued each laminated card to the folder with a magnet on it- then they have the baggie with the matching cards.  you could also cut each small picture in half- glue 1/2 to the folder and give them the other halves to match up.  i'm sure that makes no sense without seeing them, but i have like 10 assorted folders, and my kids haven't grown tired of them yet.  they are 12, 9, 3 and 2.

Answer 6

Those magnet or felt books where you can rearrange the diff pieces are great.  

The felt pieces stick to the benches, too, so it keeps them more entertained.

Answer 7

Go turn catholic

Answer 8

I'm afraid I'm too far out of the loop for what's IN the bag. So far, lots of good suggestions. (my kids are 21, 19, & 17, no grand kids yet)

However, one way to try to keep them quiet during meetings with what you have in their quiet bags is this (worked for me anyway):

If they start to get a little rowdy, take them out into the foyer, and sit with them and hold them in your lap (don't let them down to run around, unless you need to let them get it out of their system for a couple minutes first). Sit and hold them and don't let them move. I even had to hold my son's arms down sometimes. When they get really upset with this, tell them "Look you can either go in there and PLAY QUIETLY with your toys, or you can come out here and sit STILL without moving." After this once or twice, they usually accept that they can either play quietly or SIT quietly, and choose to play.  

Answer 9

I alweays had a seperate "church bag" with toys that my kids only got to play with during sacrament. (quiet ones)  This way they never got bored with them.

Answer 10

I have a 21 month old (plus two older boys) so I've had my share of quiet bags. What I've loved over the years (and currently) are things like...

*board books - LDS ones or regular (board books are quieter)

*I-Spy bags (I'll include a link below so you can see what I'm talking about)

*lace up cards (another link below)

*Crayola Color Wonder markers and paper (no more accidentally coloring on anything else)

*a small photo album filled with pictures of family members and pics of scripture stories and prophets (they're not to young to learn who people are)

*magnetic and/or felt story board sets (as mentioned above)

*quiet book (that's what my mother called it but it was a fabric book that had pages with stuff to do like button a button, zip a zipper, etc...)

What I've tried to avoid is really just bringing toys. Teething toys and such are fine because they serve a purpose but IMO a 17 month old is fully capable of being occupied without toys for an hour during sacrament meeting. Plus, also IMO, I think it helps them prepare to learn to be reverent as they grow because they've known from the start that there are no dollies or hot wheels in sacrament mtg.

The trick is to keeping an assortment because their attention span is so small. And don't let them play with the stuff in the bag during the week. That way the stuff in there is special. You could also rotate your items every couple of weeks so that it doesn't get boring. Just don't overload yourself that your wheeling a suitcase into church with you. =)

http://tinyurl.com/ispybag

http://tinyurl.com/laceupcards

Answer 11

What doesn't work:

Sitting outside the chapel the whole sacrament meeting. Pretty soon, the kids know that if they pitch a fit, they get to go out and play in the hallway and act as silly as they want to.

If you have to go in and out of the meeting, do it. (Reverently, not during the prayer and sacrament, of course) Switch off with dad. Let the kids know that you are not fooling--it's time to be reverent. Shoot, we all have kids, or had kids (my kids are now young adults and teens, but I remember how it was!!!) Anyone in the meeting who has a problem with a parent trying to deal with a fussy child needs an attitude adjustment. Don't let your kids frustrate you, it will only stress you out and make you not enjoy church.

We are the only church that brings our babies and toddlers into our main meeting and have them partake of the sacrament with us!!! It's that way for a reason--it's just one more thing that makes our church perfect and unique. Remember King Benjamin's speech where all the families, including the children, listened from their tents? What a wonderful thing to have children in our meetings along with us--instead of in playroom with paid babysitters.

If you and your spouse have to go in and out of nursery to comfort a grumpy toddler or change a diaper during Sunday school, that's to be expected. Don't worry about it--your child will soon learn and adapt to nursery little by little. Playing with toys and doing the lesson and activities will become something to look forward to.

You can do it!! Someday you will be looking back and missing and cherishing the toddler that your child once was!!

ps--our nursery was so fun, I never once had to go get a parent out of a meeting unless there was a poopy diaper!

Answer 12

We used to use church themed pop up books, those worked well, and the magnetic Noah's Ark worked well too, it was a metal case with a picture of the Ark, and had all kinds of magnetic animals to stick in the ark.