Fixer-upper family finds that patience pays off

Your first family garden is a few weeks from being fruitful. But your children's impatience is growing faster than the green beans. Your kids are ready to pack in their gardening gloves while you wonder how you can plant some seeds of patience in them.

If things don't happen fast enough for your family, the film Are We Done Yet? can help teach the importance of patience. After watching the movie, released on home video August 7, slow down to have a film-themed family conversation. Then play “The Wading Game” to bring the big-screen lesson to life!

In the movie, Nick Persons (Ice Cube) shares his former bachelor pad with his new wife, Suzanne (Nia Long), and her kids. The living quarters go from cramped to critical when Suzanne announces she is expecting . . . twins!

After a slick sales pitch, Nick and Suzanne fall for a supposed dream house in the suburbs. The rest of the family is reluctant to move to the middle of nowhere. And once they do, the family soon finds that the house is falling apart.

Nick quickly becomes impatient with the never-ending renovations and decides to fix everything himself. But his haste hurriedly becomes waste when it comes to repairs and relationships. Can he patch up the damage before it's too late?

Talk Together

Take turns sharing recent situations where your patience has been tested. Does it take Aunt Sally an hour to tell a simple story? Maybe it takes your oldest forever to get off the computer, when everyone's waiting for him to go the park. Were you able to keep it together or did you lose it?

Think of some times in the movie where characters could have been a little more tolerant. At first the kids didn't want to move to the new house, but what happened after they spent some time there? How does being patient pay off in the long run?

Together, brainstorm strategies to use when times get frustrating. Maybe you can start a round of I Spy while stuck in a traffic jam or have a funniest joke contest when you're waiting in a long line. How can your attitude make the situation more bearable?

Play Together: The Wading Game
Your family will “quack” up playing this splashy sport!

You will need:
• Children's swimming pool
• Water
• Rubber ducky
• Two plastic bottles
• Squirt gun
• Stopwatch

Fill the wading pool and the bottles with water. Place the bottles at opposite ends of the pool to be used as obstacles, and take turns shooting the squirt gun to guide the rubber ducky around the obstacles in a figure-eight pattern. Use the stopwatch to see how long it takes to complete the circuit.

Time yourselves for three rounds. Point out to your kids how sometimes trying to go super fast can make you careless and get you off course. But with patience, you'll be more likely to finish the race with fewer mistakes. And you won't always have to go slow. If you practice and practice, you'll get better and better, and faster and faster.

Like the Persons family, your family will learn that by giving yourself time and space to do the job right, you'll successfully get all your ducks in a row!