Chopped/Black Box cooking

One of the favorite activities we ever had for mutual was a cooking event that my husband just put on for our YM/YW here.  The youth are split into different groups (he did 3 groups) and sent to different kitchens with a bag of the same 20-25 ingredients.  They are then given the task to create two dishes/plates with NO adult assistance (other than safety precautions).  The youth had a great time cooking and I was a daring judge.
This is from the group that stayed at the church building:

One leader biting her tongue to keep from helping

Primary Manual 4, Lesson 11 Abinadi and King Noah

Hi everyone.  I know it has been awhile since I posted anything here, but life in Relief Society does not call for many handouts.  Tomorrow I will be subbing in primary though and so, of course, I came up with a handout.  It's rather simple, but here's the pdf.
And here is the link to the lesson on lds.org.
Happy creating!

RS Christmas Program

For the first Sunday in December, the Relief Society Presidency wanted to give some sort of program to welcome in the Christmas spirit.  I found this program by Judith Hoopes Hamilton: The Women Who Knew Jesus and added they hymns in between each part.  It was a very touching program!

Young Women in Excellence

I attended the Young Women in Excellence program our ward put on at the first of November and thoroughly enjoyed it.  They made these cute scrolls for centerpieces and placed an LED light inside some tulle in an upside down bowl:

 My husband has AMAZING handwriting and did this for them on a piece of fabric.  Underneath they had made plaques for each of the girls with their names on them, a poem and a picture.

 In the back of the room they had the girls projects on display.  For the tables, they taped icicle lights to the tables and then placed tablecloths over them.  The pictures do no justice, take my word for it they looked great!

Christmas Programs

It is hard to believe that Christmas is just over a month away.  I do like to wait for the day after Thanksgiving before decorating or starting playing music, but in preparation for the Christmas season, I remembered the program I compiled for a sacrament meeting program.
Here is the program.  I used the LDS hymn book for some of the songs and the Silent Night music from Sally Deford.

Warning, this post is interactive!

Artwork by James Christensen

I was asked to share some of my Christmas traditions at our next Relief Society evening and it got me thinking about the many traditions from growing up as well as the new traditions of having my own family. What are your favorite (and least favorite) holiday traditions?

Spa Night

Tonight at mutual (my last night=so sad!!! ) there was a spa night for the beehives. We had a great time! My pictures aren't the best quality, but still capture the essence of the evening. Shannon made these cute water bottles for everyone:

The girls started out with facials, then we gave them hand/arm massages and then they moved on to manicures.

Spa Night - slideshow dvd

The last 15 or so minutes the girls spend meditating. A great time was had by all and all of the Beehives were there, plus two friends!

YW-3-35: Dating Decisions

I stole the cake idea from Mary K. Mullen and the girls LOVED when I revealed what was in the box.  I had offered them M&M's and they thought about it for quite a while, but all decided to go for "the box."

I took Little Miss Suzy Q's idea from here and tweaked it to add a summary of the FTSOY Pamphlet to the back like so:

Here is the handout (print two sided): (PDF)

It turned out great.  Sadly, this was my last week in YW.  I had a great time in there and love the Beehives.  they are so sweet and were so good to me.  Today I was offically sustained and set apart as the Relief Society 1st Counselor.  Wish me luck!
I gave all of the girls a "thank you" note telling them how grateful I was for their friendship and helping me in my short 3 months in Beehives.  I also had picked up some pencils with this year's mutual them on them at our church bookstore so they received those today too.

YW-3-34: Avoiding Dishonesty

I'm having a hard time with how this lesson is put together.  I've had a few lessons this past year about honesty and it seems like no one can define honesty without saying what it's not.  Just tell me what it IS.  And I feel this lesson is all about the negativity.  "Avoiding Dishonesty" - isn't that a double negative?!  Ok, rant over.
So I do like how Angela Williams re-wrote the lesson (here), except for the last story I'm going to summarize Richard C. Edgley's 2006 General Conference talk like so:
"In 1955, after my freshman year of college, I spent the summer working at the newly opened Jackson Lake Lodge, located in Moran, Wyoming. …After the miracle of arriving home, my father came out and happily greeted me. After a hug and a few pleasantries, he looked into the backseat of the car and saw three Jackson Lake Lodge towels—the kind you cannot buy. With a disappointed look he merely said, “I expected more of you.” I hadn’t thought that what I had done was all that wrong. To me these towels were but a symbol of a full summer’s work at a luxury hotel, a rite of passage. Nevertheless, by taking them I felt I had lost the trust and confidence of my father, and I was devastated. The following weekend I…began the 370-mile (595-km) round trip back to Jackson Lake Lodge to return three towels. My father never asked why I was returning to the lodge, and I never explained. It just didn’t need to be said. This was an expensive and painful lesson on honesty that has stayed with me throughout my life. …Some 30 years ago, while working in the corporate world, some business associates and I were passing through O’Hare Airport in Chicago, Illinois. One of these men had just sold his company for tens of millions of dollars—in other words, he was not poor. As we were passing a newspaper vending machine, this individual put a quarter in the machine, opened the door to the stack of papers inside the machine, and began dispensing unpaid-for newspapers to each of us. When he handed me a newspaper, I put a quarter in the machine and, trying not to offend but to make a point, jokingly said, “Jim, for 25 cents I can maintain my integrity. A dollar, questionable, but 25 cents—no, not for 25 cents.” You see, I remembered well the experience of three towels and a broken-down 1941 Hudson. A few minutes later we passed the same newspaper vending machine. I noticed that Jim had broken away from our group and was stuffing quarters in the vending machine. I tell you this incident not to portray myself as an unusual example of honesty, but only to emphasize the lessons of three towels and a 25-cent newspaper." Time permitting, I'll be using this video: And using this handout by Katie Berrett:

YW-3-33: Each Person Is Divine and Eternal

I've decided that I try to put too many elements into my lessons.  The past 3 lessons, we've run out of time before I get to most of what I am wanting to do.  So for this lesson, I'm going to try to simplify it a bit.  I think this lesson is one of the most important there is and want to make sure the girls get it.
That said, I also feel this lesson is packed with guilt!  This question: "Knowing the worth of souls, would you want to make even one person feel that he or she was not of worth?" is what creates "Mormon guilt." 
Ok, tirade over.  Just wanted to put that out there.
So, I'm letting someone else do my handout work this week, thank you HolyHandouts.  Here's the handout:

Since I don't have many pairs of gloves, Phillip (my husband) suggested having the girls make gloves out of playdough (which we have plenty of).
The story at the end of the lesson seems pretty long and I think I might be replacing it with a video (visual works better than audio for our Beehives).  I'm thinking about the old seminary video with the girl who has to ask the "popular" girl to come to mutual.  We'll see, I have to find it and make sure it's not too long of course.  I'll post the details when I find it.
Discarded thoughts that might help you:  I had also thought of sharing the Sand Dollar story on the handout, but that whole simplifying thing got in the way... I'm sure there will be another opportunity.
I also liked this picture and thought about adding it to a handout:

(photo by Sarah Leen for National Geographic) taken from Beginnings New

Wow, lots of typing today.  Happy Saturday everyone and enjoy the RS broadcast tonight!