Wow - Christmastime!

Sorry we haven't posted in awhile, it's a busy time of the year.  Don't worry though, we will be back with a renewed gusto come mid January or so.

I thought I would tell you quickly about the Christmas gifts we are doing for our girls.  Almost every week the girls get pretty little handouts from our lessons.  We put a lot of thought and effort into these little handouts and the girls seem to really enjoy them.  So, we thought we would give the girls little treasure boxes to keep all their handouts in.  We got wooden boxes that we will paint and decorate and maybe put a little poem about a treasure on - or maybe the princess poem.  Anyway, we thought we were pretty cute.  When we get together to make them, I will take pictures and post them for you all to see.

What are you doing for gifts?

Faith/Knowledge Value Project

When I was 19 or so, the Stake President of the stake I lived in challenged all the members of the stake to memorize "The Family - A Proclamation to the World."  My dad, being bishop at the time, encouraged us to do it as a family, and we did!  It was such a good experience and I learned so much about the essential and most basic principles of family and marriage.  One of the Faith Value Projects is to memorize "The Living Christ," which I think would be a great experience also, but we decided as a class to memorize "The Proclamation."  A couple of the girls already have a Faith Value Project done, so it can also be done under Knowledge.  We just started at mutual a couple of weeks ago (we had a personal progress night), but have been practicing every Sunday during the first couple of minutes of class.  It's fun because we are all doing it together and my advisor is bringing treats for every paragraph they get done.  We're able to talk about the things we learn and memorize and incorporate so much of that into our lessons also...  And if a 12 year-old can do it, so can you!

PS - It was Pres. Hall of the Tempe, AZ South Stake.

Mutual Activity

We had a really fun activity a couple of weeks ago where we embellished beanie hats.  We used felt flowers, leaves, stars, and hearts and sewed them to the hats with embroidery thread.  We also had extra felt and scissors so the girls could get as creative as they wanted.  There were some really cute things!

Fifth Sundays

Well, I haven't been teaching much lately, so no new lessons to post, but I thought I would post this GREAT idea.  On the fifth Sundays in our ward, we have started doing something so that EVERYONE can attend the special 3rd hour combined meeting.  We have our Young Men and Young Women teach Primary and Nursery.  That frees up the YM and YW leaders and teachers AND the Primary/Nursery leaders and teachers.  Not only does it help everyone to feel apart of Priesthood and Relief Society, but it is a great way to prepare the youth for teaching callings when they enter adulthood.  Just thought I would share that with you!

YW Manual 3 Lesson #41 - Being Dependable

This Lesson Reminded me of a seminar I went to almost 10 years ago.  The theme was "Be Your Word."  The lecturer talked about Dependability and Integrity in the context of work mostly, but it was such a good message that it has stuck with me all these years.  I have tried to be the type of person who you can trust to do what they say they will.  I have tried to be honest in ALL my dealings.  In fact, more than once I have had to return to Wal-Mart to pay for a pack of gum, or spool of ribbon which was hiding in the basket and didn't get paid for.  Sometimes I get a funny look or comment, to which I always reply that "hell isn't worth 97 cents" - for which I usually get a laugh and nod of the head.  But seriously, are we compromising what we know to be right and true for something as trivial as a proverbial pack of gum?  I hope not, and I tried to convey that to my girls.  I think they got it.

Lesson #41 Handout "Be Your Word" Download (.pdf)  

Lesson #41 Handout "Be Your Word" Download (.ai)

YW Manual 3 Lesson #39 Recognizing Our Individual Worth

So, recently they called me an advisor, so I no longer teach every Sunday.  Which I am kind of sad about, but it has been nice to have someone else to rely on also, especially since I just had a baby a month ago.  I will still teach every once in awhile and I still take care of mutual activities.  Last week and this week though, I get to teach again because of a family emergency that my advisor had to leave town for.  My prayers are with her and her family and I don't want to be insensitive to her situation, but I am grateful for the opportunity to teach my girls again.

This week was another one of those lessons that I consider to be one of the best, funnest lessons of the year.  I get to talk about being a princess!!  So, for handouts this week, I used the poem which was the inspiration for this blog and also gave each of the girls a pink foam tiara to wear.  It was marvelous!!  So, here are files of the handout I made.  You'll notice there are 3 different versions.  I couldn't decide which I liked best, so I made all three and let the girls pick.  They turned out even better than I planned.  When printed on my HP color laser printer, the colors were so vibrant!  And by the way, these are quarter page sized (300 dpi resolution so you can get a crisp picture when printed).

Green Handout (pdf)

Pink Handout (pdf)

Black Handout (pdf)

YW Manual 3 Lesson #35 Dating Decisions

This is one of those lessons that, as a young woman, you look forward to every year.  One thing that I didn't do with this lesson that my YW leaders seemed to always have us do is make a list of all the qualities that you want in a husband.  I did that many times as a young woman, and while I still have some of those lists, my husband does not fill all the requirements, BUT he does have many other qualities that weren't listed.  So...  I modified that general idea by telling the girls that they should base their lists on the scriptures.  I do have a list in the back of my scriptures entitled "The Man I Want to Marry."  Under this title are a list of scriptures which include good qualities for a husband and father.  This is a much more realistic and righteous list than those that I made when I was younger.  And after a little while, I realized that many of these qualities I was listing for my husband were things that I needed to work on.  So, I started another list entitled "The Woman I Want to Be."  This exercise was the most fulfilling of it's kind that I had ever done, so I made bookmarks for the girls with these titles on either side and a series of lines for them to fill in different scriptures as they study their scriptures through the years.  I told them to make a scriptural list of qualities they wanted in a husband.  But told them that they needed to be a certain type of girl so that they would be able to attract that type of boy.  I solidified that with an experience of my own:

While my husband was on his mission (obviously this was before we were married) I wrote to him.  Now, you need to understand that we did not date before his mission, I was writing to him as friends.  In one of my letters, I asked him was made him decide to serve a mission.  He was the only member of the Church in his family and didn't have great support for his mission (if any at all).  He told me a few different reasons and finished with this: "And besides, what Charmaine [insert my maiden name] would marry a boy who didn't serve a mission?"  I was of course honored and encouraged my girls to also be the type of girl who would encourage others (especially their future dates/husband) to be the very best that they could.

Overall, the lesson turned out great!

Here are the sources for the bookmark and a picture of the finished product:

Lesson #35 Dating Decisions Bookmark Handout Download (.pdf) 1

Lesson #35 Dating Decisions Bookmark Handout Download (.pdf) 2

Lesson #35 Dating Decisions Bookmark Handout Download (.ai) 1

Lesson #35 Dating Decisions Bookmark Handout Download (.ai) 2

Lesson #34 Avoiding Dishonesty

I don't seem to have much that I did with lesson - or much that I saved anyway.  What I do have is a picture of my handout, it seems I didn't save the document though.

Lesson #32 Service in the Community

This lesson is sort of the temporal counterpart to the last lesson, as it talks about service that can (and should) be done in the community.  It's a good idea to also have a follow-up mutual activity involving service.

Lesson #32 Handout Download (.doc)

Here is a picture of the finished product:

Lesson #31 Service in the Church

Another great lesson!  This lesson corresponds perfectly with m favorite story from the New Testament: the story of the loaves and fishes.  What I love about this story is that John tells us that "a lad" offered the five loaves and two fishes to feed the multitude of five thousand.  I imagine that he was doing the "grocery shopping" with his family and on their way home, were attracted to Christ and what he was teaching.  When asked if anyone had any food to feed the crowd gathered, this family offered all they had with them.  It is then that the miracle happens.  Christ blesses the food and then HE magnifies it to bless five thousand.  But that's not where it ends!  What is leftover becomes the "icing on the cake" - twelve baskets!  

So, how does the correspond with service in the Church??  Well, when we offer all that we have to the Lord, HE magnifies our efforts and we become the instrument in His hands to bless the lives of others.  And not only is that a blessing beyond compare - to witness His miracles and get to be a part of it - but, what we receive in return, is so much more than what we gave!

So, along with the lesson, I shared this with the girls.  And have used it in other lessons also - it applies to so much!  Any calling we have, any effort that we make, when we rely on the Lord, He magnifies our efforts and we are blessed because of it.

So, here are the notes for this lesson: (I don't seem to have any handouts made for this lesson)

Lesson #31 Notes (.doc)

Lesson #30 Scripture Study

I love the scriptures!  Now I admit, it is both a strength and a weakness with me.  Although I love the scriptures, I have a hard time being regular with my study of them.  But this was a great lesson to remind me of how important it is to be regular about it.  I'm so lucky I get to give these great lessons!  Here are the handouts I made for this.  It's Elder Hunter's advice on scripture study as found in the Seminary Book of Mormon study guide.  There is a front and back to the bookmark, and after I printed it up, I laminated it for extra stability.  The notes, I made a copy for each of the girls to be used for future reference or FHE, or whatever.

Scripture Study Bookmark Download (.pdf)

Scripture Study Bookmark Download (.indd)

Notes from Lesson (.doc)

I'm back

OK, I wasn't sure if I was going to keep this blog going or not.  But I decided to go ahead and do it.  I really do love this calling and I love my girls and all the fun stuff I get to do, so I thought "to heck with it" and decided that if nothing else, I needed this record of what I'm doing.  So, let me know if there is anything you would like to add or would like to see. 

Much love,

Charmaine

Lesson 29 - "A Change of Heart"

So, my first lesson...  I typed up some of my notes from the lesson so the girls could have a copy to take home and use for FHE or whatever.  I always appreciated having references for lessons.  I don't know if I cared too much as a 12 year old, but I did anyway.  And I also made some fun little handouts.  If I get ambitious tomorrow, I have a great idea for scripture stickers.  We'll see though.

Here is a link to the files for this lesson:

Lesson 29 - A Change of Heart

Here's a picture of the finished handout, it's a lousy picture, if my scanner were set up yet, I would have scanned it. Sorry!

Why?

Well, I was recently called to be the 2nd counselor in the Young Women's in our Ward and it's the first time I've served in Young Women's.  I'm so excited and I already love the girls - even more than that though - I like them!  There is no teacher, so I'll be teaching lessons too - which I am thrilled about!  I love to teach.  And I figured, since I am putting all this time into all this stuff, I should put it out there for others.  I know there are tons of other websites that have tons of resources, and I'm sure I'll be using those too, but I really like the stuff that I do myself.  So, here it is if anyone else wants to use it.  And please feel free to offer any suggestions!