Christmas in July

Time to get ready for our Super Saturday, Christmas in July.  It will be on July 14th from 9am to noon.  


We'll be doing some fun projects, and most of them are cheap and quick.  Please sign up on the sheet outside the Relief Society room, or you can email me and let me know what you'd like to make.

 This is a clothespin nativity ornament.  The cost is 60¢ each.

These are stick puppets.  

There are 10 in the set, including Mary, Joseph & Baby Jesus, 

and shepherds and wise men and an angel.  The set is 75¢.

This is a small terra cotta pot reindeer ornament.  There are 2 sizes.  The small is about 1 ½" high, and costs 75¢.  

The mini is slightly shorter, but narrower so it looks smaller, and it costs 65¢.

This ornament looks like the image is floating on the inside.  These will cost $1.00 each.

These wire trees are an adaptation from something that I saw on Pinterest.  Acell helped me and figured out how to make it work with the wire I could get at Michael's.  I've ordered more wire from Amazon, and we'll see how that works.  These can be in different sizes, and you might do a set of 3.  They will be $4.00 each.

There will be other things going on as well.  There will be some free projects, such as jewelry making, and some cute napkin holders out of wire.  We'll have a table of Christmas ideas, with neighbor/visiting teacher gifts and decorations and a gingerbread manger scene and lots of stuff.  We'll have some quilts on to tie.  And I hope you're collecting your lovely but unneeded things for the Stuff Swap, where we'll bring some stuff we don't want and take home other people's stuff we do want.

There will be a nursery.   And food.  Yummy food.

The Lord Needs Missionaries

President Monson, in the First Presidency message of the January 2011 Ensign, said:
Every worthy, able young man should prepare to serve a mission. Such service is a priesthood duty—an obligation the Lord expects of us who have been given so very much.  
. . .Sisters, while you do not have the same priesthood responsibility as do the young men to serve as full-time missionaries, you also make a valuable contribution as missionaries, and we welcome your service.
. . . To the mature brothers and sisters of the Church, I remind you that the Lord needs many, many more of you to serve as full-time missionaries. 

We tried to focus on those two objectives last evening.  We had a panel discussion featuring Joyce, Cindy, and Connie, who discussed ideas on how they helped their children to prepare to serve missions.  Many of the sisters who attended also gave suggestions and ideas.

The other thing we focused on was how to prepare ourselves (as mature sisters) to serve missions.  Georgia Mills told about some of her experiences, including how the Lord paved the way for her to go to Fiji and how he helped her know how to teach when she got there.  She encouraged us all to prepare to serve, and bore testimony that the Lord has people who need your particular set of talents and abilities that you will bring.

I bore a second witness to the things that she said and talked about some of the missionary opportunities that are out there.

Here is where you can go to find out about full-time missionary service.  Please watch some of the videos that are available.  Here is a list of all the opportunities available right now.  These change monthly, so you might want to bookmark this page.

There are also wonderful church-service missionary opportunities.  Go to this page to see the overview.  Here are some wonderful and inspiring videos.  Here are only a few of the needs for service that you can do while still living at home.

If you'd like to start serving now, there are SO MANY needs and opportunities to serve.  Check out this page and follow the links.  It's exciting!


If you'd like to print out a pledge card for your small children, here it is:

We encouraged everyone to get a copy of Preach My Gospel and use it for Family Home Evenings.  Alicia has her 16-year old Jessie teach a lesson from it once a month.   It's available from Church Distribution stores or you can get it online.

There are many, many other resources to help us prepare ourselves and our youth for missions.  Ask the Lord to guide you to them.

Don't forget that the Prophet said, "Now, some of you may be shy by nature or consider yourselves inadequate to respond affirmatively to a calling. Remember that this work is not yours and mine alone. It is the Lord’s work, and when we are on the Lord’s errand, we are entitled to the Lord’s help. Remember that whom the Lord calls, the Lord qualifies."  As Georgia testified, the Lord will not just send you out to the middle of nowhere and say, "Thanks for going.  Good luck!  You're on your own!"  He is waiting and eager to help us when we ask Him.

If you have comments or suggestions or resources, please share them with us.

Managing Money

Hi Sisters,

We had such a great time at our meeting about money management, and I promised to send you notes from the meeting, in case there was something you wish you had jotted down.

Reasons to manage your money (presented by Sarah Taylor)

• stretch your money
• save for something special
• save for retirement
• remove stress
• save more without earning more
• be aware of where the money is going without wondering what's going on
• deal with the ups and downs of life
• be prepared for emergencies
• pay off your debts
• deal with a changing economy (like rising prices of food and gas)
• know where you stand financially
• be proactive rather than reactive

First priority - Tithing

• The Lord blesses us as we obey His laws and commandments, often in unexpected and unexplainable ways.
• He won't bless us if we pay tithing, but are irresponsible with our money.

Teaching kids about money (presented by Royell Phong)

• This site which Royell quoted has 10 timeless tips for teaching kids about money.
• Other Good websites:   
• Kids and Money
• Online games that teach kids about money
• Teaching kids about money

Money management tips from a cheapskate (taught by Alicia Arce)

• Money management is NOT a matter of math (quote from Alicia's dad)
• Find your number - look at all your assets and liabilities to find your net worth
• Be too stingy to pay interest.  Buy everything with cash or pay off in that billing cycle so you aren't charged interest.
• Avoid debt like it's a sin.
• Not all of us have been had the blessing of need. (another quote from Alicia's dad)
• The Lord does not bless wastefulness
• Use things up - re-use - share - plan ahead - be creative
• Buy used or get stuff free.  Go to KSL cassifieds or Craigslist or Freecycle.
• Offer excess stuff to each other rather than haul it to D.I.  Have a swap meet with family or friends.
• Barter and trade when possible.  (Ask Jana Manookin about trading a trip for a pig)
• Oh, and Annette Draper has lots of storage wheat she would love to share, left there by Janet.
• Check out Bountiful Baskets.  Order on Monday for a basketful of fresh fruits and vegetables.  You pay $15 +tax and pick it up on Saturday morning.  You never know what you'll be getting, and that's half the fun.  Their FaceBook page shares recipes
• Being wise with your money shows respect for what your husband does to care for your family.  It also shows respect for the work you do.
• Check out websites and experts on money such as Dave Ramsey, Suze Orman, Oprah's Debt Diet.
• Dave Ramsey suggests that a couple work on finances together so that they're on the same page.  They need to be honest with each other and work things out together.  Linda Collard has a DVD of his workshop that she would watch with you.  Each person should have an allowance of discretionary money that they don't have to account for.  Other things should be mutually decided.
• Pray for your husband's heart to be softened if you can't agree on priorities.
• Every time you go to the store you buy things you didn't plan, so cut down on trips to the store and don't go without a list.  Make a menu and shop once a week.
• Walmart will match ads from other stores and has double coupons on Tuesdays.  You can often combine manufacturer's coupons with store coupons.
• Savvy Shopper has lots of resources for coupons and will show you what's on sale locally and you can print out the coupon from home.  They give a class at Walmart on Wednesday nights at 7 pm.
• Buy in large quantities and share with family, friends, and neighbors so that the excess doesn't go to waste.
• Plan your menus so that you can use something for more meals.  Alicia buys a chicken and uses it for 3 satisfying meals for her houseful of hungry guys.
• Put your oil in a spritz bottle so you don't use too much.  Poke a small hole in the seal of the syrup so it doesn't come gushing out.

Here's the worksheet we used last night, in case you'd like to take it and adapt it to your own budget. Here's another sample budget spreadsheet that you can play with.  I hope that you can open this.  This was shared by our sister in California.

Writing our History

Our Relief Society activity earlier this month was about writing personal histories, ours and others'.  I had some talks and resources that I intended to share, so here is a list of links:
https://lds.org/ldsorg/v/index.jsp?hideNav=1&locale=0&sourceId=8e91a41f6cc20110VgnVCM100000176f620a____&vgnextoid=198bf4b13819d110VgnVCM1000003a94610aRCRD

https://lds.org/liahona/1977/05/creating-a-personal-history?lang=eng

http://lds.org/ensign/1977/01/writing-your-history-some-helpful-ideas?lang=eng

http://lds.org/ensign/1977/01/its-childs-play-how-to-help-your-child-begin-a-journal?lang=eng


The website I mentioned in the meeting, proust.com, sent me an email to say that they were shutting down on Jan. 31st, so I'm sorry about that.


From now on, we're going to try to take some notes of suggestions to post after a meeting so that if you couldn't make it to the meeting, you can enjoy the ideas shared there.  I wish we'd done that last time so I could share with you some of the wonderful things people suggested.  Anyone who was there who would like to add ideas or comments or suggestions about writing your own or someone else's history, please comment on this post.


I ran across this site which gives you a place to keep a journal on a secure, private website and include pictures, etc.  http://www.ldsjournal.com

Too Much Month at the End of the Money?

February's activity will be at 6:30 on February 7th, and we'll be talking about the subject that breaks more marriages than almost anything else:  money.


Whether you have too much (and if you do, I want to get to know you better) or too little, we need you there.  We'll talk about WHY money management is so important, and HOW to do it, and WHAT to teach our children.

We Have a Blog!

It's going to be fun tracking our Relief Society activities for the Payson 16th Ward.  We'll keep track of upcoming events and discuss the past meetings and (hopefully) communicate better.