Released

Hey everyone! I am SO incredibly sad to report that I have been released from Activity Days :( !!!
I was a leader for three years and I am pretty sure I think it's the best calling in the whole church! I am very excited for the next person who will get to serve in this calling.

I plan to keep this blog up for anyone who wants to check it out... I won't be adding much to it, but hopefully new leaders to come will get some ideas. I still had a few things up my sleeve that I want to share now before I totally close this calling in my life.

I have been working on these song lyrics to give the girls as a gift for maybe their birthday or when they graduate. I was planning on printing it off and putting it in a cute frame. I have the PDF version that I'd be happy to e-mail you... I'm just not sure how often I will be checking my activity days e-mail (activitydaysforfun@gmail.com). You can also get them HERE and all 5 of them HERE.

 Also... when I taught swimming lessons it was oftentimes very difficult to get my little swimmers to behave. I got this idea from my mom... that after each lesson if they were good, I would give them an "atta boy" or "atta girl". It worked like a CHARM. Even though it was just a peice of paper... it somehow made them act like angels! So.... I thought for Activity Days when the girls ever did something that was kind, caring, thoughtful or nice... that we would give them an Atta Girl. For example... the other day one of our girls, Ali, offered everyone else a cookie before she took one herself. She totally could have had first pick and no one would have noticed... but instead to let everyone else have a cooke first. I was totally impressed with that. I really wanted to whip out an "Atta Girl". I think if the girls new they could always be earning them... and we gave them out regularly, it would be a great addition to our activities.

I would just print this out and maybe put on on cute paper as a background:

Headband Holder - Developing Talents

For this activity, we made headband holders made out of oatmeal containers. Since we collected the oatmeal containers for a little while before the activity and got the candlestick at the dollar store, this activity should only cost the candlesticks + supplies.... no more than 1.50 per girl.

Here is what you will need:

• oatmeal containers
• modge podge
• foam brushes
• paper (2 12x12 pieces for each girl, with some left over)
• candle sticks (found at the dollar store)
• hot glue gun or strong glue

Each girl needs an oatmeal container and candlestick....

First we had the girls pick out what paper they wanted. In order to cover the whole oatmeal container, we had the girls pick two pieces of 12x12 paper and then cut it to size. Then we had the girls modge podge the paper to the oatmeal container.

Some of the oatmeal containers had print on the top of the lid, so some girls cut out a circle and glued that to the top of the lid. Then you just glue the candlestick to the bottom of the oatmeal container, and there you go!

I think they turned out really cute!

Then to finish them off, have each of the girls write their favorite scripture on the bottom of the lid. We pretty much ran out of time... so I also suggest having a scripture ready for them. With this headband holder conveniently in their room, whenever they want to read their favorite scripture, all they have to do is look at the bottom of their lid.

Check out my activity day files here: Snapshot Place

Called to Serve - Learning and Living the Gospel

What a fun activity! The girls loved it. For this "Called to Serve" activity, we had the girls pretend that they were being called on a mission. Trinity, my partner is such a genius... once again this was all her.

I think you can totally tailor this activity to what you want to do... but if you do it the same as us, you will need:

- Personalized mission calls
- Personalized name tags
- Scriptures
- Clothes - jackets and skirts for each girl
- (Returned) Sister Missionaries to speak

You can get my files for this activity HERE (mission call, name tags and language words, subway art).

At the beginning of the activity, each girl got a sealed envelope with a mission call inside. They each took turns reading their call and each girl was on the edge of their seat excited for their turn to see where they were going and what language they were going to speak. Trinity set it up so each place had two girls "called" to it... that way the two girls could be companions and do the rest of the activity together. For example, Julie and Andrea were both called to Geneva, Switzerland.

After they read their mission calls, each girl got a name tag in the language they were going to be speaking and we had them dress up in skirts and jackets (some of which were mine and were way too big... but that made it fun... we had plenty of safety pins.)

After they were all dressed and had their name tag, we had them find and label on a map where they were going.

Next we did a topical guide activity that was pretty challenging for them. Also I think any kind of scripture search or maybe even scripture mastery would have been great. Anything using the scriptures that is maybe kinda hard to teach them that scripture study isn't always easy.

 Then after our scripture activity, two return sister missionaries came to talk to the girls. They each talked about their missions a little bit and then bore their testimony. When they were done talking the time was up but the girls asked them questions for like 10 minutes! It was really sweet. Trinity knew these girls and they are fresh off their mission... but I think if you had Sister missionaries currently serving in your ward, they would love to come too.

We didn't do this, but I think another great addition would be having the girls learn a few words in the language they were "called" to speak. They would think that is pretty cool to learn some words, plus show them how challenging learning a new language can be!

Also... I just finished making this "I hope they call me on a mission" subway art. This would be a great handout :).

 

If you like the subway art, you can get more HERE and for the articles of faith HERE.

UPDATE! I updated these files just a bit. They are still available HERE. Now they come with mission call letters for both brothers and sisters (Primary and Youth Activity), tags in 10 different languages (brother and sister), 10 language preview cards and a map (with a key) on where those missions are located :)

Treating the Elderly: Serving Others

This was such a fun activity! We split the girls up into three different groups and each group went and visited a different elderly couple in our ward. At first the girls were very apprehensive. I even had one girl on the doorstep loud enough for the couple to hear say " I'm afraid of old people". So they were shy at first but after we got in the home and started talking... it was hard to get the girls out of the house! They learned a lot of cool things from these couples. At the end, we spent the last 10 minutes of our time back at Trinity's house talking about our experience and what we learned. One group went to a house where they got to see a paper that President Hinckley had signed and they thought that was SUPER cool. It was really fun and I imagine the couples really enjoyed the visit also.

Road to Leadership: Developing Talents

Trinity and I were talking about how important it is for the girls to learn leadership skills. What we have done is started the "Road to Leadership" program where each girl now knows that before they graduate to Young Womens, they will have the opportunity to plan and organize an activity days activity. As the leaders we will help them along the way, but it will be the girl that will come up with and lead the activity.

For our first "Road to Leadership", Ali came up with two activities! She had two work stations... one where we made "thumb" cards and another where we made little puppets for the nursery kids. I hung out more around the thumb station and it was fun to see what the girls could come up with. We made these cards using ink pads and our fingerprints. These cards were to be used to give to someone else to brighten thier day.

Our finished products. I had my baby there so I took his hand and foot print.

The leaves on the tree are thumb prints and the owls are too

Some THUMB ideas...

 

Ali had yummy St. Patricks Day cookies for us at the end of our activity.

Valentine's Activity Update

Hey! So this is what I ended up actually using for the activity. The girls spent the first part of the night coloring thier sayings:

And this is the example I made. I could kick myself... we forgot to get pictures of the girls making them! This is the only picture I have. With cute valentine's day paper (not just boring pink) these actually turned out really cute! The girls had SO much fun making them. They were very excited and chatting away the whole time. We pretty much had to kick them out of the house at the end.

I ended up getting all the candy and pretzels for $25 with lots left over. Not too bad for 12 girls to make 8 Valentines each :)

*** UPDATE ***

I have put these calendars on my new ETSY, along with many of the other files!! If you would like these files, along with many of my other files right away... you can visit: www.etsy.com/shop/snapshotplace

Valentine's Activity

UPDATED!! 

These Valentines have been updated!

Hey! So I made this 14 days of Valentine's for my husband last year. I had a LOT of fun with it... probably more than my husband:

I put this up on my family's blog and didn't think about it until just the other day I logged in and noticed I had A TON of comments on its post. Turns out over 200 people wanted me to e-mail it to them for Valentine's day!!

That got me thinking that maybe we could tweek it a little and do it for activity days!! So I changed the sayings just a little bit and I think it will be really fun for the girls! We haven't done it yet but I wanted to post this on here early so that if you wanted you could do it in time for Valentine's day also.

So my plan is to have the girls pick someone... a friend, family member or even parent that they would like to do this for. Maybe we can have them think about a friend at school that may not have very many other friends or someone who needs service. Then we will spend the activity putting it together. I changed the sayings a little bit and made the sayings so that they could color them in and then we'll just tape them to the candy. I think if we do this with mini-sized candies it won't end up being too expensive.

Here is what I plan on doing cause I think it will be the easiest and cheapest...this is subject to change based on what they have at the store...

1. I am nuts about you: any mini candy bar with nuts.

2. You are o’fish’ally awesome: Small bag of Swedish Fish

3. I’d be in KNOTS without you: Pretzels (get one big bag, put some in a ziploc)

4. You stole a piece of my heart: Reeses piece

5. I am stuck on you: A sucker or gum

6. You color my world: Skittles

7. + Scripture. You are a sweetie: Sweet tarts

Here are the others:

• You are a hot tamale: Hot tamales
• You are the star in my eyes: Starbursts
• Be my friend now and later: Now and Later
• You are priceless to me: 1000 Grand
• Thanks for going to bat for me: Babe Ruth
• I like the way you roll: ROLLO
• I have a crush on you: Crush soda
• You rock my world: Rock Candy
• Being your friend is a joy: Almond Joy
• I ‘soda’ think you are amazing: any soda
• You are the apple of my eye: apple or apple candy (I know at my dollar store they have apple suckers. If you don't do "I'm stuck on you" using suckers, you could use this one)

I also plan on including a picture of Christ or at least this scripture on the last one,  explaining the true meaning of LOVE.

Jesus replied: " 'Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.'  This is the first and greatest commandment.  And the second is like it: 'Love your neighbor as yourself.' Matthew 22:37-39

If you would like me to e-mail you the word document in case you want to change the sayings more, I'm happy to e-mail them to you. I try to check my e-mail around once a month. If you would like them right now, you can get them HERE.

Slice of Heaven Pizza Party (Developing Talents)

We have a few activities that we repeat each year and this is one of them! I wanted to teach the girls how to make something for dinner that they could do all by themselves in hopes that they would go home and make pizza one day... maybe even for thier families. I also think the girls love the idea of making THIER OWN pizza just how they like it, all to themselves.

 So really the hardest part about this activity is getting all the ingredients. Here is a sample shopping this:

1. Dough (you can make this yourself or if you are like me... rhodes rolls works great (this can also teach them how you have to get them out early and let the rolls rise, 1-2 rolls per girl is perfect), or you can buy dough from papa murphys and i'm sure lots of other places)

2. Sauce (tomato is great but in my house we like BBQ and alfredo sauce too)

3. Toppings: Pepperoni, pineapple, ham, olives, mushrooms, peppers, bacon....

Then give each girl a piece of tin foil and let them go to town! When they are done you can put the pizzas/tinfoil on a cookie sheet for ease in getting them in and out of the oven. If your oven has two racks, you should be able to fit 12 pizzas in at a time.

I didn't get my own picture of this but found this on online to give you the idea

Family Home Evening Packets (Learning and Living the Gospel)

   UNDERSTANDING   DIFFERENT   

 

I wish I could take credit for this activity... but it was all my partner. She is GREAT! And so good with the girls. We made Family Home Evening packets for the girls to take home with them and be in charge of an FHE with thier families. At the beginning of the activity Trinity read a story to the girls about animals and how they are different and that different is OKAY.

"And as ye would that men should do to you, do ye unto them likewise" Luke 6:31

Trinity said she got most of the materials online... so I'm sure if any of you would like to recreate this, you can get inspiration from these pictures but choose exactly what you want to go in them yourselves. Here is what we used:

1. A folder for everything to go in:

 2. A write-up on the activity with what is included in the packet for the girls to use as a guide when they are teaching FHE.

 3. A song for them to sing

4. These are the animals that we had the girls color and put together. It went along with the story of how being different is okay.

5. The Animal Story. I tried finding it online to share the link but I couldn't :(

6. An easy recipe for the girls to make for FHE before or for FHE

7. After reading them the story and talking about how it's okay to be different, we let them color their animals and put their packets together.