Power of the Priesthood Youth Sunday School Lesson

How can you honor the power of the priesthood?

This lesson is a mix of a few different topics from the June theme of Priesthood and Priesthood Keys.  I was trying to incorporate the topic 'How do women and priesthood holders work together to build the kingdom of God?' and questions that the youth had for us about honoring the priesthood.  

I taught this lesson last Sunday on Father's Day (Can you believe I'm actually getting up a post the same week I gave it?).  With it being Father's Day I wanted to highlight the influence of fathers and how much our parents and father figures or mother figures do for us.  We started by watching the video Earthly Father, Heavenly Father.  I love writing thank you notes so then we wrote thank you notes to our dads or moms, or anyone that has been an example like that to us.  We talked about the importance of honoring our parents and then moved into honoring the priesthood.

I loved THIS talk by Linda K. Burton.  It's such a great talk about how priesthood power blesses everyone!  Perfect talk for this lesson.

One of the things she mentioned was to think what life would be like without having the priesthood here on earth?  Can you even imagine!?  There would be no temples, eternal covenants, no prophets, no light-hope, only darkness.

We also talked about how the priesthood is always used to serve, to bless and strengthen others.  As David A. Bednar has said, "Nothing about the priesthood is self-centered."

Just like a superhero!  

These were so fun to give to the class.  I think even younger kids would have loved them too! 

All you need is paper and a bag of Tootsie Pops!

I just found a cape cut out online and glued my printable to it.  If you didn't want to cut out the cute little masks, you could totally have them just with the cape and it would be a lot easier!  You can print the masks on the same color card stock you use for the capes.  I also used mini glue dots but if I were to do this again I would use superglue to attach the masks.

I hope we are all realizing how important the priesthood is, 

it really does bless all of us no matter our circumstance.  

If you'd like the FREE 'Power of the Priesthood' printable you can find it HERE!

This post contains affiliate links, but all opinions are my own.

Friend Baby Shower

Babies just bring people together.  I am lucky enough to have incredible people in my life-friends, family and loved ones that care so much to throw and attend parties for me and my little baby!  I've wanted to share these adorable parties for quite sometime so I'm so glad I'm finally getting around to it!  Thank heavens for scheduled nap time! ;)

The first baby shower I had was thrown by my best friend from high school.  She is just the coolest and plans great parties!  Gabby also takes amazing pictures-so I'm sure you'll be able to tell the difference with the pictures I took and the ones she took below.  Find her photography page on Facebook HERE!  She also did Olivia's newborn pictures and I'm still SO obsessed, find that post HERE!

She had a parfait bar with all the best ingredients to make a fabulous parfait!  She had granola, coconut (my favorite), strawberries, blueberries, raspberries and vanilla and strawberry yogurt.

She also had a few treats on the side including assorted mini donettes and mini cinnamon rolls.

It was light and refreshing and the perfect Saturday open house brunch!

I was so obsessed with this decorative wall.  She made each of these flowers with different colors of paper and hung up THE sweetest little girl clothes under it.  Which was another gift to me and the babe!  I love that she used Olivia's nursery colors as inspiration for the party.  Pinks, gold and white!

She also had the cutest display where the guests could sign one of my favorite children books like a guestbook and leave me some advise or wishes for the baby.

Isn't Fancy Nancy just the cutest little girls book!?  I'd love any other recommendations for favorite children books or little girl books, I'm always looking for more.

You all know how much I love these IKEA frames! SO inexpensive and perfect for parties!

Pretty sure I was in the middle of saying 'cute' in this picture but seriously everything was just so darn cute!  I'm so grateful for incredible friends for coming and to Gabby for throwing this adorable party for us.

Olivia and I are pretty lucky!

Cute story about these little best friend onesies.  Gabby had announced that she was pregnant a few weeks before I had told anyone so once I told my family I made these onesies to surprise Gabby with.  Her reaction was THE BEST!  She was so sweet!  I am so glad we are friends!  And we are hoping our little babes will get married one day! ;)

This post may contain affiliate links but all opinions are my own.

Sunshine Love Notes June 2018 Visiting Teaching/Ministering Handout Ideas

I have loved coming up with new love notes/ministering messages each month, you've probably noticed that I can't just pick one! :/  Hopefully it will give you lots of options though!

This month has been full of sunlight and sunshine!  Even if it hasn't been full of some sun for you this is the perfect pick me up for you or a friend.  

This quote from President Hinckley has always been one of my favorites.  How often do we focus on our problems or sadness instead of focusing on our blessings?  There is so much joy to be had on this earth and it will help us so much more to focus on the positive! 

These tags can be paired with so many different things!  I was thinking Sunny D gummies, lemon candies, any yellow candy, or even sunglasses.  

Have you tried these Sparkling Ice drinks?  They are actually really good and perfect for a hot day!  Try the Coconut Pineapple-it's delicious!

Another favorite is this Hymn!

Perfect hymn to cheer anyone up!

I made some other sun themed tags a little bit ago that you can find HERE!  You could use any of these ideas interchangeably or double up the tags for a unique combo! 

If you'd like the FREE printables you can find them below:

Sunshine Tag

Sunlight Tag

Find more monthly Love Notes below:

(They are perfect for Ministering/Visiting Teaching/Home Teaching)

January 

February

March (I made LOADS of ideas this month-find them all HERE!)

April  and HERE

May

This post may contain affiliate links, but all opinions are my own. 

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Prophets and Apostles are like Life Preservers Youth Sunday School Lesson and Handout Idea

What can I learn from living prophets and apostles?

This lesson outline and handout idea is from the May topic of Prophets and Revelation.  Even though this is a shorter lesson outline it is always nice to have a variety of time lengths to help promote comments and you can always add more to what you feel the class needs to hear.  

I love to start the discussion with a question.  I started with asking why we have prophets.  Then followed up with watching THIS video.  Then we followed up with why we need LIVING prophets and apostles.  And then watched THIS video.

We then read Mosiah 8:16-18.

Elder Ulisses Soares said, "Isn't it a blessing to have prophets, seers, and revelatory on earth in these days in which we live, who seek to know the will of the Lord and follow it?  It is comforting to know that we are not alone in the world despite challenges we face in life.  Having prophets is a sign of God's love for His children.  They make known the promises and the true nature of God and of Jesus Christ to Their people."

We also read Prophets in True to the Fatih, and looked for roles of prophets (ex: testify of Jesus Christ, teach the Gospel, provide guidance-peace-strength-understanding).  As a class we made a list on the board of challenges the youth face today.  I wanted each of them to select one challenge and search the most recent General Conference talks to find counsel that could help overcome that challenge.

I wanted the youth to know that living prophets and apostles are like life preservers.  When we listen and follow their counsel we will be able to receive strength, peace, understanding and guidance.  You can always trust the living prophets.  Your greatest safety lies in strictly following the word of the Lord given through His prophets, particularly the current President of the Church.

If we are in troubled waters and trying to make it through this life we can turn to the prophets and the apostles for help and like a life preserver they will help us and preserve our life so we can live up to our greatest potential.

I paired this cute tag with some mini powdered donuts that look
just like little life preservers if you ask me.  

If you'd like the FREE printable of the tag- 'Living Prophets and Apostles are like Life Preservers' you can find it HERE!

This post may contain affiliate links, but all opinions are my own.

Graduation Cap Cupcakes and Emma's Preschool Graduation

My sister is the cutest preschool teacher.  She use to teach Kindergarten but with her growing family preschool was a better fit.  Boy are those preschoolers lucky!  I wanted to share the adorable details that Brittany included in her class graduation and the graduation cap cupcakes that I made for the graduation!

These graduation cap cupcakes were so fun to make-and eat!  All you need is miniature Reese's, Ghirardelli square chocolates, M&M's, Airhead Xtreme candy belts, and chocolate melts or chocolate chips and a cupcake or treat to put them on top of.

Use melted chocolate chips to "glue" the pieces together.

I froze my chocolate pieces for a few minutes so they wouldn't melt in the heat.

"Glue" the M&M at the center of the upside down Ghirardelli square, then "glue" a coordinating Airhead Xtreme "tassel" with chocolate.  I made sure that all the tassels were the same length.  

I made mini and regular sized cupcakes for the kids and adults, 

we also did a variety of plain and sprinkles. 

They just look so cute and delicious lined up all ready for celebrating graduation.

Now on to the other details.  My older sister Brittany is one of the most creative people I know so I just had to share the super cute details of the day.

She filled these pails with so many things to keep them learning, busy and having fun during the summer.  

Can you tell Adam is a little rebel? haha

Along with the summer pail Brittany gave each kid a portfolio of all of the kids work throughout the year, and a rainbow initial that each kid painted themselves.

Brittany went with the cutest rainbow theme for the graduation.

She got this chalkboard from Oriental HERE!  I'm definitely going to be getting one too after seeing how cute it is, only $30 and perfect to customize for any holiday, season or whatever really!

Brittany had the cutest program where everyone sang a few songs then Brittany gave each kid their certificate and told a little about them, including what they want to be when they grow up.

Little Emma said she wanted to be herself when she grows up. haha Best answer and so deep!

Livy can't wait to be in Mrs. Melzer's preschool class in a few years.

We loved going to Emma and Brittany's big day!  

This post contains affiliate links but all opinions are as always my own, 

I just love to share what I love!

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