2017 YW Binder Covers

2017 is upon us. I didn't post at all during 2016 except to post my binder covers for YW! hahaha

Here is this year's offering. I am now camp director and am not doing the regular day to day things in YW, however, as is usual, my oldest daughter is, & asked me to help her get some paperwork together. We are of course running just a tad late on that, however, I do really love these front and back covers. They go with the vintage vibe that some of us are in love with right now! 

Here's a little tip for you: If you'd like some of the same paper for the binding of your notebook, just print an extra copy and trim the paper to fit. It will! Good luck!

A Few Cuties!

I know I've talked about how we are doing a superhero theme this year in YW. And this clever woman, Marquette LaRee, created some amazing logos for a superhero theme she's done. We loved hers so much, and she had them available for download, so we took them and made buttons that the girls can earn throughout the year. Each month, if they complete a value experience or begin a project, they get the corresponding button for the month. 

The cool thing is that the girls can put them on their lanyards for girls camp. My lanyard is the one pictured above, from many past years at camp. The girls love them, and trade them with each other. They earn them for various certification items they complete. The nurse even has one she gives out to girls who are caught "drinking water"! :) The buttons were my good friend, Britt's idea. She is so creative!

Here's a closer look at the buttons. I want to think of one the girls can earn from the Bishop. Gotta brainstorm!

Another thing that came in this week were these little beauties! I just love them. They are little post-it notes for girls to stick on their mirrors to remind themselves of the goal they are working on for their Personal Progress. So cute & helpful! (I got the idea here.) 

That's all for now!

Happy spring break!

DIY Water Balloon Launcher & YW Honor Bee Printable

Over Valentine's Day weekend, we had an awesome young woman get baptized. Since she is 17, and a junior in high school, she won't need to complete the entire personal progress program. I believe the book specifies that instead of completing the 3 requirements and the 3 elective requirements of each value, she only needs to complete the 3 required ones and then complete a 10 hr. project for each value. This is still a lot if you are 17 already. We recently had a young woman complete her Personal Progress and she is a junior as well. We paired these two up to help each other, but to complete your honor bee, there is still some documenting that needs to happen that the book doesn't really give space for. The printable below are what we are going to use. Feel free to use them as well. (If you click on the pages below, it will enable you to print them. They are half sheets...fyi)

The sheet on "How to be a personal progress mentor,"  I did redo to fit our look. The original was found on inkablinka.com.  It just gave some really great ideas. Take a look! Love them! 

On another note, isn't it wonderful when a child asks at 9:30 at night if you can help them build a water balloon launcher before 10:30 the next morning for their college physics class? I guess I am just glad she asked. :) We had a great time and I can envision quite a few uses for this little baby after she is done with it!  

Supplies needed:

2 - 2x4 - cut into 4 pieces 36" long & 2 pieces 24" long

2 -1x3 - 6 ft long - cut into one piece 24" & 2 pieces 36" long

1 1/2" drywall screws

drill

3/8" drill bit

latex tubing

funnel

2 washers big enough to cover the bottom of the funnel

thin nylon cording

Instructions:

1. Screw the rectangular base together by  putting the 2 - 24" pieces of 2x4 inside 2 pieces of 36" 2x4 using your drill and drywall screws. I did pre-drill my wood because the 2x4's are generally very hard.

2. Drill 2 holes using the 3/8 in drill bit into one end of each of the 36" 2x4's that are left. This is where you will be inserting the latex tubing. 

3. Screw these 2 - 36" pieces upright into the base as shown in the picture above, making sure that the holes you drilled are at the top.

4. Connect the 1x3 measuring 24" across the front of the 2 upright pieces. This brace keeps them stable. I used my nail gun but you can easily use your drill and some screws.

5. Connect the braces on the sides (using the last 2 36" pieces of 1x3). Prior to doing this, I held them up and marked off the angles where the wood would hang over. Then I trimmed those pieces off. I used my nail gun to also connect these braces but you can use your drill here as well.

6. Drill 2 holes into the sides of the funnel on each side. Run the latex tubing through these and through the upright 2x4's as shown in the pic above. Tie a knot to secure. Do this on each side.

7. Tie a knot in one end of the nylon cording. Run this piece through the funnel and on the other side of the funnel run a washer and tie a knot. 

8. Now you are ready for a water balloon!

Easy!

2015 YW Binder Cover

I know I am a bit late with this, but our ward really wanted to get the girls out moving, using the theme this year. The YW leaders talked about a bunch of ideas all geared toward doing service, and in the end, decided to really focus on being someone's hero...specifically a superhero! When you are a superhero, you aren't looking at yourself, you are really focused on others...to completely put your heart, might, mind & strength of everything you are, into it. So, to go with that, here is a printable that can be used for a binder cover, which is what I intend to use it for. (If you click on the picture, it will let you be able to print it.)

Happy serving!

2015 YW Themed Leather Band

In Young Women this year, the theme is "O ye that embark in the service of God, see that ye serve him with all your heart, might, mind & strength, that ye may stand blameless before God at the last day." D&C 4:2

We decided to make a cute little leather band for each of the girls with the theme. I invited over the YW leaders to help make them, because after making one, I decided I would not be doing all 24 by myself! (lol) These are pretty labor intensive, as I was cutting the leather, punching the discs, etc. In a couple hrs, we had 8 completed, so a few more mornings and we will be done.

I think they turned out pretty cute!

2013 YW Girls Camp - "Rock Solid"

We have already had our girls camp this year. We went to Camp LoMia for the first time as a stake and the only week they had available was during Spring Break. There was a lot of questions of how the weather would be as we had a surprise snow storm the week before we were to leave!?! 

As you can see from the above picture, it really was beautiful weather, but a lot chilly & windy at night. These were our girls, minus 4th years, and 1st year YCL's. 

This is me and one of the YW counselors on the 1st year hike, which was really just a little walk. It was so pretty up there, with the river running. I am told the river is dry in the summer, though. We have on our stake tshirts. Love them. The theme was "Rock Solid" meaning, our testimony is on the fundamentals of the gospel and solid as a rock.

Such cute little first years! We call them "baby 'b's"!

And as you can see, there truly was snow still on the ground. One of the wards had a snowman they had built right by their cabin! Funny.

This is our ward tshirt that we had done for the girls. Our ward theme that we did based on the Stake theme, was "Anchored to the Rock" meaning our testimony is anchored to the Rock of our Salvation, our Savior. We did a little skit the first night there for our own girls, during our ward time, of us hiking and rock climbing. We made a kind of parody of how if we don't put the anchors in to the rock solidly, we can fall. We also talked a lot about how our faith in Jesus Christ is our anchor when the storms of life come upon us. Our faith is what will get us through. 

We made all the girls these fat quarter backpacks. They truly are simple to make and handy to use on the hikes, and carry everything to the different activities and classes all day. And it makes it easy to tell which girls belong to which ward. The link to the free pattern is here. 

We also made all the girls little journals with room for them to take notes, and journal prompts as well as quotes relating to the theme. As you can see, our assigned colors were navy & green. Our flag was just like the anchor pictured here, and we printed out the words with the banner, onto fabric and glued it on to the flag.  I wish I had a picture, but I just forgot about it!

These were our mailboxes. We saved cans for a few months, (FREE) & spray painted them ($6) and screwed them into some old wood I had laying around (FREE). Usually we use shoe organizers and put tags on each shoe pocket. Depending on the amount of girls we have, it costs anywhere from $20 to $30. So doing this, we saved some money, even though it was a bit more effort. One of the advisors put some tags on with ribbon. They did turn out cute.

One more thing we did, was put names on these water bottles that we found at the dollar store. The names were cut out of vinyl on the Silhouette. It was kind of time consuming to put all the names on, but we had 42 girls we were prepping for. Not all wards are that big. 

All in all, we are all super glad Girls Camp is over. However, it was awesome!!!

YW in Excellence 2012

We recently had our YW in Excellence program & I thought I would share some of the pictures from that night with you! Since the theme this year was "Arise & Shine Forth", we kind of brainstormed what would shine. I had a bunch of these silver stars left over from a camp craft a few years ago & immediately came to mind the song, "Like the Stars" by Jenny Phillips. I love the words she wrote:

Lyrics to “Like the Stars” 

by Jenny Phillips

The night is dark, the word is shifting

Everything is so unsure

But the stars above are always constant

Reminding us of who we are.

We were meant for higher things

And God you want us to be

Like the stars

Steadfast and unchanging

Immovable and unwavering

A strong and holy light

A sure and steady guide

When all of the world is falling apart

You want us close to where you are

Like the stars

So burn in me

True and steady

Give me strength to shine

Use my life

To light the darkness

Leading those who fall behind

It’s your design for me

And I’ll give everything to be

Like the stars

Steadfast and unchanging

Immovable and unwavering

A strong and holy light

A sure and steady guide

When all of the world is falling apart

You want us close to where you are

Like the stars

We will shine our light

We will shine our light

Like the stars

Steadfast and unchanging

Immovable and unwavering

A strong and holy light

A sure and steady guide

When all the world is falling apart

We want to be close to where you are

Like the stars

Like the stars

We printed these up on a card and as we called each girl to come up and share with their parents something they worked on that year and how it influenced their life or testimony, etc., we handed them the card and a necklace off the board below. 

Below is a picture of the podium all decorated up!

This was their "Walk of Fame", so to speak! 

At the end of the night, the girls all stood and sang, "Like the Stars" by Jenny Phillips! So beautiful!

We had wanted to have this night in a room other than the chapel so we wouldn't need to dress up too much, and the cultural hall was being used prior to our time, but that meant we wouldn't have much room to put their projects on display. So, we put them in the hall. (This probably violated the fire code, but it was only for an hour.)

 All in all, it was a good night. The girls were so cute, each adding a funny little way of expressing themselves, or sharing a testimony building story. Each girl only took about 2 minutes, so it went rather fast, and didn't make for a long night, which is always appreciated by all.