YW 2015 Theme Printable

Every year the youth program for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints assigns a scriptural theme for the year. The theme is encouraged to be incorporated in each young man and young woman's life.

The Youth Theme for 2015 is "O ye that embark in the service of God, see that ye serve Him with all your heart, might, mind, and strength, that ye may stand blameless before God at the last day." -Doctrine & Covenants 4:2

I serve with the Young Women at church and I thought it would be fun to create a few free printables of the YW 2015 Theme. This theme is not specific to just Mormons, this motto of serving God is a great moral commitment to have for anyone who is devoted to a life of serving our Heavenly Father.

I made three different color versions of the same design. There is a turquoise, coral, and mint version of the printable. To save your own copy, simply right click on the image and save to your computer as a JPEG.

I hope you enjoy and that the message resonates with you, like it does me.

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Harvest Fruit Salad: Thanksgiving Side Dish

This is one of my favorite Fall fruit salads. In fact, I just made it for Middle's Woodland Theme Baptism Luncheon. This also makes a great side dish on Thanksgiving, because let's face it one of the hardest things about Thanksgiving dinner is deciding what sides to make. I mean we all know the main players. That is a no brainer.

Turkey-Check.
Potatoes-Check.
Gravy-Check.
Rolls-Check.
Pie-Check.

But alas, what to do with the other sides. There are so many to choose from. How does one narrow down what to make?

Well I am gonna help you at least narrow down one. This salad is nice to have on the Thanksgiving table. It pairs up great with my favorite Spinach Apple Salad.

This Harvest Fruit Salad is a great addition to Thanksgiving dinner.

Harvest Fruit Salad

6 cups diced apples
2 cups halved red or black grapes
1 pomegranate, seeds only
1 cup walnut pieces
1 1/2 cups sugar
1/2 cup flour
1 1/2 water
1 Tablespoon butter
1 teaspoon water
1 teaspoon vanilla

First prepare all the fruit.

Aren't pomegranate seeds gloriously lovely??

Place all of the fruit into a large bowl.

Now make the sauce.

Combine the sugar, flour, and water in a saucepan. Heat over medium high heat until it boil lightly and starts to thicken. When it thickens, remove from heat and stir in butter and vanilla.

Let it cool for about 5 minutes. Then pour it over the fruit and evenly coat.

Then stir in the walnuts.

With everything all mixed and pretty all you need to do is serve it up.

Now that will make your mouth happy and your Thanksgiving dinner complete.

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Woodland Theme Baptism Luncheon

We just threw this Woodland Theme Baptism Luncheon for Middle. The decorations were simple and easy to pull together. There was wood, pine cones, burlap, and lots of hunter green (my new favorite color for Fall and Winter).

The menu for the luncheon was full of yummy Fall inspired food.

The Menu:

Ham and Cheese Sliders

Spinach Apple Salad

Harvest Fruit Salad

Pumpkin Snickerdoodles

Cream Cheese Frosted Pumpkin Cookies

Apple Cider

Apple Juice Boxes

One of my favorite decorations at the luncheon was this giant photo number eight.

I cut a number 8 out of foam board. Then I wrapped it in burlap strips. Then I hot-glued down square photos of Middle. I printed out these square photos at Walmart. Did you know they do that now? Well they do. The process was super easy and I had them in just over an hour. Woohoo.

The Woodland Theme Baptism Luncheon all came together perfectly because it all came together easily and that is always a good thing.

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Lunch Sack Envelopes

Invitations to special events don't need to be expensive or ordered online. There are ways you can make a homemade invite look special without spending tons of cash. One of those ways to to be creative with how you package the invite. I have used a lot of fun mediums. This Lunch Sack Envelope is one of my favorite envelopes.

They are so easy to make. SO easy.

Most of us have lunch sacks just laying around. You can get traditional brown or white. Heck, they make similar bags that are "gift bags" and you can get those in practically any color. I also grabbed a sharpie pen and some washi tape.

The invites themselves were also affordable. I simply made them myself on PicMonkey. Then I printed them out on white card stock.

To make the Lunch Sack Envelopes, I measured the size of the invite and then sewed across the bottom of the sack with a 3.5 stitch just above the bottom of the bag fold.

Next I cut off all the bottoms.

Right there I had an envelope. To fancy it up a bit, I simple tore off a piece of washi tape and smacked it right on the bag. Then using a sharpie I wrote the recipients name above the tape.

Now all I had to do was slip in the invitation. 

I delivered them just like this to our lives-by-us friends and family. I slipped the whole thing in a larger envelope for those friends and family who we mailed one to.

See, invites don't have to break the bank. I am pretty sure I only spent money on the postage to mail some of them out. Huzzah! That is what I like.

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Left Over Halloween Candy Cookies

Halloween has been over one week. Have your kids eaten all their candy yet? Have you eaten all their candy yet? Do you need a creative way to use all that candy?

Well, I have a smart and not healthy way to get rid of it. Why not put it into some cookies! You know because cookies need candy in them.

So go ahead and gather up some of that excess Halloween candy. I recommend all the chocolate candy. While very delightful on their own, I am thinking Starbursts and Swedish Fish would not taste spectacular in these cookies. So I guess you should go ahead and just eat those.

Once you have gathered up some of the chocolate bars, chop them all up.

I use my favorite Chocolate Chip Cookie as the base for this cookie. However, instead of the milk chocolate chips you add in the chopped up Halloween.

Follow all the same directions.

Then when you are done you have these delightfully yummy Halloween Candy Cookies. These are great cookies to hand out to friends and neighbors. I baked up a batch for our school's teachers. I knew they were a hit when one of them posted on my Facebook page how much they loved them.

These cookies are the perfect way to use up that Halloween candy. Trust me!

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