Today I Went to a Meeting.

It was NOT a boring one either!  We're planning for next year, which is gonna be upon us before you know it!  I'm the secretary for Primary at church.  Primary is the children's Sunday School group, ages 3-11.  Every year we have a theme that we follow. Last year was "I Know the Scriptures are True." 

The theme for 2012 is going to be "Choose the Right."  So excited! 

I've now got a lot of extra things to accomplish before the end of the year: 

(child giving a talk in primary.  source)

I've got to make the handouts for the children that are assigned the talk, scripture, and prayer each week.  That means 12 separate ones since there is a variation to the theme every month.  And just because I retain info better when I write it down, here they are! 

January:  Agency Is the Gift to Choose for Ourselves
February: When We Choose the Right, We Are Blessed
March: Living Prophets Teach Me to Choose the Right
April: Jesus Christ Teaches Me to Choose the Right
May: I Choose the Right When I Am Baptized and Confirmed a Member of the Church
June: I Choose the Right by Living Gospel Principles
July: I Choose the Right by Living Gospel Principles
August: I Choose to Fill My Life with Things That Invite the Spirit
September: The Ten Commandments Teach Me to Love God and His Children
October: Blessings of the Priesthood Are Available to All
November: I Can Choose to Be a Missionary Now
December: Jesus Christ Is the Son of God
 
I've got to put together the lesson manuals for all the teachers (each age group gets their own teacher), which basically just means making sure they have all the schedules, media, supplies, and pictures that they need with their new manual.  The pictures were a mess last year!  I'm hoping it will be a shorter process this time around.
 

(this is actually a picture of the manual for the nursery age, which is 18 months-3 yrs.  i use this to create scripture lessons for my girls at home.  it's nice that it's online because i've often misplaced my copy!  source)

I've got to make some scripture visual aids.  This one is probably the shortest and easiest on my list.

And this week, I've got to put together a HUGE Thankful Tree.  Then the kids can take a paper leaf, write what they are thankful for that week and tape it to the tree.  In December we're going to switch out the leaves for some evergreen and they can write their gifts to Jesus on paper presents (example: "I'm going to give Christ the give of being nicer to my sister this week.") and tape them under the tree. 

(i really want to do something like this but it's got to hang on the wall.  how am i going to get twigs attached to poster board in a non-tacky fashion?  picture source.)