Birthday Celebrations

One of the most encouraging things that we do in our ladies Sunday School is celebrate each other's birthdays.

I am one of those women that LOVES to celebrate birthdays! I believe that the day that God created a person and gave them the gift of life is a very special day indeed, and because of that, it is my desire to make every lady in my class feel like a special person on the anniversary of the day that they were born.

I have taught the ladies in my class to make it a priority to remember each other on their birthdays. I have encouraged them to make it a point to do one of these five things when one of us has a birthday:

1. If you have no money: Telephone the person and wish them a Happy Birthday.

2. If you have a card and a stamp: Mail the person a birthday card and write something kind and encouraging in the card.

3. If you have some time: Bake them a special meal or delicious treat. Wrap it up real pretty and bring it for them to enjoy and eat.

4. If you have a little money: Send the person a card with a dollar or two and write a kind word of praise or encouragement. I remind them that one dollar or two times 40 or 50 of us adds up to enough money to buy ourselves a nice gift and a special breakfast, lunch or dinner :).

5. If you have a few more dollars: Put $5.00 in a card, purchase a gift card from Starbucks, Dunkin Donuts or Panera Bread, or buy a small gift of some sort. One of my favorite gifts to give is a $6.00 apron the I buy from Wal-Mart and then I embroider it in a personalized way. Some other good ideas for gifts that most women love and could use are lotions, kitchen towels, cooking or decorating magazines, chocolates and candles.

Birthdays are such a fun time in my class. It warms my heart to see the women leave church with their arms filled with gifts and to hear about how many well wishes that they have received through the phone calls people have made or the cards that they receive.

Ladies Friendship Tea

This past Saturday we hosted our annual Ladies Friendship at Ruffled Feathers Country Club. The theme for this tea was "Happiness" and I asked 11 ladies to be a table hostess and decorate their table in things that made them happy.

The ladies did a wonderful job with their tables! It was so much fun to look at the adorable themes that they came up with. In addition to decorating their tables in a special way, they also provided little "goody treats" for every one that sat at their table.

We enjoyed a delicious luncheon and dessert and then we played a few fun games that I had planned ~ Flower Names & Their Meanings, Pass the Tea Cup, and Two Truths and a Lie. This last game was especially fun. I asked each of the table hostesses to write down three things about themselves: two truths and one lie. For the game I had them stand up and I read aloud the three statements that they had written and the ladies had to guess which was the lie. It was fun.

I gave a nice little talk at the end entitled, "Happiness Came Looking for Me." Many of the ladies said that it was a blessing to them.

This year I also invited a tour group from Providence Baptist College to provide the special music and they did such a fine job.

We had about 105 ladies attend many of our ladies brought their family members and friends.

The Lord blessed the activity in a special way and three visitors showed up at church the next day because of it!

Sweet Sister Program

A couple of years ago I began a special little program that would give the ladies of our church an opportunity to "encourage one another".

I am a firm believer that ladies need the fellowship of each other in the local church. This nation is filled with lonely people who need an ear to listen to them, a shoulder to cry on, and a heart to pray and rejoice with them. And most of those lonely people are women.

When God brought us here almost eight years ago, I promised Him that I would do all I could to love and encourage the women that He would bring our way.

And my oh my, what wonderful women He has brought our way! Women from all over the world have been influenced by our ministry and I have been greatly humbled by the opportunity to be a part of each one of these ladies lives.

But there is something that I have found even more special than getting to know the hearts and minds and burdens of the ladies that have contacted us from all over the world . . . my favorite part of being the Ladies Ministry Coordinator of our church as been the opportunity I have had to get to know and encourage the dear ladies that attend my own church.

The Sweet Sister Program that I designed many years ago has helped me, and many others, to do just that.

Here is the way it works:

Each lady that wants to participate fills out a form with her name, address, phone, favorite snacks, favorite things to collect, and prayer requests. Those forms are then redistributed among the participants so that every one has a Sweet Sister in which to love on and pray for during the three month time.

I encourage them to become a faithful friend to their Sweet Sister in the following ways:

• Pray for her regularly
• Bring her special treats from time to time
• Be friendly to her when you see her at church (or anywhere for that matter!)
• Sit with her in church if she sits alone
• Contact her if she misses a church service

It has been so precious to see many of the ladies become very, very good friends after they have become better acquainted by participating in the Sweet Sister program.

In the past year, I have asked a dear lady in my church to oversee this ministry and she is doing a wonderful job with it! She encourages the ladies to participate and then continues to encourage them to be faithful to be a good friend once they are a part of it.

Mothers Together Seminar

On Friday, June 5th I hosted our first annual "Mothers Together Seminar" at our church. I invited a sweet friend of mine, Mrs. JoBeth Hooker from Hyles-Anderson College to be my special speaker for the evening and what a wonderful job she did teaching and encouraging the ladies that came to attend!

Mrs. Hooker is the mother of six grown daughters and every one of her girls have attended Bible College and are serving the Lord with their lives. She is a beautiful woman (both inside and out) and has a passion for encouraging women to be the best wives and mothers that they can be.

I asked her to speak on these two subjects while she was with us:

"Making Your Children Feel Loved"
"Encouraging Family Unity"

I planned the evening simple on purpose. I wanted the whole focus to be on the good teaching that I knew that the ladies would receive. I encouraged the women to bring a dip or spread to share, I asked a couple of ladies to sing two "skit songs" (one for each session) and the rest of the night was devoted to learning from this dear wise woman.

This seminar was such a big hit and so encouraging that I will host one every year at this time. I will bring in a variety of speakers (so that they can learn from many different women) and have them bring different types of foods to share ~ but I will continue to keep it simple so that the teaching can be easily absorbed.

Good Housekeeping Workshop

In the month of March I held a "Good Housekeeping Workshop" for our ladies and it was such a huge success!

The theme for this workshop was "Clean & Clutter Free" and I used a power point presentation to teach it. This made the whole presentation easy to teach and fun to listen to as well.

The main points of this workshop were:
"Why Me?"
"What Happens If I Don't?"
"What Should I Use?"
"Let's Get Started"
"What Will Hinder Me?"

The ladies were so motivated by this workshop that just about all of them went home and cleaned their house! I think they were motivated because of all the "bugs" that I showed them that live in the midst of the dirt and dust around their homes. I received so much good feedback from this workshop that I'm already planning another one to teach on paper clutter.

A friend of mine asked me if I would be willing to give this presentation at her church and told her YES! I would be thrilled to take this show on the road!

At the end I sent all the ladies home with a gift bag filled with a sponge, a spray bottle and some natural cleaners that they could use. They enjoyed that, every woman likes to receive a free gift, don't they?!

Women's Missionary Circles

Last night we started doing something new ~ we started hosting monthly Women's Missionary Circles.

We began by diving our missionaries into four different regions: North, South, East and West and then choosing a coordinator to lead the circle meeting of each region.

At this present time we are meeting in four different homes, and at each home their is a time for reading the missionary letters, signing birthday and anniversary cards for the missionaries and their families and our church staff, praying for the needs of the missionaries and our church and its staff, and discussing ways that we can encourage some of the elderly people in our church.

We gave each lady that attended a booklet filled with the names, addresses and birthday/anniversary information about each missionaries, a guideline for our meetings and also a guideline on how to pray for each missionary family throughout the week.

The whole meeting took about an hour and it was a very encouraging and productive time.

The Christmas Coffee 2008

Last night we held our annual Christmas Coffee and it is always such a hit and so much fun.

The reason that this event is such a big hit is because of the crazy cookie exchange that we do at the end of the night.

I have received many requests for how we do this, so here it is . . .

Ladies of Grace Crazy Cookie Exchange

First of all, have all ladies bring a dozen cookies cleverly wrapped. The ones that are the most clever are the ones that the ladies fight over the most!

Next, share these rules with the ladies:

Rules: You may only trade once. And you must be pleasantly cooperative when someone wants to trade with you. Failure to comply with these rules could result in bodily injury or verbal character attacks. Play at your own risk!

1.Everyone trade cookies with someone else.
2.If you helped with the Christmas Coffee in any way, trade with someone that didn’t.
3.If you were invited to the Christmas Coffee by someone from our church, trade cookies with someone else who was invited also.
4.If you have blonde hair, trade with someone that has brown hair.
5.If you are over the age of 60, trade with anybody you want.
6.If you are under the age of 20, trade with someone older than you.
7.If you are wearing Christmas earrings, trade with someone that is wearing plain earrings.
8.If you have on green or red, trade with someone else.
9.If you are wearing glasses, trade with someone who is NOT wearing glasses.
10.If you have your nails painted, trade with someone who doesn’t.
11.If you have gray hair, dyed or undyed, trade with someone else.
12.If you are between the ages of 30 and 50, trade with someone younger than you.
13.If you are glad that you came to the Christmas Coffee trade with someone else.
14.If you have NOT put up your Christmas Tree already, trade with someone who has NOT put theirs up.
15.If you sang in this Christmas program, trade cookies with someone else that sang in the Christmas program.
16.If you are wearing a hat or funny ears, trade cookies with anyone you wish.
17.If this is your first Christmas Coffee, trade with another first time Christmas Coffee attendee.
18.If you are here with your mother, trade cookies with anyone else.
19.If you are here with your daughter, trade cookies with anyone else.
20.If you are excited about Christmas, trade cookies with anyone else.
21.If you baked your own cookies, trade with someone else that baked their own cookies.
22.If you bought your cookies to trade, trade with someone else that bought theirs too!
23.If you have more than three children, trade with someone else.
24.If you have been married for more than 10 years, trade with some that hasn’t been married 10 years.
25.If you are wearing colored tights or socks, trade with someone else wearing colored tights or socks.
26.Everyone trade with someone else.
27.If you are thankful that Mrs. Stanly came to speak, trade with someone else.
28.If you have bought any of your Christmas gifts, trade with someone else.
29.If you have wrapped gifts sitting under your tree, trade with someone else.
30.If you love cookies, trade with someone else.
31.If you had a good time tonight, trade with anyone else.

Of course, I always have special music, a skit, a testimony from one of our ladies and a special speaker and plenty of good food and special coffee . . . but the real reason that these ladies flock to the Christmas Coffee is because of our crazy cookie exchange. They love it!