Relief Society Birthday Celebration “Something Extraordinary: Relief Society of the Past, Present, and Future”

This year for our RS Birthday Enrichment we chose the theme “Something Extraordinary: RS of the Past, Present, and…This year for our RS Birthday Enrichment we chose the theme “Something Extraordinary: RS of the Past, Present, and Future.” It was our best attended Enrichment in some time.

Publicity:
Our awesome Enrichment leader made beautiful invitations to send out to everyone. They used a silhouette of a woman with 1840s hairstyle, a reflective piece of paper to look like a mirror, and silhouette of a younger woman with a modern hair style. These were our RS sisters of the past, present (mirror — we are the present of RS), and future. Posters with our silhouettes and the time and location of the dinner were placed on easels outside the chapel, and then moved to Primary and YW to help sisters there know about the event. We also reminded the bishopric to announce the activity during sacrament meeting and had a notice printed in the bulletin.

We also labeled invitations with names of less active or absent sisters to be sure they receive an invitation, either by mail or from their visiting teacher.

Enrichment Birthday Food:
The menu was lasagna, salad, rolls, and birthday cake.

[img_assist|nid=16917|title=Enrichment Night: RS Birthday Cake|desc=|link=node|align=right|width=0|height=]Since we struggle with helping sisters that serve in other auxiliaries feel they are a part of Relief Society, assignments were made to sisters from Primary and Young Women to heat up the frozen lasagnas and other food. Our Enrichment night leader bought the frozen lasagnas and distributed them to the sisters to bake. A young woman with cake decorating experience made us a 1/4 sheet cake with the RS logo on it. It was beautiful!

The Skit:
http://theideadoor.com/RS/history_of_relief_society_program.htm

[img_assist|nid=16918|title=Enrichment Night: Decorations|desc=|link=node|align=right|width=0|height=]We used shortened versions of the above skit for the first 5 RS presidents’ parts. The RS president in our ward talked for about 45 minutes for the “present” portion, and a graduating Laurel read a small part for the “future”. We did this as a reader’s theater to keep things simple, and invited those sisters doing the “past” parts to dress up if they liked.

We used the building’s stage backdrop and put large versions of our silhouettes on it. We also set up 7 rocking chairs for the sisters to sit in. They used a couple of fake plants and made a miniature picket fence out of cardboard to finish the set.

The Big Day:
[img_assist|nid=16916|title=Enrichment Night: Sisters enjoy the event|desc=|link=node|align=right|width=0|height=]We set up 7 round tables. Sisters were invited from the RS and others auxiliaries to decorate a table with a spring them. The tables were so cute! Then we set up the stage and some long tables to serve the food. A small table was used to display the RS logo birthday cake.

The Enrichment night leader created some handouts for a get to know you game called “Find Someone Who”. Several of the sisters went from table to table introducing themselves to visitors and less actives and the form gave them an excuse to start up a conversation. “Do you know what a ‘hoppy taw’ is?” or “Find someone who is excited about the new Star Trek Movie” or “Find someone who has lived in a non-NATO country.” We didn’t give prizes or anything — it was just an ice breaker.

We played the game, ate, watched the skit, and then closed with the song. It was nice to have the skit last, so that sisters went home on a spiritual note instead of a chatty one.

The Music:
For a closing song, members of the Relief Society performed the song “+++++++++.”

Other:
[img_assist|nid=16913|title=Enrichment Night: 72 hour kit display|desc=|link=node|align=right|width=0|height=] Because we hope to put an emphasis on food storage at each of our Enrichment activities, we asked a sister to do a display on 72 hour kits to set up in the foyer so people could see it when they came in. She did an amazing job!!!

She had a table set up with a 72-hour kit for pets, a whole privacy tent with porta-potty (that some of the preschool age kids tried to use!!), MREs and much more.

We also had a children’s class manned by the Young Women. [img_assist|nid=16914|title=Enrichment Night: 72 hour kit for pets|desc=|link=node|align=right|width=0|height=]We provided a snack (pretzels, water, and grapes) and a church movie to watch, along with a short lesson from the Nursery manual and some coloring pages.