FUN Thanksgiving Activity

You know how it works in the business world, right?

I'm sure I'm not the only one who sighs at the Jack O'Lanterns in Costco on July and the Christmas trees up for sale in August. And then is a hypocrite and listens to some Pentatonix Christmas music. 

But I suppose that prepping for Thanksgiving a month early isn't soooo evil, right? 

Right? Good, because I'm so excited to share my latest product, a FUN Thanksgiving Scavenger hunt for only $4.99!!

This mystery/scavenger hunt will promote unity and teamwork among the youth and teach them about gratitude. 

In this activity, they'll compare gratitude to baking cookies. As the youth go to each room, they will receive an ingredient for the cookies, learn a little about gratitude, and receive a clue. The clue will have to be placed there ahead of time and will tell them where to go to next. 

This is a fun activity perfect for your Young Women or Activity Day girls, to teach them about gratitude, sneak some spiritual supplement into the activity, and have a fun time around Thanksgiving. If you don't live in the U.S., give the girls a brief explanation of the holiday this scavenger hunt is based on, and let them complete the fun activity. Gratitude can be understood universally! 

There's clues, ciphers, riddles, puzzles, cryptograms, and more. But don't worry! All of the answers are listed at the end of the packet in case you need to give a hint to the girls. 

Here's the storyline of the Thanksgiving mystery:

"It's Thanksgiving at the Porter house, and Peggy Porter feels a little blue. Nothing seems to be going her way. She just turned 16, but no boys have asked her out. She tried out for the cross-country team, but didn't make it. She's failing Geometry, and on top of it all, her dreadful cousin Patty is going to come stay with them for Thanksgiving weekend.

How in the world is Peggy supposed to feel grateful? 

Peggy's mom wants her to bake some cookies for their ministering sisters, but she has hidden the cooking supplies and ingredients, leaving behind only a couple clues.

Can you find the missing items and mix them together? If so, you'll end up with a delicious treat -- and the answer to the question Peggy keeps asking herself: 

What is gratitude and how can I develop it in my life?"

While Peggy is a Young Woman and a little less relatable to the Activity Day Girls, she appears briefly and I still think the Activity Day Girls will be able to crack the case. Enjoy this with the teen girls, tween girls, or both! (And don't be afraid to make it a combined activity either.)

Of course, there's a Faith in God and Personal Progress connection and worksheets, because this is me we're talking about.

The ingredients for living with gratitude are detailed in the packet. The ingredients for the delicious (but super easy) cookies the youth will be making are detailed in the packet. A necessary ingredient for a FUN Thanksgiving activity? Buying this packet, for only $1.99!

Be sure to Pin, share, stop by the shop, and follow the official Pinterest account, and, in advance, happy Thanksgiving!!

-Latter-Day Lucie

thanksgiving page

 coming soon

lds thanksgiving quote #4 -- love & thanks

Hey y’all and happy Friday. I felt this was extra relevant because look who said it! Our awesome prophet.

Now for one moment, think of everything that you want in your life.

I won’t even try to guess exactly what came to your mind, but by the way the question was phrased it’s likely that you desire things that you already have.

How many times do we get caught up with the next best thing, our latest idea for the wishlist, and then forget the time when we wanted exactly what we now have?

Sometimes you haven’t even gone without something, and that can also lead to taking things for granted.

Whenever I have a cold, I sulk, remembering the good times when my nose wasn’t running and I would breathe without sniffling; when my head doesn’t throb and I don’t constantly shiver. All I will want is to be in that blissful state of, you know, not-sickness.

But when I’m finally well again, maybe sometimes I go back to longing for “more important things.”

Maybe y’all go ahead and write that list. Just think about the amazing amount of blessings that we already have; that were right under our noses the entire time.

Then think about how happy our Heavenly Father will be when He sees our fleeting, lovely gratitude even if just for a moment.

If we love him, we’ll keep His commandments. (I can’t believe we’re still in 2019, maybe mentally with all this content creation I’ve moved onto go and do already!) And from the way President Nelson has worded it, it seems like gratitude is one of them.

Just some thoughts on gratitude, but don’t get too used to these weekly quotes! In 2020 ( oh my goodness that is so soon!!!) I’m going to be lettering scriptures from the Come Follow Me reading on Mondays instead. It’s still a quote every week, but this time nice and aligned with the direction the church is going in. Don’t worry — this won’t be a CFM-only blog, but it’s something I’m excited to incorporate.

Honestly, as a YW blogger mostly, I have no idea how things are going to look next year in this organization. But I have faith. And I’m so excited for what the future will bring.

lds thanksgiving quote #3 -- look around, look around

“Count Your Blessings” is seriously the best Thanksgiving hymn. Like look y’all it’s some Thanksgiving music! 

I won’t quote its lyrics, bc um that would be ...cliche, but I will say it’s a pretty great hymn. Sometimes things really do look bad. I remember so many moments, praying about everything going wrong, and then turning to the “thanking” portion of the prayer; tearfully searching and scanning and looking only to find that it seemed things to be grateful for just didn’t exist. The looking up, trying to see through the blur of the tears, and thinking “If ALL of this is happening... are You really there?”

But the thing is, after all the grief is grieved for a while, the tears are shed in a puddle, a choice remains. Do we search for the blessings in disguise?

I’ve found that no matter how desolate things seem, there’s always a small shred of a tender mercy to remember and hope for. 

When I’m sick? Grateful for the immune system. When I’m tired? Thankful for the weekend, however far away it is. This isn’t about being Pollyanna, though. She’s annoying. It’s about picking yourself up, dusting yourself off, and seeing that walking through the storm with an umbrella is a choice. 

This principle is what my activity, “The Thanksgiving Mystery” is all about! The main character, Peggy, is having a lot of things happening to her, and she wonders how to be thankful at Thanksgiving and move on. But to figure this out (although it really is simple lol) she must go through puzzles, cryptograms, and codes while making delicious cookies. Sounds crazy, I know, but it is seriously such a fun Thanksgiving activity! It incorporates doctrine, treats, and clues, and could be great as a combined or yw activity, for ad girls, or even for families. Check out it here.

Happy Friday! 

young women's treat for november!

THIS MONTH'S IS SO CUTE! Maybe I'm just a little excited to share.... this!

I was originally thinking about this being a Printspo post, but as I lettered it I saw much potential in this as an adorable treat tag. There are just so many goodies with every holiday (sadly, or awesomely, it varies on opinion, as a part of our American culture I think.) Regardless of whether I actually eat any of these, I just had so much fun drawing all of the awesome Thanksgiving pies, pumpkin spice desserts 😂🤩 and... everything! Gratitude really is sweet, right?

it is literally SUCH a Thanksgiving mood, and I love it.

It's actually a pretty short quote, so I just designed it as a Ziploc bag topper, so you can put literally WHATEVER you want inside!! I had to make up a random trail mix thing as part of making it an interesting graphic people would click on, but don't think you're limited to any of the items above.

You could put in...

-those awesome pumpkin candies
-bugles (think cornucopia)
-Reese's pieces (they are Thanksgiving colors)
-candy corn
-anything pumpkin

And there are so much more ideas on Pinterest -- this one seemed like the cutest trail mix one -- but y'all this is not a food blog, so I won't get carried away, but this Latter-Day Saint one so ofc I was happy to make a treat tag you can give to your Young Women, as a ministering message of sorts, to Activity Day girls, and MORE!!

Get the free treat tag here (there's a few to the page) and while you're on it, be sure to follow my account on Pinterest.

HAPPY THANKSGIVING!

lds thanksgiving quote #2 -- papa thanksgiving

This quote says Gratitude is a catalyst to all Christlike attributes! Or more simply, the parent of them! Hehehe, we had Father Christmas and now we have Papa Thanksgiving. Lol. So. I was like, “this is such a cute quote - but is it for real?” I’m setting out to prove it with the Young Women values. Maybe they’re going away, but they’re not bad to live by. Here is how gratitude relates to each one.

FAITH

Gratitude + faith is a great recipe for a testimony. When we have those spiritual experiences it’s so important to not check a box and move on. Living in the gospel is a constant process in life, and if we are grateful for the testimony we have already, we’ll continue to nourish it through gospel study and prayer.

DIVINE NATURE

Can we imagine a Heavenly Father who sits around, pouting, ungrateful for all of our accomplishments? That’s not how He is — and things like gratitude and other divine attributes are set in place for us to follow to become more like Him.

INDIVIDUAL WORTH

A lot of times this gets made all about self-love, and believe me, that’s important, but it’s also about loving others in a Christlike way. It’s about being grateful for the talents you’ve been given — and the talents of others as well. It’s being grateful for being the amazing person that is YOU and for being placed in the lives of others - out of the billions of people in the world!

KNOWLEDGE

You know how people say ignorance is bliss? How people avoid eye contact with homeless people or pretend that a person sitting alone at lunch isn’t there? It’s hard to know when someone has it worse than you, definitely uncomfortable sometimes.

I love the book “The Quiltmaker’s Journey” which talks about a girl who was rich and lived in a city with high walls. They were told never to go outside the walls, and she wondered why, and eventually escaped. There she saw the extreme desolate poverty that existed out of her little bubble. We can know that life isn’t perfect. We can not shy away from the statistics about poverty, starvation, malnutrition, disease, crime, mental health issues and courageously know that we have work to do. We can be grateful that we have circumstances we are in sometimes, but if we really care, we’ll try to help others who aren’t as fortunate.

CHOICE AND ACCOUNTABILITY

When you discover that you choose how to feel in every situation, and own up to it, it’s liberating and agonizing. It can be hard to see that you’re responsible for your choices, feelings, and actions, but it’s really great to see that you can choose to be grateful whenever you want.

GOOD WORKS

I can’t think of a more important example of service than being the 1 who says thank you, who shares a handwritten note, who expressed their gratitude even when they think it isn’t a big gesture that will make a huge difference because people do notice. Just one thank you can really make someone’s day.

INTEGRITY

Integrity is all about aligning actions with beliefs. Do you thank your mom for everything she does, then yell at her days later? Do you thank God for all of His blessings on you, then to start a fight? Do you claim to be thankful for the sacrifice of those like William Tyndale who was burnt at the stake and Moroni who hid forever in a cave and Joseph Smith, who was brutally murdered, while never ever even reading them? Just something to think about.

VIRTUE

Virtue is about being temple worthy, and it’s so easy to take for granted a nearby temple when it’s available. You hear the stories of people selling all they own to visit a temple hours away, riding on buses for days, making temple road trips... and sometimes it’s hard to remember to go when the temple isn’t exactly in your view. I’m in the Philly temple district, and there are lots more people in the area who have to travel much farther than I do. When I do go, we always hear that there are mostly people from the D.C. area attending since their temple is closed. Would I be willing to drive 3+ hours just to go to the temple? If I’m not even able to create time to go on the 25-minute drive, maybe I should start there. It’s so important to be grateful for the doctrine and blessings of the temple.

Alright y'all. That was a LONG post, but I am so glad I was able to write it. I want to bear my testimony that Personal Progress was an inspired program -- and we are moving on from it -- but that doesn't mean that we have to hate the good times we had with it while it was still here. I feel so lucky like I'm in the best of both worlds, as I get to watch and see for myself all of these inspired revelations and changes. And more info is coming!

When this publishes, we'll be like 1 week away from the Face to Face with Elder Gong! Woohoo! If you wonder anything at all, ask!! You never know if your question will be featured. Submit a question here, and while you're on your phone, if you have 30 seconds...it would be so cool if you could follow my Pinterest account. We're just getting started on that platform, and there is so much good stuff we've rounded up over there.

lds thanksgiving quote #1 - give & receive

Thank you.

It’s such a common phrase for some people, and so rare for others. It reminds me of in the Bible, with Moses, where all you had to do was look to live — it was so easy. But still, some people’s pride got in the way.

Do we sometimes forget how easy it is to send a thank you not or text? Or even just to say the two (or less) words? I love how easy it is to say thank you! You can toss your thanks around like candy, except for that the candy is free.

Y’all I always get tempted to sprint on into Christmas mode this time of year once Halloween is done, but I really am trying to not get in the Polar Express just yet and stay present in the season.

And it’s hard! I always have to be one jump ahead (by the time you read this I probably will be planning stuff for the New Year) Bc that’s how blogging & Pinterest works, but it is so important to me to enjoy all these holidays, even some of the less “all about me” ones maybe.

So this month I’ll be sharing 4 Thanksgiving quotes! Halloween was TOUGH to turn gospel related, but gratitude is such a big principle of the gospel so I see this being a piece of cake.

This one says “gratitude gives warmth to both the giver and receiver alike” and it is from ex...no, ...former?...late...previous Apostle Robert D. Hales. (Do I say former apostle? If I do does it sound bad? Lol)

But anyways, he was great and so are his words.

I like how he says warmth. If you’re genuinely grateful for something, it’s hard not to smile as you're giving thanks. God loves a cheerful giver, and in my opinion, a cheerful thanks-giver as well.