This year for Young Women in Excellence, we did a week-long event called "Daughter of God" week. I took the main idea from my all time favorite blog 71toes. This lady literally does it all. She is amazing! The whole purpose behind this activity is for the girls to gain a testimony that they are literal daughters of God. We believe that once they understand who they are, and the divine nature and qualities they possess, it will be easier to live each day with the temptations they are faced with. That the things we teach and ask of them (word of wisdom, chastity, keeping the Sabbath day holy etc) will make more sense, and everything will fall into place.
We changed quite a few things to meet the needs of our own girls, but I was so grateful that I came across her post. I started out the week last Sunday with a Young Women lesson on Divine Nature. I found
THIS awesome lesson that I used as a reference, and
THIS awesome video by President Uchtdorf.
HERE is my written out Sunday Lesson. I gave this handout for the girls to glue into their journals. (We made journals the previous week for mutual out of dollar store notebooks. They covered them with paper and washi tape and actually made them really cute!
After my lesson, we handed the girls each a big manila envelope containing 7 letters. Each letter was labeled with a different day (Sunday, Monday, Tuesday etc) to open each day of the week. Each of us leaders took a day and wrote a personal letter. The link above shares all the letters that the other leaders wrote. Ours were very personal, so i'll keep them private, but we did use one letter from the above link, written from Heavenly Father on our first day, and on our last, we sent them on a YouTube video scavenger hunt using
THIS blog address. Us leaders all submitted our favorite LDS church videos and songs and had them write in their journals the things they felt as they watched them.
At the end of the week on Saturday night we invited the girls over to my house for Pizza and a short discussion on fasting. (The fasting lesson was given in September, so this was more of a review) We invited the bishopric to come, and one of the counselors led the discussion and helped them understand the meaning of fasting with a purpose. One of my counselors prepared a spiritual thought while the girls were eating. When we all finished eating our "last meal" (haha), we all knelt while a member of the bishopric led us in a special prayer to start our fast. We have the best bishopric, I am SO grateful for them. We then began our 24 hour fast. I was surprised at how many girls admitted they had never fasted before, so I was grateful again for this activity to introduce it to them. (This also passes of Integrity #6 Experience)
The following day (fast and testimony meeting) one of my counselors continued the theme of the week and had the girls fill in the words to a poem as she taught them all what it means to be a Daughter of God. I'll have to get the outline of her poem to add. We then gave the last end of the time to allow the girls a chance to share their testimonies. There was lots of giggling during the awkward pauses when all of our tummies started to rumble.
We met back up at the church at 5pm for a dinner to break our fast and the Young Women in Excellence program. The Bishop said the prayer to break our fast, and after we ate, we played a cute slideshow showing pics from the year made by one of my laurels, that included the photos taken at our annual photoshoot (This is how I "bribe" them to come to Young Women in Excellence each year. Is that awful? They look forward to seeing these pics and I make them wait and present them in the slideshow so they won't ditch haha) After that, I spoke, we gave out awards to girls earning ribbons, the bishop gave some closing remarks and called it good! It was a tad stressful adding the dinner, but this has been my absolute favorite activity with the Young Women so far. We had the parents bring a soup to share, and we did rolls, salad, cupcakes and cookies to go with. Easy peasy.
I used Rosemary Wixom's talk from 2015:
Discovering the Divinity Within in my talk. I also talked a bit about the movie Moana. Gosh, I love that movie. It fit in perfectly with our theme. I told the girls to pretend I was their crazy Grandma for a sec while I read them the council (I re-worded several things) that she gives Moana near the end of the movie:
I
know a girl from Georgetown, she stands apart from the crowd. She
loves her friends and the gospel, she make her whole family proud.
Sometimes
the world seems against you, the journey may leave a scar, but scars
can heal and reveal just where you are. The people you love will
change you, the things you have learned will guide you, and nothing
on earth can silence the quiet voice still inside you. And when that
voice starts to whisper: you've come so far. Georgetown girls, do you
know who you are??
 |
| Great night and the CUTEST young women! |
Here are the pics from our Photoshoot. I had them each choose a divine quality they see in themselves. They pretty much freaked out when I asked them that, so I settled for a word that described them (Hence the one girl who wrote sassy haha) Again, it pays to have a photographer in the ward who is willing to donate her time and talents for us!
Here are a few fun free printables to decorate with. The last one matched a letter one of the leaders wrote. The first and the last ones are framed and in Rylee's room. I love them. What would we do without pinterest??
