ward christmas party

The Relief Society has been in charge of the Ward Christmas party since we moved here in 2012, and since I was always in charge of the decorations when I served in Young Women's, I feel like I've been involved with the party for the past 10 years, haha!  It's a good thing I like planning and parties :) And that   there are always so many other people helping so the burden is light. 

But I felt super bad for Shawna this year because she offered to do all the food and it was a lot of work.  We were gonna "keep it simple" with fruit trays, muffins, and breakfast casseroles, but it was anything but simple when she made like 11 casseroles.  I tried offering like 4 times to help in the week leading up to the party, but she kept saying that she would take care of it.  We did a "Christmas Morning" theme, so when I showed up at the church to set up on Saturday morning, Shawna and her husband Eric were already busy in the kitchen putting the casseroles together.  Shawna was sweating from being over the hot stove making gravies, compiling the casseroles, mixing the fruit dip, preparing the fruit trays, etc.  I had to go in the gym to get all the decorations ready, but I tried to hurry so that I could get into the kitchen to help.

Everything turned out beautifully, but I just felt bad that Shawna and Eric had so much on their plate!  I think they learned their lesson and will accept help next year :)

A few pics of the set-up...

The Grand Prairie 1st ward had their party the night before, so we asked them to leave up all the tables and chairs.  That helped a ton since we didn't have to set everything up, and it helped them since they didn't have to take it all down.

The Primary kids sang a song for us, then Chelsea (the Activity Chair) asked her dad and brother to do a set of Christmas songs for about 20 minutes.  They play guitar and violin and the music was incredible.  They are both inactive, but since Chelsea was the one that asked, they were more than willing to help.

Melanie prepared a little skit about the symbols of Christmas, and then the kids were able to visit with Santa.  Brooke was a little embarrassed because she could tell that Brother Aguilera was the one dressed up as Santa, but she humored me for a picture. 

Colby wanted a picture with his buddy, Logan Funderburk.

Then it was off to cookie decorating and ornament making...

I felt like it was a great party, but I wish that people would have stuck around a bit longer.  Sometimes in the church, I feel like we're quick to clean up and move on.  As soon as the program was over, we had a closing prayer and although they said that people could stay around and mingle, a few people started cleaning up and then everyone felt like they had to busy themselves.  Next year, I will make it a point to not rush the clean-up process so that people can spend some quality time together.