Pool Noodle Fall Wreath

Hello! Welcome to my blog! 

I bought a pool noodle over the summer and I finally made a wreath with it. I hot glued a cork into the end holes of the noodle and hot glued the cork and the ends of the noodle to adhere it into a circle (and I had to hold it for a few minutes until the glue cooled). Then I wrapped the noodle with some awesome orange jute that I found at Value Village for a lovely deal.  This craft is so easy and I recommend trying it out. This is a genius idea - thank you to whoever came up with it.

I made a banner for the wreath. The banner is made out of burlap and I printed the lettering off my computer. Check out my printing on burlap post by CLICKING HERE.

Here is a jpeg file if you would like to print out the banner. 

Right click, copy image, paste into your favorite program, resize to desired size, print. 

Why don't you try it yourself?

Thanks for stopping by!

Linking up to....
Under the Table and Dreaming

What Do Mormon's Believe? Women in the Church

Hi! My name is Sue! Welcome to my blog! I am a woman who belongs to The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Some may refer to me as a Mormon woman.  It is interesting to hear the “surprise” in some people’s voices when they find out I am Mormon. It makes me wonder if they are surprised because of what society has painted a Mormon woman to be - and who we actually are. 

It is a different story.

My daughter and I - Fall 2011

I joined this Church when I was twenty-eight. I observed this church for seven years before I became one of it’s members. I did not join it on a whim and I strongly disagree with anyone who says that Mormon women do not have a mind or a voice. I would not have become a member of this church if I thought for one moment that the men perceived themselves as better than women and if the women were treated as second class citizens. I have never felt so empowered as a woman. I have been involved in some amazing projects and have carried out incredible responsibilities that I would have thought that I couldn’t do before I was a member of this church. I continue to strive to become the person that we as members of the church are encouraged to be. I love how the women are taught not apologize for being a woman but rather to embrace womanhood.  We should not feel the need to redefine who we are as women - but rejoice in who we are and in our feminine qualities.  We do not need to be more like men to feel like we are accomplishing something in society, we need to enhance the gifts we have been given as women - as we do so - society will be enhanced. 

To continue with my series - What do Mormon’s Believe?  I encourage you to investigate from all kinds of sources of what women in the Mormon church are like. I know that you will find major discrepancies in your findings as I did when I wanted to know more about the Mormon Church. I’m not going to tell you what to think as I know you can make your own decisions. What I will do is tell you what I believe, I will tell you some of my experiences and I will direct you to some facts and teachings about my church. 

Here are some interesting facts you may or may not know:

- Mormon women in Utah enjoyed the right to vote as early as 1870—a time in American history when many women rejected political involvement as the proper domain of men, and fully five decades before the achievement of U.S. women’s suffrage. 
Source Washington Post

-Dr. Martha Hughes Cannon became the first woman ever elected as a state senator in the United States in the State of Utah.

Source - Famous Mormon Women

For a church who some believe hold women down, the history of women in this church says otherwise to me, but I you encourage you to look into it for yourself.  

I suggest you read the history and work of Relief Society (the women’s organization in the church).

CLICK HERE for the free online book.

I have heard it said that the Mormon church is male centered. I beg to differ. In fact, I am going to be so bold as to say the church is more women centered.  The church doctrine we follow is what the Apostle Paul taught that “neither is the man without the woman, neither the woman without the man, in the Lord” (1 Corinthians 11:11). In the sight of God, and in the marriage relationship, men and women are equally important.

Although we love and honor men in our church, there does seem to be more focus on women. In my congregation there are hardly any “activities” put on for men.  There are way more activities for women.  These activities are encouraged to promote teachings and activities that strengthen women. We enjoy annual conferences held for women, 18 and over, and young women 12-18. There is also an annual women’s conference held at BYU - all focused on strengthening women. I encourage you to check out the home page for this conference where you will be able to find archives of what has been presented at these conferences in the past.
CLICK HERE

And last but not least, I would like you to meet some Mormon women. 

CLICK HERE to visit Mormon.org to see what other women in the church say about gender equality.

CLICK HERE to visit my profile on Mormon.org

Below are some videos of a variety of Mormon women. This will give you some perspective of who we are from the mouths of people who go to the Mormon Church. There are more to watch on You Tube as well. Thanks for stopping by!

Pretzel Mummies - And How to Make Your Own Candy Eyes

I saw some adorable pretzel mummies made by Midwestern Girl and I just had to make them myself. Please go to her blog by CLICKING HERE to see her adorable mummies and she gives instructions on how to make them. I could not find the candy eyes. Although this deterred me from making these adorable creatures for a while I decided to try making my own. 

These were surprisingly easy to make. I piped blobs of royal icing on waxed paper. (CLICK HERE for a royal icing recipe.) Then I put a spoonful of icing on a yogurt container lid, added a little bit of water, and colored the icing brown (I would have used black if I had it). While the icing blobs were still soft - I dabbed the end of a toothpick into the brown icing and dabbed it on to the white icing blobs. I let these dry overnight so they were really hard before I starting decorating with them. 

When I placed the eyes on the pretzel ( I glued them down with melted chocolate) I liked using one eye that was bigger and one eye that was smaller for a pair. It gave for a more zombie affect. The picture of a the cup is showing a technique that I saw on Pinterest. I used a sandwich bag to put my melted chocolate in and then I cut a tiny hole in one of the corners. I draped the sandwich bag over the cup and scooped the melted chocolate in. This got the chocolate right to the bottom of the bag without touching the sides. You might already do this - but I was just thrilled to find this tip out as I filled piping bags the hard way before.

I packaged the pretzels up and put them in a home made treat bag (click here for tutorial). I gave this treat to one of my friends boys - so I put the saying "Be good to your mummy" on the bag.

I made the tag by wrapping streamer (that I ripped in half lengthwise)  around a blank tag and pasted  googlie eyes on. Pretty simple!

Thanks for stopping by!!

What Do Mormon's Believe - Men and the Mormon Church

Hello! Welcome to my blog. My name is Sue. In an effort to shed some light on what the Church I belong to believes, I am doing a post every Sunday with the topic - What do Mormon's believe? Today I want to do some mythbusting so to speak about men in the Mormon church in which some people view them as dominating over the women. As a woman that has gone to The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints for fourteen years, I can report that I am not dominated. It is true that men "preside" over this Church, but that "presiding" is not meant for power or control, rather they are to be of service to the membership - kind of like what the Savior said in Matthew 20:28 

...the Son of man came not to be ministered unto, but to minister..."

 That is to say, that He was not here to be served, but rather, to serve. 
I have never felt so empowered as a woman since joining this church. I joined when I was 28. Society seemed to teach me that the power of a woman is to leave a mark with the power of seduction, flaunting what I have because I have it. There are better ways to leave an impression. Society also seemed to teach me that staying at home with children was some form of oppression for a woman. I find staying at home with children (if you can afford it) honorable and important. Although there seems to be a battle of the sexes in society and with some individuals, the Church actually elevates women. It is expected that both men and women treat each other with respect.

There is an immense amount of talent, and I may say of real sound statesmanship within a community of ladies; and if they would only train their minds, and exercise the rights and privileges that are legitimately theirs, and would contemplate subjects that they now pass over and never think about, they would find they have an immense amount of influence in guiding, directing, and controlling human affairs.

--President Brigham Young

 This was a quote from a male leader empowering women for good ahead of the times. I am not exactly sure when this was said, but Brigham Young was the leader of the church from 1847-1877. Another quote is below from a more recent leader (1994-2008)...

People wonder what we do for our women. I'll tell you what we do. We get out of their way, and look with wonder at what they are accomplishing. 

President Gordon B. Hinckley

Both quotes are an example of the respect that the men in our church are expected to give all women. 

When I met my husband, he was different than other guys I dated. He respected me. He was kind and had values that made an impression on me. He was a Mormon. Time went on and I learned what Mormon's believed in and taught first hand - and I joined the Church as well. The quote art above is one of many principles taught at my church, and we both try to apply those qualities to our lives to become better people. My husband and I have been married for twenty years. My hubby is not perfect, but what I can count on is that he will eventually do right by me because of what he is taught at our Church. I think he would say likewise in regards to me. Here are some pictures of my sweetie and I.

I came across an article on BeliefNet (I have no idea what faith sponsors that site )titled, The Mormon Gender Gap.
Here is a snippet of that article:

According to [the] Pew [Forum], Mormons have one of the most lopsided gender ratios of any religion: 44 percent men and 56 percent women. You can’t argue with the gender gap — that’s what the data is. The question is why such a disproportional gender gap emerges in the LDS Church...


 What is it (that women) like so much about LDS church activity?..... (The author tries to make some explanations -some I disagree with- you can read my comment linked to that article)

At the very least, it should be a wake-up call to those LDS feminists who depict LDS women as some sort of oppressed underclass in a patriarchal institution. The data tells the opposite story: the women are quite happy while the men are voting with their feet. What LDS feminists need to explain is why women are so happy with the LDS Church.

Read the whole article here: http://blog.beliefnet.com/mormoninquiry/2009/05/the-puzzling-mormon-gender-gap.html#ixzz26ltuM17F

So yes, in my congregation in British Columbia Canada, there are more women than men. They would not be there if the men were pompous or ignorant towards them.  I am always surprised to hear that apparently I am oppressed as a woman because I belong to this Church. 

 If you are searching for some truth about the Mormon Church I hope you take into consideration what you have read on my blog.  Of course, we all need to come to our own conclusions. Our Church welcomes people to investigate these issues to make educated decisions for themselves. If you are interested in learning more please go to LDS.org or Mormon.org or you can go to my profile on Mormon.org by

clicking here.

Thanks for stopping by!

Family Name Sign - Wedding Gift Idea

Hello and welcome to my blog! Today I am posting a wedding gift I made back in April. Believe it or not, I give gifts that are not survival kits once in a while. For this wedding I decided to try my hand at making a family sign.

First of all I bought a pantry door from my local Re-Store. I sanded the center with fine sand paper, dusted it, taped it to protect the outside frame and painted a couple coats of black acrylic paint. 

I carbon copied the words using sewing transfer paper. I printed the words off my computer. I used the font "Bickham Script Pro" for "The Smith Family" (size 500), "Bodoni Ornaments" (the @ key ) size 200 for the embelishment , and "Georgia" for "Established 2012" size 96.

I am happy to report the couple was thrilled to get this unique gift!

Why don't you try it yourself?

Thanks for stopping by!

What Do Mormon's Believe?

Hello! Happy Sunday! Welcome to my blog.


The Mormon Church is receiving a lot of attention right now due to Mitt Romney, a Mormon, running for the President of the United States. Although I am Canadian, I am hearing a ton of misinformation in regards to the Mormon's. I married a Mormon. Although I did not share his faith at the time - I knew that he was a good person. I married him because he was different than other guys I had dated - in positive ways. What I learned over the years being married to a Mormon is not to believe everything you hear. I found it interesting the contrast to what people would say about his church (who didn't go to his church) and the actual things that I witnessed. I have since become a member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (that is the real name of the Mormon church). In an effort to shed some light on some of the teachings of the church I am proud to belong to I am going to make and post 'quote art' every Sunday. The quote above was from a talk given by the president of the church in a world wide women's broadcast in 2007 called "Three Goals to Guide You". If you are interested, the text of the talk and video, they can be viewed HERE.

In conclusion, being a Mormon is not a weird thing as some people would like to suggest it is - I have been on both sides of the coin. We are people who desire to have a close relationship with God, and because of that relationship we strive to improve ourselves through the teachings of Jesus Christ. I hope that this post and the ones to follow will give you some incites to who Mormon's are, and what we believe.

Click HERE to go to my profile at Mormon.org to find out more.

Thanks for stopping by!

p.s. Here are a couple other quotes I have found on Pinterest that are from leaders of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (the Mormon's).

From Sugar Tot Designs Blog

From My Happy Little Life Blog