Works-For-Me Wednesday: Gleaning ideas for banquet, shower, and party themes

Posted on June 20, 2007 by Barbara Harper

For 14 years I went to a church that had an amazing group of people who coordinated the social functions of the church — banquets, father-son outings, church picnics, etc. At any kind of banquet (they had three annually: a sweetheart banquet in February, later changed into a “Midwinter Banquet” to be more inclusive of everyone in the church rather than just those in relationships; a missions banquet in the fall, and a ladies’ banquet in the spring) they had beautiful and imaginative ways of working a theme out into the decorations and favors. It didn’t occur to me until my last few years there to start a file to record some of these ideas for future use. I made file folders for the different types of banquets and a couple more for baby and wedding showers, then I would include a copy of the program and maybe even a page of notes of some of the details. In the shower files I’d include a particularly cute invitation or ideas about games or centerpieces, etc.

Several years later I found myself the coordinator of the ladies’ group at church, and one of our functions is the annual ladies’ luncheon (used to be mother/daughter banquet, but once again, we wanted to make it more inclusive). I haven’t copied any of the ideas verbatim — in fact, I think I have only used one variation of one of the themes there — but sometimes it is inspirational just to flip through that folder. The memory of seeing a theme creatively worked out through the details of a banquet spurs more creativity in applying the process to different themes.

You could even expand this to include a file for different types of party ideas. We’ve had the generic birthday parties at the putt-putt place and simple ones with just cake and ice cream and presents, but a few times we’ve had themed parties — a train one, a Lego one, an army one, and a detective one — that were a lot of fun. The Family Fun magazine web site has tons of ideas for themed parties. We found a few ideas for the detective party just by searching on the internet, and what we found plus a little thought led to more ideas.

I’m starting a Word document to jot down other theme ideas as they come to mind to possibly be worked out later.

(An updated P.S.: You can also find a wealth of ideas for banquets/luncheons at the Creative Ladies Ministry site, a book called Let’s Plan a Party from Regular Baptist Press, and the Sweet Monday ministry for ladies’ meetings).

For more works-for-me tips, visit Shannon’s place at Rocks In My Dryer.

Book Review: Renovating Becky Miller

Posted on June 19, 2007 by Barbara Harper

Renovating Becky Miller by Sharon Hinck is one of the books on my spring reading challenge (which is rapidly drawing to a close this week!!) I had read Sharon’s first book, The Secret Life of Becky Miller, last year (it was one of the first books I discussed on my blog!) and just loved it — the characters and situations and struggles were very real — so I knew I’d get the sequel as soon as I saw it. I finished it last week, but this is my first chance to sit down and get my thoughts together.

Becky Miller is a young Christian mom, married with three children, heading up the women’s ministry at church. In the first book she struggled to “do big things for God.” Each chapter started with a “daydream” in which Becky somehow saved the day. This book starts each chapter with a spoof of a movie scene (I didn’t realize that at first because I hadn’t seen the first film alluded to. 🙂 I thought it was a spy scenario like the first book might have had. After a while I began to realize those scenarios were strangely familiar — then I “got it.”) It was fun figuring out what movie the scenes were from. I got most of them even though I hadn’t seen all the films. If I had just read the back cover of the book more thoroughly, it would have given me a tip-off.

Becky faces a number of pressures — her new job at a new church is taking a lot more time than she thought it would; the people there feel that increasing and expanding their programs will reach more people for Christ, so there are constantly new projects and more work added on; her husband’s mother is having physical problems and comes to live with them; something’s bothering her husband, but she can’t get him to open up; something is wrong with one of her closest friends, but she can’t get anyone to tell her what the problem is; her husband think they need to find a new home, and the ideal one in their price range that just needs “some fixing up” is an old farmhouse. Becky think the bigger house in the country will mean a slower, simpler lifestyle, and the “fixing up” will be a good project to draw the family closer. If you’ve ever had a house that needed work, you’re probably smiling and shaking your head right now. 🙂 On top of all of that, the leg that has been having problems since the accident she had in the first book is getting worse because she is so busy with everything else she hasn’t had time to do her physical therapy.

In other words — she is under a lot of pressure.

I could relate to thing on so many levels. The first home we purcahsed was a “fixer-upper” and we didn’t realize how much money, time, and energy it was going to take. I head up the ladies’ ministry at church, and though we haven’t had any church growth pushes, there is always the pressure to do more. We have had parents in just for a short time but have had discussions about what we might need to do in the near future, as many in the “sandwich generation” have. I’ve had physical problems that I wished the Lord would just go ahead and heal so I could get on with my life and minister for Him more effectively. Just keeping in touch with your family (even living under the same roof it is all too easy to just pass by while getting other things done) and trying to be a good mother to your children can be enormous pressure, not to mention these other things.

At one point, Becky asks, “Lord, is serving You supposed to feel like this?”

I think many of us have asked or have felt like asking that question.

I’ll leave you to find the answers Becky found in the book.

Because I have four bookcases filled to overflowing already, usually after I read a book, if I really don’t think I will ever reread it, I pass it on to my mother-in-law or someone else. But I am keeping the Becky Miller books. I want to revisit them again some day. Once again the characters and the struggles were very real (even though my kids are older than Becky’s, I could remember a lot of the “young mom” struggles, and some of them still apply though in slightly different forms) and the answers Becky found, though not new to me, were wonderful reminders.

If I had a rating system, this book would get the highest rating, plus a couple of plus signs. 🙂 It’s everything that good Christian fiction should be. It will have you smiling in some parts and pondering its truths in others.

By the way, Sharon Hinck has a website and a blog and a “Book Buddies” newsletter you can sign up for. She has another book out already, The Restorer, that is on my to be read list. It is a fantasy, and I have no doubt she can handle it well, from the fantasy preludes in her chapters of the Becky Miller books!

Time Travel Tuesday: Cooking Experiences

Posted on June 19, 2007 by Barbara Harper

My Life as Annie hosts Time Travel Tuesday in which we look back at some time in our lives in relation to the topic of the week. Last week I suggested our first cooking experiences might be a fun topic, and Annie graciously decided to use that idea for this week’s theme. Thanks, Annie!

I don’t remember exactly what my first cooking experiences were — I think I received a Girl Scouts cooking badge. But the first thing I remember cooking was fried chicken when I was maybe 11 or 12 or so. I must have had some experience with it before this — I can’t imagine starting out with this on my own! But for some reason I was cooking fried chicken with a friend — and we were so afraid of the hot oil that we’d drop the chicken in and then run to the back door. That sounds like a disaster in the making, doesn’t it? But somehow we avoided setting the house on fire or burning ourselves. I also remember making oatmeal cookies with a friend — it called for brown sugar and we didn’t have any, so we just used regular white sugar (I didn’t know then about the emergency substitution section in most cookbooks). The cookies all ran together — it looked something like those pizza-pan sized cookies you can get at the Chocolate Chip Cookie Factory, only they didn’t have those then, so we couldn’t claim we were imitating them. 🙂 They tasted good — they just didn’t hold a cookie shape.

I also remember now being younger than this and roasting a hot dog over the flame of a gas stove with a fork.

By the time I got married, I had been cooking for my family of 8 for a while — I would usually at least get dinner started before my mom came home from work — so having to take on meal preparation wasn’t that big a leap for me. I do remember when we were dating and both in the dorms, we didn’t have access to ovens, so a popular thing to make for one’s boyfriend was one of those boxed cheesecake mixes. Often at dinnertime you’d see a girl going to meet her guy with a cheesecake she’d made, and I do remember making those for Jim on occasion. I don’t remember what the first meal was that I cooked for Jim, but I remember a couple of early cooking disasters. Gravy was something that took me years to learn. I do fine with it now — though we pretty much only have home-made gravy when we have turkey. But my first attempts were awful. I remember one time getting my electric hand-held mixer out and “beating” the gravy right in the pan to try to smooth it out. Another time, the texture was ok, but it was really, really light. I thought I had read somewhere that red plus green made brown, so I put a few drops of red and green food coloring in. It turned very green, and nothing I tried made it look a normal color. For some reason, instead of dissolving in tears I started laughing hysterically, then Jim came in to see what was going on. I couldn’t make myself eat it — the color was just too awful. But we joked about green gravy for years, and for years I also kept a jar of ready-made gravy in the cabinet “just in case” mine didn’t turn out.

Another time I was making popcorn the old fashioned way in a saucepan with some oil in it (this was before the days of microwave popcorn. They had then these big popcorn poppers usually with a yellow plastic domed lid — but we didn’t have one). I had a little can of popcorn that I thought was enough for one batch. I was talking with Jim while I made it, and he saw me dump the whole little can in and knew it was too much, but just sat back to watch what happened. Blissfully unaware, I kept talking and shaking the pan back and forth — when suddenly popcorn erupted over the sides of the pan and spilled everywhere. I don’t remember exactly how I reacted — I’ll have to ask him — I think I just said “Oh! Oh!” He did help me clean it up, after he stopped laughing at me. 😀

Updated: I am adding this in after my initial post because I just remembered it. 🙂 Once in our early married years, when I was trying to be the frugal Mrs. Housewife, I discovered rutabaga was only 19 cents a pound. I had never made or even seen it before. But I got some and came home and looked in my cookbooks to see how to make it. There was a recipe to include it in mashed potatoes and another recipe with apples. So I made the mashed potatoes — and the rutabagas turned them kind of an orange color, but they tasted ok. The apple dish was “ok” but not spectacular. When my husband came home, he noticed the mashed potatoes were off-color, but he was trying to be polite and not say anything, while I was anxiously awaiting his comments. Finally I asked him how he liked the potatoes. He cautiously said, “What’s different about them?” I told him about the rutabagas — and he was thoroughly grossed out. That’s one of the few things that he just thoroughly cannot stand. When I mentioned that the apple dish I had made for dessert had rutabagas, too, he said, “Oh, no, not the apples, too!” So — no more rutabagas for this household, no matter how cheap they are. 🙂

You can read more “time travels” back to early cooking experiences at Annie’s today. Feel free to share yours, too, and add the link in there!

Ladies Luncheon

Posted on June 18, 2007 by Barbara Harper

The ladies’ luncheon went well. We had a lot less people than usual due to so many people being out of town or having family obligations. Even as busy as the May schedule is around church and school, it seems to be a better time for this, so I am going to go to the church office this week to try to secure a date.

I think I mentioned before that the theme was “The Heart of the Matter” taken from I Peter 3:3-4, “Whose adorning…let it be the hidden man of the heart.” Our colors were pink and chocolate brown. I have a tendency to go kind of Victorian with decorations for things like this, so I was trying to make it look more contemporary. Several ladies spent a couple of evenings “adorning” hearts with scrapbooking paper (what’s funny is that I didn’t even make the connection with adorning until Saturday) and putting them on wire stems for use in the centerpieces. I posted pictures of some of them here, but here is one shot of them.

Then I mentioned earlier that my original idea for centerpieces wasn’t going to work because it was too tall — and I didn’t realize this until the Thursday before we were to decorate on Friday evening! So part of Thursday was spent scrambling around trying to find an alternate solution. I did find some smaller vases at Wal-Mart for 97 cents and some smaller sprigs of greenery at Michael’s for 99 cents. I really think the bigger centerpiece looked better and I liked it better and it could incorporate more of the hearts — but the little ones “fit” better on the tables.

I forgot to bring my camera when we decorated Friday night, so I just took a couple of hurried pictures Saturday. I wish I had taken the time to get better shots, but here is one of the tables.

I found those pink and brown napkins at Hobby Lobby — thought the brown ones looked delicious, just like chocolate. 🙂 We scattered around some of the heart cut-outs from some of the different sized craft punch things I had around the center of the tables (we had also used some in decorating the individual hearts). Above each place setting we set the favors, little heart-shaped tins from a company called beau coup (they have scads of heart-shaped items!) I special ordered M&Ms in brown and pink and had the pink ones printed with different kinds of hearts found in Scripture (a merry heart, a pure heart, etc.). The picture I took at the time didn’t show the words on the M&Ms — they were turned over. 🙄 So here is a shot taken of one at home:

By the way, this is what a 5 lb. bag on M&Ms looks like:

I didn’t think it looked like much — but it goes pretty far. We still have some left over.

I had washed out all the little favors beforehand and set them out to air dry so there wouldn’t be any moisture left to cause the candy coating from the M&Ms to melt.

I don’t know if the tins were meant to be ready-to-load — they probably were — but I couldn’t help thinking of all the hands that would have handled them from the manufacturing through the sending processes, and it just made me feel better to know they were all clean (have I mentioned being germophobic?) Then — I had let them sit out overnight Thursday to thoroughly dry. The next morning, Jesse thought he heard something n the enclosed fireplace. Jim looked, but didn’t see anything. When he moved the fireplace insert out a little, a bird that had been trapped behind it flew out — and flew upstairs into the kitchen where these were on the table! And the dog, who was still inside (we bring her in at night) followed the bird up there! My husband assured me the bird flew around the outside of the room and not across the table, and the dog was too interested in the bird to pay attention to the table. Honestly, if there had been time, I probably would have washed the tins out again just to be safe (I am that fanatical about cleanliness in relation to food — sadly not about cleanliness in general, as my floors and desk can attest), but there just wasn’t. I didn’t see any feathers or dust or debris or anything on them, so I carried on as planned.

But to get back to the luncheon…

Our speaker was Beneth Peters Jones, for those of you who know her. She is always a wonderful speaker, very down to earth and funny, yet always drawing the focus back to God and the grace He gives to fulfill what He requires. One of the most gracious people God created. We had tried to schedule her for a couple of years, and she was very willing and interested, but she was always out of the country when we had asked before. So that was one plus to having the luncheon outside of our normal time frame. Some of the ladies there said they had never heard her, so I was glad they were able to.

Overall everything went very well. We always have this catered, and the food was great. I am so thankful for ladies who helped set up and clean up. To those of you who prayed for calmness of heart, mind, spirit, and body for me as I had asked earlier — thank you. The Lord abundantly answered!

And though I enjoy doing this — it is nice to have it over. 🙂 My mind is till buzzing, though, and I jotted down a couple of different theme ideas to consider for next year along with a few ways to implement them.

I want to come back later today to talk about a book I finished last week, and I have a couple of other posts simmering on the back burner. I need to catch up on housework today and sort out the receipts to turn in to the church office and other assorted tasks. And I need to figure out what to do about those curtains in my family room! I received the fabric I ordered a while back but haven’t even opened the box. I hadn’t thought about lining them when I ordered the other fabric, so I need to decide about that before I can get started, plus look at trim to match the fabric. So my next project is all lined up and waiting…

Honoring the Fathers in my life

Posted on June 17, 2007 by Barbara Harper

Exodus 20:12: Honour thy father and thy mother: that thy days may be long upon the land which the LORD thy God giveth thee.

Leviticus 19:32: Thou shalt rise up before the hoary head, and honour the face of the old man, and fear thy God: I am the LORD.

My father passed away several years ago, but I want to honor his memory. He did not come to know the Lord until 6 years before he died, and though he had a lot of problems, I honor the position the Lord gave him as my father. He did love me in his own way and tried to do right as he knew it. One of the major things he taught me was to have respect for those in authority.

I want to honor my step-father. I honestly had problems with the idea of a step-father having any say in my activities when I was 15. 🙂 I have written here and there before that after I became a Christian, God had to teach me that honoring and obeying my parents was a matter of obedience to Him regardless of whether they were Christians or were doing the right thing. After that I wondered how a step-father fit into the picture. Then one day I realized that Jesus had a step-father — Joseph. The Bible says Jesus was subject to both Mary and Joseph, even when they didn’t understand him (Luke 2:50-51). Over the years I have come to greatly respect my step-father as a steady, dependable man who cares for his family, is an extremely hard worker, and would do anything in the world to help those he cares about.

I wrote earlier about my “spiritual mom,” Mrs. C, and the godly influence she was in my life. Mr. C was a shining example of a Christian father to me, and I am so glad the Lord brought them into my life.

I honor my husband as a caring, thoughtful, sweet, fun, loving companion and father to our boys.

And I honor my heavenly Father who gave me life, loves me dearly, brought me to a saving belief in Christ, speaks to me through His Word, shows me His love and care in a hundreds of ways every day.

One of my favorite poems for Father’s Day

Posted on June 16, 2007 by Barbara Harper

Only a Dad

By Edgar Albert Guest

Only a dad with a tired face,
Coming home from the daily race,
Bringing little of gold or fame
To show how well he has played the game;
But glad in his heart that his own rejoice
To see him come and to hear his voice.

Only a dad with a brood of four,
One of ten million men or more
Plodding along in the daily strife,
Bearing the whips and the scorns of life,
With never a whimper of pain or hate,
For the sake of those who at home await.

Only a dad, neither rich nor proud,
Merely one of the surging crowd,
Toiling, striving from day to day,
Facing whatever may come his way,
Silent whenever the harsh condemn,
And bearing it all for the love of them.

Only a dad but he gives his all,
To smooth the way for his children small,
Doing with courage stern and grim
The deeds that his father did for him.
This is the line that for him I pen:
Only a dad, but the best of men.

Father’s Day Jokes

Posted on June 16, 2007 by Barbara Harper

A college boy wrote his father, “I can’t understand how you can call yourself a kind parent when you haven’t sent me a check in two months.! What kind of kindness is that?”

The father replied, “Son, that’s called ‘unremitting’ kindness.”
~~~~~~~~~~

Tom had won a toy in a contest. He called his kids together
to ask which one should have the present.

“Who is the most obedient?” he asked. “Who never talks
back to mother? Who does everything she says?”

Five small voices answered in unison:

“Okay, Dad, you get the toy.”
~~~~~~~~~~

The coed came running in tears to her father. “Dad, you gave me some terrible financial advice!” she cried.
“I did? What did I tell you?” said the dad.
“You told me to put my money in that big bank, and now that big bank is in trouble.”
“What are you talking about? That’s one of the largest banks in the world,” he said. “Surely there must be some mistake.”
“I don’t think so,” she sniffed. “They just returned one of my checks with a note saying, ‘Insufficient Funds’.”
~~~~~~~~~~

One summer evening during a violent thunderstorm a mother was tucking her small boy into bed. She was about to turn off the light when he asked with a tremor in his voice, “Mommy, will you sleep with me tonight?”

The mother smiled and gave him a reassuring hug. “I can’t dear,” she said. “I have to sleep in Daddy’s room.”

A long silence was broken at last by a shaken little voice saying, “The big sissy.”
~~~~~~~~~~

One night a wife found her husband standing over their newborn baby’s crib. Silently she watched him. As he stood looking down at the sleeping infant, she saw on his face a mixture of emotions: disbelief, doubt, delight, amazement, enchantment, skepticism.
Touched by this unusual display and the deep emotions it aroused, with eyes glistening she slipped her arms around her husband.
“A penny for your thoughts,” she whispered in his ear.

“It’s amazing!” he replied. “I just can’t see how anybody can make a crib like that for only $66.95!”
~~~~~~~~~~

Junior had just received his brand new driver’s license. The family trooped out to the driveway, and climbed into the car, where he was about to take them for a ride for the first time.

Dad immediately headed for the back seat, directly behind the newly minted driver.

“I’ll bet you’re back there to get a change of scenery after all those months of sitting in the front passenger seat teaching me how to drive,” said the beaming boy to the ol’ man.

“Nope,” came dad’s reply, “I’m gonna sit here and kick the back of your seat as you drive, just like you’ve been doing to me all these years.”
~~~~~~~~~~
Fathers of 1900 and Fathers of Today:

In 1900, if a father put a roof over his family’s head, he was a success.
Today, it takes a roof, deck, pool, and 4-car garage. And that’s just the vacation home.

In 1900, a father waited for the doctor to tell him when the baby arrived.
Today, a father must wear a smock, know how to breathe, and make sure film is in the video camera.

In 1900, fathers could count on children to join the family business.
Today, fathers pray their kids will soon come home from college long enough to teach them how to work the computer and set the VCR.

In 1900, fathers shook their children gently and whispered, “Wake up, it’s time for school.”
Today, kids shake their fathers violently at 4 a.m., shouting: “Wake up, it’s time for hockey practice.”

In 1900, a father came home from work to find his wife and children at the supper table.
Today, a father comes home to a note: “Jimmy’s at baseball, Cindy’s at gymnastics, I’m at gym, Pizza in fridge.”

In 1900, a Father’s Day gift would be a hand tool.
Today, he’ll get a digital organizer.

In 1900, “a good day at the market” meant Father brought home feed for the horses.
Today, “a good day at the market” means Dad got in early on an IPO.

Saturday Photo Scavenger Hunt: Hair

Posted on June 15, 2007 by Barbara Harper

Theme: Hair | Become a Photo Hunter | View Blogroll

I didn’t think I had a picture for today’s theme other than various fuzzy bedhead pictures from when the kids were little, til I remembered this:

I was working at a fabric store and we were asked to dress up if we worked on Halloween. Though we as a family don’t “celebrate” Halloween, I didn’t feel there was any harm to dress up. And since we worked at fabric store — we were supposed to make something. So this is my Raggedy Ann outfit. I added red circle cheeks later.

I had to wing it to to make the “hair” by making a circle of white fabric, making a casing for elastic around the edge, and cutting a lot of red yarn, then sewing rows of yarn in circles around the white fabric. Then I added elastic to the casing.

It held up well through the years, even being tossed in the washing machine. All three of my kids had a “clown day” in elementary school, I think in K-5 or first grade, and they used the hair with the clown costume I made for them.

Tell me what you think…

Posted on June 15, 2007 by Barbara Harper

I’ve been getting things together for centerpieces for this ladies’ luncheon and thought I had things pretty well in hand when I realized my centerpieces were too tall. I took them to the church yesterday to try them out — and, yep, it’s right in the line of sight of the person directly across the table. A friend with me thought it was ok — they’re big round tables and you usually talk to the people around you rather than across from you because you feel like you’re shouting across. But it’s just one of those cardinal rules I learned somewhere that the centerpiece shouldn’t be so tall that you can’t see over it.

So — I spent part of yesterday hammering out a plan B, came up with a couple of possibilities, and found a smaller vase and greenery. I still think I’ll keep the big one maybe to put on the clavinova.

Here’s the big one (not in its final polished form — just put together to get an idea):

And here’s the little one with the smaller vase:

Think the smaller one looks ok?

The theme, by the way, is “The Heart of the Matter” from I Peter 3:3-4: “Whose adorning…let it be the hidden man of the heart.”

Paul Harvey on Fathers

Posted on June 15, 2007 by Barbara Harper

Some of you may remember Paul Harvey’s radio broadcasts with “the rest of the story.” I don’t know, are those still on any more? I found this some years back and love it: it’s one of my favorite pieces about fathers (though of course the theology here and there is off — but I am posting it for the sentiment about fathers).

A father is a thing that is forced to endure childbirth, without an anesthetic.

A father is a thing that growls when it feels good–and laughs loud when it’s scared half to death.

A father never feels entirely worthy of worship in his child’s eyes. He never is quite the hero his daughter thinks, never quite the man his son believes him to be. This worries him, sometimes, so he works too hard to try and smooth the rough places in the road for those of his own who will follow him.

A father is a thing that gets very angry when school grades aren’t as good as he thinks they should be. He scolds his son although he knows it’s the teacher’s fault.

Fathers grow old faster than other people.

And while mothers can cry where it shows, fathers stand there and beam outside–and die inside. Fathers have very stout hearts, so they have to be broken sometimes or no one would know what is inside. Fathers give daughters away to other men who aren’t nearly good enough so they can have grandchildren who are smarter than anybody’s. Fathers fight dragons almost daily. They hurry away from the breakfast table, off to the arena which is sometimes called an office or a workshop…where they tackle the dragon with three heads: Weariness, Work and Monotony.

Knights in shining armor.

Fathers make bets with insurance companies about who will live the longest. Though they know the odds, they keep right on betting. Even as the odds get higher and higher, they keep right on betting more and more.

And one day they lose.

But fathers enjoy an earthly immortality and the bet is paid off to the part of him he leaves behind.

I don’t know where fathers go when they die. But I have an idea that after a good rest, he won’t be happy unless there is work to do. He won’t just sit on a cloud and wait for the girl he’s loved and the children she bore. He’ll be busy there, too…oiling the gates, smoothing the way.