189th Semiannual General Conference of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints

What do you do to make General Conference exciting in your home?  Here are a few ideas I and others have used to become and remain engaged in the process.

1. Make the weekend fun, plan a full two days of favorite foods and activities around conference time. Involve every family member in planning the weekend with crafts, food, activities, and journals
2. Have a project you work on only during conference. We worked on a conference quilt embroidering designs on blocks to include in the quilt
3. Have everyone select a word ("the" is not allowed) and every time the person hears her or his word they get a small treat
4. Play conference bingo
5. Keep a conference journal like this one or this one
6. Listen and write down any blessings you hear in conference talks
7. Make a general conference wall here is one way to do it for small children
8. Play Fantasy General Conference
9. Have dinner with an apostle
10. For small children make General Conference Stations in the TV Room
11. Download the Conference Family Packet October 2019 (PDF Download) from Deseret Books
12. Make a memory game with pictures of the apostles or church images
13. For small children, make a stained glass window with clear contact paper and small squares of tissue paper (see image below)
14. Make a doodle book such as this one or this one
15. Make a conference bracelet by picking a topic for each color of the bead and add that color to the bracelet when you hear the topic
16. Conference banana split, with each talk they make notes on they earn part of a banana split (banana, a scoop of ice cream, hot fudge, caramel, nuts, whipped cream, etc.)
17. Make a conference breakfast cake 

Ⓒⓞⓝⓕⓔⓡⓔⓝⓒⓔ Ⓦⓐⓛⓛ Ⓘⓓⓔⓐ

Choose some pictures from the Gospel Art Kit to hang on your General Conference Wall. I chose topics that are fairly likely to be mentioned, such as temples, Jesus, and Book of Mormon, and stories that my children are very familiar with and would recognize if mentioned, such as Samuel the Lamanite and Joseph Smith's First Vision.

I printed off a current set of Apostle cards and laminated them. Now, the children will be encouraged to listen to the speakers and a) recognize who is speaking, and b) listen for the speaker to mention any of the topics on our Wall. If they mention something on our Conference Wall, then the children can tape the Apostle's picture on the appropriate Gospel Art Picture. (from https://www.wetalkofchrist.com/2010/04/general-conference-wall.html)

🆂🆃🅰🅸🅽🅴🅳 🅶🅻🅰🆂🆂 🆆🅸🅽🅳🅾🆆 🅸🅼🅰🅶🅴

1.        (draw outline of image on contact paper this is the conference center)

mαkє α cσnfєrєncє вrєαkfαst cαkє

Conference Breakfast Cake with a Cream Filling

Ingredients

Yield: 13 x 9 cake

For the filling:

Two 8 oz. packages cream cheese, softened

½ cup sugar

½ teaspoon vanilla extract

1 large egg

For the cake:

3 cups Bisquick

½ cup (1 stick) unsalted butter, softened

1 cup sugar

4 large eggs

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

1 cup sour cream

For the streusel topping:

¼ cup sugar

¼ cup flour

3 tablespoons butter, chilled and cubed

For the glaze:

¼ cup confectioners’ sugar

1 ½ teaspoons milk

Instructions

Preheat oven to 350°F.  Grease/flour or spray a 9 x 13 cake pan. Set aside.

Make the filling:  Mix the cream cheese, sugar, egg and vanilla until creamy.  Set aside for the filling.

Make the cake batter:  Cream together the butter and sugar.  Add eggs one at a time.  Add the vanilla extract.  Slowly pour in the Bisquick alternating with the sour cream until it is all combined.

Spread half of the batter into the prepared cake pan with a spatula.  Spread the cream cheese filling evenly on top. Top with remaining cake batter and smooth with a spatula.

Using a butter knife, gently swirl in the batter.

Make the topping:  Add the sugar, flour and chilled butter in a small bowl.  Stir using a fork or pastry blender until the mixture is crumbly.  Sprinkle the streusel on top of cake batter.

Bake for 40-45 minutes until a cake tester inserted in the center comes out clean.  Cool on a rack.

To make the glaze: In a small bowl, combine confectioners' sugar and milk until creamy. Drizzle over cake.

On Managing My Time

It seems a simple thing to write down a schedule and stick to it.  I made a nice little schedule to be sure I got everything done for BYU-Idaho.  See it really is a nice little schedule

What this nice little schedule doesn't account for is my 97-year-old mother.  She is self-sufficient, but not completely.  Between 7 and 8 a.m. I helped her three times, each time interrupting my thought process and requiring a reset.  They weren't big things, finding a cap to her pills that she dropped, reminding her how to use her new hair product, and then later taking the spray bottle for the new hair product and pumping all the air out until it actually would spray.

Something else this nice little schedule doesn't account for is my sweet Tarzan who called me during my 8:00 hour to discuss finances.  This caused an interruption of thought and required a reset as well.

And then there are the dogs.  They had cornered some little creature and were actively trying to "get" it from under the electric lawnmower.  Fearing they would destroy the lawnmower, I went out and set the little guy free.

I decided a better way for me might be to make a list of tasks and prioritize them.  That way, when I get time to work on my schedule, I can start at the top and work down.

Using this list I had better success at accomplishing what is important.  I completed 1, 4, 7, and 8 before going to work.  Now that I have listed my priorities, I can be sure I get everything important done before the end of the day.

Daily:

1. Say my prayers
2. Visit with Tarzan before he goes to work
3. Study the scriptures
4. Participate in the Discussion Board
5. Email
6. Grading
7. Listen to Inspirational talks while I get ready for the day
8. Breakfast
9. Spend time with Mom-coordinate with sister
10. Lunch, Dinner
11. Spend time with Tarzan

Weekly:

1. TGL responsibilities
2. Visit someone in need
3. Extra study for Sunday School lesson
4. Read for enjoyment
5. Crochet

I think I'll try that for a week and see if I do better.  

Lucky Me

Lucky, lucky, lucky me
I'm a lucky son of a gun
I work eight hours, I sleep eight hours and have eight hours for fun ♪♫♫♪

Do you ever think about how lucky you are?  Getting away from thinking about your problems can make problems more bearable.  Try counting your blessings--you may have some of these and they are not in order, but here are a few things to think about.

Food on the table	Car to drive
House to live in	Bed to sleep on
Job to pay the bills	Family
Friends	The Godhead
Sunrise	Sunset
Pets	Moon
Sun	Clouds and Rain
Animal Life	Doctors and Nurses
Pedicures	Babies
Rainbows	Books to Read
Sunglasses	Shoes
Fingers	All Body Parts
Indoor Plumbing	Scriptures
Pepsi	Look for good Find joy Be happy Banish sad