How to Throw a Well Attended Relief Society Activity

THE PURPOSE:

To encourage actual research and discovery of family history

Ask each woman to go into her personal  family history (either on familysearch.org or other) and trace her mother’s line back as far as she can go, following her mother’s mother’s mother’s, mother's... mother etc. Once she’s found the name, come prepared to share something about that woman.

We did this in May, it felt appropriate for Mother’s Day month. But really, you could do this any time of the year.

IDEAS FOR SHARING:

(Keep it under 3 minutes per share.) 

It can be a photo of what she might have worn, or food she might have eaten, or world events that might have had an impact on her etc. A sister might even discover an interesting story attached to that ancestors name and could briefly share it.

TORTILLAS

What do pictures of tortillas have to do with anything?

I discovered my great grandmother (7 generations back) lived in Norway.

After a tiny bit of research I discovered she would have eaten a lot of Norwegian Potato Lefse in  the 1800s. So I found a recipe for it, prepared some and brought it to share. Lefse is very similar to tortillas. I was surprised how making these me feel close to my great (times 7 ) grandmother as I cooked, I imagined her doing everything I was doing only many, many years ago.

THOUGHTS

On why this activity was so well attended:

1. People like to talk about themselves and family. 

2. It was a unique challenge and fun spin on what usually seems like a tedious and daunting task (family history work). 

3. It’s exciting to discover new things and then to be provided with an opportunity to share those discoveries with other people.

4. I've noticed “participation” activities ALWAYS have better attendance.

Please enjoy this activity. This one brought me great pleasure to attend and to help plan. And we got good feedback from the sisters as well.