Sisterhood and Service

As you may or may not know, I am currently serving as the Enrichment Counselor in our ward (in the women's group at church). Our stake is currently working on a joint Relief Society/Young Women Humanitarian project. The project is to make T-shirt dresses or simple A-line dresses that will be sent to the Humanitarian Fund in Salt Lake City; and then ultimately to little girls in less fortunate countries. What fun it has been to be part of the planning in what has turned out to be a very successful and spiritual experience. It has been so exciting to see the sisters (both young and not so young) serve in such a capacity. We planned a couple of joint Enrichment/Young Women activities where sewing machines were stitching, gathers were pulled, and wrinkles were ironed out ~ all to the less than silent hum of laughter and sisterhood. There were older sisters teaching the Young Women how to sew, and Young Women teaching older sisters how to sew. Many of the sisters who were not able to participate in our Enrichment night activities, took it upon themselves to make dresses at home out of fabric pieces found in sewing closets or just recently purchased at the fabric store.

A couple of weeks ago, our ward had a project celebration dinner in combination with the Relief Society General Broadcast. At this dinner, we chose to hang up (in the gym) all the dresses (88 to date) that had been so selflessly made so that the sisters could see the impact that they can make by opening their hearts to others. Since I was mostly in charge of the project and partly in charge of the dinner, Rick and the girls (and my good friend Cindra, the RS president) were lucky enough to get to help me hang the dresses What a treat that was for our family. With EVERY dress that was hung, Alexis would say, "Oh mommy, some little girl is going to love this dress! This one is the cutest!" Little does she know how loved those dresses will be and how much they will be appreciated. Anyway, it was a fun evening with a yummy dinner (we introduced the sisters of the eastern US to Hawaiian Haystacks), a sight to behold, and wonderful messages from our church leaders! How blessed my life is to serve and how fortunate I am to partake of the strength of Spirit that comes through sisterhood and service. I hope these pictures tug at your heartstrings of service like they did mine!