Luau Party

If you wear a flower on the left side of your head you are single.  If you wear it on the right, you are taken or married.

Games to Play:  
limbo
hula hoop contest

Ambiance:
paper sack lights (weighed down with sand and can use tea light candles with battery operated tea lights)
Hawaiian CDs for background music (found several at the Dollar Tree for a buck each)

Fun Activities (depending on the crowd):

• Sew simple bathing suit sarongs (find a good pattern and try it out)
• Make a candy lei:  Materials - small candies of any kind, plastic wrap (colored preferred) and curly ribbon.  Spread the wrap out on a table about 3 ft. long and lay the candies down the middle of the wrap.  Carefully close the wrap around the candy and in between the candy, tie a curly ribbon to close and to create the candy lei.  Knot and tie at the ends with more ribbon.
• Watch "Johnny Lingo" or "The Other Side of Heaven"

The Spread:
Make Hawaiian Haystacks or Pearly Shell Chicken Salad served with Hawaiian rolls and Hawaiian Punch, (or pork and teriyaki chicken on rice).

Learn Something New this Summer: Cross-Stitch in 5 Minutes

When pioneer women and girls crossed the plains to settle in the western United States, they brought with them their knowledge of homemaking skills and crafts. Many of them were converts from Britain, Scandinavia, and Europe. Traditional needlework was one of the skills they carried with them.

Learning to use a needle and thread to stitch unique designs on small pieces of cloth was often part of a young girl’s upbringing. In this way, mothers, grandmothers, and schoolteachers taught girls the art of needlework. While the girls were learning different stitches, they also learned numbers and letters by stitching and reciting them. These pieces of creative stitching were called samplers.

Stitchers often sewed a favorite saying, quotation, verse, or scripture onto their samplers. Some samplers were decorated with images of birds, animals, trees, fruits, flowers, temples, schools, or houses. The beehive as well as the likenesses of Church Presidents and other leaders were favorite pioneer designs.

After deciding on a design, the stitcher drew it on cloth with a pencil or pen. Then she began sewing, frequently using cross-stitches, as well as outline, stem, satin, and chain stitches. Quite often the stitcher would include her name, age, and the date the sampler was finished. (Julie Wardell, "Stitch a Sampler," Liahona, June 1998)

Go to this site to learn how to cross-stitch, a favorite past-time for me since Jr. High: http://yarntree.com/007begin.pdfYou'll be able to print out the instructions, but if for some reason the link is