Latter-day Village Square

A number of new items have been added recently to the Primary KB and Primary Music KB.

• April Monthly Theme Poster and Bookmarks - http://latter-dayvillage.com/primary/article.php?id=1548
• April Primary Scripture Search with a fun Thomas S. Monson Puzzle -http://latter-dayvillage.com/primary/article.php?id=1551
• April Newsletter Template -http://latter-dayvillage.com/primary/article.php?id=1550
• Lesson Supplements for Primary 4 Manual -http://latter-dayvillage.com/primary/category.php?id=205
• Revised Lesson Supplements for Primary 2 Manual -http://latter-dayvillage.com/primary/category.php?id=229
• New Games added to 2008 Scripture Power Activity Day -http://latter-dayvillage.com/primary/article.php?id=1508
• Updated General Conference Activity Page and Worksheet -http://latter-dayvillage.com/primary/category.php?id=34
• We Thank Thee O God for a Prophet - song idea - Music KB only -http://latter-dayvillage.com/primarymusic/article.php?id=1462
• A new April Sharing Time about President Monson - http://latter-dayvillage.com/primary/article.php?id=1563

PRIMARY OPEN HOUSE

New Primary Stake Leader Training the week before conference -
http://www.lds.org/pa/display/0,17884,8029-1,00.html

NEW IN OUR STORE:

• Baptism Clipart Collection - perfect for planning, decorating and scrapping your child’s baptism!
• NEW - Thomas S. Monson - Follow the Prophet Stickers - just in time for General Conference and the April theme.
• Prophets of the Restoration Activity Book, with activities and lessons for all the latter-day prophets - with new coloring pages and links for Thomas S. Monson.
• Scripture Mastery Stickers in 3 sizes - a great way to recognize children who are memorizing monthly scriptures or bringing their scriptures to Primary.

While doing research on Google AdSense ads displaying on your site, I ran across another LDS online merchant that is offering an 2008 Primary theme vinyl wall lettering. However, their product only lists the theme; ours includes the scripture reference in a contrasting font. Additionally, our version is cheaper, $17.50 versus $19.95. Ours is shorter, 3 feet vs. 4 feet, but in our opinion, is a much better value due to the secondary font and the verse inclusion.

	I wanted to let you know about a brand new Primary product we just added to our store - it is a digital download 2008 Primary Interactive Calendar by Tina Descovich! SEE CALENDAR I am so excited about this calendar because it is our first editable pdf product, and will usher in a new line of editable download products and resources at LDV. When you open one of these beautiful monthly calendars, you can click on any box for any date and add your own text, then press the PRINT button on the bottom of the page and it will print. You can use these for your Primary Board or to include in a monthly newsletter for all the children! It combines the beauty of lovely art and the function of editability that I am so excited about! Go to the website where you can sample the January Calendar - type in your own dates and print!
	The artwork matches the beautiful new 2008 Primary Theme Collection by Elsa Remund that is now in the Download Depot Club http://latter-dayvillage.com/pages/VDDClub.htm as well as being featured throughout the Primary Knowledgebase in the 2008 Primary Category and in the 2008 Music, and featured on our new 2008 Primary Stickers! See Stickers in our store
	There are 2008 Pencils in the store too! These are beautiful and a great way to introduce the new theme or to use as birthday gifts.
	Do-it-yourself Vinyl Lettering Wall kit - oh how easy and how beautiful! Display the 2008 Theme right on your wall - and you can easily remove it at the end of the year without damaging the painted surface!
	Cute as can be - these 1.2″ round SUPER SINGER stickers are perfect for motivating young singers to participate in Primary Music!

Hope you are having a wonderful holiday season and are all ready for a very happy New Year!

Sincerely,

Debra Woods Hamilton
http://latter-dayvillage.com
debra@latter-dayvillage.com

This is an exerpt from a message I sent out to our Primary subscribers after our recent Villager Newsletter.

2008 STICKERS! I just added beautiful new stickers to the store with the 2008 theme by Elsa Remund - I also added Super Singer Stickers with Melissa Carter’s cute designs which are on the third page of stickers.

Since the newsletter, I got some messages indicating there were missing files or corrupt files in the new material I have recently added to the Primary Knowledgebase and Music subscriptions.

I am so grateful when someone points this out to me, because I may never know otherwise. I saw that in every case, many people had tried to access these files unsuccessfully before someone finally pointed it out to me. I know it is an extra chore to send me a note, but if you find a mistake or problem, it would be so helpful if you would let me know. Kindly, I do appreciate a gentle notification. So thanks to those of you who let me know of the problems.

There was a missing lesson supplement attachment, and a missing substitute thank-you postcard attachment, both have been fixed. There was a corrupt pdf file that wouldn’t display - the 2008 Music Planner (for full Primary and Music subscribers) which I needed to replace. I am sure I have missed some other things, so let me know if you happen to notice anything.

Also, someone made a request I thought would benefit a lot of people, so I added it - in my 2008 Page-at-a-glance Outline, I make suggestions for songs for September-December, I’ve always done that, since the sharing time guide doesn’t list specific songs. But some people might want to choose their own songs for those months, so I added an alternate version with those months blank in both the Primary KB and the Music page.

I also wanted to point out that I have added some new resources or updated resources for lessons for 2008. There are lists of all the songs associated with the lessons - and for the Primary 4 (Book of Mormon) manual, I have added links to the song words at lds.org. There is a Book of Mormon reading program and some other helps added to the 2008 Lesson Helps for each manual you should check out.

I really appreciated an alternate December Sharing Time Idea sent in that I have added to the KB article I had already written. Your ideas are so valuable, and when you share, it benefits a lot of other people, so never hesitate to send in new material you have prepared, or ideas that have worked for you.

Thanks to everyone who sent in photos for the 2008 Monthly Primary Theme Posters. I was overwhelmed by the response to my request - so many sweet pictures! Since we cannot use all of them for the posters, I want to make a video or presentation with some of them - I will keep you informed about how that is going.

I had a lot of fun creating the 2008 Motivational Chart idea for the Music page. I have repeatedly looked for cute artwork of children in international costumes over the years, and I would always find one here and one there. So I bit the bullet and created a set of international paper dolls for this idea. At first I just had the different color cut outs, and then I did the clothes to go on them, but they looked funny without hair and faces - so I went back and added the hair and faces to the dolls, but now they looked like naked children, so I had to add a little jumper to each one. It was all a lot of fun. I hope you enjoy using this chart.

I was hunting the internet for a fun new idea for a 2008 music choose and review. I can’t even remember how I stumbled on it, but I saw a cootie catcher on some family website - and a rush of childhood memories came to me. I had to follow the instructions to make one after all these years, and I made marks on the paper so when I unfolded it, I could see where the various parts should go - then I designed a colorful SONG CATCHER in Adobe Photoshop, and it is just a lot of fun. There is one with all the 2008 CSMP songs and a blank one you can write your own songs on. And it will also work for a sharing time or lesson game if you want.

I want to make a special thank you to Amber Mock. She has been doing the lesson supplements for the CTR B manual for the past several months. She has earned free Download Depot art collections for helping this way - I just know her work is great and much appreciated by me and those who use the supplements.

Sorry this is so long. Thanks so much for your patronage.

God bless,
Debra

The Primary monthly theme poster for July 2007 is now online. The theme is, My family can follow Jesus Christ. The portrait depicts the wonderful Davila family - Herbert, Fatima, Paul, Natalie and Matthew. They live in my ward and were happy to help out. Serene did another fine job with the portrait. We will work together to finish up the portraits for this year - I as chief toddler watcher while Serene draws! It is a challenge for a young mother to set up an art studio in a tiny apartment with three children under the age of three, so I will get some Granny-practice. I WISH Serene was my daughter, my boys just didn’t jump on the chance - they all grew up together. Anyway - you can print out the portrait, theme text and scripture text - three pages, and display them together in the Primary room. Also included are mini-posters, four per page, to hand out to the children. Bookmarks can also be found, 8 per page, that have the portrait, theme and scripture text. This makes a great incentive for memorizing the monthly scripture.

I’ve been working really hard to get so many things added to the site that I haven’t taken the time to blog what I’ve been doing! I add things almost every day to Primary - sharing times are done through the first week of July, lesson supplements through lesson 22, June Monthly Theme Posters/mini-posters and bookmarks, the song idea for Listen, Listen.

I’ve been doing more powerpoint presentations for the lesson supplements, sharing times and music - they are fun and easy - I am wondering if people actually use them? I am the Nursery Leader in my ward and some of the lessons called for lots of pictures of nature - I found great ones but my printer was out of ink! So I took all the cool pictures and put them in a Powerpoint Presentation, added music too - and took my laptop to church with me to show the presentation to the children. They loved it! I could show it several times, even when I was busy doing something else! I know some buildings have a projector that allows you to project onto a screen whatever is on your computer monitor. That’s a great way to get a presentation large enough for everyone to see - though the lights need to be lowered to see well. Anyway - I hope teachers and leaders are able to make use of some of the presentations I put together.

If you want to do your own, one nice source for artwork is the scripture reader books - like New Testament Stories, Book of Mormon Stories etc. The pictures are small, but if you scan them at about 300 dpi - you can get a good size image for the computer. It is a nice way to tell a scripture story that doesn’t have any pictures in the manual or GAK or library. You can even narrate if you want, though I haven’t tried that yet.

SHARING TIMES - I have, up to this point, avoided even looking at the suggested sharing time ideas in the 2007 Outline for Sharing Time and CSMP. I don’t want to be influenced by their ideas when I am trying to think of my own. Well, I noticed some of the references I needed were in the descriptions of their ideas and I was reading them. I decided that I could just flesh out the ideas in the outline - there are always two weekly gospel principles each month that they give presentation ideas for - rather than always creating my own from scratch - and they have great links right to the pictures and songs - so that’s what I have started doing. I create visuals to go with their ideas, link to the song sheet music, link to the pictures online and link to the scripture passages mentioned. I make word strips and anything else called for, that will save you time, and make it more fun.

My philosophy about Sharing Time and teaching songs is to draw the children in so that they are intrigued by the process - and then they are more than ready to learn the principles or memorize the songs - if it is fun, they will want to. When I say fun, it doesn’t mean ha-ha, game fun - but interesting to them. They don’t mind repetition - even the older ones - if it is something they like. I have to keep in mind how many times my own children watched their favorite movies over and over again - never tiring of them. Kids like to repeat what they enjoy - they like the feeling of confidence that they know what to expect. So if it is fun, you will not get comments like - “Oh no! Not AGAIN!” There is nothing worse than trying to convince children of something, or bribe, beg, cajole, threaten - I despise being in that situation, and who wouldn’t? Children can be merciless - and it is a drudge (or much worse) for the teachers/leaders to face disinterested children.

Here is a hint - if you think it is boring - by all means, that will come across to the children. If you think it is a difficult concept - so it will seem to them. I took a theater history course at BYU that required the reading of ancient plays from Greece and Rome. They could only be found in the reserve library - so you went in and had to read them there. I’d give myself two hours to read a play - figuring a play on stage takes two hours, so that should be plenty of time to read a play. Only one problem - I’d fall asleep after the first scene. I was so completely and utterly bored. Then I’d go to class, feeling awful and ornery, and my teacher would say, “Wasn’t that a MARVELOUS play?” and she would go on and on about how exciting and fascinating it was. Then I felt disappointed that I had not recognized it myself. She brought ancient history to life. Her enthusiasm was the only thing that got me through that course, which was required for my major.

Sometimes when I am preparing a presentation or lesson - I am so moved by the story it brings tears to my eyes. That’s when I know it is going to work for the children. When I am moved, they are too. So let yourself really feel the messages of the lessons and the songs. Let the spirit touch you, and it will come through to the children.

I just love designing stickers! I just finished two new designs - Happy Birthday Stickers - more generic than the Happy Birthday from the Primary stickers we have had for awhile, and way cute. I did 10 designs but whittled it down to the best 8.
Then I was thinking what kind of sticker would be good to give children after the BIG day - when they are done performing the Children’s Sacrament Meeting Presentation - WHEW! So I designed some really adorable “You Are A Star!” stickers.
I have actually designed some new 2007 stickers, but I am hangin on in hopes of getting a new artist on board that has been recommended to me.

CHRISTMAS MUSINGS
I love Christmas. My husband doesn’t get into it, but I just love it. Even though it isn’t the REAL anniversary of the birth of Christ. Even though it was an adopted pagan ritual way back when and nowadays is sooooo commercial. I still love Christmas. So I was looking at my gorgeous tree last year and I thought about how I could do it differently in the future, and a great idea came to me - how about really lovely themed ornaments - in sets of 12 - each year a different set - The Nativity, The 12 Days of Christmas, Twas the Night Before Christmas, The Nutcracker, Pioneer Christmas and so forth. So I am securing the right artist to do the designs that will be printed on felt with fronts and backs to be sewn together. . . a new holiday tradition.

We will be introducing some new products in the store from new manufacturers. We found a company that makes beautiful feminine brief cases/laptop cases that are perfect for sisters serving in callings that require more materials than fit in a scripture case. You will love them! Also we have a software company that has developed software perfect for family history/scrapbook media collection/organization and distribution that will soon be available at LDV.

Stay tuned for more developments!
Debra