And now for a drum roll please!!!!
I Introduce to You!
(linked above)
This idea has been something that I've been toying with for quite a while. A couple years ago, the LDS church came out a publication recognizing 100 years of Girls' Camp. In this publication, they listed some of the goals that girls of the early 1920 accomplished through the Beehive Girls Program (similar to the original design of Girl Scouts or Campfire Girls).
Girls would learn skills in any area that interested them and would come together to discuss what they learned, share their knowledge, delight in the joys of womanhood (WO-MAN-HO), and fellowship together to give praise to the Lord.
As the times changed, so did the program. Eventually it was no longer relevant to the needs of the girls in the world and so it became a memory to the few left who participated. The program was replaced by the Personal Progress program (which most LDS ladies today have grown up with). Personal Progress has also taken many forms. Today it focuses mainly on finding your relationship with God and making your own path to Him through the of learning life skills and offering service to others. Where this Program is wonderful and commendable in its own right, there seems to be something in regards to the completeness and well rounded person that is idealized in the goals of the Beehive Girls. Where Personal Progress is a wonderful tool (I encourage mothers, daughters, grandmothers, wives, etc. to look at the lessons and continue to work on new goals as it truly does have a way of focusing our lives around our Lord), there is something lacking in the general gaining of life skills that are of a more practical and self-sufficient nature in the adult world.
The goal of this challenge is to be an aid used for learning skills that have been forgotten through the last century. The tasks set in this challenge are not meant to be a hindrance or distraction from anything of the busy lives of women today, but rather a tool to help guide a restoration of practical skills. Although some of the skills listed in the book are dated (most people don't need to know how to drive a team of horses, or have a need to kill dozens of house flies because they are ever present), there is still much we can learn from the skills that these young women once learned. Wouldn't it be nice to know which how to dress wounds and clean bandages? Wouldn't it be easier to understand babies if you knew what each cry meant? Wouldn't knowing how to sew save you tons of money by mending an article that ripped or a child outgrew rather than going to buy a new one when it is perfectly salvageable?
That is the purpose of this challenge- to see how much you can learn.
If our call as women is to be as the one described in Proverbs 31, then let us take the challenge and mark how we can improve our world. Confidence grows when people are enabled. What better way to grow your confidence than to be well rounded and capable?
"Strength and Honour are her clothing; and she shall rejoice in time to come"
~ Proverbs 31:25 KJV
May the Lord Bless you today.
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