What's Christmas without cookies and treats? We do a lot of holiday baking. My kids love to decorate sugar cookies. It is a two-day process for us. I make the dough on one day and let it chill overnight. The next day we actually bake and decorate the cookies.


I love this recipe for sugar cookies because they are soft and remind me of the Lofthouse sugar cookies. My kids will eat any frosting but I prefer to use butter over shortening. This recipe originally called for shortening in the frosting but I changed it to butter for personal preference.


This year my daughter is on a gluten-free diet. We made 2 batches- one with gluten-free flour and another with regular all-purpose flour. Both batches turned out great. Our candy selection was scarce (and gluten-free) but we still had fun. Can't go wrong with cookies, right?

Click HERE to download and print our Christmas Sugar Cookie and Frosting recipes.

Some of my favorite recipes contain buttermilk or butter. This is one of those. Never buy prepackaged pancake mix again. This recipe makes the best buttermilk pancakes and the toppings makes them out of this world.


I would love visiting my aunt in the summer when I was a kid because this was the only time I had access to her pancakes. She gave me her recipe years ago when I had my own little kids. As my extended family has grown, I have become THAT aunt to my nieces and nephews and I love it! Whenever we have a family reunion it is a given that I will make pancakes with coconut syrup. In my own home we make them often on Saturdays when the hubs is home and we can all eat breakfast together.


Let's talk about this coconut syrup. This is a recipe from my sister-in-law. It is our absolute favorite. We don't really buy regular syrup anymore either because my kids love the coconut syrup more (which also contains buttermilk AND butter, so you know it's good).

If you eat just the pancakes and syrup, you will LOVE it! However, when it is summer and the peaches are ripe and juicy, they are a MUST topping. They add another dimension to this already delicious dish that will knock your socks off. And, don't forget the whipped cream- either canned or freshly whipped. Put all of these together and you will be in breakfast heaven!


A warm pancake (or two, or three) served with fresh whipped cream, topped with peaches, and drizzled with coconut syrup is all you need. It is DIVINE. I dare you to try it. Go all out while the peaches are in season. You won't regret it. Get the recipe below!

This blog post came as a request by a sweet Primary chorister who wanted some ideas of how to end Singing Time each week. The chorister before her would do a cheer but she wanted to do something different. I loved her idea of doing something special/routine to end Singing Time. Here are a few ideas that I gathered from other teachers. I hope you find something useful here.

• Puppets: Create a "Singing Time" puppet that opens and closes Singing Time. Ask it questions and let it whisper in your ear. Relay the responses and messages to the Primary. 

• Questions: Ask the children questions at the end. They can be anything from "How does this song make you feel?" to "What did you learn from this song today?"

• 60 Seconds: Ask a question that requires a one-word answer. Receive as many one-word answers from the children as fast as you can in 1 minute. You can make this as fun or spiritual or serious as you want. For example, "What's your favorite ice cream flavor?" or "How do you feel right now?" This would be a great way to get to know your primary kids real quickly too. 

• Call and Response: This is slightly different from the call-and-response for getting a noisy class under control again. Same idea but with a more positive vibe. For example, you can ask, "Do you know how much I love you?" and they can respond "THIS MUCH!" with arms stretched out as wide as they can. Or blow them a kiss and have them "catch it". Let them know they are loved. This is why we do what we do, right?

• Goodbye song: create your own or maybe sing the "Hello Song" but instead of "hello" sing "goodbye". Here's an example:

           Goodbye, goodbye,