Other pages with valuable content that I’m not sure when or how to use, I add to my topics files.


Hopefully this has given you some good ideas on how to utilize our awesome church magazines!

The kids chose their favorite posters. I trimmed them, loosely mounted them on white cardstock, slipped each page into a thermal laminating pouch and ran them through my little laminator. Voila!

Of course, this isn’t a designer’s blog, but the kids love their new posters all the same!

Posters

For the old-school posters (and the General Authorities picture chart), I found 10.5 x 16.5” frames at Target (a few years ago) and hung them super low so the little kids can enjoy them.

My favorite? The posters. They used to come as 2-page spreads, but the last few years have been 8.5 x 11” = easy to manage.

Repeating Specials

The Friend often features the same special articles, one each month of the year. For several years, these cool comic-book-type-scriptures featured latter-day prophets (in 2009 it was Joseph Smith). So I made a binder for these stories.

Words of the Prophets

I reserve articles and poems about Easter and the resurrection for a skinny Easter binder to display with my Easter books in April. I also add artwork from church magazines to the music and lesson binders I put together for Easter week (so the kids have visuals while they sing and in the lessons).

Occasions

Similar to the Ensign, The Friend always begins with a message from the First Presidency. I put all of these in the front of a binder. Following that, I added the one-page articles from the apostles. I had enough to fill a binder, so stopped there.

I put all of the other articles and poems into a large binder. I keep all of these binders in the “Sunday section” of our library for the kids to enjoy.

Easter

Pioneer Day

I just put together this binder for Pioneer Day in July. I mainly used articles from The Friend, but also included a few from the Ensign.

General Conference

Obviously, I keep anything directly related to Conference in this binder. I also include articles that spotlight the First Presidency and Quorum of the Twelve.

Christmas

I put the activity sheets into an easy-access folder. The kids can write or color on these or cut them up.

I used to be concerned about re-usability, wanting to copy them first or something, but then they just never get used. Besides, you can always reprint from the online Friend.

The Rest