Olga Otte hosted the December Kum Join Us Extension Homemakers meeting at her home on Dec. 6.

A pitch-in holiday meal was served after members gave thanks with the Lutheran common table prayer. We were joined by Karen Brigdon, Carol Mansfield’s daughter.

The wonderful meal consisted of delicious ham balls, green beans, sweet potato soufflé, corn, coleslaw, jellied cranberry salad, deviled eggs, dinner rolls and a cheeseball and crackers that made its way to the table for seconds while everyone chatted about their upcoming holiday plans. Ruta May made a scrumptious strawberry dump cake from her daughter’s recipe to fulfill everyone’s sweet tooth.

Instead of exchanging gifts, members brought nonperishable food items and toiletries. These were delivered by Olga to Anchor House Family Assistance Center and Pantry to help those in need.

Olga also read our devotions from Borchers’ daily devotions booklet on the verbs shall, will and may. In Isaiah, we hear what God will do: I will make, I will help, I will not forsake … It is going to happen.

In response, we hear what will unfold for Israel: You shall make, you shall rejoice, you shall glory … Finally, we hear the longed-for hope: “So that all may see and know. All may consider and understand that the hand of the Lord has done this, the holy one of Israel has created it.”

It’s easy to pass over people and things we take for granted, but these helper verbs slow us down and make us pay attention to what God is doing. We should all be more attentive to even the smallest detail.

Olga played the piano while we sang Christmas carols, and afterwards, we played a game with candy called “I’ve never, have you?” Each player began the game with the same number of candies, and when a player said something they hadn’t done, each player lost a piece of candy if they had done it sometime in their life. It was really difficult to think of things that you hadn’t done but others had in order to make them lose their candies. This was a great way to get to know things about each other we didn’t know before. It was a fun game.

Ruth Ann Hendrix asked everyone what their favorite Christmas toy of all time was. Most responded with babies such as a Mary Ellen doll, a Nutcracker doll or a baby rocker they still have, but probably the most unusual was a snow globe and a pedal tractor.

The Jan. 3 meeting will be hosted by Linda Guinn at her home. Anyone wishing to attend who is not a member should contact the Purdue Extension Jackson County office in Brownstown at 812-358-6101 and you will be put in touch with someone who can assist you.