Why I love the Mingle

Some of you may know that my favorite thing about my calling at church is the fact that I am nominally in charge of "The Mingle." Most months, Leilani is actually in charge, but when she wasn't on the STW committee, or when she is out of town, the responsibility falls to Elizabeth and me. Elizabeth is usually happy to let me have the limelight, and I'm usually more than willing to take it.

When I first came to the STW committee the Mingle was a spotty little activity called "Break the Fast," which, you guessed it, happened on Fast Sunday after church. It was lightly attended and always held at the chapel. We decided to move it from the first Sunday to the third to prevent it from interfering with people's fasts. And to capitalize on the fact that many ward activities fall on the third Friday or Saturday.

Now, as I said, it is my favorite activity each month. Why? I have a hard time figuring it out. I think the following reasons might have something to do with it:

1- I love to cook, and Mingle gives me a reason to try out a new recipe. Usually I have some inspiration while I'm trolling recipe websites, (One of my favorites is 101 Cookbooks) or reading my cookbooks. Something I want to try that I haven't tried before. I'm not sure the last time I actually took a tried and true recipe to Mingle. Some turn out great... Other times, not so great. (My contribution this week, a simple bean salad, wasn't anything spectacular.)

2- I love the chance to talk to everyone. Mingle brings people together to, well, mingle. And I love it.

3- It always works out. Every mingle, I start to freak out that we won't have enough food about 5 minutes before we are to begin. And we always have enough to eat. Some months, we only have just barely enough, but everyone always gets at least one full plate of food. Even if it was from an industrial size can of corn... We've had some serious Loaves and Fishes moments at several mingles, but they have always turned out. It's kind of faith building.

4- The themes. Coming up with a theme has always been fun. We instituted themes quite a while back to get people thinking about the mingle mid-week, rather than Sunday afternoon. My favorite to this day was "Food that begins with the first letter of your name." We got some extremely creative food that month.

This month, I decided to not stress out about the Mingle, even when it was 5 minutes to showtime and there was an abundance of salads, but no main dishes. It was hard, but I think I was successful. And of course, I loved it. Even after I dumped my entire plate on the table right when I was sitting down.