A Night in Bethlehem

Tim and I were asked to be in charge of the ward Christmas party this year. I had seen a lot of different themes for Christmas parties and really thought it would be special to make this years focus all about our Savior.  

A night in Bethlehem, would be this years theme. I asked three other couples to be on our committee. We assigned out different projects for each couple. 

Here was the breakdown of the different assignments:


Video Projector: Jonathan Horton was in charge of making a video to play on the projector that projected the night of Christ's birth. He also created background noise to play like the market places in Israel. We planned for 300 people. 

Invitations/ Posters/Announcements: Rachel Horton was in charge of making the posters, invitations, and printing the announcements. Families are notified of the event by flyer three or four weeks in advance. The picture above is what the invite looked like.

Markets & Tables: Shelley and Rick Shaw was in charge of the markets, getting the easy-up canopys, the decorations, table decorations. There was 4 markets: Potatoes, Ham, Fruits/Veggies and the Bakery. The tables were decorated with different nativities that people had signed up to bring. They were decorated around green pine garland. For the tables we used white butcher paper and put a burlap runner down the middle.

Jacob's well: Tim Kehl  (my husband) was in charge of building Jacob's well. Tim made this well, using materials from a circular foundation an covered it in wall paper. He made the rim out of installation and wall paper and used wooden beams and cut them to the right height for the poles. It turned out awesome!

City of Bethleham: Pam and Scott Solomon were in charge of making a cardboard silhouette of the city of Bethlehem to go across the bottom of the stage

Food: I was in charge of the food preparations, getting the costumes, and market decorations. The food that was served was: crock-pot ham, baked potatoes, pita chips, Texas Road House rolls with cinnamon butter, all different fruits and veggies, and a bakery with desserts. I had asked a few ladies in our ward to cook a 6-7lb ham in their crock pot. We purchased 24 hams and had about 6 full hams left over after the party.  We also asked 6 ladies to wrap and bake 25-50 potatoes and had them place them in coolers to stay warm.  For the rolls, we ordered 23 dozen rolls from Texas Roadhouse. They donated 1/2 of the rolls due to the event being a LDS christmas party. We had a sign up sheet for desserts that were provided by the families in the ward to bring the night of.

On the day of the event, we had the families enter through one main entrance. My two little kids were both dressed in biblical clothing and as families would enter the door, each family was given a bag of money for the evening. They were told by my little 7 year daughter, "Here is your money to pay your taxes, in Bethlehem." The families then entered the city gate, which was a pop canopy with two roman soldiers guarding the gate.

The Markets made from Easy-up canopy's covered with a king sized sheet and decorated with Christmas lights. 

The cultural hall was decorated as a street scene in Bethlehem, complete with booth where food,  which were to be bought with the sack of coins given to each family as the enter. Many strands of white Christmas light are strung above the hall giving the beautiful effect as stars when the lights are dimmed for the play. We pinned lights to each market.

The junior primary sang, "The bells in Bethlehem" as the opening song, then we started with a prayer. We had 8 rows of tables, with 4 six foot tables that were connected. Each row of tables were asked to start at a different market to get their food. Each market had a mason jar that read, "Taxes," that they were to pay for their food.  

Allie and Mason handing out the tax money to the families as they entered

The tax money that was given to each family. Each person received one coin to pay their taxes at the market place

The gate entrance into Bethleham

Fruit and Veggie Market

Serving fresh whole fruit and veggie trays 

The Bakery, which had all kinds of desserts that the people brought as a potluck dish

The potato market with all the fixings

The potato market before the lights were dimmed

The tables were covered with white butcher paper with a burlap runner

Nativity's were used as the center pieces with pine garland around each nativity 

The Bethlehem silhouette in the background 

This nativity was displayed before entering the gate into Bethlehem


The entertainment was provided by the choir group from West Jordan High-school who preformed Christmas songs.