Crawfish Boil

Today, my LDS ward had a crawfish boil. I was in charge. We had five hundred pounds of boiled crawfish, 120 hamburgers, 80 hot dogs, corn and potatoes (cooked with the crawfish so they’re peppery – yum!), desserts, salads and beverages. The ward bought everything but the desserts and salads. It cost almost $1000. This is an enormous sum for an LDS ward to spend on an activity.

I am relieved to say that it went off mostly without a hitch. It was a little windy outside, but otherwise the weather was perfect - sunny and 72 degrees. We had plenty of food, with little left over. There was lots of noise and socializing. Kites were flown, Frisbees were thrown, tug-of-war was played. I had plenty of help setting up, keeping things in order, and cleaning up after. A couple of guys who appeared rather world-worn came and got something to eat, which was nice – I’m glad we were able to feed them. The only real problem was that we had to shut down the inflatable jumping thing because the older kids got out of control.

I was very glad when today arrived. I knew I would be able to eat all the crawfish I wanted (and I love crawfish). Then when the day was over, this event would be behind me and I wouldn't need to think about it any more.

I think it’s important after any event like this to do a good evaluation. What worked? What didn’t? How can we do better next time? Without an evaluation, the same mistakes get made over and over again. I plan to make some extensive notes for the next person to do this. Who knows...maybe it will be me, and I’ll have my own notes to refer to next year.