Homemaking meeting is a wonderful opportunity for the sisters of any ward.  As I understand it, the purpose of homemaking meeting is to associate with each other so we can uplift and support one another; it should help strengthen friendships. Homemaking meeting should also help us improve ourselves and our skills in many areas so will can better fulfill our roles as women.

I have read several books on how to have successful organizations and there is one common theme that runs throughout all good organizations:  The members see the organization as one that is helping them achieve personal goals and also the organization is one that helps the members grow and progress together. 

When you apply this principle to homemaking meeting you should find more success in attendance and the general spirit of the sisters in the ward.  If you look at the Pursuit of Excellence program and use it as a guide, it has all kinds of ideas for classes that will help bring personal progress for the sisters. I have seen this work very well in more than one ward.  We had homemaking classes on such things as stress management, family home evening ideas, literature, how to better utilize The Book of Mormon in our homes, fitness and how to lose weight, importance of temples, learning about the lives of the prophets, things to do with preschoolers, how to make your home a learning center, we studied the lives of music composers, etc. 

To me, this way of doing homemaking worked best because you don't have the paying problem, the Presidency can work more together because the homemaking counselor's area becomes a way to help the education counselor, the classes are ones that apply to everyone so no one can just look at the topics and feel like homemaking meeting doesn't have anything to offer them, etc.

We also tried to always have a service project going so that those who wanted more to visit than to attend classes, could come and work on the project while they visited.   This way they were also feeling that their time spent at homemaking was of great value.   For service projects, we made baby quilts for a children's hospital with the Church's name inside, another time we made larger quilts for an orphanage, we gathered items for a women's homeless shelter and got them ready to take to the home, gathered and cleaned toys for an organization that gave the toys away to children at Christmas, etc.

Several years ago when I was a Relief Society President it was church policy not to do crafts unless it was teaching a skill such as sewing.  I have always thought this was a generally good idea because this way we are doing more than just making something, we are coming to homemaking meeting to improve and learn as well as associate and support each other

Debra Coe