In case you haven’t noticed, cursive is dead. Read more »

I love pioneer stories, but have a strong preference for ones I have not heard before.  I thought I would share one from my family:

Nicolai Sorensen came from Soro, Denmark Read more »

Not too long ago, I lived near my parents, but in a very different world.  While our wards technically bordered each other, they were worlds apart. Read more »

…I hate our national anthem. Read more »

I had the pleasure of attending church with my sister yesterday and she goes to a lovely LDS building in Arlington, Virginia. It really is a beautiful building in a fabulous residential neighborhood, but the facility has one major flaw: a teeny tiny parking lot. Indeed, there were about 25 spaces. I, along with most of the congregation, parked on the street, which I hate to do because I feel it is an incredible nuisance to the surrounding residents, and that can’t be good neighbor-making or missionary work.

I commented on their lack of parking, and my sister told me that when President Benson (before he was a President, natch) had been around, the church had been given the opportunity to buy a neighboring lot (now long occupied) and Benson had dismissed it: the church will never need more parking in DC! Read more »

Today is Loving Day—it commemorates the Supreme Court decision that officially made it illegal to discriminate against a proposed marriage based on the race of those involved. For 16 states in the US, it wasn’t until 1967, that they were forced to allow inter-racial marriages.

As a member of an inter-racial marriage, this particular decision holds my attention. I wonder why inter-racial marriages were so problematic. Certainly, both my government and my religion have at times cautioned against them. And frankly, although no one is banned from marrying a member of another race now, there are still plenty of people who have negative feelings about inter-racial couples. Why? Read more »

My sister decided to serve a mission.

Luckily, she had no “issues” that made her suspect in her mission interviews.

Unluckily

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I have a stake calling in the Young Women’s organization and it has been quite an education. I have not worked in Young Women’s since I was a Laurel myself and I have not previously had a calling that required so much oversight and coordination.

Someone somewhere (before my time) decided that next year, our stake would do a Trek for Youth Conference. The idea does not thrill me, but clearly other people are interested, so I will not protest on the sole basis of not wanting to wear a bonnet (although I will not wear a bonnet). We traditionally do Youth Conference in early September, which is an awkward time for the youth, so had wondered about choosing a different time. Apparently, more important people than myself selected and approved a new month for Youth Conference next year: February.

Yes, a Pioneer Trek in February. In upstate New York. Read more »

Book of Mormon Stories

When I was young, Primary children, including myself, sang this little dity using questionable hand motions. By the time I was a Merrie Miss, though, we weren’t doing the actions anymore, because they were deemed (rightly so, I think) offensive. Read more »

Should you find yourself en route to the Hill Cumorah Pageant this year, I thought I might lend you my local expertise:
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We have this little pecularity in the English language when it comes to the names we use for our parents. As nouns, Mother and Father are equals and partners. Mother and Father appear to be on par with each other and, without specific information, we would assume they have similar commitments to their family roles. But look what happens when we turn these into verbs: Read more »

The countdown has begun: my son has one more month before entering the golden age of Nursery. I have served in the nursery before, and I want my kids to be Nursery ready. So far, my son has a few skills under his belt that will serve him well:

1–Clean-up. He is great at picking stuff up and has pretty good aim at getting it in the desired basket.
2–Sit on demand. He doesn’t always STAY seated, but he will sit when you tell him to, in basically the right area, oriented in the correct direction 80% of the time.
3–(Most importantly) Fake eating. My son has perfected fake eating wherin he brings fake or imaginary food near (but not to) his mouth and makes eating mouth motions and sounds.

He isn’t as verbal as I would like, but I think he is headed in the right direction. What are other important nursery skills you think kids need to be successful?

I guess I better gear myself up for a return to Sunday School.

I rode the bus from one city to another. When we boarded in the capital, one young woman got on in extremely “liberated” attire for that country: she wore tight pants, a revealing tank top, and had long extensions braided into her hair.

As soon as the bus got going, she started her transformation

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When I served in Japan 10 years ago, there was a well-known Japan-Payson connection. I only had one Paysonite companion, but there were five (5) Paysonite elders in my MTC district and many more in my mission. Read more »

Some time ago my little branch got a new leader. He was, in my opinion, an unlikely suspect, but frankly the likely suspects had already taken their turns.

Soon after he became branch president, this man spoke of a rash of near misses. Most of these included recreational vehicles and, ahem, stupidity Read more »

Paying taxes has never been particularly painful to me. I believe this puts me in the minority, but there it is. My basic approach to money is “easy come, easy go.” Read more »

I have often thought that hospitals should retain a Baby Name Consultant on their staff. So many drugs in a new mom’s system (including the oxitocyn!) really makes naming a baby dangerous. Please know that I recognize naming to be a VERY subjective endeavor—no two families are going to agree exactly. If you dislike any of my ideas, know that you are not alone and comment, please.
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I am uniquly qualified to help the new parents of the world because I see a lot of baby announcements (dozens of cousins, many other friends, former companions, and colleagues in child-bearing prime time) and I am opinionated. If you also fit my definition of uniquely qualified, then please comment for the benefit of the sleep-deprived and proud about to announce the presence of a new stranger to the world. Read more »

Did you have the pleasure of attending the General Young Women’s Broadcast last Saturday? I did. In the middle of the speakers, they did one of those hip new video segments. When it was anounced, I imagined maybe it would be a montage of young women performing good works all around the world with some stirring music. Or maybe young women bearing their testimonies of Christ in various mothertongues. What it actually was, I really could not have imagined. Read more »

I have been on the fringes of Primary for years, so the policy that men ought not be teaching Primary classes alone make some sense–personally, I think we should be two deep regardless of gender. Obviously, we want our children to be safe.

Yet, if I were a man, I think I would have a hard time with this as that gender has been singled-out as dangerous. Read more »