. On the night before Asher was born my Dad, brother, and two sisters were visiting us in SLC. They were headed back to Idaho the next morning, because my little sister was going to the Christmas Ball, and had been hoping the baby would be born while they were in town– no such luck.…
“Birth is not an emergency. It is an emergence.” – Unknown The night before Rose was born I was sitting at our computer finishing writing a blog post when I turned to Jon, who was sitting on the couch doing homework, and said, “Man, it feels like this little girl is trying to push her…
Thursday morning– exactly two weeks before my due date– I woke up with a dull, crampy ache in my abdomen, lower back, and legs. It didn’t feel like labor and so I assumed it was just another one of the many pregnancy aches and pains I’d been feeling the last few weeks. Yet as the…
My little boy turned three this week. Time has gone by so quickly. I remember that a few weeks before he was born I spent the afternoon dipping chocolates with my Grandma. As we cooked she she shared with me her thoughts about my own father’s birth who was born just a few days before…
Several nights ago I decided to make bread before bed. I quickly threw together a batch of bread, confident that I knew the recipe off the top of my head, and stuck it in the bread maker. I turned the machine onto its longest setting and went upstairs to get ready for bed, intending…
This post was originally posted on my personal blog back in January 2010. I thought I would share it on this blog because once again– almost exactly a year later– my husband and I just spent the afternoon butchering chickens. All the same emotions I had the first time we butchered a chicken came flooding…
Thank you again to everyone who participated in the “This is What Family Home Evening Looks Like at My House” series. It really turned out wonderful. If you haven’t gotten a chance to read the posts from the people who linked up to the blog hop make sure you do. They are really great! And…
I am very excited to share the project that I have been working on the last few months. I’ve wanted to do something like this for a long time and I am so excited it is ready! I’ve put together study guides to go along with my new book, “Walking with the Women of the…
-1- My kids are so excited about Halloween. This is the first year that they have been old enough to understand what it is all about and they can hardly wait. I don’t know what got them so excited about it but for the last month Asher has been asking me (at least 4 or…
So, it seems that this year is the year to share the good news of Women in the Scriptures! Not only is my book coming out this Fall, but Camille Fronk Olsen (my former teacher) also has a book on Women of the New Testament coming out (which I am thrilled about), AND then this…
I was scrolling mindlessly through my Facebook feed tonight when I happened on this news article posted by a friend and my heart skipped a beat. I hungrily read through the article, which talks about how CES (the Church Educational System for the LDS Church) just recently changed its policy and will now hire female…
“And the Lord God planted a garden eastward in Eden…” (Genesis 2:8) My garden is beginning to pop up and, like always, it brings me so much joy to see these little plants spring into existence. Even though I’ve been planting things since I was a little girl I can never quite get over the…
On October 3, 1918 President Joseph F. Smith received his glorious vision of the spirit world— the world we go to when we die– and Jesus Christ’s visit to it during the three days his body was in the tomb. He said that as he pondered the Spirit of the Lord had rested upon him…
Originally posted October 19, 2009 I am really proud of my husband. He spent all of last semester working on a design competition with several other students at his University. The project wasn’t for any of his classes, it was something he took on in addition to his regular school work and his graduate research.…
In the last several days I’ve heard at least 5 people make the statement ” There just aren’t very many women in the scriptures.” Every time it has made me want to jump up and down and yell at the top of my lungs “YES THERE ARE YOU JUST AREN’T LOOKING FOR THEM!”…
“To do well those things which God ordained to be the common lot of all man-kind, is the truest greatness” – Joseph F. Smith This morning I got an email informing me that my favorite teacher passed away last night. Mr. K was my High School journalism teacher. He was grumpy as a bear…
I have been having a blogging identity crisis lately. Someone asked me awhile ago where my blog fit into the blogosphere? Are you a mommy blog? A religious blog? A lifestyle blog? A feminist blog? A craft blog? A cooking blog? A family blog? A platform blog? I didn’t really know what to say.…
Last night my husband and I started watching the movie “Young Victoria”. I’d heard such wonderful things about this movie and was so excited to see it. I drilled several of my friends who’d seen it about if it was clean… really, clean. They know that my husband and I have really strong standards about…
Today I am over at Empowering LDS Women for their series this week about finding balance in motherhood. Here is just a snippet of the start of my article so that you will go over and read the whole thing. I’d love some feedback on this one! When I was 17 years-old one of my…
I had an incredible experience yesterday. I got to meet Sister Julie Beck. It was amazing. She is one of the most incredible women I’ve ever met. She just radiates love from her… pure and genuine. For those of you who aren’t LDS Julie Beck is the General President of the Relief Society, the women’s…
It won’t come as a surprise to anyone who reads this blog regularly that typos are my tragic flaw. I try my hardest to proofread and re-read my writing, but no matter how hard I try there are always typos. Most of the time I just don’t see them at all, even if I…
Originally posted December 3, 2009 I took Advanced Placement (A.P.) Physics when I was in High School. The first semester there were about 15 girls in the class,but by the second semester there were only four of us left. It was a hard class. To this day I’m not quite sure what compelled me to…
I’ve been feeling sort of low lately. It seems like Satan has been working hard on me to make me feel small, worthless and hopelessly flawed. There are days when life, and all the suffering, pain, and heartache that comes with it, seems so meaningless and I really begin to wonder why I am here…
Three years ago, about this same time of year, I wrote this post. In it I said : “I love the image of our glorious Mother Eve receiving the Savior as He visits the spirit world with hundreds of thousands (perhaps millions) of her daughters standing behind her, ready and excited to receive the fullness…
I have so neglected this blog the last year. The little widget on the sidebar tells me that I have only posted three— THREE— posts on here in 2017. One of the big reasons for that silence is that for the last year this project has taken a huge part of my time, my creativity…
And get a coupon code for a FREE study guide on women in the scriptures
I’m very excited to introduce my latest project… a study guide for the women in The Book of Mormon! Which is now available on Amazon or as a download. There are only six named women in The Book of Mormon, three that are unique to The Book of Mormon (Sariah, Abish and Isabel) and three Bible…
I’m sorry I have been missing in action the last few weeks. It has been a busy summer and since I’ve procrastinated doing all the projects I told myself I would do this summer till the very end… I’ve been really busy. You think I would learn:) So, lately I’ve been thinking that I would…
This is my second lesson in my Mom’s MTC, if you want all the nuts and bolts about how we use this curriculum in our home please read this post. Obedience – To God – To Parents – Listening Songs: “Quickly I’ll Obey” pg. 238 Children’s Song Book or “I Feel My Savior’s Love” pg.…
Jesus answered and said unto him, Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God. Nicodemus saith unto him, How can a man be born when he is old? can he enter the second time into his mother’s womb, and be born? Jesus answered, Verily, verily,…
Wednesday night Jon went out to check on the animals before bed. He closed up the pen and counted, “goat, sheep, sheep… lamb!” Standing right next to Cutie Pie (our ewe) was a tiny little lamb nursing. Jon came running back the house hollering that we had a lamb in the barn. I couldn’t believe…
I was recently invited to review Alonzo L. Gaskill’s new book “The Lost Teachings of Jesus on the Sacred Place of Women.” The title really intrigued me and I figured that this book would be right up my alley. And it was. This book isn’t very long, only 112 pages. The first part of the…
We finally put away our Christmas decorations today, and with how crazy life has been around here lately I am just impressed that they got taken down before July! As I was packing things up in boxes I remembered that all month I’ve been thinking about these two little penguins, which have been standing on…
Not long ago I read an article in The Washington Post entitled “D.C. Third Ward Mormons Welcome Romney, even though most are democrats.” The post made me smile because for the last several months, ever since Mitt Romney announced his candidacy, I have been thinking about this ward… a lot. About six years ago, when…
Keep reading for a chance to win this beautiful printable of the Relief Society Declaration This week the Relief Society, the oldest and largest women’s organization in the world, will celebrate is 173 birthday! I have a great love for Relief Society, which has mostly been gained by serving in it for the last 13+…
The practice of women wearing veils is found repeatedly throughout the scriptures, and for a good portion of human history it has been common for women (and sometimes men) to veil their heads and faces. Today, in many religions around the world women still cover their heads and their faces when they are in the…
This afternoon I sat on the porch and watched the leaves fall off our maple tree. I basked in the crisp sunshine that warmed my face and took a deep breath of that smell.. the fall smell…and I felt joy rising inside my heart. I sat with my face to the sun and just drank…
“To every thing there is a season, and a time to every purpose under the heaven.”– Ecclesiastes 3:11 It is canning season in my neck of the woods and now that I’ve finished my pickles and peaches it is almost time to move onto the apples and the pears! I am feeling especially blessed to…
This is the original illustration that went along with the story I wrote this opinion piece when I was 16 years-old for my High School newspaper. It came from a talk we had one day in the journalism room with some of the Senior boys, who hated asking girls out to dances because…
“Charity” by William Adolphe Bouguereau, 1878 In college I worked on a volunteer Rape Crisis Response team. For three years I took turns carrying a pager for 48 hours each month, responding to dozens of summons from the hospital and the police office to help women who had just reported a rape. I stayed…
I’ve been thinking for awhile that I needed to do a homeschool update and share what has been working for us this year, and what hasn’t. I know that I learn so many good things from other people that I thought I’d mention what we have been doing in case it is helpful to…
When I was little I heard my parents talk about how they remembered exactly where they were and what they were doing when they found out the news that the US president, John F. Kennedy, had been shot. At the time I didn’t understand how news could be so life changing that the very moment…
John Alden and Priscilla Mullins, my ancestors! The kids and I read a wonderful book about the Pilgrims the other day for school. It had lots of information about them that I had never learned before, including the fact that only 5 of the 18 women who sailed on the Mayflower survived the first winter!…
I have a theory that I want to test. This is it: That if it wasn’t for women– especially women over 40– democracy as we know it would fall apart because there would be no one to run the polls. I am just curious, how many men did you see running the polls where you…