Well-Endowed Barbie

Lately, there has been quite a stir in the bloggernacle regarding the issue of modesty. Over the past few months numerous articles, Facebook posts, and blogs have taken on the issue of modesty and how it pertains to the young girls and the young women in our church. Many of these writings tell of the young women being solely responsible for maintaining the purity of our youth. Yes, it is a heavy burden to carry, but, alas, we of the fairer sex have come up with many ways to help keep modest hottest, starting with our youngest members.


First, through clever pinning on Pinterest, we saw one modest mother's idea of helping Naked Barbie maintain her modesty and the pure thoughts of little boys who might see her in her birthday suit. With just a few minutes with a Sharpie, Naked Barbie became permanently tattooed with undergarments fit for the eyes of innocent children who might play with her. 

See how Naked Barbie is now Modest Barbie in her shiny, new, skin-tight body suit. The purely transformed Modest Barbie is now suitable for playtime for both little girls and the impressionable little boys who might see her. This is a good first step in policing our children's thoughts, teaching them that nakedness, even when it comes to toys, is not suitable for their eyes and is something to be ashamed of and covered up.

Now, just in case Modest Barbie, is not quite to your modesty standards, you have other options, another mother has taken modesty maintenance a step further. Even though Modest Barbie has her private parts covered, there is still a bit of skin showing. With just a few minutes more, you can transform Modest Barbie into Shade Clothing Barbie, another idea from a different Pinterest mother.

Shade Clothing Barbie has the coloring extended down to just above her knees, and covers her chest and shoulders. I think this is a great second-step in keeping children's thoughts pure, but also, this may also help prepare little girls for the day when they will seek their own endowments for the temple. These colorful underclothes do give a sense of the garment a young woman receives after her first endowment, but they do lack the importance and sacredness the garment holds. 

To really prepare preschooler and little girls for the temple and the future of being the guardians and stewards of pure thoughts and sexuality for men, I give you Well Endowed Barbie.

Well-Endowed Barbie teaches little girls to hide their nakedness, but not be ashamed of their underwear. Having Well-Endowed Barbie as an example of what a true modest woman wears will help teach her what clothing she can and cannot select for her doll, and later, for herself. When your daughter takes Well-Endowed Barbie to a non-endowed house, she will be able to judge the other Barbies and their poorly chosen, immodest clothes. Also, Well Endowed Barbie's clothing will help protect her from the uncontrollable sexual urges of Unaccountable-For-His-Thoughts-And-Urges Ken Doll.

Starting from a young age and having Well-Endowed Barbie as a visual guide, will help your daughter pick the right clothes and the right friends for her future. It will help her stay away from the girls who show their shoulders, clavicles, thighs, and belly buttons and what impurity "those" types of girls hold.

So with just a little white nail polish and a pencil, you can transform your daughter's Barbie into something more suitable for her to play with... And coming soon, the "Barbie Burquini", it is not just for "Muslim Barbie" anymore.


(Other takes on Modest Barbie here)

The Bad Mother

I am a bad mother.


I buy birthday cakes for my children at the grocery store. I don't make those hours-long, fondant-covered colorful creations that would impress even the great Martha Stewart. In fact, you would be lucky to find enough birthday candles in my house for the cake. This year, I could only hunt down three, so when DaughterNotSo had her fifth birthday, she blew out the first three and I relighted two for her to blow out again. And when we had a birthday party for her with her little friends, I bought a number "4" for her cake instead of a "5". Fail.


I don't do DaughterNotSo's hair everyday. I rarely make those hair creations with the twists and braids, and bows, and floral arrangements other moms create. I do try to have it brushed though, but most of the time she looks like she could belong in an orphanage with Little Orphan Annie. I cut SonNotSo's hair by myself and he hates it. The poor kid ends up with hair in his eyes, ears, nose, mouth, and bellybutton. I think I am going to buzz his hair for the summer just to ease the process for me.


Sometimes I recycle outfits they have worn from the day before. A few stains can last through another day. Sometimes their clothes are wrinkled from staying in the dryer for days because I haven't gotten around to folding them and I have a pile of button-up shirts that need to be ironed for the kids. I question my sanity as to why I even bought clothing that would need to be pressed. 


My children don't get bathed everyday and sometimes playing out in the sprinkler is counted as a bath. When they do get bathed, I leave them in the tub just so I can have a moment to meditate on my bed as they splash around, making a swampy mess. I should really be doing something like straightening up their rooms from days of neglected ciaos.


Feeding the kids 3 square meals everyday is even rarer than folded laundry. Getting SonNotSo to eat veggies and coaxing DaughterNotSo to eat her meal without issue, would be like a New Testament miracle. Sometimes I forget to give them their gummy vitamins. Most of the time, DaughterNotSo reminds me.


Yes. I am a bad mother. No pretenses here. I hardly pretend to be a perfect mother who has it all together. Putting on a facade of perfectionism would require more work. If you bump into us at the store, the kids may have crusts on their faces and stains on the clothes and their hair will probably look unkempt.


You may even wonder what my problem is...


Now if between the crusts of gunk on their cheeks and sleep in their eyes, I could just wipe the smiles off their faces, I could be a worse mother.

Time Out, Brad Wilcox

I know. I know you will find this extremely hard to believe, but I attended my local Time Out for Women this weekend. My MIL purchased tickets months ago for my SILs and me to go. Well, each of my SILs bailed (well, one of them DID have a baby last Tuesday), so a good friend of my MIL and me went with us. Yeah, I wasn't looking forward to the whole context of the conference, but the perks of spending the night in a hotel, going to dinner, and having a break from the kids outweighed any potential annoyances the conference might have in store. What's more, I love my MIL and wanted to spend some time with her. She is a good woman.

 Going to dinner + fresh hotel sheets + not waking up with the kids > TO4W

I decided ahead of time to go as an objective observer with a positive attitude. I was not going to be looking for opportunities to be offended or annoyed by the speakers or the attendees. I was going to be very real and practical about the whole thing. 

The Friday night session was okay. The first speaker, Brother NotFunny, had a  pretty dismal talk. A person who is truly funny does not need to try to be funny, but somehow Brother NotFunny never got that memo. People around me were cracking up and I just could not fathom why. I wondered if subconsciously I had a bad attitude affecting my funny bone, but then I looked over at my MIL and my GF. There they were. Arms folded. Faces serious and somewhat puzzled. Good. It wasn't just me and my uncorrelated self. 

Next, Virginia Hinckley Pearce spoke and she was, meh... Again, I thought perhaps a bad attitude was influencing me, but no, my MIL and GF later confirmed my same thoughts. Fortunately, the night wasn't a total bust because Jenny Oaks Baker, a Julliard-educated violinist saved the night. Listening to her play the violin was a treat. She was absolutely brilliant.

So the Friday night session went well for me. No major or even minor annoyances. We topped the night off with a trip to the Cheesecake Factory and a pillow fight before bed. The next morning my MIL and GF headed over while I caught a few more zzzzs. Then I got up. Got ready and got over to the conference. I summoned up my positive energy and open mindedness. I was ready for round two.

I made it in time to listen to Linda Eyre and her daughter Shawni Pothier. My MIL knows Shawni personally, so that was much of the reason she wanted to go to TO4W. They both did a fine job and I was feeling fine...

Until...

Enter Brad Wilcox from stage right...

Cox started out his talk relating a story from when he was a mission president. His story was of a disheartened elder who wanted things to be easier. "Wouldn't it all be easier if we just had to do baptisms for the dead?" He then goes off into this diatribe mocking people who say things like, "But Brother Wilcox, don't you know how hard it is? I was born this way. Do you know how hard it is to change?"


From there I began to feel a little uneasy in my seat. I was afraid this would turn into Packergate from that one General Conference. Remember that one? It went something along the lines of gays not being able to overcome what they feel to be inborn tendencies and then he asked why would Heavenly Father do that to anyone, meaning create someone who was gay. Somehow I felt Cox was hinting around on the whole "I was born this way" excuse that he must think is illegitimate for the gay population. 


But I digress. The best was yet to come. Cox then went into this rant of mockery saying the following: It is easy to not going to church. It is easy not going to the temple. It is easy finding the anti-Mormon website to question church history. It is easy to ruin your testimony...


As though I had springs in my butt, I popped up as quickly as I could and angrily walked out in the middle of his self-righteous rant. It was all I could do not to flip him off on the way out, and now I wish I would have. I was pissed and hurt. I immediately called Husband NotSo to relate what had happened and I started to cry. I cried because he was so wrong, so wrong about how "easy" he thinks it is. It is not easy at all.


There have been many, MANY times in my faith crisis where I have thought how much easier it would be to just go back to church, continue to ignore the things that bother me, and continue to be spoon-fed the baby food of what I should believe. It would be easier to have someone else do the thinking for me. It would be easier maintaining relationships with my family and friends if I continued to go to church, instead of taking the initiative to ensure those bonds don't crumble.

Perhaps the most damaging part of all this, was the permission Brother Cox gave the hundreds of women and young women there to judge people who question the church or who have left the church because that is the easy way. No doubt each of those women know someone in their family or ward who has left the church or who is struggling with the church. Now instead of hearing a message about compassion and Christ-like love, they heard a message that they could judge those they know for taking the easy route. Now, because they stay in the church and continue to do what they are told to do, it is deemed harder and must, therefore, be better because it is sanctified by Brother Cox.


I promise, I tired to go into TO4W as open minded as I possibly could be. I knew some things might bother me, but I accepted that fact ahead of time. What I did not expect was the blatant rudeness and judgment coming from one of the more renowned persons of the church.

Ugh. I could not help but note the different feeling I felt at TO4W and the Mormon Stories Conference we had last weekend. At TO4W I felt like an outsider. I didn't feel the collective power a group can cast when it gets together for the common good and I so wanted to. At the MorStor Conference, I felt so much love and power. I truly and honestly loved each an every person who was there. I felt bonded to these people from their many walks of life. I loved those people and I know they loved me. It rejuvenated me and I have craved that feeling, like crack, throughout the whole of last week. It felt like a little piece of heaven on earth.


And to Brother Cox, I recommend taking your nasty foot out of your mouth and walk around in my shoes for a day before you deem what is "easy" and what is not. 


For that, I award you the SisterNotSo WTF moment. WTF, Brother Cox. WTF.

Washington DC Mormon Stories Conference

What a weekend. What a crazy, fantastic weekend. It was like Christmas Eve, Christmas, the Super Bowl, and election night all crammed into one afternoon. If you don't know what I am talking about, I am talking about this. There is a small group of Mormons out there who have either left the church or who are unorthodox on some level and desire to interact with people like themselves and who still feel a communal pull. Through Mormon Stories, we have formed regional groups to help fill the void where ward and stake communities once resided in our lives. It has been refreshing meeting up, conversing on facebook, and emailing these regional members from all walks of life.


This weekend, we had our regional conference for the Washington DC area. I was fortunate enough to be part of the planning committee for the event. Our team was so incredible. The bonus was having varying degrees of faith represented in the planning. Through that we were able to create an event inclusive to all. I would love to give the run-down of the whole thing, but, rather, I am going to highlight some of my more poignant experiences. 


I have not been around very many openly gay people. Of course I had my own thoughts influenced by the church regarding same-sex attraction. Then Prop 8 happened and that compelled me to think deeper about the issue. Around the same time I listened to the podcast John Dehlin did with Carol Lynn Pearson and from there, my views have evolved. 


At the conference, I met and conversed with many openly gay people and for the first time I saw them for who they have always been: Just normal men and women, trying to lead normal, happy lives. They were no different than I. It is not that I expected warts or horns. I was not expecting anything really, but for the first time my heart opened up as I listened to their own Mormon stories. I saw pain and sorrow and then I saw relief. Relief of finally being accepted by a group who all have a common denominator in Mormonism. 


I loved our conference and I love the people who were there. More to come in the following days, but for now I am exhausted. Exhausted and utterly fulfilled.

If Given An Ear

I recently was asked if I were able to have the ear of some General Authority, what would I say or ask them: Simply put, my response was:


Personally, I do not care about women receiving the priesthood because I no longer believe in its power, but it would be refreshing to see women involved in higher decision making processes, instead of those decisions being based solely on the 1960's male tradition of running things. Seeing some female representation would be huge for me.


I would also love to see The Church go back to basics with Christ's message. I do not like seeing such a rich and powerful church use its resources for things other than to relieve human suffering. So much good could be done for God's children around the world if those resources were spent on them rather than on the infrastructure of the church. 

Crunching Numbers

The data I used for this calculation comes straight from the Church's website.

Here's a couple of interesting things to note:


Membership                                                14,131,467
Value of Humanitarian Aide Since 1985       $1.3 Billion

So lets do some math:

1,300,000,000 / 25 years of humanitarian aid = $52,000,00/year.


$52,000,000 / 14,131,467 members = $3.67/member/year of what is contributed from their tithing to humanitarian aid


Things to consider: What the Church has contributed to humanitarian aid each year regarding to the actual membership of that year.


Other things to consider: 25,000 people die EACH DAY (both adults and children) due to hunger.


And on a different note: 2 new temples are to be built in the Republic of Congo and South Africa. 


...and THIS is why I can't leave it alone.

After This Life

I found a cheap airfare I could not pass up on, and decided to take a late-summer trip out to Utah to visit my family. We do not have a good sense on what Dad's time frame is, so it is my desire for my children to get to know and create their own memories of Grandpapa.


As with every trip, I have an agenda. My time out there was shorter than I normally plan when I go, so I crammed a lot of stuff into the ten days I was there. After being home a week, I am still trying to catch my breath.


On the top of my list were plans to meet-up with a married couple with whom Brother NotSo and I met through Mormon Stories. Brother NotSo and I quite like and respect both of them. I had a wonderful time meeting them and listening to their insight on certain church topics. I feel like a sponge these days, wanting to soak up the thoughts of those who have wrestled with the complexities of life before me.


One of the topics I brought up and we discussed was the afterlife. I am in such need of an afterlife, that any thoughts people have on it, I want to hear. It weighs so heavily on me that this life is it. That once we take our last breath, whether prepared or not, that that is the complete end of our existence. No afterlife. Nothing. Just bones in the ground and memories to be passed on only to dissolve when the carriers of those memories pass on too.


I once believed in eternal life, but when you go through the process of reevaluating your beliefs, you end up questioning EVERYTHING. I can say now, I am less than 50% sure there is an afterlife. I mean, sure. I hear stories of people coming back from the dead and having out-of-body experiences, I just wonder and I am now skeptical if there is not some other explanation for those events.


So why am I so desirous to know if there is an afterlife? After talking to my Mo'Sto' friends and digesting my thoughts, I have realized why I fear the nonexistence of eternal life. 


I do not want "this" to be it. I have spent my whole adult life pretty much in a constant state of mediocrity and suckitude. Depression, bad habits, and laziness have been the bane of my adult life, weighing down the potential I have to be a kick-ass human. There have been times in my life I have been so low, I would rather be dead than continue to live the rest of my life feeling so low and so helpless. The points in my life of feeling a sense of accomplishment have been few and far between.


My need for eternal life is wanting to have a do-over. If I can just make it through this life, my next life will be better and easier. I won't feel so damn tired all the time. I will have the energy to do the things I want to do. Hell, I will have all eternity to get my to-do list checked off. If I can just wait this life out, if I can keep chugging along in my mediocrity then there is no need to fight to overcome my demons, and then I will have my reward. 


More thoughts to come later...