A House of Order

Sandy Reddish divides her time between being a military wife to a solider who is deployed, part-time speech language pathologist, and a mother of three wild children. New to the world of blogging, she writes in spurts from the insane trenches of temporary single parenthood… The pristine corridors of the temple feel therapeutic as I tiptoe to [...]

La Leche à la Hong Kong

No one warned me that we’d be hiking all day long, trekking under full blown summer sun on Lantau island, running low on water, dehydrated, sluggish, in need of shade and a toilet. Had I known all this beforehand, of course I would have carried several water bottles for myself and several clothes changes and [...]

The ‘R’ is silent

a much younger me As a firstborn, Daddy’s girl and still a bit of a tomboy, I now applaud my parents’ ability to create a girl’s name out of my father’s: Dale. But it wasn’t always so. My face still flushes when I recall how in jr. high school I would boldly scrawl “Niki King” [...]

Waiting on the Lord

Teasing, my husband called it graffiti from a religious fanatic. But I loved the scripture painted over my kitchen table: “They that wait upon the Lord shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings as eagles; they shall run and not be weary; and they shall walk and not faint.” Isaiah 40:31 How [...]

A Matter of Perspective

This week, I spent nearly a full day by Mum’s bedside in hospital. Her pain was neon intense, as unstoppable as a meteor, and anxiety framed her face more starkly than her sweat slick hair and oxygen tubing. At one point just before her CT scan she gripped my arm so tightly my hand turned [...]

Abundance

When the economy crashed in 2008 I had no idea that my husband and I would still be struggling financially nearly three years later. My husband is an entrepreneur/real estate developer, so we’ve been especially hard hit by the recession. While my husband tolerates financial risk and uncertainty quite well—he’s an entrepreneur, after all—I crave [...]

A Common Thread

Julia M.L.Whitehead has used writing as life’s therapy ever since she popped her first pimple and didn’t make cuts for the junior high cheer squad. She joined journalism instead! High school English from a poetry pusher helped sprout a hobby that still sees the occasional blossom. With college came a degree in ELED and a [...]

Buyer Be Noir

Buyer Be Noir By Linda Hoffman Kimball It was a dark and stormy afternoon. The Massachusetts air hung low and dense, tinged with the scent of the sea and punctuated occasionally by the brutal screams of sea gulls. Thunder rolled and the wipers beat, beat, beat their ominous tattoo on my rental car’s windshield. [...]

Book Club Discussion: Room by Emma Donoghue

First, my apologies! Even though this is completely embarrassing to admit, yesterday (Thursday, the day we were supposed to discuss this novel) I spent the entire day thinking it was Wednesday. I’m blaming it on the end of the school year. So forgive me for not having this discussion up and ready to go. Now, [...]

The Fear of God

The slate of speakers for sacrament meeting that Sunday consisted of four formerly inactive members (one teenager and three adults) who had recently started coming back to church. Jake*, periodically wiping at his eyes with the back of his hand, recounted with a touch of awe the experience of receiving the priesthood as a sixteen-year-old. [...]

Vice and Contempt

From Alexander Pope, and often quoted by my grandmother: “Vice is a monster of so frightful mien, As to be hated needs but to be seen; Yet seen too oft, familiar with her face, we first endure, then pity, then embrace.” The point of the verse is that we can become too familiar with evil, [...]

Typical

Today’s guest post comes from Karin Brown. Karin is a stay-at-home mom to three girls and two boys, ages ten years to ten months, who consistently keep her on her toes. She is an active volunteer at her children’s elementary school and enjoys collecting re-tellings of fairy tales, specifically Cinderella and Beauty and the Beast. [...]

Stuck Like Glue

I can’t recall what was said or why we had a “discussion.” I just remember it rattled me, and quick as lightning I was on the defensive. I huffed around, hot and bothered by a handful of tossed out words. I tugged on my running shoes and whisked out the door, hoping to run my [...]

Book Club Reminder: Room by Emma Donoghue Next Thursday

Segullah’s book club will be discussing Room by Emma Donoghue next Thursday, May 19th. It’s a relatively quick read, so if you can get your hands on a copy you still have time to finish the novel and join us. Below you’ll find a quick plot summary, borrowed from Amazon.com. I’ve also included a few [...]

It’s Coming…

Friends, the Summer Break is almost upon us. Swimming pools, lazy mornings, popsicles, anytime cuddles, late breakfasts, and warm nights are just around the corner. And like an evil twin follows messy bedrooms, bored kids, days upon unscheduled days, and endless bickering. I am caught somewhere between counting down the minutes until we are free [...]

Moments

Today’s guest post comes from Cami Kesler. Cami is married to her college sweetheart and is the mother of three sweet girls and owner of a poodle named Nancy. She works part-time as a labor and delivery nurse and loves running, quilting, sporadic/intense reading, journaling, blogging, and eating chips and salsa morning, noon, or night. [...]

Pot Luck?

A few years ago, my sister went to church at a singles ward where they had a potluck every Sunday. Some weeks they called it “Break the Fast,” and other weeks it was a “Linger Longer” but the basic concept was the same. The girls plugged their crockpots in the kitchen before sacrament meeting, the [...]

Dear Mother’s Day

Today’s guest post comes from Sarah d’Evegnee, who has her MA in Literary Criticism from BYU and has taught English at BYU, UVU, and is currently an adjunct faculty member at BYU-Idaho. She is also a mother. When her two worlds inadvertently collide, she quotes Sesame Street in the classroom and deconstructs Dr Suess as [...]

Final Whitney Votes

Whitney award winners will be announced tonight! A month ago, we (Shelah, Mara, and Emily M.) listed a few of our Whitney favorites. You can read that post in its entirety here, but this is a quick summary of our favorites from it: For Best Novel: Wolves, Boys, and Other Things that Might Kill Me, [...]

Recipes and Remembrances

This afternoon I made two dinners to bring to a hoping-to-have-her-baby-any-day/hour/minute-now woman in our ward. Her two-year-old daughter is allergic to eggs, cheese, and peanuts, so I dug around in my recipe box for a while before settling on teriyaki chicken and rice and chicken pot pie. After putting my one-year-old down for his [...]

Oh snap, I’m turning into my mother!

I’ve always joked that one of my talents is sleeping. I can fall asleep at any time, any place as long as I’ve got a decent pillow. Until lately that is. My long hair has been wrapping around my neck at night and making me sweat up a storm now that our Texas temperatures have [...]

It Was Good

Night begins to encroach upon the edges of my windows, and the slackening sun is orange and dull, but the front room is illuminated in its entire Lego-spilled splendor. And I am searching for a pacifier for the baby. He is clean and warm, in fresh jammies—extra soft from hand-me-down wear and the recent dryer—and [...]

Piano for me too

I’ve always wanted to be able to play piano, and what I imagine playing are hymns. It’s not just that I was once called to be primary pianist (true story) on the assumption that the wife of such a musically intense man must surely must be competent at the piano. (On further information, the call [...]

Let’s give it up for…

Mother-in-Laws! That’s right! I know, I know. Media images fill our psyches with images of the Marie Barones of the world. But hey, they gave birth to our husbands, right?

Mothers and Daughters

Today’s guest post comes from Amira, who has lived, worked, traveled, and studied around the Muslim world. Visiting the Great Mosque of Djenne or the Registan of Uzbekistan sounds much more enticing than seeing the Louvre or the Colosseum. Fortunately her husband agrees and they have happily lived together in the Middle East and Central Asia. [...]