My husband spent the first decade of our marriage traveling a lot. He was off seeing the world, climbing the Great Wall of China, flying over erupting volcanoes, scuba diving with tribal chiefs (oh, and going to boring meetings and stuff, too, but whatever), and I was home pondering if I could get away with ordering pizza four nights in a row.

I follow a familiar pattern: I pick up a Martha Stewart magazine at the grocery store (usually the Halloween issue. I love that holiday and nobody knows their tricks and treats like Martha); I like what I see so I subscribe. Then for 12 months I am blessed to behold Martha and her perfect lifestyle. Picture after picture of her lovely peony gardens, her jawdroppingly clean and organized laundry room (no clothes in sight. Imagine that!), her handcrafted vases made entirely of sandollars and starfish. After a while I can only roll my eyes at Martha. Her endless tales of parties and gardens and decorating really get on my nerves. People actually write questions asking Martha about when to flip their mattresses and how to properly store their masking tape. “Get a life Martha, ” I think to myself.

My great-grandmother, Mary Leona Johnson Jolley, was born in 1888. She lived to be 95 years old, and although she died when I was only eleven, I remember her well. She was a mother of nine from a small town in southern Utah, and even without the benefit of much formal education she was formidably intelligent: a poet, a thinker, a writer and a reader. By the time I knew her she had written probably thousands of poems, studied hundreds of subjects, and penned a number of personal histories. If she’d been born in 1988 instead of 1888, she’d probably be one of the next generation of Segullah women.

My husband just spent two consecutive weekends, six days total, away, for Scout-related bishopric training. I was dreading it. I have a hard time motivating myself to do anything when he’s not around. Make dinner? Chicken nuggets sound good. Clean? Meh, he’s not coming home anytime soon, so I can save it up and have one great cleaning blitz just before he gets here. Or I can leave it and play the martyr even more. The internet beckons, with its endless pointless ways to fill my time and the empty space. And I miss him.

Have you met my friend Lois yet? Lois, not her real name, and I go way back. (Maybe someday I’ll tell you.) She blogs at Lois Common Denominator. If I had to describe her with a few brief details (in addition to the fact that she is hysterically funny), I’d probably tell you about how on her blog she calls her children by the names she wanted to name them and about that time she made me Bacon Chocolate Chip Cookies. Today’s guest post is a little something I compiled from her earlier work. It’s about her equally entertaining mother, Dot. Thanks Lois!–Dalene

This is a favorite family story. I wasn’t there when this happened, so hopefully I have all the details correct:

Late one night, my parents, Dot and Ardale, were sound asleep. A loud KNOCK, KNOCK, KNOCK came to the door. Dot and Ardale cautiously opened the door to find police officers on the porch asking if they were OK. My parents said that they were all right and asked the police what this was about. The police replied that they had received a 911 call from this address and were here to check it out. Neither Dot nor Ardale had called.

“Is there anyone else in the house?” asked the police officer.

Hey Segullah Blog readers, it’s me, Heather H. Not the witty and ever-present Heather O., nor the poetically gifted Heather B. But me, the I-used-to-blog-about-once-a-month editorial staff member who has been scarce as of late due to a beautiful new baby. Do you remember me? Have you missed me?

Here’s my most recent motherhood faux pas (okay, the most recent one was ten minutes ago, but it wasn’t good enough to blog about):

Two weeks ago my first grader brought home a note saying his class would be dismissed two hours early the following Monday and Tuesday. Crap, I thought. I have enough trouble remembering things on our usual schedule. Throw in a monkey wrench like this, and there’s no telling what might happen.

Talk to me about scripture study.

I need to do it every day more faithfully.

I also need to do about 479,000 other things every day.

The Lord is kind of yelling at me right now in exhortation.

How do you do it?

How do you make it meaningful?

How do you invite the Spirit into your home?

“If you can’t behave yourself then I’m not going to bring you to Costco again!” 

I said these words, which wouldn’t have been such a big deal, except that I was saying them to my mother.  She had already been scolded twice by the Costco sample ladies for trying to grab their food straight out of the microwave.  “But I don’t want to wait for them to cut up the food.  I’m in a hurry,”  she whined.  Even though we both knew we weren’t in a hurry at all.

My mother is a brilliant, opinionated, artistic, spiritual woman.  She also has severe ADHD.

While Deborah was defending her non-book-snob status last week, I was also coming to terms with my own. And I guess here is where I must admit that I’m a bleeding-heart-book-snob. I think there are books filled with nuance and beauty and books that are thinly veiled propaganda abounding in oversimplification and poor writing (and that it’s not all subjective). I also think that juvenile fiction is written for and should probably be enjoyed mostly by juveniles. But hey, sometimes I also think my oldest was sent to this earth only to punish me for some crime (like cutting the heavenly corners) that I committed in the pre-earth-life, so take this all with a camel-sized GRAIN OF SALT.

However, I have nothing against a good escapist read now and again. And Jessica Draper’s “Hunting Gideon” is just that.

Today’s guest post comes to us from Kacy Falconer of the simply fabulous Every Day I Write the Book. Thank you Kacy! We hope you’ll grace us with a few pages from your book again sometime.

My mom was a working mom. She worked every day, made dinner every night, did housework and yard work on Saturdays, and usually had a “big” church calling for Sundays. She did all of this with pretty much no help from her husband or kids (I’m sorry to say.) I never thought about it, wondered “how she did it,” or found it the least bit interesting.

Now that I’m 35 and staying home full time with my four kids, I find myself reading every housekeeping-homemaking-childraising book I can find. I’m obsessed with routines and schedules and systems. I wonder how often other people go shopping, when their kids take naps, and if they shower every day. No one REALLY exercises, right? And planning menus—isn’t that a myth?

Today we have another great guest post from Lori, of Hearts and Hands. Thanks Lori!

Ours was a friendship that, over the years, dissolved into what could be termed as a mere acquaintanceship. I left the neighborhood we both lived in and vowed to return to see Julie as often as I could. She was going to become a real estate agent. Regrettably, I don’t know if she ever got her license.

Through the grapevine, I heard she moved into an apartment across town. I didn’t think of her again until I opened the local newspaper; the story said her young son had been injured in an accident and, after several months, had lost his battle to live.

A little voice told me I should go see Julie, give my condolences, and try to be of support. It wasn’t just the kind of fleeting worry that makes you wonder if you should return home to check and see if the stove is still on — and you do and its not. It was the kind of voice that shouted, “Go home. The house is going to burn down!” But time was short, my life busy.

I ignored the prompting.

I remember when my first was born and the foreign utterance that crossed my lips to my dad, while I was still in the hospital with my new baby.

“Now I know what joy is,” I told him. And he said, that’s right, that’s exactly right.

In Darlene’s beautiful poem, in the latest issue of Segullah (out this month) she makes lots of discoveries about motherhood, and the imagery is ripe and gorgeous. She tells of what she has learned, how she has feared and changed. And truly motherhood has changed us all.

How has it changed you?

And when are you going to subscribe to Segullah the journal already?

Recently, a dear friend confided in me.

“I didn’t like my book club’s book last month. I’m sure it was beautiful and masterful, but it was about abuse and sex and a horrible sad life. It didn’t matter that there was redemption. It was too awful to read. I must not be a very literary person, I guess.”

Mother’s Day is in eight days–can I recommend a gift subscription to Segullah for your mom/wife/friend? Our Spring issue, Roots and Branches, is at the presses now, and it’s wonderful. I am so excited about it. I was trying to be all professional about this announcement, something like “From the stunning cover by Cassandra Barney, to the poignant final essay “Too Late to Say Good-bye,” Roots and Branches is a must-read.” But really, the stiff language there does not convey just how much I love this issue!!!! Look at all those exclamation points! I’m going crazy with them. Here are just a few highlights:

Art by sisters Cassandra Barney and Emily McPhie.

Poetry by Darlene Young, including the poem “Since You Were Born,” which I cannot read without weeping.

Justine’s essay “Names,” about her connection to her maiden name and her grandma, who was a World War II refugee.

The quirky tale of looking too much like her sister, from Lisa Rumsey Harris (winner of our 2006 Heather Campbell Essay Contest).

How did Eve react to her first time of the month? Powerful poem from Elizabeth Cranford.

Julie Smith, from Times and Seasons, discusses why these women in Jesus’ Genealogy.

There’s also Cream of Wheat, exotic Italian men, sheep shearing, famous Mormon opera singers, deep Southern drawls, and all manner of excellent poetry.

You can order a gift subscription here. And as an enticing sample, here’s a link to that amazing poem by Darlene Young.

Happy Mother’s Day!

New: We are also offering a dollar off per issue for the first five people who subscribe and write “Mother’s Day” in the Paypal notes. That’s a year’s subscription for only $12.