Itsy Bitsy Yellow Polka-dot Bikini

Have you guys seen this evolution of the swimsuit video yet? It's been bombarding my facebook news feed for a while, mostly by people I know/knew from church. I understand why this would be a huge hit in the LDS community; we love when "science" catches up to things we have been teaching in the church, like when scientists figured out in the 60's (at least I think it was the 60's) that tobacco is really bad for you after the Word of Wisdom (the part of LDS doctrine that tells us tobacco, alchohol, coffee, etc. is bad for us)  had been a thing for more than 100 years. This time, instead of confirming the Word of Wisdom, "science" has apparently confirmed the importance of "modesty."

For those of you who have not seen the video yet, Jessica Rey, who is an investor (I think) for a "modest" line of  swimsuits, describes the history of the bikini and her "repentance story" as a former bikini wearer. She, then, explains a study in which men were shown pictures of women wearing bikinis while hooked up to equipment that would measure their brain activity. Alarmingly, after seeing these pictures, the part of the brain that utilizes tools lit up, but the part of the brain that deals with figuring out motivation, etc. of other people, like the women in the bikinis, in some of the men did not. This means that the men were thinking of the women as tools for pleasure (ooh she is so hot! I wonder what it would be like to do x,y, or z  thing to her. I bet it would feel soo good) instead of as humans with motivations and feelings (hmm..she's apparently been working out and is proud of her ab muscles). This proves that wearing bikini's dehumanizes you, and if you continue to wear them, than you can't hold that one man responsible for thinking dirty things about you, or sexually harassing (or full-on assaulting) you.

What does this say about a LDS missionary serving abroad in an area where women do not normally dress "modestly"? Does that make him entitled to seeing the woman he should be serving as tools? How about to touch them inappropriately? Absolutely not. We expect our missionaries (and all of the priesthood holders within the church) to see these women as precious daughters of our Heavenly Father and to treat them with respect!

The argument that men's thoughts and actions are completely dependent on what women wear also contradicts the doctrine of free agency. All children of Heavenly Father, including the male ones, are designed to be very capable of making their own choices, independently of what other people around them have chosen, and all of us including men will be held accountable for their choices. I strongly believe that this includes the choice of a man to lust after, harass, or assault one of His daughters, regardless of what she is wearing.

In a facebook comment feed on a former teachers post (yes, I am friends on facebook with a few of my teachers from college and I think even one from high school), she referred to an old definition of modesty, "freedom from vanity." In this perspective, modesty is no longer limited to scantily dress, or even really to sexual attention seeking behaviors in general. By this definition, gossiping about the woman who showed up to church with tattoos and a mini-skirt is immodest, because it suggests that the gossiper has excessive pride in his/her attire.

Instead of teaching our youth (boys too) that modesty is about protecting men from a woman's scant dress, we should teach them that modesty is about respect. Girls who have respect for themselves don't feel the need to inflate their pride, to put others down to make themselves feel better, or to dress or behave in a way to get lustful attention from men; Women who respect men will treat them like men, not like animals who are incapable of self-control. Men who respect themselves will not need to assert their power and sexual prowl to prove their manliness, and men who respect women will behave like a gentlemen regardless of attire or appearance.

Good Men

Happy Father's Day everyone!

but most especially to my daddy. Isn't he so handsome? He's also insanely intelligent, and handy, and I love him

Once on the internet, I happened upon a comic which featured an LDS man looking bewildered and describing his experience at an LDS broadcast (for my non LDS readers, the prophet/apostles/other general leaders of the church put on broadcasts for various occasions.) I really wish that  I could find this comic again, because it's much funnier than my attempts to explain it, but I can't. Not even google could help. The man was amazed to hear the speaker tell the congregation how pleased the Lord was with their work, and how much the Lord loved them, etc. He then realized that he had accidentally ended up in the Relief Society (women's) broadcast.

I keep running into the "women are more righteous, compassionate, responsible, or other wise generally better" stereotype. I'm not sure if it's just a Mormon culture thing; it shows up in sitcoms featuring bumbling idiots who would probably be in a ditch somewhere without their smoking hot, intelligent wives constantly bailing them out from their stupidity. After several conversations with my other married friends, I have determined a list of things that our good men are much better at than we are. 

1. Good men forgive much quicker than we do. 
2. Good men are much more willing to drop everything to serve or comfort us
3. Good men are better at looking at the big picture and putting everything in the proper prospective 
4. Good men don't panic nearly as much
5. Good men are not nearly as judgmental, and are never catty 
6. Good men are often more genuinely kind 

Mr. Bacon specifically is much better at gardening, philosophizing, fixing things (not just car things but most things), not complaining, and being a good worker, and I could go on for a while. I'm very grateful to have such a wonderful man by my side and that my children are going to have such a wonderful father.   

Also Mr. Bacon is incredibly handsome, funny, and keeps my life very entertaining

Denim Crafts: Baby Skirt

Babies change everything (except their own diapers- Mr. Bacon).

Now, before you people get all excited, I am still not pregnant. Yes, my pinterest will sometimes flood with baby/parenting related things, but that is because I am obsessed with babies, and has nothing to do with the vacancy status of my uterus. Please stop telling other people that you heard from someone that I am pregnant, or asking me when I'm going to start popping out children, or hinting that I should start popping them out now that I am done with school. Frankly, not only is it none of your business and annoying, but it also makes the part of me that is insane enough to want to have a baby right now want to cry. 

On a happier note, one of my best friends was recently blessed with a little baby girl. Aren't they beautiful?

Learning how to share her mother has been difficult, but this little princess being here is so worth it. One of my favorite perks is that I now have an excuse to make adorable baby things like this little skirt 

I started off with an old pair of jeans that I've had since high school. I liked the overall fit, but didn't wear them very much. Normally, denim and sewing machines do not get along well, but this denim was really thin and stretchy, so it happened to work okay.

I already knew that I wanted to make capris out of the jeans for summer wear, since my only non-work capris had an unfortunate mishap with bleach a week or so before this. I measured out what I wanted for the capris and chopped the bottoms off, and made my capris. I was going to make these adorable denim baby bibs from the bottom flairs, but having spent my allotted "fun money" for the month and not having adequate fabric to use for the project, I decided to try to make a variation of a circle skirt using the flair as a circle. 

Denim frays so I created a "hem" around the top part of the skirt. I then folded over the hem again and sewed a casing for the elastic, threaded the elastic through, tied it off, and sewed the casing closed. (Sorry, these steps don't have pictures. I don't remember if my camera was not cooperating or just M.I.A. There are  plenty of tutorials on how to make an elastic casing, like here). 

As you can see in the picture, the bottom of my jeans were frayed from when I actually wore them. I didn't want the bottom of my skirt to be already damaged, so I trimmed those off and re-hemmed them. I found the precious white lace on the bottom of the skirt at Wal-Mart and I stitched that on after the new hem was on, mostly because the lace is adorable, but also partially because I wanted to hide the stitching from making the new hem. 

The new skirt was given to dad at church because mom and baby were out of town, so I don't have any pictures of the princess wearing her skirt yet, but I will be sure to update as soon as I do! 

Why I Will Never Be a Celebrity

So, Mr. Bacon and I stopped by a Wal Mart on our way home from a temple trip last night. I saw this at the checkout line

Seriously Star Magazine? 

I have enough faith in humanity to be confident enough to believe that I am not the only person who finds this disgusting, so I have to ask, how does this even get published?

or all of these magazines that are literally fat shaming a pregnant woman,  even if it is annoying Kim Kardashian. Also, I think Kim looks pretty good in the picture on the right and decent in the one in the middle, so they're fat shaming a pregnant woman who doesn't really look that fat. 

This gets published because enough people are interested in bashing famous people so they  can feel better about themselves that this is profitable.

 While, I am not a mom, I know a lot of wonderful mothers who have shown me that motherhood is really hard and that no mother will ever be perfect. Yes, motherhood is fattening. Motherhood is exhausting. Good mothers will lose patience with their children, or not get their child to bed timely, or feed their children junk food sometimes, and the list goes on. Do you love your children? Are you exploiting your children for money? Do you abuse or neglect them? Do you let your husband/boyfriend abuse or neglect them? Would you put the needs of your child above yours? Would you do everything in your power to ensure that they are happy successful adults? These celebrities probably have the same fears and hopes that you do as mothers themselves, and frankly, even if they are scum the only people who need to know are Child Protective Services and the other appropriate law enforcement, not anyone who ever shops at a grocery store. 

Adventures in Sewing: Dress to Skirt with Shirred Waist

So, I happened upon a shirring/smocking tutorial while messing around on pinterest, and while browsing the blog, I happened upon a tutorial to turn a maxi-dress into a maxi skirt with a shirred waistband. It looked easy enough and I have a few dresses that have a cute print, but don't fit well up top. I was feeling particularly brave this morning and pulled out this dress

Pardon my un-made bed

I found this dress at a Ross back in high school and bought it one year for Easter. I have a lot of good memories in this dress (including wearing it to my high school and college graduations), and some sad feelings about the potential of ruining it, but the 15ish pounds I gained during college (a fair amount of which went into my chest) were having a hard time fitting into the bodice, and the skirt is just a smidge too short. I hoped that by taking the top off, I could keep this fun springy pattern and the adorable lace on the bottom for a few more years. First thing I did was remove the zipper with my seam ripper

I then used the seam ripper to take the bodice off. Just cutting it off would have been quite a bit quicker, but I wanted to keep as much of the length on the skirt as possible. I then pinned the opening from the zipper shut made a quick seam to close it off.

Now that I had a tube of fabric I pinned down the top at half an inch (like the tutorial said) and sewed it down to make a casing for elastic. This took a while because I haven't mastered sewing in a strait line yet. If you are new to sewing and trying this out, I would recommend a slightly larger casing. I will explain later.

I then shirred a waist band starting right below the casing. I'd show you a picture, but my camera spazzed out, and I couldn't get a clear one. The link with the tutorial has some pretty good pictures of this step. 

A quick note with shirring, after longer than I would like to admit of my sewing machine not cooperating with the elastic thread, I ran some google searches and found that only the bobbin should have elastic thread on it. Use regular thread for the top part of the stitch. I somehow missed that in the shirring tutorial.

The last step of the skirt is to thread 1/8 inch elastic through the casing and then stitch it shut. Remember that whole not mastered sewing in a strait line thing? I sewed the casing too narrow and was not able to thread the elastic through it. This could have been avoided if I had made the casing a little wider than 1/2 inch, which is what I will probably do next time. This is probably a sewing no-no of sorts, but I ended up zig zag stitching over the stretched out elastic on the inside of my skirt. The gathering effect on the outside is still the same, but the inside is not as pretty. Here are some pictures of the finished skirt. 

This is what the shirring looked like on the inside of the skirt

What the waistband looks like from the outside of the skirt

the skirt not tucked in 

 I know the shirt doesn't look so good tucked in, but I wanted to show you how the waistband looked on. Also, please ignore the messy bedroom in the background. 

Overall, I am happy about how my skirt turned out. Because I can wear the skirt down lower, I get a little bit more length at the bottom, and the shirred waistband is comfortable around my stomach at it's current size. The elastic has enough give that I will probably be able to continue wearing this skirt for a little while, but the skirt is too small to pull up over my hips, so I have to put it on over my head, and if my chest gets any bigger, I won't be able to get it on that way either. This would be preventable by making sure that the unshirred waist will fit over your hips before shirring it. I'm not sure how much shirring will take the waistband in (like if I started with a size medium dress if it would fit better or if it would be too big), but this is definitely something I would like to continue in the future

The Dirt on Laundry Soap Round 2: Soapnuts

 My very dear (and insanely wise, and talented, and I could go on forever) friend, Mandy from the Wandering Interrobang left a comment on my last post about Zote Soap about soap nuts. I was not aware that this was even a thing. My homemade laundry detergent started off as a quest to save money, but I know many of you are interested in eliminating toxic products from your homes and using more environmentally friendly alternatives, and soap nuts may be the way to go for you. The vast amount of information about them is very confusing, so Mandy has graciously agreed to explain them for us (and be my first guest post!). 

My wonderful (beautiful, kind, wicked smart) friend Mrs. Bacon has asked me to elaborate on a comment I made on her most recent posting about home made laundry detergent. Basically, I said “I don't use detergent, I use the much cheaper and non-animal-fat-containing soapnuts.” I have been using them for years, and I sometimes forget not everyone knows that they are a thing.
Soapnuts (or soap berries) are a type of fruit that grows on a tree. They are kind of like a cherry in that they are fleshy fruit around a small hard pit.

Where they differ from cherries is that they are not an eating fruit. Their juice is almost pure saponin (the part of soap that does the cleaning). They have been used for centuries as a natural cleanser for clothing and bodies. They mainly come in two different species, Sapundus mukorossi and Sapundus trifoliatus. I've used both and had both work well.

When purchased, they will be dry. This is okay, even though I said it was the juice that has the soap. Like a dried cherry has concentrated sugars, a dried soapnut has concentrated saponin. Some places put value on selling whole berries, but pieces works simply fine. They will have a vinegar smell in the box or bag, but will not transfer this smell to your clothing.

One word of warning here, however. Try not to put a soapnut seed through the wash. They are intensely black in color and may mark your clothing. Fortunately, reputable sellers will have removed them before packaging. Soapnuts are sold by weight, and since the seeds don't help in the washing, they would only serve to beef up the shipping weight. Some may remain here or there, but I've never had more than two in a large bag.
Using them is simple. Place about 4-5 berries in a permeable bag, and toss it in with your laundry. Wash as usual. That's it. Most ship with a small muslin bag, though I use a bigger mesh one as it is easier to locate and remove from the washer.

4 berries should do up to five loads. After each load, pull the bag and rub one of the berries. If it is slippery/soapy feeling, or produces small amounts of suds, they are good for another load. When spent, you can compost them, or just throw them away.

I have been using these for years now, and I would NEVER go back to chemical-y detergent. I have a pretty severe skin allergy to most perfumes and dyes, and soapnuts are great for people with sensitive skin, in particular infants.
If purchased in bulk, the cost is only about 12 cents per load. Putting all those things together, I really never recommend anything else. I love them and use them every time I do laundry. My experiments on using them for dish detergent are not going so well, but I digress.
I kind of hate to recommend a place to buy them, but there are a lot of scammers out there. I personally buy from NaturOli, as they have proven to be consistently less expensive, and yet higher in quality than anywhere else we have found.
Wherever you get your soapnuts, I hope that you will find them as hassle free and inexpensive as I have.

The Dirt on Laundry Soap

Around a year ago, I saw a post from my sister-in-law about homemade laundry detergent, raving about how wonderful it is and how much money she was saving. Saving lots of money? That's something I should be doing! I clicked on the link, and was so surprised by how easy was to make. This discovery has launched my decision to be Sham-free (the trend is also referred to as "No Poo" but that name makes Mr. Bacon uncomfortable) along with my adventures with homemade cleaning products.

A few months ago, I was walking around the small grocery store in town looking for more fels naptha soap   to make more detergent, and could only find this octagon soap instead. This should be an adequate substitute. Laundry soap is laundry soap right? WRONG! Octagon soap is an all-purpose soap that advertises use for laundry purposes, but is not close to being a satisfactory substitute for fels naptha. It smells weird, made the laundry detergent chunky (later research indicated the chunkiness was a result of me using too much in the recipe, but it still didn't get my clothes clean enough), and made my whites dingy.

After using up all of the octagon detergent, I went to Wal-Mart intending to get more fels naptha, but ended up finding  Zote laundry soap (the pink variety).

Pardon the blurry pictures my camera was having issues

The bar was considerably bigger than the fels naptha bar and less than half the cost, so I decided that it was worth a shot. According to the internet, 

• No one is really sure what exactly goes into a fels naptha bar. Zote is made from coconut oil and tarrow (which is a product that comes from cows somehow), and is scented with citronella (which I think smells good). Neither one of these soaps are acceptable for vegans or the extreme environmentalist types
• Not Quite Homemade determined that Zote is an acceptable substitute for fels naptha soap in laundry detergent. She recommends using 1/3 bar in a batch the same size as what I usually make. This means that in theory you can interchange 1/3 bar zote to 1/3 bar fels naptha. The amount of other ingredients that Not Quite Homemade and the Family Homestead are the same, but the Family Homestead uses more water. 

I went ahead and made a half batch of the recipe using the Not Quite Homemade method because I don't have a 2 gallon bucket and the half batch fits nicely into my old laundry jug.

When I went to use my detergent, I was surprised by how solidly the detergent had gelled. I have to shake up the detergent before use to break up the chunks, but the zote soap gets my clothes clean and smelling nice. Not Quite Homemade suggests that if the detergent comes out to solid, to use less soap, but I think I am just going to add more water next time I make it. As you can see in the picture below, the letters on the zote bar work well to determine about how much soap is 1/6 (if you are doing a half batch) bar. Use a kitchen knife to cut between the letters, before the z and after the e and that will divide the soap into sixths. 

Zote soap is very soft which makes it easy to cut and grate, just make sure to clean your knife and grater well before using again for food. Overall, I like it better to fels naptha and will probably continue to use it for my detergent. 

"Empty Words"

Update: A friend kindly reminded me (I wish I was as good at the whole "having tact" thing that she does) that this post could be offensive to people who struggle with depression for reasons other than having a bad attitude (Confession: Every so often I get into funks because my attitude needs regular tuning.) Many people struggle with depression because of trauma or chemical imbalances in the brain, and just trying to be happy isn't always an option. There is no shame in seeking medical attention or other forms of help if you need it. If you end up in the position I was in when this was written, here is probably a better place to go then reading this post. 

The other day, I saw a friend post a video on his facebook wall, asking for people to watch it and pay close attention to the text in the video because he needed help with something and was not sure how else to ask. I kept scrolling because I am a terrible person I had other things that I needed to get done. A few other people had already commented on the post, so I assumed that other people were already taking care of it.

Today, the same friend posts the same video, clearly upset that he did not get the help he needed, just "empty words." I watched the video (here). My friend admitted on facebook that he has been struggling with depression, is not sure how much more he can handle, and that he needs help, which is actually really brave on his part.

How do you help someone who's struggling like this? I can't just snap my fingers and magically take the pain away. I left a comment offering some empty words encouragement, but I can't force him to be encouraged by what I, or any one else, has to tell him. I can't force him to stop listening to whatever horrible voice in his head is telling him that he is not enough. I can't force him force him to stay motivated to beat this. All I can give him are my words and whatever time he wants me to listen to him. That's it. He has to chose to feel encouraged, to stay motivated, to ignore whatever is inside his head that tells him he can't beat this. He has to beat this himself because he wants to choose to be happy, even though life is going to be hard sometimes.

But, that's one of the most awesome parts of life. That you can choose to be happy, even though life is going to be hard. I can't force my friend to be happy, but I can't force him to be sad or angry or afraid either. That's entirely up to him. Try to imagine how awful life would be for everyone if happiness only occurred once you had x amount of dollars, looked like y,  had a companion with z traits, and you never had to do any thing unpleasant or frustrating ever. No one would ever be happy because obtaining all of those things is impossible. Isn't it so empowering that your happiness is controlled by you and not what's going on around you?

For those who are struggling with depression, know that you are loved, that you are strong, and that you can beat it. Know that there is no shame in asking for help. Please, let yourselves be encouraged by the words that everyone else to offer, because that's all they have to offer you.

For those of you who love someone who is struggling with depression, know that it is not your fault. Accept that you cannot take all of their problems away. Lift your loved ones up, but do not let them bring you down. If they refuse to be uplifted, that is their fault and not yours. Know that only they are capable of beating their depression, and that any promised change that is based off of your wishes and not theirs, will not be lasting.

For those of you who are scumbags think that it is cute to pretend to have depression for attention, it's not cute and you need to stop it. Yes, it is tempting to use your tears, your cuts, or threats of  throwing away or taking your life to get what you want, but that is manipulative and emotionally abusive and not how you should treat people that you want to have meaningful relationships with. Being lonely is not fun. I understand that better than most people would think, but in the long run, this behavior will leave you more lonely then you are now and cost you some very precious relationships. If the only thing keeping someone from leaving your life is fear or guilt, you should let them go, and make room for someone else who will actually love (the friendly kind, not necessarily, but maybe romantic kind) you.

I recognize that my words aren't always affective. here are someone else's, Dieter F. Uctorf to be exact, words for you are in a dark place in  your life. I hope that somewhere, you find words that are helpful for you.

Jes

Anyone else think that the whole Mike Jeffries thing is getting a bit old? Yes, what he said was obnoxious and completely uncalled for, but he's the CEO of Abercrombie and Fitch. Who is actually surprised that he thinks that way? 

The public reaction has been to attack Jeffries' appearance, which is a bit hypocritcal. Think about it. The public is angry because Jeffries is attacking people for  how they look, but it's ok for the general public to turn around attack him for his looks.( My friend Mandy, from The Wandering Interrobang, has a really insightful post about that here). Then there is that one guy has been buying Abercrombie and Fitch in thrift stores and handing them out to homeless people. 

Jes, from the Militant Baker, decided to take this nonsense to and use it to make a point about body image. She got a really talented photographer, a male model, and got to work. The results (here but be cautious, these pictures are intended to be sexual) are stunning. This girl, who is about a size 22, radiates with confidence and is absolutely beautiful. She uses the contrast with the male model, who could fit in among the "cool kids" to make a point. "Fat" girls can be sexy and desirable too. 

Mr. Bacon got me into the habit of reading comments, and I was rather disgusted with the number of people who chastised Jes for encouraging women to be unhealthy. Really people? Yes, people who are overweight are at higher risk for heart problems, etc., but WEIGHT IS NOT AN INDICATOR OF HEALTH. Some women eat right, exercise regularly, and have otherwise healthy vitals, but still cannot lose weight. I did look around at some of Jes' other posts, and it's fair to assume that she's pretty active. I also think that it is a huge double standard that these people do not chastise thin models for encouraging women to be unhealthy. Someone please explain to me how the "I'm bigger than a size 2, which makes me fat and undesirable" mindset is emotionally healthier than confidence? Also, is anyone aware of what those girls do to themselves to stay that thin? How is that healthier than Jes? Health issues that are related to being under/overweight aside, what's wrong with loving your body? Isn't that what will encourage healthy choices to better take care of it? Think about it. 

Homemade Wheat Thins/Parchment Paper v. Aluminum Foil

It's after 11 o clock at night, and I'm hungry. I made brownie in a cup for Mr. Bacon* but after devouring a chocolate bar,  I decided that I should probably not be eating more sugar (sigh). I looked around my pantry and fridge and noted some leftover avocado sauce that I could use as a dip, but that I had nothing to eat it with. I had been eyeing a pin on my recipe board for homemade wheat thins. The picture looked absolutely perfect for what I needed. I had all of the ingredients and they only need 10 minutes in the oven. Awesome! I mix everything together, open the drawer to pull out the parchment paper, and.... 

I'm out of parchment paper. Figures.... After the day I've had today, of course there is no parchment paper. I'm still hungry and the "dough" is just sitting on the counter. After a quick google search, which said that I could use aluminum foil instead as long as I made modifications to the oven temperature and cooking time to prevent burning. I lowered the temperature to 375 from 400 degrees and baked for the normal time. 

When I pulled them out of the oven they looked alright, but the cracker crumbled after I picked it up. It tasted burnt by itself. I tried it with the avocado sauce and it broke. The burnt was still present even in the avocado sauce. Shame... So, no crackers and dip for me, I'm still hungry. Also, aluminum foil does not always work as a substitute for parchment paper.