My Gay Sister

Over the past ten years since my little sister told me she was gay I have tried to understand what she is going through and help her deal with life. It's a rough road to grow up in an LDS family and have such strong same gender feelings. It's easy to feel evil and depressed. Although she has gotten past that stage in her life, it's still difficult to deal with. Since she is being more open with everyone, I thought I'd share what I've learned in case it can help anyone else relate better to someone in a similar situation. I'm not an expert at all, but at least I'm less clueless than I used to be. (And to those of you that know Heather, she is happy to talk more about it)
As her big sister who has all the answers (ha!) I've gone through different phases of trying to find solutions for her to be happy. Pray and it will go away. Fall in love with a boy and then you can just focus on him. Be single and be happy about it the rest of your life, just like straight people who can't find their match. Really none of those are solutions though because she has tried them all with no success.
When people are straight and single they at least have that hope that someday they will meet the perfect person for them. When you don't want to be in a gay relationship, but that is who you are attracted to, you feel hopeless and alone. It makes friendships difficult too. You want to have close friendships, but not too close that it's unhealthy for you. It's never fun to fall in love with someone you can't be with.
I guess some people are attracted to the same gender and then later are able to have healthy heterosexual relationships, but that isn't always how it works. I read the book, "No More Good-byes" and it talked about a scale from 1-6. People that are a 1 are completely straight, no sexual feelings towards same sex at all. 6 is homosexual. In between are people that are bisexual, or people that have a little more option in choosing gay or straight. If you are a 2 or 3 and want to live a heterosexual lifestyle, it's not that drastic to find someone to fall in love with and make a marriage work. But if you're a 5 or 6, that's just not realistic, as in Heather's case.
There are a lot of strong active people in the church that are gay, but don't act on their feelings. I'm sure it is very difficult, but what do you do when you love God and the church and are gay? Some people can't take it anymore and commit suicide. Even if God commands people to not have same gender relationships, I don't think He sees suicide as a better alternative.
I worry about the youth out there realizing how they feel and struggling to know what to do about it. I hope they will have understanding people to help them feel loved by God and everyone around them.
I'm sure it effects people in different levels of intensity. Heather is a very emotional person who puts so much into the relationships of her life. Being homosexual effects her everyday. I wish I had a solution for Heather. She has told me she knows she needs to live her values to be happy. The conflict comes because she has a value of having her needs met, by being loved and cared about in a relationship with a woman. However, she also has a value of following God and living the gospel.
I know she does all she can to reach out to others feeling the same way and help support them. She is an amazing person who deserves to have a happy life and I hope she finds a way to live all her values, even though right now the path is unclear.

Family time

We have been wanting to do some bike riding together, especially since we live by so many awesome paths. We put Brandon's old bike back together, bought me a bike and even found a nice used trailer for Calvin to cruise behind us in. We are all loving it!

Toilet

Sometimes when things are quiet and I haven't seen Calvin for a while I find him playing with the toilet brush in my bathroom and making a mess. Last night I found him in the bathroom and he didn't have the toilet brush (it was in the garbage can, he must have already finished with it) and for some reason his hair was all wet. I asked him why his hair was wet and he scrubbed his head with his hands and said,"washing hair!"
"How are you washing your hair?" I asked. He started to reach his hands into the toilet to demonstrate. ew! Washing his hair with toilet water??! What will he think of next?

Fill in a caption #3

I really like using photoshop to color my sketches, but I'm pretty new at it so I think these little "fill in the caption" blogs are a fun way to practice. I love hearing what people come up with too. Here are links to the two from the past: #1 #2

Calvin entertainment

These pictures are from when I told Calvin to go get some shorts and he came back with another t-shirt instead. He was really mad at me that I wouldn't help him put it on, and then even more mad at me when he tried to do it himself.

Instead of saying yeah to something Calvin would say "yeah I do", whether the question was Do you want to call Grandma? "yeah I do" or Should we go outside? "yeah I do" Is it green? "yeah, I do"

He'll say sorry to so many things. Like when he doesn't want to eat lunch and I offer him a whole list of things he'll say no to all of them and then say "sowwy" Or if he trips on a toy he says "sowwy" to the toy. Or when a kid tried to play with his toy he pulled it away, held his hand out to block it and said again, "sowwy"

Fox and Frog are said almost the same way. And I can't repeat how he says it. (F@%!) We're working with him on it.

He discovered that a lot of his diapers have a picture of Mickey and Pluto on them and every time he needs a diaper change he insists on "Mickey Dog!!" We have a growing pile of Mickey & Minnie diapers he's going to have to deal with at some point.

We were in the front yard and Calvin was running through the sprinkler when suddenly he took off sprinting down the sidewalk yelling "church!" "uh church!" The church is only a block and a half down the sidewalk, but I knew he wasn't really going to church on a Friday afternoon in his swim suit. As I ran after him it turned out he was running down to the neighbors house that has a dog out front. I guess he thought if he yelled "church" I wouldn't try to stop him??

Animals

Yesterday we went with some friends to Thanksgiving Point and Calvin just ran around and screamed the whole time he was so excited. He loves walking over to see the horses by our house and pointing them out every time we drive by them (which is every time we get in the car) He was SO excited to get to ride on one. When I asked him his horse's name he said "Calvin". And the same with the next horse he rode on too.
When we walked by a little baby goat it just sat in the corner for a long time until we were about to walk away it came over to the fence and let Calvin feed it a couple pieces of corn. I told him we were going to keep walking to look at other animals and he pointed at the baby sheep and said, "mine!" That's quite the souvenir he picked out.

June 2nd

If you are curious how the June 2nd prediction went, I don't know if I can say that was a magic day and suddenly I was better, but for sure a magic week. I would say 95% of my nausea is gone and what a difference that makes on my life. I feel so good, I even went to the track this morning and got in some walking/ jogging. Calvin even ran half a mile or so at the end as he ran around the track to get a little wet from the sprinklers. Hopefully we can make this a habit. Now we both need a nap!

A/C Heaven

It's been gradually getting warmer and I kept worrying that when we finally hard to turn on our A/C it wouldn't work. My nightmare came true. And just in time to have a pile of relatives over for Sunday dinner. We frantically called around and found someone to come by yesterday to see what the problem was. It was a simple fix and not nearly the cost I feared we would have to pay if it needed replaced. I can't even say how revealed I was to feel cold air coming from those vents. I LOVE AIR CONDITIONING!!

Name That Picture

I'm putting this painting in the BYU alumni show and I'm trying to think of a title for the piece. I usually do pretty boring titles like "Ice Skaters" but I think this time I want to do something more fun. Do you have a suggestion? These are some of my ideas so far:

1. Trying To Stay Warm and Not Fall Down
2. Emerald & Aqua
3. The Girl on the Top Right Just Realized She Doesn't Actually Know the Guy She is Waving at
4. Slippery
5. 67% Of the People in This Picture Can't Feel Their Toes

I'll throw a poll on the side if you want to vote, but really I would love suggestions.

(And special thanks to Katy for inspiring me to have a more interesting title)

Memorial Day

We threw together a last minute BBQ on Monday. A friend gave us a grill and Brandon got propane for it this weekend so we are set for the summer. No more oven cooking! It's all grilled this year. Here are some of the evening highlights:
croquet battling:
frisbee:
dancing:
cookie eating:The best part about Calvin's shirt is when you ask him what it says he responds, "daddy wocks!"

Sibling

That's right, a sibling for Calvin! My due date is on Thanksgiving. I have been very nauseous and if I am sick for the same amount of time that I was with Calvin then on June 2nd the nausea will go away. In the meantime, I have been eating a lot of watermelon and saltines with cream cheese. That's the flavor of the week anyway.

Competition

I was at Seagull Book today and I saw they have new tithing banks for kids. I am very familiar with the old selection. The cardboard one, the plastic one, and the modern tin one with color illustrations and a lock! I might be biased, but it was clearly the best one on the market, and yes, I get royalties on it and love it. So, NO! I am not happy that there is copy cat bank that is also tin, with a lock and key, and color illustration and less expensive! (smaller though) You can see them here. Just don't buy the copy cat.

Park

Whenever we go outside to play at some point Calvin will start running down the sidewalk yelling he is going to the park. It's the perfect size for him because the only thing at this park that made me nervous was the gap between the play area and the yellow swirl that seemed to big for him.
The other day he was getting better and better at climbing up the swirl without my help and eventually he got to the top, and pulled himself over to the play area. He was SO proud of himself, and even though I was scared he was going to fall, I was proud of him too.

Fishing

Yesterday we checked out Salem Pond. It was so pretty and a perfect day. Calvin had a blast and was very interested in watching (and helping) Brandon fish. I would love to see his reaction if Brandon really caught something. I guess we'll have to go back.
Do you love the super long basketball shorts Cal is sporting? It is his most frequently requested clothing item. It's his "daddy" shorts, because dad wears basketball shorts too.

Off to Russia

My little brother was in town for a few days before he entered the MTC. It was so fun to see him, and Calvin loved having him here. We don't get to see Chad very often since he lived so far away, but that didn't stop Calvin from crying when we said good-bye. No one else was crying, but as soon as he realized how far away Chad was getting Cal screamed "Cha! Chaaaaaaaaa!" It was so dramatic I had to laugh. It's not like Calvin has anyway of understanding that he won't see him for 2 years. I hope Chad felt loved.
When Calvin woke up from his nap later that day he asked for Chad and I told him he was at the MTC now to be a missionary. Calvin pointed to himself with both hands and asked, "and me??" I told him when he was as big as Chad he could go to the MTC and be a missionary. Later when Brandon asked Calvin about dropping off Chad he put out his bottom lip and said, "Cha. sad." I guess he is still a little upset about saying good-bye to uncle Chad.

What makes my day

Funny things Calvin has said lately:

Instead of just saying "no" he tells me, "no way" Like this morning when I asked him if he wanted to take another bite of cereal, "no way."

When I was getting out of the shower and someone knocked on our front door he yelled "come in" about 50 times before I got myself downstairs.

Sometimes when Calvin wants me to play sports with him I'm lazy and sit on the floor while shooting hoops or hitting golf balls. I guess that's no longer acceptable because now he tells me to "geh up!" He kind of shrugs his shoulders and jumps while he tells me this.

At the end of a hymn at church Calvin will say "done" or "the end"

When I tell him to come inside from playing in the dirt, he explains he can't because he is "working"

When Cal comes into a room you are in he will say either "hey" or "hi" in a dull voice like he's super cool. Which, he is.

He wanted to go outside at 9:00 at night and I told him it was too dark outside. He told me he would wear a coat.

Qubo

We don't have any kind of cable, just what I thought were basic stations. However, Canada is basic too I guess. Some of you may be familiar with Qubo, which is the only all-cartoon station we get. Cal's favorites are BG and Jacob Two-Two. I have to say, the art for Two-Two is kind of cool. If we tell him BG or Two-Two isn't on he'll respond with "check". He doesn't trust us that we know they're not on, now we have to check. oh he is funny. And he tells us when things are funny too. The other day he was looking at a picture of a bald eagle and he pointed at the beak and said, "teeth, funny". I don't know what was funny about it, but I sure like seeing him laughing and telling me what he thinks is funny.

Pictures

I just posted a pile of pictures, some of which include "before", "the mess", and a few "after" pictures of our new home.

Egg hunting

When Calvin woke up on Easter morning we brought him downstairs and told him their were eggs with candy in them. Since "canny" is a common request from him that he doesn't always get, he was stoked. He didn't bother carrying his basket around, but preferred to run and find a handful of eggs, run and put them in the basket, run and find more (and announce it), and run back to the basket, and so on. It was very entertaining to watch and it's too bad you couldn't have seen because we are still in a house of boxes and chaos so I have no idea where the camera is. Maybe next year.

Naming

Calvin has named his favorite basketball. He calls it "Orange". You might think he is just saying the color of the ball, but no, his orange ball that is exactly the same except it has black basketball lines is not referred to as Orange. That ball is not acceptable when looking for a ball to shoot with, only Orange will do.

*sigh*

Anyone know the best way to wash throw up out of a pillow? poor Calvin. what a night.

Crazy continues...

I will spend this week packing and cleaning as much I reasonably can. Then I will fly to WA for my grandpa's funeral, come home, and sign papers to close on our house. Then we will have only a few days to pull up carpet & tile, then put down new carpet & paint so we can move in. And clean the house. oh yeah, and while we do all that, we will finish packing and cleaning our apartment. Yesterday doesn't seem so crazy anymore. But the wonderful part is that in the end - we will be living in a house! Contrary to what my niece might tell me, I do know what it's like to live in a house and I am looking forward to it.

Sunday Adventures

Today was full of surprises. Calvin slept in and we woke up when Brandon got a text to see if he was going to his morning meeting. We forgot about day light savings.
It's my sister's birthday so we had her over for some crepes. Calvin was so excited since he heard it was her birthday, he keeps yelling BIRTHDAY! He just knows it means good food.
Some of our neighbor's kids were coming with us to church today, (ages 2, 3, and 6) while their mom went to the hospital. The oldest girl made sure her little sister remembered to put on underwear, which she claimed she was. Fortunately, she dragged her back inside to make her put some on, because she really wasn't. The little boy was buck naked when we arrived and ready to head out the door, but his mom quickly got him dressed, mostly in boy clothes. But the shoes took too long to find so he sported some pink boots.
Sacrament meeting was far from dull, as you can guess with Cal + three. Everyone went to their classes and had a good time, except Calvin. Things were fine until he decided to climb up on a chair where a girl was already standing. She shoved him off and he face planted onto a toy chest before hitting the ground. Bloody lip and bloody nose and LOTS of crying. I think everyone in the building knew someone was injured. Luckily Brandon was in the hallway right outside the nursery. We grabbed some paper towels for the blood and took him outside. He cried for awhile, then the blood slowed down, and when we promised him cookies when we got home he stopped crying.
Afterward our friend was home from the hospital, but needed some rest so the three kids played at our house. We threw together some grilled cheese and sides and tried to keep them from locking bedroom doors. Later we cleaned up the mess and has some company over for dessert. Crazy day! I'm ready for bed.

Personal style

Calvin has decided he is old enough to decide what he wears now. Yesterday and today he has insisted on wearing his swim shorts instead of pants. At least spring weather is coming (I hope!)

Family Tree

Brandon and I have been checking out the new family search website the past few weeks. (not because there is the TV show about family history, but that was cool too) I was excited to find out all the Russian and Ukrainian ancestors I have since my little brother just got called to serve a mission in Russia.
When Brandon was looking at his line we were getting excited to see Counts and princesses, I kept hoping we would see a king, but after a few dozen of them from several European countries the kings were even getting boring. Then we found Charlamagne and Julius Ceasar, etc. etc. Every kind of royalty there is, and bishops too.
Brandon wants to know who messed things up in the family and why we don't live in a castle in Europe right now? That's his motivation for family history.

update: the next day we looked at some more lines on my family tree and found more kings and Constantine and more famous people. Maybe when you go back that far you have thousands of ancestors so a handful of them are bound to be Kings? The first name we saw that we recognized from Brandon's family tree was King Coel and his wife "the Fair" who lived in 125AD. I'm guessing there is a closer relation than that, but I like thinking that we aren't related until the 2nd century.

Geneology

This show looks awesome. What a great way to inspire people to learn about their ancestors.

Junk

It's that moving time of the year when I need to go through my clothes and boxes of things to decide what I can chuck. I came across this shirt. Yes, it is ugly. very ugly. Do I ever wear it? no, not really. But I had to run SO far to get that shirt, how do you get rid of it? I guess that's what spouses are for.

Translation

Calvin is at the age where he says a lot of stuff, but it takes parent intervention to understand a lot of it. Some examples are:
down = phone
butt = button
man-ah = snowman or snow or play dough (because we make snowmen out of play dough)
walky = thank you
He used to say "tank tu", and before that he said "tanks", we are kind of going backwards on this one. I think walky is a version of "your welcome"?

Fill in a caption

Ditch the workout, join the party

My zumba instructor is so amazing the news is going to come to her class. So many people come to her class she has to teach in the gym now instead of the dance room to fit everyone. It's crazy. I am debating if I should go to class that day. It would be fun to see the excitement, but do I really want to risk being on TV while dancing like a fool? If I do go, should I buy some cute, new work out clothes? Also, if I go, and you see me on TV, keep this in mind: If I look ridiculous it's because that's one of the new songs I haven't gotten down yet. If I look awesome it's because that is the one song I bought on itunes and practice at home. And if they have the camera on me while saying "zumba is for all shapes and sizes" I am never going again.

New Soap Dispenser

A new soap dispenser isn't super exciting, but it is exciting to get to make your own. My friend Robynn invited me to go to Color-Me-Mine a few weeks ago to have some fun creative time. I knew Calvin would insist on painting too so I turned his clothes clothes inside out and let him paint away. I figured with Calvin it was better to keep it simple so we stuck to one solid color. Then Robynn watched Calvin so I could add some decorative swirly leaves at the end. If it didn't cost so much I think I would go there everyday. Then I would have a lot of soap dispensers.

Confession

Brandon, Heather and I played a fun game of Settlers tonight. (Brandon won)
It made me think back to when I was little and how easy it was for me to win playing Monopoly against one of my younger sisters. I would magically roll a 13 to land on "Free Parking" that was stacked with money for me and I rarely landed on her property. She was too young to count the dice quick enough and I guess I was too young to have a conscience? Sorry about that, Michelle. I promise next time we play monopoly I'll give you some free money... or at least be a kind trader. (which is saying a lot considering my usual competitive and borderline vicious trading style)

Patience

Patience is a hard thing for a lot of people. It's so hard for Calvin he can't even wait for me to cook an eggo waffle any more. Lately he gets so mad if I try to cook them and insists on eating them frozen:
(and he even ate the whole thing)

Names

Lately Calvin has started shortening Mama, Dada to MaDa or DaMa. I guess he figures this is a quicker way to talk to both of us? He also calls me Becca. I kept trying to figure out if he was referring to something else but he keeps pointing to me and insisting that I'm "Becca!"

I haven't had anything to blog about because I've been so focused on buying a house. Not that it takes up my time, besides looking at carpet and paint samples, but my mind is consumed with images of our potential new home. So hopefully things go well with all the paperwork and the inspection and we will be homeowners sometime in March. Calvin is practicing for the house by doing a lot of extra loud yelling that will no longer disturb neighbors when we don't share walls with them.

More Snow

We had a nice pile of snow this morning and since our snowman had some awesome hair going on, we decided snowoman would be the best way to go on this one:

Abstract

The other day we went to the BDAC to see the Illustrators in Utah show. (my Christmas painting is in the show) It was family art night so along with having snacks they also had painting stuff for the kids. Here are Calvin's creations. He made them completely on his own, the only way I helped him was 1. helping him know when to stop by telling him he was done and 2. keeping him from eating the paint.

He told me the first one is of a chubby blond lady dancing with her head turned to the side:This one is also a dancer, looking from the back:

Six remotes

A. digital converter box & channel changing
B. "universal remote" used for the dvd player (remember the problems with this one?)
C. TV remote
D. heater remote used to give to Calvin so he doesn't use a remote that actually does something
E. not sure, but we've had it forever, I think it's suppose to work for the stereo?
F. volume for movies since the sound goes through the stereo

Yes, it took me 3 weeks after we got the new TV to figure out how to watch it and an extra week to be able to watch a movie as well.

go jazz go

Brandon got us tickets from work to go to a Jazz game. Usually I am mildly interested in going, if at all. But check out these seats- yeah, there's actually people sitting above us! Way better. We had a good time. However, a disappointing part of the night was when I discovered that I am older than everyone on the Jazz team except Okur. Oh well, I wasn't planning on trying out for the team anyway.

Missing the internet

We didn't have the internet for a little awhile and there are a lot of things I don't like about not having the internet, but I've decided the worst part is having to use the phone book.

Painting Demonstration

If anyone is curious to see an example of my painting process you can check it out here.

TV again

Am I mean if I took the new TV back? What if this is the replacement?:Brandon's brother upgraded. Probably the nicest hand-me-down I've seen in my life. Although, it is competing with the awesome Christmas tree that was handed down to us from some friends this year too. Remember our old little tree? We have a few oversized ornaments that fit so much better on this tree. They are from Brandon's childhood, so we always had to put them on. One is a 7" canoe, which I'm very skeptical that it's an ornament at all, but Brandon claims it is.

pointy elbows

Everyone has quirky things about them. I have discovered that Brandon has elbows with special powers. Special pointy powers. He used to have several long sleeve dress shirts for work, maybe 7 or 8. Now he has one. What happens to them all? The elbows all have holes in them. We've cut off the sleeves and hemmed them, and now he has a closet full of short sleeve shirts. If you ever see him at work don't be surprised if he still has his coat on. Maybe I should get him one of these jackets for Christmas:

Gingerbread Houses

Calvin and I were invited over to Brooke's for a fun morning of gingerbread decorating. Here are some samples of our creations.

new & exciting

I went to a Zumba class at the gym for the first time yesterday because everyone kept saying how great it is. And it's true! It was a combination of latin and hip hop dance turned into an aerobics class. But it really was more dance than aerobics. I LOVED it. Even if it didn't burn calories, I think I would go anyways, that's how fun it is. I loved the variety of people in the class too, the young, skinny, gym obsessed people, and old people, and larger people, everyone fits in.
The other new thing I tried is a paypal account. I feel so excited that any stranger in the world can so easily send me money. I just need to give them a reason to now...

(I would add a link here for you to send me money so I could really see how fun this is, but I don't know how to do that)

Parenting

Calvin has a serious problem with throwing his food. Nearly every meal and all kinds of food. Sometimes I think it's to tell us he's done eating, sometimes because he doesn't like a food, sometimes it's just for attention. We've tried a variety of methods to get him to stop, it's been going on for a loooong time. We've been doing more time outs lately. He's so funny about it, he doesn't care at all, he just stands in the corner until I tell him he is done. I'm pretty sure when I say "time out" I might as well be saying "let's play a game where you stand in the corner".

First real snow

This was Calvin's first real snow because last year he never played in it. This year he was fully equipped and ready to go. I think he was a little frustrated initially with the marshmallow look and how difficult that made it to walk around. He seemed to get used to it and when his neighbor friend invited him to come out again later, he was lovin' it.

Santa time

We meant to get pictures taken with Calvin & Santa last year, but it never happened. We had our ward Christmas party on Friday and I guess they had a hard time finding a Santa, not only was he an hour late, but he didn't pull it off really well. Even the two year old sitting next to me said, "that's not Santa!" We tried to have Calvin sit on his lap, but he was scared. Brandon insisted on a picture though, so here it is. The introduction:
The release:You can see he is trying hard to escape. Besides this one moment of the party, Calvin had a really good time. All the kids were running around the gym and eating lots of cookies. He loved it. He thought it was really funny to go over to the exit doors and smile at us while we motioned at him to come back. Then of course he would laugh and run out so we would chase him.
One time when I was following him around the hallways, I let him get too far ahead of me and he ran into the men's bathroom because someone had propped the door open. I stood there panicking, knowing any moment he was going to throw himself into the toilet. Since the door was wide open I could see that no one seemed to be in either of the stalls Calvin was running in and out of. I had been standing there for awhile trying to quickly figure out if I dared to run into the men's room or not. As he headed for a toilet, I went for it. As I spun around I realized the men's room was set up differently than the women's and besides the two stalls they also had urinals to the side of the door that I couldn't see before. Fortunately they were also empty because that could have turned into my most embarrassing moment ever.

Aspirations

Brandon is always telling me how he wants to be Jason Bourne or Jack Bauer or other guys with impressive skills. We have both been reading C.S. Lewis books lately and were discussing once again how amazed we are with his intelligence and grasp of spiritual concepts. So then Brandon said he would like to have the brain of C.S. Lewis with the skills of Jason Bourne. Quite the combo.