Doves and Serpents | With open minds and Mormon hearts.

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2September 1, 2011
Crash Test

The thought of any inexperienced driver in charge of a 4,000 pound machine makes me very nervous, but anticipating my...
0August 31, 2011
Knit Together: Back to School Edition

I love back-to-school season. I love it because it means my kids will be back in school and not at...
0August 31, 2011
Help Start the Student Review

Ah, seeing this brings me back to the good ole’ BYU days. If you were at BYU in the...
3August 30, 2011
I Feel Fine

This week, in video form: 1. Everything was going surpisingly well … 2. And then everything seemed to break —...
9August 29, 2011
Getting Glenn Beck’s Blessing

Glenn Beck: How many warnings do you think you’re going to get, and how many warnings do you deserve? This...
11August 28, 2011
Ride to Church in Queens, NY

Today’s Ride to Church comes to us from my very smart and beautiful 16-year-old niece, Synneve. This post has been...
5August 28, 2011
09 A Mormon in the Cheap Seats: Faith is the Miracle

Faith doesn’t affect anything. It doesn’t cause anything. Faith is a commitment to see the world in a particular way....
10August 24, 2011
Staff Stacks

Check out what the Doves and Serpents writers are into now!
3August 24, 2011
Don’t Let the Sun Go Down on your Wrath

Is anyone else skeptical when older people who have been married for a long time say that they have never...
15August 22, 2011
On Starting High School

Dear Kennedy, Today is your first day as a high school freshman. This is madness. When we dropped you off...
24August 21, 2011
08 A Mormon in the Cheap Seats: Painting by the Numbers

It’s about the process, not the outcome. Painting by the numbers, regardless of how carefully, isn’t the same as painting...
8August 21, 2011
Doubting Thomas & Me

“Faith is like a little seed. If planted it will grow,” sing the Primary children. The Book of Alma extends...
8August 21, 2011
Pauli’s (Train) Ride to the Rocky Mountains

Today’s Ride to Church comes to us from Pauli from Highlandlake/Mead, Colorado. ; I haven’t attend formal church services now...
9August 19, 2011
The Unbearable Lightness of Being

I am here one day, and on the next, I am gone. Yet I am part of a community, a...
19August 18, 2011
“The 2011 OB Drink Give-away”

I’ve spent almost all my 38 years in Texas or Louisiana, so I’ve weathered some bad summers. The summer of...
10August 17, 2011
Saving Her Pennies

When my kids were younger, I naively fantasized about how great it would be once they got out of daycare...
12August 16, 2011
When We Lived in Uncle’s Hat

When We Lived in Uncle’s Hat explores what makes a home or a family — the family goes through many...
4August 15, 2011
Place and Grace

My fondest childhood memories are on a boat. Nearly every summer time was spent at a lake or reservoir swimming,...
4August 14, 2011
Stephanie’s Walk to “Church”

Today’s “Ride to Church” comes to us from Stephanie Durden Edwards of Missouri. Stephanie writes: ; My Sundays used...
11August 13, 2011
07 A Mormon in the Cheap Seats: Spiritual Pinball

These strategies are how we self-soothe, in a spiritual sense. They are the pinball bumpers of Mormonism-bumpers that will...
6August 12, 2011
The Rabbit Hole

Today’s guest post was written by Amanda Mixon, a graduate student of English at Texas State University in San Marcos,...
6August 11, 2011
Window to Utopia

What would heaven be like, for a teenager?
9August 10, 2011
Around the Dinner Table: Do What You Are

; [This is kind of cheating because it didn’t actually occur around the dinner table. It occurred in our mini-van,...
10August 9, 2011
Husband and Wife Book Club: The Road

Read The Road only if you can handle the bittersweetness of life. Read The Road only if you can bear...
11August 7, 2011
Fast (?) Sunday

It is the first Sunday of the month. In many Mormon families that means one thing: no breakfast! Well, that’s...
5August 7, 2011
Ride to Church + in Snake River, Idaho

Today’s post comes to us from Sean whose personal blog can be found here: www.inlimine.blogspot.com To fully enjoy Sean’s...
54August 6, 2011
06 A Mormon in the Cheap Seats: The Real Story

We learn the mental gymnastics of religious apologetics like Hispanics learn soccer.
6August 5, 2011
The Tree of Life

The Tree of Life begins with a quotation from The Book of Job: “Where were you when I laid the...
2August 4, 2011
The Nursery Window

“Long ago,” he said, “I thought like you that my mother would always keep the window open for me, so...
10August 3, 2011
My Little Red Book

I recently re-read a book called My Little Red Book-a compilation of first period stories written by women from all...
2August 3, 2011
Mormon Matters 45: The Mormon Practice of Bearing Testimony

As a result of Brent’s latest Mormon in the Cheap Seats posts (Build Out, Not Up and On Testimonies), Mormon...
21August 2, 2011
The Husband and Wife Summer Book Club

I’ve written in the past about how different our literary taste tends to be. We are reliable (and not always...
7August 1, 2011
Like a Virgin

“10% of yoga is the outfit, 10% are the poses” the teacher joked at the beginning of class, then followed...
9July 31, 2011
10 Seconds with Tinkerbell

This week I found myself in that place Tinkerbell is so fond of — the place between asleep and awake....
7July 31, 2011
Ride to Music and the Spoken Word

Today’s Ride to Music and the Spoken Word comes to us from Katrina Barker Anderson, who took pictures of her...
19July 30, 2011
05 A Mormon in the Cheap Seats: On Testimonies

I like fast and testimony meetings. I like them even though I sometimes feel like I’ve wandered into a UFO...
20July 29, 2011
Mormon Film Pioneers

I believe we have stories to tell and if we don’t do it, it will be done for us.
4July 28, 2011
We Are Pioneers

As I was telling my Kindergartner earlier this month that we’re all pioneers in some way. Whenever we stand up...
2July 27, 2011
A Twist on “Pioneer Day”

When it was announced that gays and lesbians would be allowed to marry in New York beginning on July 24,...
15July 27, 2011
Letters to My Polygamist Ancestors

By Dayna Patterson ; Letters to My Polygamist Ancestors Dear Charles, What was it like to have three wives? It...
15July 26, 2011
But With Joy Wend Your Way

Few hymns seem to capture the Mormon spirit so completely or at ts best. The steady beginning building to the...
0July 25, 2011
Mormon Matters 43: Healthy Approaches to Teaching Modesty

Last week I participated in this Mormon Matters podcast regarding modesty and Mormonism with Dan Wotherspoon, Chelsea Robarge Fife, and...
12July 25, 2011
Trekkie

Those who weren’t too busy, too judgmental, too self absorbed and too self-important to drop everything to help someone else...
11July 24, 2011
O Pioneers!

One year we had a brown horse in the church parking lot. Bonnet-wearing girls and cowboy-hatted boys took turns “riding”...
3July 24, 2011
Trek

Mormons all over the U.S. (and elsewhere, perhaps) gathered yesterday to celebrate Pioneer Day–commemorating the entry of Brigham Young...
3July 24, 2011
A Mormon/Muslim wedding

I loved this article by Elna Baker, author of The New York Regional Mormon Singles Halloween Dance. It was published...
16July 23, 2011
04 A Mormon in the Cheap Seats: Build Out, Not Up

Can a religion be built on faith? Just plain faith? Faith that isn’t looking for a promotion, or...
6July 22, 2011
Eat, Bray, Shove: Two Men’s Mimicry, Mockery and Mastication Across Northern England

What would you get if the producers of “Curb Your Enthusiasm” combined “My Dinner with Andre ” and “Easy Rider”...
10July 21, 2011
The Gluttonous Baby

For as long as humans have made objects, there have been baby dolls. It’s an almost universal phenomenon that...
18July 20, 2011
I, Heather Kathleen Olson Beal, Being of Sound Mind and Body

A few months ago, Brent and I finally managed to complete a task that has been on our to-do list...