BONUS: At The Feet of Extraordinary Women This is the Gospel Podcast

Stories in this Episode: Sarah and KaRyn share lessons learned from their very first storytelling project over 15 years ago when they invited accomplished, faithful women (like Emma Lou Thayne, Ariel Bybee, Liz Lemon Swindle, Olene Walker) into their living rooms; Leslie, Claire, Cari, Tennisa, & Emily give us 2 minute stories of letting the Lord lead from the start of our THIS IS THE GOSPEL video series.

SHOW NOTES

To see pictures and links for this episode, go to LDSLiving.com/thisisthegospel

TRANSCRIPT

KaRyn Lay  0:00 

Hello from my home office, which is really just my desk by a window in my stepkids' room that I have commandeered during the social distancing. They're thrilled, as you can imagine, to wake up at eight every day so that I can get to work. But I actually think that my daily occupation of their rooms speaks to the reality of parenting and family and relationships during these tricky times—flexibility, creativity, figuring out what works for your unique situation—well, that's the order of the day. And we hope that you are finding your groove and whatever way you can. We're certainly trying to do that with the podcast, and while we gear up for season three, over the next few months, we're still going to bring you a few bonus episodes that just can't wait until we get back into a recording studio. And so today, we've got a quarantine edition of the podcast with some stories that celebrate the ways that women rely on the Lord and the many roles, including motherhood, that they inhabit throughout their lives.

 

Welcome to This Is The Gospel, an LDS living podcast where we feature real stories from real people who are practicing and living their faith every day. I'm your host KaRyn Lay.

 

First step, a few stories within a story within a conversation. This Is The Gospel producer, Sarah Blake, and I recently recorded a conversation we had where we tried to remember all the details from the very first, but clearly not the last storytelling project that we embarked on together over 15 years ago.

 

I don't exactly remember when we decided, A: to call them the gatherings, and then B:I how did it even happen?

 

Sarah  1:43 

I don't remember either because motherhood has erased so much of my memory, but I think it was 2004 or 2005. We were single in our single sport in Salt Lake.

 

KaRyn Lay  1:56 

Yes, everything starts with us being single.

 

Sarah  1:58 

I know. Side note about that though, the years that we were single that felt like a curse have become one of the greatest blessings and like, to me, it's a constant whenever something hard is going on. I'm like, well, that one big one turned out to be the greatest blessing. So I can trust this one will work out too.

 

KaRyn Lay  2:17 

Agreed.

 

Sarah  2:18 

Okay, so we were single in our singles ward, trying to find our way. Right?

 

KaRyn Lay  2:23 

I think at that point, I kind of was like, not that I was giving up. But I, I sort of had the sense that I was going to be single for a while. Like, I was always hopeful. I loved falling in love, but I, I leaned into it, I leaned into a little bit to like, Okay, if I'm going to be a cat lady, who's just sort of doing life on my own, then, like, we better figure out the best way to be single. That's kind of what I think I remember us talking about.

 

Sarah  2:52 

Yeah, but you never did get the cat. So that was that was a hopeful gesture to not...

 

KaRyn Lay  2:57 

That was. I babysat someone else's cat and lost it on the first night that I had it. But where it wasn't actually lost, it was actually just asleep in one of the drawers of my apartment, but I freaked out and called everybody and made them help me look for this kitten that I thought I had lost. So after that I realized being a cat lady was probably not in my future. Until now. Now I have a cat.

 

Sarah  3:21 

Now you have a cat. Go figure.

 

KaRyn Lay  3:23 

I actually think you we