Fashion Home Evening

Tonight, the "F" in "F.H.E." stood for fashion.

After a wonderful lesson on Elder Perry's conference talk "Let Him Do It With Simplicity" courtesy of Sister Barker, we circled up the wagons (or in this case, seminary desks) and set about the task of designing branch t-shirts, armed with nothing but fabric markers and a dream.

A dream to design a shirt so awesome, we would be translated and spend the remaining years till the millennium (Or months, by the look of things. Or possibly days? Or, dare we hope, hours?) hanging out with the three Nephites. Why the three Nehiptes? Because they have been around so long, they must really, really appreciate a good, unique t-shirt slogan after the last few thousand years reading the same old t-shirt slogans again and again, right?

I have been doing happy dances about this activity ever since my friend (and FHE chairperson extraordinaire) Zealanda told me about it weeks ago. That excitement led me to spend some time pondering what I should write on my shirt. I was glad I took the time to ponder, but the end result of said ponderings ended up being a long list of sayings that I couldn't possibly fit on one shirt. Our branch (the Parke Avenue Branch) is just so inspiring that my sleep-deprived brain just kept churning out more and more ideas. And since I hate to let a good idea go to waste, I decided to put them in this post. Which I did. Along with some photos.

PLEASE NOTE: MOST OF THE PHOTOS ARE IN NO WAY RELATED TO THE SLOGANS ABOVE THEM IN ANY WAY OTHER THAN THEY ARE PHOTOS OF BRANCH MEMBERS DESIGNING SHIRTS.

My first thought was to play off of all of the initials we use on a daily basis and do something like...

The P.A.B's

Y.S.A.

F. H.E.'s are

A-O.K.

And then I thought about the recent influx of R.Y.S.A. (Really Young Single Adults) into the branch and considered writing something like...

My Elder's Quorum President is an Honors Student at Burley High School.

A saying that I like a lot could have made a great shirt for one of our pre-missionary guys...

Please bless the Mia Maids: They will be just about the right age when I get home.

I also considered...

The P.A.B. Elder's Quorum: If You Feed Us, We Will Come

and
P.A.B. Elder’s Quorum Basketball: Making middle-aged dads feel even older for three seasons

and

The P.A.B. Elder's Quorum: We're not relationship slackers; we are just saving up for an eight cow wife

For a while there I thought about using the name that President Sagers, our Stake President, claimed to have considered before settling on The Parke Avenue Branch. That name played off an important geographical feature of our valley: The Oakley Dam. If president Sagers had stuck with that name, my decision tonight would have been a lot easier because I just could have gone with...

I'm a member of that (Oakley) dam branch

or...

We love our (Oakley) dam branch
Or...

I attended the (Oakley) dam branch until I was 31, and all I got was this (Oakley) Dam Branch T-shirt

I also had a lot of ideas for T-shirt slogans the sisters in the branch might like. The book Sister Hobson brought to our R.S. sleep over last month helped inspire...

The P.A.B. Relief Society: Where Fascinating Girls Gather

and

The P.A.B. Relief Society: Walking with slightly strait knees since 2006.

(If you don't get those jokes, read this post .)
I also liked...

P.A.B. Relief Society: Come with us and we will make you fishers of men

Another soon to be classic saying, inspired by the chronic lateness of our branch members...

I’m not late finding an eternal companion, I’m just working on Young Single Adult Standard Time

Here is another idea (that has absolutely no connection to the wonderfully young sisters in the photo below!) is...
Singles Branch +25 Club: Anxiously Engaged in a Lost Cause

or

The L.D.S. Young Single Adult and Institute Programs: Making sure twenty-somethings around the world are too busy to sin

Now, don't think that I was the only one with ideas tonight. President Jones and Kristi volunteered to help Eric with his shirt...


...of course when Eric's die-hard BYU fan parents see Eric's UofU shirt, President Jones might also have to volunteer to let Eric move in until his parents cool down.

I thought the Barkers would go with some kind of slogan that emphasized the joys of marriage.

But instead, Brother Barker decided to emphasize the joys of driving his yellow VW Beetle.

As you can see, settling on one t-shirt slogan was proving to be a very difficult task. Eventually I narrowed it down to two. One of my favorites was...

The P.A.B. : Ignoring Elder Oak's Counsel on Dating since 2006

I hated to see that snarky thought go to waste, so I was thrilled when Sister Jones adopted it for her shirt.

That left me free to use my favorite idea.

After a lot of thinking, and pondering, and soul searching, I finally decided to go with, what I think, sums up the most important qualities of our branch in one simple thought.

After all, Simplicity was the theme of our FHE lesson tonight.

I'm happy with my decision.

Too bad stake conference was last week. This would look great with my jean skirt.