SAHD blog- the Boyer sisters

[MamaJunebug]

They don't count it as "working outside the home" rather it is "helping to add to the family's income with the full blessing of daddy and not having a boss other than him" a la many of the SAHM/SAHD home based businesses

Yeahhhhh, about that .... I clicked on their video link and there were none that looked like actual, y'know, singing performances. Not that I really need to hear them. They're either very good or very ordinary. My takeaway was that it must be nice to have no job to go to, no real schedule to keep, other than to dress up, doll up, get photographed and blog 'em.

Really unremarkable jewelry.

[iloveevolution]

I wonder if they are secretly bored - I know I would have been bored out of my mind if at 19 I was sitting at home playing dress up and crafting with my sisters day in and day out, obeying all of my parents' rules!

They do have a separate YouTube channel and website about their singing- I'm not at all familiar with the type of music that they sing, 40s big band style- but they don't seem that good to me??

www.boyersisters.com is their singing website

[PrairieGirl]

I am presby (not the fundy kind!) and Iloveevolution has explained it perfectly - that line in the Apostles' Creed refers to the church as a whole (small c), not the Roman Catholic (uppercase C) church. Not one of my favorite lines due to the confusion it causes....

We visited an Episcopalian church on Passion Sunday so my daughter could participate in their program, and my husband got all confused when we recited the Apostles' Creed and they mentioned believing in one catholic church, lol. He leaned over and whispered to me, "Aren't we in an Episcopal church?"

[salex]

I wonder if they are secretly bored - I know I would have been bored out of my mind if at 19 I was sitting at home playing dress up and crafting with my sisters day in and day out, obeying all of my parents' rules!

They do have a separate YouTube channel and website about their singing- I'm not at all familiar with the type of music that they sing, 40s big band style- but they don't seem that good to me??

http://www.boyersisters.com is their singing website

Um, yeah.

They aren't the Andrews Sisters. Their version of the National Anthem was harmonic, but my HS music teacher would have been all over them for some of their enunciation.

I listened to the fist bits of several of their renditions of Boogie Woogie Bugle Boy and while they have improved with time-- they are OK.

Self publishing gives us Sarah Maxwell and Self Recording gives us The Boyer Sisters. :clap:

[eri]

It is probably cultural approbiation of working women, seeing they dont work? at least they are only 3.

Working women don't need online advocates defending their "culture" from "appropriation." Sorry. Whoever is offended personally can go email the Boyer sisters themselves

The Boyer sisters are just playing dress up. They are ignorant, that's all.

[iloveevolution]

what's puzzling about the WWII fixation besides the rosie the riveter outfits is that they are SUPER nostalgic for wartime- never mind the fact that millions of people died! They even went to some kind of "remembering WWII" reenactment festival recently- it's just so sugarcoated! It's so sad that in so many of these homeschools the kids are not taught to think critically about history (or anything else)

[Marian the Librarian]

what's puzzling about the WWII fixation besides the rosie the riveter outfits is that they are SUPER nostalgic for wartime- never mind the fact that millions of people died! They even went to some kind of "remembering WWII" reenactment festival recently- it's just so sugarcoated! It's so sad that in so many of these homeschools the kids are not taught to think critically about history (or anything else)

That was the "Remembering WWII" fest that took place in Linden, Tennessee last summer. The event has its own FB page, with many photos:

facebook.com/RememberingWWII?fref=ts&ref=br_tf

The Boyer sisters were all over it - there were also lots of Botkin/Vernier/Courter attendees. These folks love cosplay and guns. I think there's some kind of time warp going on in that neck of the woods - they all yearn for the days when the menfolk went out killin', and the womenfolk stayed home bakin' and sewin' and baby-makin'.

[GenerationCedarchip]

I hadn't seen the blog. Interesting. I have, however, heard the Boyers sing in person. They sang at an event that a bunch of folks from my cousin's church went to. We were all down there for a family reunion anyway, so the whole clan ended up going to this thing, too.

I obviously didn't spend a ton of time with them, but they sang pretty well (I've heard plenty of fundie family singing groups and they're a cut above a lot of them.) They also seemed comfortable around people and genuinely happy. I can't remember which sister was which, but I actually liked them.

Sometimes on the blog they seem genuinely enthusiastic about historical costumes, singing and things like that. When they start talking beliefs, it almost sounds like they're parroting whatever they've read or been told. I wonder how that will evolve over time for them as they establish identities and start to really own their beliefs.

[salex]

I hadn't seen the blog. Interesting. I have, however, heard the Boyers sing in person. They sang at an event that a bunch of folks from my cousin's church went to. We were all down there for a family reunion anyway, so the whole clan ended up going to this thing, too.

I obviously didn't spend a ton of time with them, but they sang pretty well (I've heard plenty of fundie family singing groups and they're a cut above a lot of them.) They also seemed comfortable around people and genuinely happy. I can't remember which sister was which, but I actually liked them.

Sometimes on the blog they seem genuinely enthusiastic about historical costumes, singing and things like that. When they start talking beliefs, it almost sounds like they're parroting whatever they've read or been told. I wonder how that will evolve over time for them as they establish identities and start to really own their beliefs.

Do girls and women in their belief system actually get to establish identities and develop their own beliefs????

[GenerationCedarchip]

Do girls and women in their belief system actually get to establish identities and develop their own beliefs????

Not always, but having grown up in reformed circles, I would say that women do this to some extent. There is less room for experimentation in some ways, but most of the girls I grew up with had opportunity to think for themselves and not all of them fell in lockstep with their parents' views on all things.

There is a lot of pressure to conform to certain norms, but I've noticed that the emphasis on looking around to see if others are toeing the line tends to fade as folks get out of their early/mid-20s. Some folks never leave that mindset, but a lot of the folks I've known who remained in reformed fundie circles have softened some of their stances with age and allowed for more variance on nonessentials. That's why you'll find some folks drinking and some not, some are skirts only and others not, home-based businesses and college attendance for some vs. others who feel called to "the cultivation of home." I'm not as familiar with other strains of fundie culture, but reformed fundie has a fair amount of variety.

I would suggest that the Botkins, Phillipses, et al represent an extreme end of what one finds in those circles. I'm familiar with a few reformed fundie churches that are very insular, and exceedingly conservative. However, I've attended several and most(including my old home church) tend to have families in the congregation that run the gamut from Botkin-style patriarchy to fundie-lite. The vast majority of these folks that I know don't blog regularly and so I think what we see on blogs skews things a little bit.

[iloveevolution]

Not always, but having grown up in reformed circles, I would say that women do this to some extent. There is less room for experimentation in some ways, but most of the girls I grew up with had opportunity to think for themselves and not all of them fell in lockstep with their parents' views on all things.

There is a lot of pressure to conform to certain norms, but I've noticed that the emphasis on looking around to see if others are toeing the line tends to fade as folks get out of their early/mid-20s. Some folks never leave that mindset, but a lot of the folks I've known who remained in reformed fundie circles have softened some of their stances with age and allowed for more variance on nonessentials. That's why you'll find some folks drinking and some not, some are skirts only and others not, home-based businesses and college attendance for some vs. others who feel called to "the cultivation of home." I'm not as familiar with other strains of fundie culture, but reformed fundie has a fair amount of variety.

I would suggest that the Botkins, Phillipses, et al represent an extreme end of what one finds in those circles. I'm familiar with a few reformed fundie churches that are very insular, and exceedingly conservative. However, I've attended several and most(including my old home church) tend to have families in the congregation that run the gamut from Botkin-style patriarchy to fundie-lite. The vast majority of these folks that I know don't blog regularly and so I think what we see on blogs skews things a little bit.

It's so interesting to read an insider perspective on this particular subculture! What do they mean when they talk about the Covenant? The Boyer girls use that word a lot- covenant rings rather than purity rings, their dad is their covenant head, they say they were born into a covenant household, etc. does it just have to do with the covenant between Jesus and the church or is there a particular understanding within the reformed set about a covenant?

[moodygirl86]

They often post outfit posts with plenty of selfies as well as hair and makeup tutorials and a few haul videos from thrift shopping.

Fundies taking selfies of how modest they are? Methinks their modesty is the thing they are most proud of...

[MamaJunebug]

I wonder if they are secretly bored - I know I would have been bored out of my mind if at 19 I was sitting at home playing dress up and crafting with my sisters day in and day out, obeying all of my parents' rules!

They do have a separate YouTube channel and website about their singing- I'm not at all familiar with the type of music that they sing, 40s big band style- but they don't seem that good to me??

http://www.boyersisters.com is their singing website

Thanks! I listened a bit. Some beautiful harmonies, but something about the pitch of their voices made it unpleasant to listen to very long.

[morri]

I guess it irks one a whole lot different on different sides on the Atlantic since 40 were obviously poor misery over here, where as In the US it was war, but the general population was less affected by it.

[NachosFlandersStyle]

In the post about their rings-- instead of giving their brothers symbols of purity when they turned fourteen, their parents gave them "tools of dominion"-- that is, knives and handguns.. Holy shit. I could see if it were a hunting rifle, but they specified a handgun. These folks do not mess around with the symbolism. They're also really up front about their daddy- worship. He "represents Christ to his family" and their list of reasons he's #1 is long and creepy even by fundie standards.

[salex]

I guess it irks one a whole lot different on different sides on the Atlantic since 40 were obviously poor misery over here, where as In the US it was war, but the general population was less affected by it.

It was less glamorous than the dress up gangs like to make it here as well. I wonder if the 40s fangirls have ever seen The Best years of Our lives, which show soldiers returning disabled, to wives who were not happy to see them, children who had grown up and unemployement or underemployement and changes in society that would not fit many of these girl's ideals. Even it is sort of glowy, but there is some grit to it that shows that even though the USA didn't have the devastation, there were post war difficulties.

as an aside, we have letters from relatives in England thanking relatives here for various foodstuffs and supplies they shipped over right after the war--and talking about how tough things were. A cousin's husband talks about his house being bombed while he was in it, as a young child.

[anachronistic]

I don't know exactly why, but I find them sort of creepy. They remind me of characters from that Canadian show, Bomb Girls - well, the happy, singy bits of the show, not the sad/realistic bits. They just seem so very saccharine, but they're not acting - that is how they really are. I have a tremendous urge to poke them with facts on the end of an old hatpin......

[NachosFlandersStyle]

It was less glamorous than the dress up gangs like to make it here as well. I wonder if the 40s fangirls have ever seen The Best years of Our lives, which show soldiers returning disabled, to wives who were not happy to see them, children who had grown up and unemployement or underemployement and changes in society that would not fit many of these girl's ideals. Even it is sort of glowy, but there is some grit to it that shows that even though the USA didn't have the devastation, there were post war difficulties.

as an aside, we have letters from relatives in England thanking relatives here for various foodstuffs and supplies they shipped over right after the war--and talking about how tough things were. A cousin's husband talks about his house being bombed while he was in it, as a young child.

I suspect that these girls don't have any particular ideas about what the forties were or weren't like. Their blog does not suggest that they are interested in, much less knowledgeable about, any era in history.(Dude, the oldest girl answered the question "what do you think about the civil war?" with "uhh.. yay south!") I think they just like pretty dresses.

[eri]

In the post about their rings-- instead of giving their brothers symbols of purity when they turned fourteen, their parents gave them "tools of dominion"-- that is, knives and handguns.. Holy shit. I could see if it were a hunting rifle, but they specified a handgun. These folks do not mess around with the symbolism. They're also really up front about their daddy- worship. He "represents Christ to his family" and their list of reasons he's #1 is long and creepy even by fundie standards.

WHAT THE FUCK.

The egalitarian in me is having a freaking spaz attack right now. That seems so wrong to me.

[Arrowoftruth]

Wait these girls are teenagers? Yikes only the youngest one actually looks it. The other two look more...mature

[ladyamylynn]

The middle sister is giving me a total Lady Edith vibe in a lot of the photos.

[iloveevolution]

Wait these girls are teenagers? Yikes only the youngest one actually looks it. The other two look more...mature

Yep the youngest- Charlotte- is 15 I believe and the older 2 are 17 and 19! They don't dress their age and they wear a lot of makeup so they end up looking much older. The middle one just "graduated" from homeschool I'm pretty sure, not that it makes much difference in their day to day lives whether they are in school or not they are always home

[SolomonFundy]

The middle sister is giving me a total Lady Edith vibe in a lot of the photos.

That would be Brigid, and you are right on the money with the Lady Edith comparison. I think it's the teeth. And the nose. And the hair. And really, pretty much everything about her.

This sentence from her bio on the blog is super special:

"And if you catch her on a day where her sewing machine is out of her favor, she may just be haphazardly knitting a sweater, banging around on the piano with a boogie beat, or cuddling with the two furry companions of the BFS studio."

[salex]

That would be Brigid, and you are right on the money with the Lady Edith comparison. I think it's the teeth. And the nose. And the hair. And really, pretty much everything about her.

This sentence from her bio on the blog is super special:

"And if you catch her on a day where her sewing machine is out of her favor, she may just be haphazardly knitting a sweater, banging around on the piano with a boogie beat, or cuddling with the two furry companions of the BFS studio."

OK that made me immediatly think of this

[morri]

I didnt expect them to be teenagers, They are the reasons I still get ID'ed for cigs(not even mine ) at nearly 30 xD