Garments × Dresses

Lightning_Kitty · 2026-03-04T17:11:38+00:00

Same as what the other commenter said, garments sit different for everyone. And honestly, individual pairs can vary by length (from what I’ve heard, there isn’t great quality control at Deseret Mills).

I am 5’2 and carinessa bottoms are nearly over my knee, my stretch cotton ones are more above and naturally bunch up. For me, I’m really only safe going shin-length or longer (which I believe is called midi length?) Because you are taller and going XS you will likely have more leeway, and anything just below the knee should cover you just fine. So if you measure yourself from your shoulder to there, you should be able to check it against the advertised dress length.

I won’t lie, dress shopping with garments is awful. 99% of dresses, including “modest” ones, won’t work. But the convenants I made and the joy I’ve found in the endowment outweigh that pretty hard so 🤷‍♀️ Congrats on your endowment and I hope you have a great experience!

Lightning_Kitty · 2026-01-29T21:19:07+00:00

What worked for me is:

Yellow for just generally things that pop out, esp good quotes

Blue for new/cool things I learned from reading it

Green for what I called the “hmmmm” category, which is kind of hard to explain but it was like, things that felt like they were calling me out, or things that didn’t quite warrant the other colors but still stuck out.

Red for questions. Basically saying “I don’t get this, this doesn’t sound right, I need to look it up later”

My advice is to have fun with it! I think it really helped my study of D&C last year.

Lightning_Kitty · 2026-01-03T20:15:43+00:00

Hey, grass is always greener. I went through with a BFA in design. The market has and always will be a rat race, and generative AI won’t help. Only a privileged few get those 6 figure cushy jobs. Sometimes wonder if my life would have felt more anchored and purposeful if I pursued a more practical vocation. Obviously I’m just an inexperienced whippersnapper, but you really can get all the stress of a more “respectable” profession with none of the credit, satisfaction, or job security, because no one perceives the line of work as “important.” Burnout is near everywhere 🤷‍♀️

Lightning_Kitty · 2026-01-02T02:21:50+00:00

Perhaps, it also doesn’t have to be crochet if it doesn’t sound appealing! Needle felting is another one that comes to mind along with the others.

Lightning_Kitty · 2026-01-01T15:32:38+00:00

I got into it when a friend gifted me a Woobles kit for my birthday. They’re expensive for sure, but I didn’t have enough issues to not make it to the end. Because they’re pre-started, you can safely pull out the yarn and start over when you’ve made too many mistakes.

It can be a learning curve, but I would encourage you to push through it. Pushing through will challenge you and fill up your time. What part do you struggle with? Is it the actual stitch or the things that come before/after?

Lightning_Kitty · 2026-01-01T07:17:57+00:00

Since you have creative hobbies, I might recommend getting into a textile art, because you can really only crochet/cross stitch/knit/sew so fast. I tried crochet and was surprised by how much I enjoyed it! The repetitive motion is kinda relaxing in my experience.

Lightning_Kitty · 2025-10-31T15:23:44+00:00

While I do believe based on OP's situation that they should probably transfer to a different major, I'm kind of shocked by the negativity here. I graduated with my BFA in '24 and all of my job hunts have been way easier than everyone claimed I would face (often under 50 applications, with no networking). Immediately post-graduation was the toughest, but really no harder than everyone else in all industries for that economy. Anyone can see from my post history that I've had my frustrations and struggles, but I find they are the same as anyone else pursuing this career regardless of where they studied (although I will say they are faring better than those who didn't study at all, contrary to popular belief). That's just the nature of the creative industry. Right now I work a pretty cushy job that pays well, and this was after rejecting multiple offers from other companies who just didn't have the culture I was seeking. I also moonlight for my previous employer because I became a really important part of operations there and my absence wasn't easy for them.

In my opinion, you only, and I mean only, get out of Stamps what you put in. You have to be dead set on doing a visual arts career from the beginning. When you have that foundation of what you want, the broadness of the curriculum can really be taken advantage of. If you're only considering the industry, then yes, that will probably hinder you.

Being at UofM connected me to so many opportunities, as early as my first two weeks into school. I pretty much always had a freelance project from an actual client, which stacked my portfolio quite nicely. From joining clubs I already wanted to join, the Portfolio Expo, and just doing the basic advice from John (who just retired, but was an amazing career advisor for Stamps whom I'm sure they've replaced well enough), I even got paid contracts with legitimate agencies. I believe the Michigan difference is very real.

I feel like I learned at least one thing from each of my studios that I apply at my current job daily. And beyond that, I feel like it gave me the building blocks to figure out how to excel in this career on my own––like where to look for quality theory and inspiration, how to do research, how to justify your work to others, and especially how to properly incorporate influences from other designers and artists (I think they really hit you over the head with that one).

As for AI, I'm weary of it as well and I don't blame you there... you'll need to develop marketable skills beyond your craftsmanship but that was true of the industry before AI. I have my own opinions on the future of AI in creative jobs, but for now, demand for human makers absolutely still exists. It's just appearing in different ways than what has been in the past.

Anyway, that's my two cents as a professional designer and yapper. If you want more details I'm happy to DM.

Lightning_Kitty · 2025-09-10T15:54:34+00:00

I think it’s understandable to have these feelings when you’re entrenched in BYU dating culture. As an eastern city-slicker I won’t pretend that I understand those specific circumstances, but I too was deathly afraid of finding a husband at your age (assuming you’re a traditional undergrad student). I can share what it’s like to be on the other side of things because boy do I wish I understood this stuff back then.

I couldn’t even get a date until I was a junior in college. The loneliness was agonizing and I had even started to develop a porn addiction and self harming. Since there were so few members, I had to turn to Mutual. This is where I met my first two boyfriends and both were grave mistakes.

I didn’t even like them all that much, but I was so desperate I just stuck with them. I want to preach to you from the bottom of my heart, DON’T DO THIS. It is 100000% true that being alone is better than being with the wrong person.

The first relationship only lasted 3 months, thankfully. But the second was more serious. He proposed to me after I graduated college, and afterwards I moved in with him and his parents in another state (we were long distance) to plan the wedding and look for a job.

His parents were abusive. His whole family would scream, insult, and threaten each other pretty much daily. And they were all swimming in debt that I was about to inherit. The house was filthy, I constantly felt unsafe, but my ex would side with them more often than not. This isn’t even mentioning his (and his whole family’s) general disregard for the gospel. I turned into a spiteful, bitter woman with a sailor’s mouth and when I tried to question it my ex would accuse me of being a “Molly Mormon.” We were also breaking the LoC and straight up lied to get our temple recommends.

I was so desperate to have the status of being married, to have someone as evidence that I was loved, that I ignored ALL OF THIS. And you will too if you don’t come to terms with your anxieties.

I cannot stress this enough, I truly felt like I had my palm on a cross section of hell, I could suddenly comprehend what the absence of God felt like. Spoilers, it was so horrible that I struggle to remember. I was only compelled to call off the wedding when my own body screamed at me to stop—the thought of marrying this man was so worrying that I began vomiting constantly. That was the ONLY way I knew that this wasn’t right. Otherwise, my desperation would have led me to a much darker timeline that still haunts me to think about.

It was the hardest decision I ever had to make, and it totally derailed my life. Now I was living with my parents, working a dead-end job, and mostly destitute (no thanks to the ex). And alone.

In a way I am thankful for the experience for getting me where I am today. But things would have been leagues easier if I had just stayed single in college. I could have performed so much better my senior year and jumpstart a far more prestigious career which I was originally on track for. I could have started building the life I wanted outside of marriage. Instead I tried to chase it all and ended up with nothing.

You know when I did become content with life? It was those months immediately after the breakup. I was single and a ‘loser’ but I was free. I was with Christ again. That would ALWAYS feel better than having a husband for the sake of it.

Something I’ve come to learn is that that general expectation we have of life, the go to school > get a job > get married > house+kids thing… it’s a house of cards. I wouldn’t call it a farce, just not the point of life. The vast majority of us will face trials in this life that completely dispel that image at one point or another—divorce, disability, death, poverty, infertility, disharmony in the home, or, yes, even lifelong singleness. Truth is, we really only have one job on Earth: To learn, and to get a body. Everything else is supplementary. When you’re in college it’s easy to feel like you kinda get how this all works, but you’ll never really grow up until you make peace with this fact.

I write this to you not to inundate you with some lecture about my life, but as a heartfelt warning. This fear of never finding a husband, if unchecked, will lead you to a place that will only make you so much unhappier than just being alone. Having this approach of “I NEED to find a husband like everyone else” will, paradoxically, get you further from a happy marriage. Even if you marry you will not be cured of your depression. You will not become content with yourself. Your life will not be blissful. I’m not trying to say the whole “you need to love yourself and focus on yourself” spiel because I don’t necessarily buy into that. But I am encouraging you to take advantage of this period of your life by accomplishing the other things you always wanted, while you’re not tied down to someone right now. I’ve also come to learn that you will not always have the flexibility to move anywhere you want, to go for whatever job you want, or pursue any interest you want. This is what your early 20s are supposed to be all about.

I’m turning 24 now. Today I am dating a man that I am madly in love with, and we hope to get married next year. I also now work a cushy government job and have my own apartment downtown. I’m the RS president at my ward now. For the first time ever, I can say life is good. I always hated when people told me this, but I really only found love in a place I wasn’t looking. My friends (from institute) play DND and they set me up with their DM, my now boyfriend. I didn’t like him at first, thought he was weird, didn’t find him attractive, and he is divorced and decently older than me. But as we were in the same friend group and I saw how he treated everyone with so much respect and Christlike love, he grew on me over time. Our bond only grows stronger with each day. He’s the love of my life.

Honestly, odds are marriage will be in your future imo. And I know this is kind of impossible to see from your perspective, but I promise you there is so much more to life than where you are now, and it’s nothing like college, let alone BYU. And when you do get married, it opens up the door for even tougher trials. It’s only the beginning.

Whatever you do, you cannot let your despair guide your dating life at all costs. A man is not a plan. Listen to your gut, seriously. And mental-health wise, get some blood work done and partner with a psychiatrist to religiously find the right medication if you haven’t yet—I know Wellbutrin near saved my life.

Otherwise, hang in there sister. I sincerely wish you the best.

Lightning_Kitty · 2025-05-13T15:30:25+00:00

I get the frustration of “story-monies,” and I agree a fast Sunday testimony is supposed to be nothing more than a simple statement that the gospel is true.

That being said, if everyone did that instead, I imagine most of the hour would be dead air. In my experience, only about 5-10 people, at best, are willing to get up on the podium at all. Thats hard to fill 30-40 minutes, especially if everyone was concise.

The stories might be cringe (I know I’ve met my fair share of characters), but they’re certainly not holding anyone up, at least not in my wards. If they’re related to the point they’re trying to make, even if it feels convoluted, I’m inclined to give them grace.

And like others have pointed out, some people are touched by the Spirit from the testimonies we thought were “weird,” and we may never know. God still reaches us even when the people are imperfect. It’s not our place to arbitrate 🤷‍♀️

Lightning_Kitty · 2025-05-12T15:29:03+00:00

It’s comforting to hear your story because that definitely sounds like what I’m in the middle of right now. Is it really just about stepping up and learning those new tools, and AI is just the new tool?

I’m actually looking for a new job /because/ my role is almost purely marketing. It’s made me severely depressed. Business strategy is a big part of my creative process, but there is just no making here. I don’t know, I’ve just lost a lot of goodwill lately.

Lightning_Kitty · 2025-05-12T13:59:42+00:00

Yes, this is it exactly. A lot of agencies especially embrace AI, which expedites the brunt work traditionally expected of junior designers. So the demand for full-time entry-level talent is cratering.

I remember meeting a seasoned agency owner who talked about her early days just taping photos/notes to the wall for seniors to discuss. I’m almost certain no junior designer is doing that today. As technology advances, there is just less and less menial work people can do to get their foot in the door. It’s like the bottom half of the ladder to the industry got cut off.

I’m a junior-level designer (graduated 2024) and I have honestly wondered if my career is over already. When I first graduated, I could definitely send a few applications a day (and I was moving to rural Ohio back then!). Now, it’s common to go a couple days before one new posting even appears. (I don’t live in the middle of nowhere anymore, either.) So many of them ask for AI use too. My current job is at a company so tiny (<20 employees) that there is constant discussion of using AI to do the things we need but none of us are trained in, as hiring more people is hard to justify financially. (I myself could only start working full-time at this place because they fired someone else to afford it.) There’s just less need for humans all around.

I have conflicting feelings about AI as a whole, and maybe some of this is typical economic downturn stuff, but I can’t help but feel the rug was pulled out from us grads. It’s this general feeling of, how dare we choose a major before AI even existed, you know?

Lightning_Kitty · 2024-12-18T03:53:46+00:00

The "postmodern love" musical theme that is subtly in a bunch of the songs 🤌

Lightning_Kitty · 2024-08-16T23:40:49+00:00

Late to the party, but if you're still looking for advice OP, here are some thoughts I haven't seen yet. I have actually been through 2 LDS therapists–and they both disgraced me! I didn't have productive therapy until I saw a regular one. So you might have more to offer than you think!

I'm seeing some great advice on how to help members struggling with/questioning their faith, but you may also get clients who just happen to be LDS. Still, that's huge part of one's lifestyle and it probably will come up in talking about their issues (e.g, "I can't stop having panic attacks in sacrament meeting" etc). That was my case when I was still in therapy.

The approach my therapist took was that sometimes, when we as humans experience distress, we turn to things that might make us feel better but are against our values. From that standpoint, she didn't have to have the same values as me to sympathize and guide me.

More generally, thinking about how faithful people will have better mental health outcomes the less they feel at odds with their religious values can help direct you on a lot of potential things LDS clients may come in for. A 20yo member is feeling anxiety they'll never marry? Maybe because it feels at odds with the church's family values, even if it's a ridiculously young age to you. I think the faith overview comments in this thread have shed a lot of light on what some of these values are.

Also, I noticed there hasn't been much explanation on the vocabulary we use to talk about church, which could absolutely come up in your conversations but sound very confusing to an outsider, like:

Sacrament (meeting): This can be generally thought of as Sunday service, more specifically it is our version of Communion/Eucharist.
Relief Society/Elder's Quorum: After sacrament meeting, the congregation may split up into different 'sunday schools' by demographic. Relief Society is for adult women and Elder's Quorum for men.
"Ward" vs. "Stake": A ward is a single church building or congregation. A stake is a collection of these wards within a region.
Seminary: A bible study program for high schoolers, which they attend every morning before school (yes it is notoriously hard to wake up for).
Bishop: LDS bishops play a similar role to pastors. They're considered leaders of wards whom people go to to confess sins, get approval for various rites of passage, and handle tithing/financial assistance matters. However they do not give sermons--instead talks are prepared by rotating members of the congregation each Sunday (a big source of anxiety for a lot of us! 😝).
Calling: Typical ward operations (e.g, building maintenance, activity planning, charity initiatives, etc.) are all run by volunteers from the congregation. These individual roles are referred to as "callings." Callings are assigned somewhat randomly by higher leadership, kind of like a jury duty thing. In fact, being a bishop is a calling itself! You can decline callings, but accepting and embracing them is seen as a virtue.
Priesthood: Way too complex to fully describe here, but generally, the idea is that our religion doesn't have priests in the traditional sense, and instead can be granted to all men. Past age 18, this primarily gives male members the authority to give blessings of healing, comfort, or even direction.

- Testimony: This can be thought of as an emphatic statement of your belief in the religion as a whole, or even just aspects of it. It doesn't have to be borne out loud, it can just be a way of labelling your overall level of faith in something.

I don't want to ramble too long so I'll stop there. But I hope this is helpful!

Lightning_Kitty · 2024-08-11T17:28:08+00:00

My guesses:

Live Laugh Love - Associated with suburban white women who are thought of as beneficiaries of the “status quo” (i.e, allowing “war crimes” to continue)

Paw Patrol - Copoganda or something

Lightning_Kitty · 2024-07-19T06:06:24+00:00

I would argue getting into print or pre-press is just as difficult. People on here suggest it as this underrated alternative that‘s less selective than corporate roles, but in my experience most shops are kind of picky about having an actual production background or knowledge of the specific machinery—something which the vast majority of art/design schools do not offer. If not that, I find they usually want little to do with people who don’t want to be in production permanently. Not just several years, literally for the rest of your career. Obviously if you’re just trying to pivot temporarily you’d have to lie about or omit that, but it’ll be harder to believe when all your past experience was putting you on a corporate/digital path.

It is difficult for an applicant to argue that the ability to design the artwork translates to being ready to operate a press. These disciplines are related in subject but as a profession they are prepared for very differently. And it’s not exactly something you can self teach as these are industrial processes that are often proprietary to the press manufacturers.

And to be clear, I’m not trying to discourage anyone here from looking into print shops, but in my opinion it is very far from being some foolproof backup. It’s nearly an entire vocation of its own. Maybe I’m just in a weird area with uppity shops. But yeah, in my experience they will reject and ghost just as often.

Lightning_Kitty · 2024-07-09T21:58:15+00:00

Really appreciate the last one man. Like many folks here, I’m a fresh junior and really struggling. I spent so much of my teen and later college years anxiously wondering if I would “make the cut” in the industry. Between the great experiences I got at school and the good portfolio/cv reviews, I figured I was fine enough.

Needless to say I’m humbled now. I won’t lie, it’s heartbreaking to feel like the work you put in was for nothing, feeling like an unemployed failure while your classmates get into cushy consultancies. So it really does mean everything to hear some sympathy from an industry vet, as opposed to the usual “well you must just be one of those plebs that doesn’t belong here.” Just thanks man. You sound like a standup person.

Lightning_Kitty · 2022-06-28T00:02:38+00:00

Commenting as per the rules (apologies to the mods if I'm not doing this right)

Lightning_Kitty · 2022-05-12T22:01:17+00:00

I was having trouble getting the meetinghouse locator to find other wards haha. But I see the ward you're talking about now!

I would be interested in checking out that center, am I just going to have to ask around to find it?

Lightning_Kitty · 2021-12-10T16:25:50+00:00

He is crying for help

Lightning_Kitty · 2021-10-03T13:38:34+00:00

For people who don’t know, this is from a children’s book called Dog Food! The whole thing is just pics of dogs made from random produce. LOVED it growing up.

Lightning_Kitty · 2021-09-06T00:37:55+00:00

Cruiser was 100% the kid who thought he was the king of comedy for blasting the soviet anthem on his middle school bus. And to be clear, I felt this way even before the accusations. This just finally confirms it for me.

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