Joyeux Nöel (semi-wordless Wednesday)

We are having a swampy Christmas in Central Ohio this year; it has left me dreaming of celebrating Christmas in a more picturesque setting.  And what could be more lovely than Paris at Christmas?

La cathédrale de Notre Dame à Noël

Menu de Père Noël

Bûche de Noël

Les lumières de Noël de Paris

Tour Eiffel neigeux


Macaron à Noël? Pourquoi pas?

Some Quotes, Some Hymns

I've always loved those stylized quotes that you find all over pinterest and decided to try my hand at a few of my own. This first one sits in front of my computer on a small plaque that was given to me by my mom during one of the darkest stages of my depression.

The Little Prince is a book that amazes me every time I read it. As a child it was a cool adventure with a sad ending. As an adult it plumbs the depths of our souls and speaks truths that are difficult to put into words.

This is from my favorite prayer. If you are a long-time reader, you may have noticed that I admire Mother Teresa greatly.

This song just slays me. Right to the heart.

I grew up Methodist. The doxology is part of me. It may be my favorite hymn (besides "In The Garden," which I like to sing with a country twang, and "The Old Rugged Cross," which I used to sing to William when I was nursing him).

That's all I have for tonight. If you've never designed one of these, you crafty bloggers you, I encourage you to do so. It's lots of fun. What would your picture-quote say?

Ethereal

e·the·re·al - [ih-theer-ee-uhl] –adjective

1. light, airy, or tenuous: an ethereal world created through the poetic imagination.

2. extremely delicate or refined: ethereal beauty.

3. heavenly or celestial: gone to his ethereal home.

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A ramble with some knitting and kitty pictures (and a profoundly amazing title)

I started this blog as an act of desperation. We had no money, and I was caught hook, line, and sinker by those internet ads promising gobs of cash if you just blogged about something you knew. I knew knitting. So one day, I sat down, signed up for a Blogger account, and wrote about a knit along. Easy peasy! And I incorporated Adwords and waited for the cash to come pouring in.

You know what happened next, don't you? Where was the money??? I quickly learned that blogging was about something completely different than money. I also learned that although I loved to knit, and Dropped Stitches was supposed to be a dedicated knitting blog, I just didn't want to write about knitting all of the time.

So I started putting in tidbits about my life. Then a recipe here and there. I wasn't really dedicated to posting, and for a time quit writing. I hadn't figured out the cardinal rule of blogging: if you really don't want to write about the stuff you are writing about, you aren't going to write a good blog. Easy as that.

Somehow, one day I decided that I was going to start writing again, but this time, I'd use my blog as a creative outlet. It would be my place to let off some steam, explore who I was, and share a bit about knitting. It slowly morphed into a completely different monster. One that will rock you to sleep and sing you a lullaby (because there are no mean monsters in my Dropped Stitches world), but an very interesting monster with a VERY interesting hairdo nonetheless.

The first time I wrote about faith I was scared to death. Who wanted to read about a girl and her faith struggles? As it turned out, a lot of people did. I received more comments than I ever had. I learned to be authentic. And transparent. Every time I revealed more of myself, flawed, scared, depressed, all of the yucky stuff, I felt lighter, more free. And I decided that if people didn't want to read about the yucky, well they just didn't have to, did they?

I don't even know how to categorize what I write now. I just try to share, be true, and you all know that I like pretty pictures, so I share them. I don't share a lot about my family because they need their anonymity, but I share some stuff. By the way, eldest daughter broke her wrist attempting an axel. Figure skating is a dangerous sport!

So that's my ramble. This is what you get when I'm sleepy and a bit migrainous. And in a totally unrelated bit, kitties and knitting just sort of go together, do they not?

Enjoy your day and be good to yourself.

Photos We Heart It

Shutter Love

Today is my first time participating in The Trendy Treehouse's Shutter Love Tuesdays. The theme this week is pets.

Foxy showed up in our garage emaciated and severely dehydrated. After three days of drinking water she finally used the litter box and started eating. I remember telling the kids not to be surprised if we had to put her down. Well, she pulled through with flying colors and is now the crankiest and funniest cat I have ever owned. And she is everyone's favorite. And she is definitely a "Mama Cat" with the ability to fight off every "predator" that enters our yard, be they dogs or chipmunks (we have no more neighborhood chipmunks because of her). We love her, and are happy that she showed up in our garage that day.

Picture Picture

Some new photos for your enjoyment.











I am currently testing photography paper to decide what my images look the best on. Once I figure it all out, I will put images up for sale in my shop (so excited about this!). I'll keep you posted!

Light

Well, yesterday's post was pretty heavy, so I got on We Heart It and found some pictures full of light. They could be happy, they could be cute. They make me smile.

Have a Happy Day.