Carole Knits

october zinnia
october zinnia
martinis with a view
martinis with a view
gettysburg fence for
gettysburg fence for
germinate shawl on rocks
germinate shawl on rocks
field of flags 2
field of flags 2
color affection with edge
color affection with edge
cedar leaf shawlette 2
cedar leaf shawlette 2
3_27_2014
3_27_2014
3_18_13
3_18_13
2_24_2014
2_24_2014
1_11_13
1_11_13

Three On Thursday

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On the Happier podcast a few weeks back Gretchen and Elizabeth had a discussion about aphorisms. It’s not a term I’m especially familiar with but it’s defined as a concise statement of a principle. Examples include statements such as actions speak louder than words, he who hesitates is lost, and don’t fire until you see the whites of their eyes. This discussion got me thinking about phrases and expressions that I say a lot. Mine own personal aphorisms, if you will. Guess what? It’s Thursday so I came up with 3!

  1. Done is better than perfect. I started saying this when I learned how to sew. Seriously. You can rip out that seam over and over and try it get it perfect or you can accept that it’s done and just move on. It can be applied to so much more than sewing, too! Blog posts? Done is better than perfect. Dinner? Done is better than perfect. I’m looking at my to-do list right now and thinking that I could use this phrase for pretty much everything on there except payroll. Payroll needs to be done and perfect.
  2. It’s better to beg forgiveness than ask permission. This is one that a good friend said to me over 30 years ago and I took it to heart at that very moment. My attitude about it changed slightly when I became a mother and I always told Hannah this was a rule for grown ups only! But still. It’s a good philosophy for those times when you just need to . . . bend/ignore/push the rules a smidge. Becomes sometimes it’s easier to just make a decision and potentially have to apologize later than to do nothing in the moment.
  3. I’ll alert the media. This one comes from the movie Arthur starring Dudley Moore. Arthur turns to his butler Hobson and says, do you know what I’m going to do? I’m going to take a bath. And Hobson says, I’ll alert the media. It’s the most perfect, most sarcastic, most wonderful way of saying: I don’t care without actually saying I don’t care because that might be mean. I say it a lot when Dale announces something: I’m going to the garage, I’m going to take a shower, I’m going to bring in firewood, etc. I look at him deadpan and I say: I’ll alert the media. Usually he laughs. Emphasis on usually.

Do you have aphorisms that you use? It’s kind of fun to think about them so please tell me what yours are in the comments.

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A Month of Photos And Videos: November 2019

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It’s that time of the month. No, not that time. It’s photo time. The time when we take a glance back and see what happened around here last month. Here’s November . . .

It sure looks like we ate a lot! I love the quality of the light in so many of those food photos, everything looks cozy and warm and festive. There aren’t as many people photos as I try and get but I think I make up for that in the video below.

And that’s a wrap on November! We’re on to twinkle lights and snow!

Read With Us: The Winter Selection Announcement

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Hello my reading friends! I am happy to join with Kym and Bonny today and tell you that the next book for Read With Us is Fever by Mary Beth Keane. I haven’t read it yet but I think it sounds terrific. Here, I’ll share the Good Reads summary with you:

Mary Beth Keane, named one of the 5 Under 35 by the National Book Foundation, has written a spectacularly bold and intriguing novel about the woman known as “Typhoid Mary,” the first person in America identified as a healthy carrier of Typhoid Fever.

On the eve of the twentieth century, Mary Mallon emigrated from Ireland at age fifteen to make her way in New York City. Brave, headstrong, and dreaming of being a cook, she fought to climb up from the lowest rung of the domestic-service ladder. Canny and enterprising, she worked her way to the kitchen, and discovered in herself the true talent of a chef. Sought after by New York aristocracy, and with an independence rare for a woman of the time, she seemed to have achieved the life she’d aimed for when she arrived in Castle Garden. Then one determined medical engineer noticed that she left a trail of disease wherever she cooked, and identified her as an asymptomatic carrier of Typhoid Fever. With this seemingly preposterous theory, he made Mallon a hunted woman.

The Department of Health sent Mallon to North Brother Island, where she was kept in isolation from 1907 to 1910, then released under the condition that she never work as a cook again. Yet for Mary, proud of her former status and passionate about cooking, the alternatives were abhorrent. She defied the edict.

Bringing early-twentieth-century New York alive, the neighborhoods, the bars, the park carved out of upper Manhattan, the boat traffic, the mansions and sweatshops and emerging skyscrapers, Fever is an ambitious retelling of a forgotten life. In the imagination of Mary Beth Keane, Mary Mallon becomes a fiercely compelling, dramatic, vexing, sympathetic, uncompromising, and unforgettable heroine.

We picked this book for a number of reasons, carefully considering the length and availability from the library, as well as the subject matter and discussion topics and I think we have chosen well. As for the timeline, you have December and January to get this read and we will discuss it in February. You can expect us to mention it now and again before then but we are mindful that this is a busy time of year for everyone and we don’t want to overwhelm you with book stuff when you might not have the time to consider it.

I hope you’ll join us for part two of our online book club, it’s definitely a group effort and we need YOU to make this a success.

 

Sometimes Mondays

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Are the start of a new month. And when that month is December, well, it seems like the perfect time for a Calendar of Kindness. I’m going to follow along with these prompts and spread kindness, love and holiday cheer this month. I hope you’ll join me.

Happy December, friends.

Self Care Saturday: Find Your People

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It’s time for the final post for NaBloPoMo and since it’s a Saturday that means it’s time to talk about self-care again. This week I’m encouraging you to find your people.

Your people are the ones who get you. The ones who are there for you at a moment’s notice. The ones who support you and make you laugh. The ones you want to hang out with, have dinner with, go to the movies with and do all the fun stuff with. Beyond the fun, though, they are also the ones who hold you when you weep, who pull you back when you skate too close to the edge, the ones who have your best interest at heart all the time. And, part of the reason they are your people is because you do all those same things for them when they need you.

Listen. Self care is all about loving yourself, caring for yourself, and improving yourself and while a lot of that can be done alone, there can be real benefits to including friends as part of your self care. Watching your friends grow can help you be inspired to try something new, hanging out with them can increase your trust and help you to become more vulnerable. And if I’ve learned anything this past year it’s that being vulnerable is where the magic happens.

I’m truly fortunate to have a strong inner circle of friends as well as a rich middle circle and a large outer circle. (If you don’t know what I’m talking about, this is a great piece on identifying your circle of friends.) Your circle of friends, and how you choose who is included in that circle, is a critical component to your self care. Do your best to build that circle with the right people and watch how that changes your energy and growth.

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