Knit Along

It’s been a while since I’ve had needles in my hand. I finished up the scarves and cowl and then the holiday season took over. I cast on Katherine’s Martinmas sweater in Size 2-4, using the beautiful Madelinetosh yarn she sent me. I’ve never tried anything more complex than scarves and washcloths, so this is truly a new adventure for me. I’ve done well with the first two rows but I keep having to re-do the third. I’m afraid I am missing an idea. I’m pretty sure I’m not doing the M1R or M1L right, which would mean I’d get too many stitches. I need to find a video that explains it- the pictures on knitpicks aren’t making sense to me. If you have a link, please share!

I won the lovely A Mother’s Rule of Life: How to Bring Order to Your Home and Peace to Your Soulfrom Ginny’s giveaway last month, and it arrived just as we left on our travels. I cannot say enough good about this book. I truly have walked away from my time with this book in the last two weeks with such a deep and profound sense of peace. I am sure that must surprise one, seeing as how the word ‘rule’ is in the title, but really and truly. Lovely. I’m not even sure where to start with my thoughts regarding it. I remember being a young mother, with first one little baby and then two, in my little snug house on a hill, and how much I rejoiced in the simple tasks of motherhood and homemaking. Perhaps it was because it was all new, and such a tremendous change from my life previously, but I remember that time very, very fondly. When I think of that time, I think of peace. But as is true, another chilld comes a long, or two, or three, or four, and life gets super intense and well, just explodes! Crisis happens: a cancer scare. A lost job. The death of a child. Serious illness. Two plus years of unemployment and then under-employment. More serious illness. And we forget why we’re here and why we’re doing it.

Holly Pierlot tells about just such a time in her own life and what led her into the practices she now keeps and shares with us in the book. And it is just so good. I think if I am ever in a position of mentoring a new, young mom, it will be this book I give and discuss with them. I appreciate her gentle, firm, loving tone (the tone I wish for as a mother myself) and how she comes and sits beside you, so to speak, and reminds you, above all, to put on love. Of course she has many practical tips regarding planning, organizing, homeschooling, finances, and the like, but the under-pinning heart beat of the book is rather our Faith, our love for God, and how that informs everything else. Our mother’s rule. I have been a mother twelve years now, with six children, and I remembered and learned so much and have since been putting it into practice myself. A keeper for sure. And I never would have read it had I not won it in the giveaway!

What are you reading lately?

Sharing with Ginny.