Holidays Amaze has a holiday blog page. Dr. Karen Petit is the author of one book of poetry (Holidays Amaze) and four novels: Unhidden Pilgrims, Roger Williams in an Elevator, Banking on Dreams, and Mayflower Dreams. - www.holidaysamaze.com

My Personal Maze for an Amazing New Year

1/1/2019

This picture is the first part of "A Maze Poem: A Maze of Choices for New Year's Day," which begins on page 3 of Dr. Karen Petit's book: HOLIDAYS AMAZE.

The second poem in my poetry book Holidays Amaze is titled "A Maze Poem: A Maze of Choices for New Year's Day." The first part of this maze poem is the picture in this blog post. While I've often been very busy and did not think that I had the time to follow through with any new resolutions, writing this poem about New Year's Day made me realize that I wanted the freedom to choose new paths, rather than always just staying on the same one. With a New Year's resolution, I can initially create one or more resolutions, follow through on some days, and/or not follow through on some days. I'll have more choices, rather than just staying on the same path. For my resolution this year, I'm going to try to keep losing weight slowly and becoming healthier by doing these things:

Eating more vegetables and fewer carbohydrates
Three nights a week, only eating salad and soup for supper
Standing up more often while using a computer
Exercising more while watching TV
Only eating one small piece of chocolate at a time and then using substitution as a technique to help. (If I want more sweets, I'll substitute fruit, a couple of small carrots, and/or some sugar-free candy.)

A Forevergreen Christmas

12/25/2018

Christmas is one of my favorite holidays. I love meeting with my family and friends. I also love all of the many beautiful Christmas decorations that are created and placed in so many locations every year. Additionally, I love to think about and celebrate my Lord and Savior's birth and life. He has given eternal life to so many Christians.

May your Christmas be a truly amazing holiday!

"A Forevergreen Christmas" is the poem on page 89 of Karen Petit's book of poetry: Holidays Amaze, published in 2018 by WestBow Press.

Thankful on Thanksgiving

11/22/2018

I'm thankful for so much in my life, including these and many other items:

to have a life
to have holidays as a part of my life
to have many loving & helpful relatives, friends, acquaintances, colleagues, & pets
to have the essentials of life: food, shelter, clothing, . . .
to have the many freedoms that we have in our country, such as the right to vote
to have the ability to see some of nature's beautiful animals, plants, and settings
to have many admirable manufactured items in our world (houses, cars, computers, phones, appliances, roads, books, pens, pencils, furniture, electricity, . . . )
to have the chance to pursue my dreams: to be both a professor and a writer
to have the ability to pray to God & to thank Him for the many blessings in my life

November 11th, 2018

11/11/2018

This photo of the U.S. flag was taken by Dr. Karen Petit and appears on page 67 of Holidays Amaze.

Holidays Amaze has the poem "The Strength of Unity on Veterans Day" on pages 65 and 66. Especially since I know so many veterans, I really enjoyed writing this poem. My father, for example, was in the navy during World War II. A couple of my brothers also served in the military. I am thankful for the past, present, and future courageous, helpful actions of veterans in keeping our country safe and filled with freedrom.

I also love the U.S. flag's design; it includes a star for each of the current fifty states, in addition to a stripe for each of the historic thirteen colonies. I love this use of connections between our country's present and past history.

Have a Sweet Halloween!

10/31/2018

Page sixty-two of Holidays Amaze has a sweet maze poem for Halloween titled "A Maze Poem: Costumes on Halloween." The last two parts of the poem read: "Candy, thanks, and smiles were sweet to walk miles. Sweetened receivers are joyful givers." Because I love smiling while giving away and eating chocolate, I really love Halloween!

Columbus Day

10/8/2018

I'm so happy to be one of the vendors at the Autumnfest in Woonsocket on Columbus Day. Not only do I enjoy talking to people about my books, but I also talk with other people and answer questions about the writing, editing, and publishing processes. Additionally, I'll be meeting family and friends, listening to music, watching a parade, looking at some nice vendor displays, and having a lot of fun.

Holidays Amaze on Labor Day

9/3/2018

Labor Day:
September 3, 2018

My cats love to help me with my writing, especially on such great holidays as Labor Day. They not only put their paws on the keyboard, but they purr, look at me, talk to me, and talk to each other.

While we might think our pets are just relaxing all the time, they all have very important jobs: helping their owners. Even if their helpful actions seem to be distracting ones, I don't think distractions from loving animals are really distractions. Their actions rather help us to pause for a moment in our busy lives, see love-in-action, smile, laugh, pet our animals, and participate in loving relationships.

An Amazing Holiday Dream

9/2/2018

The blog entries on my five different book websites are often connected to each other, so I'll be posting this blog entry on all five of my book websites to illustrate one example of the many connections that I often see between my books and their content.

A few days ago, I had a dream about a holiday event in my home. Because this really was a dream, I could also post this blog entry on my dream blog for Banking on Dreams (http://www.bankingondreams.com/dream-blog).
Since I have a large family and we were all in my kitchen at the same time, the room was as crowded as a crowded elevator. I even imagined during my dream that my kitchen was a kitchen inside of an elevator in which we were coming up with rules about who would be washing dishes, who would be putting the leftovers in the refrigerator, etc. The dream could therefore be connected to the freedom blog for Roger Williams in an Elevator (http://www.rogerwill.com/freedom-blog).
We talked about how thankful we were for our large family with many helpers, so content about this dream can also be posted on my "Many Good Thanks" blog for Mayflower Dreams (http://www.mayflowerdreams.com/blog).
We said a prayer and talked about God, so the content of this dream would also be appropriate for posting on my sharing faith blog for Unhidden Pilgrims (http://www.unhiddenpilgrims.com/sharing-faith-blog).
Because my family and I were helping each other to wash the dishes and to do other tasks after an amazing holiday meal, this blog entry has been posted on this blog page to illustrate the amazing fun that happens on holidays.

Do Holidays Amaze or Are Holidays a Maze?

8/29/2018

Holidays Amaze shows both the amazing and the maze aspects of our many holidays and celebrations with its maze poems, prayer poems, shaped poems, sonnets, and narratives. The poems that are formatted as maze poems, in addition to the ones that use maze symbolism, make Holidays Amaze an amazing collection of poems to enjoy, especially on holidays.

The picture on the right shows a tiny version of the first half of the maze poem on page one of Holidays Amaze.

Thankful for Holidays Amaze

8/25/2018

This morning, I was reading a poetry journal that I had written decades ago. The entry for June 13, 1990, was very interesting. I was still recovering from a minor car accident. The image to the right shows what I wrote for my last entry in this poetry journal.

Near the end of 1990, I was very thankful that my injured knee recovered and was fine; I was even pain-free. I sometimes wrote poetry in the decades following 1990, but I did not officially publish any of these poems--until after my second novel was written. I then published on my book websites a few of these poems, which are now still on two of my blog pages: http://www.mayflowerdreams.com/blog and http://www.rogerwill.com/freedom-blog.

These poems on my blog pages were included in Holidays Amaze, my first book of poetry that has just been officially published and is now available for purchase at WestBow Press. It will also soon be available for purchase at multiple other places.

I always considered myself to be someone who loved both poetry and prose. Now I am so thankful that I was able to keep writing academic documents, prose, novels, and poetry about amazing holidays and celebrations.