A love letter to at least 97 awesome people

Heidi from Literate and Stylish recently posted about a problem she was having with Blogger comments remaining in Blogger rather than transferring to Disqus. I believe the problem is that with the mobile version of a Blogger site enabled, Blogger's commenting system overrides Disqus. So on the mobile site, only Blogger comments appear, while on the full site version, only Disqus comments appear. I'm disabling the mobile site now to avoid further issues like this. I'll monitor the issue going forward (my favourite football phrase) and if the problem continues I'll be contacting Disqus.

So to Bren, who left this comment on this post:

"Absolutely adore your blog...finding it has been one of the highlights in a pretty gruesome year for me. Thanks!"

Here's what I have to say. First, thank you for reading my blog. Thank you all. I never thought I'd have any followers, let alone 97 (?!) through Google Reader after a year. (Sometimes I feel lame because other blogs grow so fast but I received my first email about an affiliation program and I don't even know how to respond--I can't imagine how I'd handle it if this blog mushroomed like some do.) I have no idea where 94 of you came from or how you found Animated Cardigan, but I am really, truly honoured that you all think I'm funny/clever/stylish/un-boring enough to follow me and read my posts and, hopefully, take away something from this crazy thing. I know I can be a bit sporadic in posting, but I'm really glad you're all still hanging around!

& specifically to Bren, I hope with all my heart that 2012 is a million times better than 2011 was, and if there's anything you want to see from me that would help--ridiculous nail polish, how I look with my hair teased to high heaven, whatever--let me know and I'll try my best to help out.

And lastly, because I'm talking about how much I love you guys and how much I love this blog, here's a screenshot of the best text messaged I ever received, from earlier this year:



I just about melted into the floor in a puddle of rainbows and sunshine when I read that. I don't think about myself as a particularly inspiring person--for the post part I just go about my life and hope for the best--but once in a while someone posts a comment here or a friend sends a text and I'm reminded that there's something about me that is good enough for others to find inspiration, and that makes the broken cameras, horrible lighting, quarreling with hobos hiding where I take my pictures, and spending 40 minutes every night editing my photos and writing a post all very much worth it.

So thank you all for following along, and I can't wait to see what the new year brings us!