{good} stuff

good stuff I've found recently around the web, all with the twang of New Year, New Starts....

{Plum Paper Designs} << clickable link

love those fancy, designer planners but just can't justify spending $50 + on them? This Etsy shop has  nice, semi-custom planners with add-ons, stickers and personalized covers ~with less sticker shock

{Only Passionate Curiosity}

Printable homeschool planners.  >>prettier than the plain ones I make up in Word, with big O's for checkboxes.....

{Elisa Pulliam}

PDF-books: How to Start the Year Equipped and Thriving. These look very good and she was having a BOGO sale...though Jenny-the-late has missed the ending day

{7 Ways to Conquer your morning routine} 

for those non-morning people among us. New Year, New Start!  Er...or something...

{Daily Page Notepad}

Thyme is Honey Etsy shop....simple but eye-pleasing daily checklist. Because, I will forever be an optimist that I can get my act together, and I will keep buying stuff to somehow, magically attain this goal...plus, I love paper....

{What Comes Next}

A Study in Brown blog. She writes about seeking simplicity and experimenting with living with no internet in the house.  I don't think I would like this, I don't think I could do it, and yet, the thought intrigues me with the possibilities....

Happy New Year, bloggy friends!

Merry and Bright

This holiday season has been merry and bright and full of friends, family and fellowship.

We have an annual winter bible conference with our church every year and we get to enjoy hosting people in our home.  Some years we have people from other countries, and some years we have our bible college boys return- with new spouses.  It's all very sweet.

We had one of the bible college girls who spent time encouraging Meg come stay with us, along with her family. When we traveled to Boston with the kids a few years ago, they let us stay at their farm.

So, it has been a very busy couple of weeks here with cleaning and getting ready for guests, having & feeding guests and attending our conference.  Whew, kind of exhausted here!

I don't know about you, but the New Year inspires me to get more organized and set new goals.  I am reading {albeit, slowly, and haphazardly- It's the Jen way...}

• Getting things done
• Switch: How to change things when change is hard

Which is kind of humorous, since I am adding these books to my collection/stack of "get organized" books...but, ahem, I'll give it a go, one more time...

I am planning on reading through the New Testament several times this year.  Witness Lee was a Bible teacher whose books I really enjoy.  I know people who knew him personally and he made a deep impact on those people.  It's well-known that he read through the New Testament once a month, continuously and I thought I'd like to do this, too.  I know that there is no way I'd keep up with reading enough to read it every month, so I decided I'd like to do it every two months.  There is a great site a friend just showed me where you can schedule your Bible readings- including the whole Bible, online.  You can plug in how long you want to take and what days you want to read.

Read His Word  is the site.  I made an account and now when I check in, it tells me what I need to read for the day.  Way cool :)  }}much less clunky then me taking the page number of my N.T. and dividing it by 60 days...which is what I was going to do...

I mentioned before that Simply Convivial has a series on Getting things done -

• 31 days to GTD for homemakers

she also is starting up a new series on digital home management

• Digital Household notebook series

My last big goal is to spend as much time as possible sitting on the couch with Sky, watching HGTV.

How about you, any good New Year's resolutions sites?

Absolution...Resolution...something like that

I know the whole New Year's resolution is just so cliche'- Yet, there is something I really like about a brand new year, a clean slate, a new beginning, resolve. I am going to keep my list short, I've learned with time that the more you try to put on your list, the more likely you are to fail. I've also learned to keep my resolutions short. Here they are

I resolve:

To break my 7 -year fast of brown sugar and cinnamon pop tarts.

To start eating more health consciously and to start taking vitamins- starting this Tuesday
(less diet coke, more cranberry water, fish oil, less sugar...)

To go out with a bang before this Tuesday, hence the box of pop tarts and the chips and melted cheese I have eaten for almost every meal this weekend. And the candy cane jo-jo's brownies.

To begin my yoga practice again. (I bought this dvd yesterday- whoo-hoo!)
And to up my walking program.

To spend more time with the Lord, reading his word and praying. Specifically, to start my morning this way..I hate mornings-not just catching some reading randomly during the day and praying while I fall asleep at night....

To finish the 2 teaching company courses I have, before ordering anymore. I have one on St. Augustine, and one on C.S. Lewis.

To be more organized with my homeschooling (vague, I know, but I am still thinking the hows out in my head)

So, I 'll let you know how it all goes...how about you? Any resolutions out there you want to share?

As for the pop tarts...I banned them years ago because I ate them for most breakfasts, and often for a snack, with a diet coke of course. I am a comfort/habit sort of eater- these things are just really really bad for me so I decided to never buy them.

My big diet/food changes happen this week,
as Sky observed..."you're going out with a bang, I see!" and then when my howl of dismay erupted on discovering my new box of pop tarts was already expired, he inquired if the universe was trying to tell me something.
um, screw the universe...I ate them anyways. Those things never really expire.

Pop tart anyone?