Month: January 2017

Grace Notes Subscription Review

I first heard about Grace Notes Subscription on the Mom Struggling Well podcast. Emily Thomas, the host of the podcast, shared that scripture memory was a struggle of hers, but that her friend Deborah’s business was helping her with it. As someone who has always had a hard time truly hiding God’s word in my heart, I was intrigued.

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Guest post: Simple resolutions to start your year on the right foot

Friends, today we have our first Outrageously Wonderful guest post of the year. Meredith Simonds writes at Plenty Woman, a website for women ready to believe we are everything anxiety says we’re not. We met at the BlogHer conference this summer and I immediately knew I had met a forever friend. Meredith writes honestly about her struggles with anxiety and shares beautiful affirmations and meditations that are an encouragement to your soul. You won’t want to miss a word of today’s post about simple resolutions. 

I like to start my New Year’s resolutions in December. Sometimes July, as that’s my birthday month when I’m feeling particularly motivated to convince myself I’m getting better with age.

Starting on resolutions early like this gives me a chance to do a trial run. It’s nice to know you hate doing something before you commit to doing it on January 1.

I also like my New Year’s resolutions to be forgiving. I want to do these things every single day, but if I only do them half the time, it still makes a world of difference.

Three out of the four resolutions on this list are ones that stuck for me this past year, so I can vouch for their simplicity. The fourth is a resolution I’m working toward, but one I believe can be equally user-friendly.

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One word: A look back and a look forward

I’m not a resolution girl, but I do love the idea of setting a one-word resolution for the year. For me, setting a word of the year really helps me focus and set my priorities for the year. It’s like making a promise to yourself or giving yourself a gift.

As I set my word of the year for 2016, I felt certain it would be the year of joy. From my dad’s motorcycle accident last January and 40+ day stay in the hospital to losing my grandmother and ending the year with pneumonia, 2016 was so not the word of the year. The word that I settled on, nourish, was the perfect word for the year.

Every time I felt like I was off track, I came back to my word and identified something in my life that needed to be nourished. It was a constant reminder to take care of the people and things in my life that are important to me. I absolutely loved having that as my word.

So when sitting down to think about a word for 2017, there were high expectations. I spent most of the week before Christmas in bed recovering from pneumonia, so I had plenty of time to think about what this year’s word should be. I had a general idea, but nothing seemed quite right. And then the whirl of Christmas and family and celebrations began and then – poof – it was 2017.

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