Contemplative

No access to intent yesterday so no post.

I have alot of things on my mind right now. So I think my post will simply be I'm in a contemplative mood right now. Thanks Ginger for the suggestion of a word for the day.

For me contemplative means to think about what's on my mind and decide on the best plan of action for me. Also at times to just forget about it and let it me.

Blogger time

I'm not sure what time zone blogger is set on. I know I missed posting Monday. But when I looked back over this weeks archives it showed no post from Saturday til Tuesday and I know I posted early Sunday morning.

I just posted a brag on my granddaughter and it showed up on Tuesday too. This is about 5 minutes later wonder what day it will show on.

Going to brag a little

I'm going to do a little grandma bragging tonight. As some of you might know my granddaughter is homeschooled. She's learning to read and doing a AWESOME job.

The site we use to help her is Starfall.com. We use it to compliment the other resources we use with her.

Ball season is also coming up here. We registered her this week. She moves up a league this year. Not batting off a tee anymore. So we've been practicing what we can with her inside. She is working enthusiactically to be a good team player.

WTG girl.

A little off color funny

A 5-year-old boy went to visit his grandmother one day. Playing with his toys in her bedroom while grandma was dusting, he looked up and said,'Grandma, how come you don't have a boyfriend now that Grandpa went to heaven?'

Grandma replied, 'Honey, my TV is my boyfriend. I can sit in my bedroom and watch it all day long. The religious programs make me feel good and the comedies make me laugh. I'm happy with my TV as my boyfriend.' Grandma turned on the TV, and the reception was terrible.

She started adjusting the knobs, trying to get the picture in focus. Frustrated, she started hitting the backside of the TV hoping to fix the problem.
The little boy heard the doorbell ring, so he hurried to open the door and there stood Grandma's minister. The minister said, 'Hello son, is your Grandma home?' The little boy replied, 'Yeah, she's in the bedroom bangin' her boyfriend.'

The minister fainted. Now, that's funny... I don't care WHO you are

For Monday

You might of noticed I didn't get a post done on the 25th. We got up late. Then had to get more cookies delivered almost done with delivering all those. Then had more errands to do.

So this may be my post for just yesterday or maybe for today too. I don't know, have things on my mind. I was feeling bad because I missed my daily commiment but then realized I'm still committed, life just got in the way Monday.

What are you passionate About

As my profile says I'm a housewife, mother(2 grown children) and grandmother. My family has been and still is my life. I've always like to learn new things.

Sometimes it feels like I just can't learn something tho. Or in this case figure out the answer to the question. Which is "What am I passionate about?" I never seem to have a answer to this question. That did frustrate me because I felt weird not knowing a answer. I should have a passion.I like to do alot of different things. Especially learning and putting what I learn into action.

Tonight I realized my passion is learning. And when I've learn all I feel like I need to learnat the moment I'm ready to move on to the next thing. That doesn't necessarily mean I'm a expert at what I'm learned it just means I have all the knowledge I need at the particular moment.

Sharing my thoughts through writing is one of the things I like to do. This challenge has been enjoyable to me. Tonight I was thinking about the goals I sat for February(can see under February goals). Except for my daily water goal I've done really good. I plan on continuing these goals in March.

But I also wanted to set a goal for March. As I thought about it I remember something I'd like to learn more about. Spring is coming. And in Missouri where I live Spring also means the possibility of severe weather. So in March I will be learning and posting about severe weather. I guess there's the possibility I will be posting 2 times day on some days because I'm sure there will be other things I'd like to talk about too.

There will be a storm spotter class here the first week of March but I don't know if I'll be able to attend. But my daughter is planning on attending so she can share with me what she was taught if I don't get to go.

I'm excited at the idea of setting a goal to reach in a month. Wish me luck. I do have to say I hope what I learn ISN'T needed here this year.

#5 Confidence Builder

Confidence builder #5 is 'become aware of negative self talk." I'll admit this is one I have to pay close attention to. Negative self talk
can creep in before I even realize it's there.

I'm not doing a good enough job getting organized. My post aren't interesting enough. What do I have to contribute? blah, blah, blah

I have to make a conscious effort to notice my self talk. Then I have to say to myself I hear you but sorry at this time I'm too busy to participate in this conversation. Or switch to positive self talk.

For example: Thought- I'm not organized enough. Switch thought to I do a little each day and I'm seeing progress along the way.

Becoming aware of negative self talk isn't a easy task. But it's well worth the effort to get the negative replaced with the positive.

At the moment, I'm having the thought this post just doesn't sound like I'm getting across what I'm trying to.

But I'm going to end this post with I know I've done the best I can and that's all anyone can do.

#4 Confidence Builder

Confidence builder #4 is "Stop Comparing Self to Others." I'm learning that comparing myself to anyone else is a losing game. For the simple reason that comparing is often done in a negative mindset.

See when you compare anything be it people, homes, towns etc... one is often lacking something the other has.

But what I'm learning in reality is there is only one. There is only one me and I'm good enough. There is noone else EXACTLY like me.

There is only one house EXACTLY like mine. Only one town EXACTLY like mine. But for this entry I'm only talking about people.

We all have our similiarities but we're all different too. Comparing is competing. There's no competition. We all have our own looks, talents, desires, feelings, thoughts......

While there is always room to learn, grow and improve. We each do it in our own way and at our own pace.

I Am Unique. Want you join me in celebrating our uniqueness ?

Sincere Compliments

One of my February goals is to read my emails and ebooks that help me grow at least twice a week.

Alot of the things I read I already do or I've heard before and maybe didn't quite grasp the meaning the first time. Or this time they might be explained in a way I can better understand.

For instance, today I was reading something I'd read before but this time it was being explain in a different way.

The idea was to "MAKE PEOPLE FEEL GOOD ABOUT THEMSELVES AND FEEL GOOD ABOUT MYSELF IN THE PROCESS."

And the way to help others feel good about theirselves is to learn to give SINCERE compliments.

Now I very well know how to give a SINCERE compliment. As a matter of fact, I just gave some SINCERE compliments today. Could tell the people receiving them felt good and I also felt good giving the compliments.

But what I hadn't thought about was that this builds their confidence and mine too. All parties feel good from the transaction. I also realize to do this I have to take time to NOTICE others. Sometimes in my busy life's I don't pay attention. I just pay for the service I've received(groceries, gas, fast food etc...) get my stuff and leave. Or I pay the utility bills or take my library books back and leave.

Dale Carnegie was very good at the demonstrating the pleasure of making someone feel good about themselves.

Dale would turn a person's day around, and make them feel GREAT about themselves, by issuing a simple, sincere compliment.

He'd go away feeling great about himself; the receiver sure felt good about themself; they had a nice little conversation; and that was that.

I want to become better at giving SINCERE compliments to my family, friends and others I encounter through the day.

ICE STORM WARNING

Thought I'd make my daily post while the weather is permitting. We were put under a Ice Storm Warning about 5 minutes ago till Friday. They're predicting at least a half inch of ice. The weather channel said to be prepared for down trees and power lines.

This definately falls into the catagory of "focus on what I can control." Which means to do all we can to stay warm and safe.

Back to watching more weather.

ICE

We have the possibility of ICE(yuck) hitting our area during the night or early tomorrow. We went to the grocery store last night. At least half our heat is gas. The laundry is the majority of the way caught up. We're going to get some more candles in a little bit. So I guess we're about as prepared as we can be.

I'm doing my writting challenge now and if the electricity(I hope not) should get took out. I will just write on paper and post when I can.

Everyone who might be in the path of this stay safe and warm.

Tiring day.

We are give out tonight. It's 11:25 here. We have delivered so many cookies today and still have quite a few to go. And other folks who didn't get cookies wanting cookies. Good thing the scout leader brought a few extra.

Need to check the weather to see if we're still in the possibility of wintry mix.

So this will be short tonight but I feel GOOD that I'm still making my committment to the challenge.

Cookies

Well I know what we're going to be doing for the next few days. Delivering girls scout cookies. My granddaughter sold 375 boxes of cookies. This is great for her because she's a little on the shy side.

It has been a great experience so far. The group goal was 200 boxes each but the prize she wanted you had to sell 300 boxes. So she sat herself a goal of 300 boxes and really worked for it. She 's a inspiration-if you want something give it all you have.

Congrats girl good job.

A Reminder

Discovered on the intenet a few years ago that when the Amish ladies make a quilt they always purposely put a mistake in it. This is a reminder to them that noone is perfect. There's only been one perfect being on this earth.

Every time I've read over my published post lately and see the mistakes I've missed I'm reminded of the Amish reminder and don't stress so much over it. My mistakes aren't on purpose but they help me remember I'm not perfect.

#2 abd #3 Confidence builders

I intended to only post the #2 confidence builder tonight but when things were getting a little frustrating realized I might as well post #3.



#2 confidence builder is "Create an action plan to address worries." I realized I hadn't posted my writing challenge for today about 20 minutes ago. So I'm thinking don't worry about it. Because my action plan was to post here at least once a day. There's no set time I have to post.



So I truck on over here and proceed to pull up blogger. And low and behold what do I see over and over. Page cannot be found I hate that saying lol. Not sure if it was blogger acting up or my computer.



But I'd decided if I couldn't get the page up I'd apologize and post it on MHH if I had to. Because I'd made a commitment to myself and accepted Ginger's challenge to write once a day.



So I pulled out my confidence builder's and knew what should be posted as #2. But the trouble I'd went through trying to post this help me decide to go ahead and post my #3 confidence builder "Focus On What I Can Control."



I couldn't control my computer or the internet but I could control how stressed I did or didn't get over the situation. For the most part I did pretty GOOD(patting self on back).



So I just need to make a effort, create my action plan, and remember what actually is in my control.

P.S. I had to go to draft to try again to post this because it said blogger couldn't be contacted.

1 Confidence Builder for me

I Never Know What I Might Find when I clean out my purse that I've forgetten about. As I was cleaning my purse tonight I found a folded piece of paper. When I opened it to read it I knew what it was and wondered how I forget it.

Written on the paper were some confidence building goals I'd just wrote a few weeks ago. So instead of stuffing them in my purse where I might forget them again I decide to put them in my blog, one at a time. As well as motivating me to write, it puts them where I'm more likely to see them.

Today's confidence builder goal for me is "become effort oriented, not results oriented" To me this means put the effort out there and not have a preconceived notion of how it just has to be. The results might be better than I could have ever anticipated. They might be what I expected, or they might not be.

But as I always told my kids just try your best that's all you can do.

Accomplishments so far

Just thought I'd post a update on my February goals, my change challenge. and things we're working on this month.

February Goals

1. Drink at least 8oz. water daily. This one is a hit and miss but I keep working on it.
2. Do my arm exercises. Have accomplished daily so far.
3.Start a blog and write in it daily. Have accomplished daily so far.
4. Meditate daily. Have accomplished daily so far.
5. Read and practice my emails and ebooks that help me grow in the areas I want to at least 2 times a week. Have accomplished this so far.
6. Make eye contact with others. Have accomplished daily so far.

Change challenge

I will save at least one quarter a day toward Christmas. Have accomplished daily so far.
I will save at least one dime a day toward a holiday coming up. Have accomplished daily so far.
I will save at least one nickel a day for Halloween. Have accomplished daily so far.

I haven't got my emergency(my daughter does tho) fund set up yet but will soon.

I think I'm doing pretty good. We are also doing 15 minutes(each) a day decluttering and cleaning. We can already feel a nice difference in our home.

We're also trying to eat healthier and exercise more. But through all this it has to feel GOOD and kept simple as to be motivated to continue.

Happy Valentine's Day

Hope everyone is having a Happy Valentine's Day. I have the valentine my favorite little girl(granddaughter) made me on the right.

Early Planning stages.

We're discussing doing a Mother's/Father's Day outside celebration around the end of May.

We're working on giving my granddaughter more experiences to enjoy the year. My husband's parents are no longer with us and mine aren't in the best of health. So the plan is to try to have more family/friends get togethers.

The warm weather(as long as it cooperates) will be a good time to start. Our house is too small to entertain large groups but the yard is good size and on top of that there's a vacant lot right beside us we can use.

We have the menu planned. Here it is:

homemade mashed potatoes(peeling left on),
beans & ham,
baked ham,
deviled eggs,
cornbread,
cakes-a chocalate and strawberry,
sweet tea,
soda(maybe),
light bread,
chips

Simple but delicious food we can sit around and enjoy while we enjoy each others company.

My Change Challenge

Someone at http://magicalholidayhome.com/forum suggested looking at the site
http://cindysporch.com/pages/cashchristmas_jar.shtml for ways to help save money.
I really enjoy both these sites.

I'm taking the cash stash idea at Cindy's Porch and using it in a way to challenge mself to save. I'm going to use my change broken down in nickels, dimes, and quarters.

I will save at least one quarter a day toward Christmas.

I will save at least one dime a day toward a holiday coming up. At the moment I'm saving my dimes for Easter.

I will save at least one nickel a day for Halloween.

Each denomination of coins will have their own decorated(hopefully lol) container. Now this might not sound like much to some folks. Bt it is a attainable goal to me.

I will also be adding bills as I have them to the containers. I plan on putting the money in the containers and forgetting about it.

I'm also going to start a emergency fund. Don't know if I'll have $1000 in it by next February but I'll have something.

I have to start somewhere and baby steps usually work best for me.

Thanks

Thanks to Ginger from Ginger's Journey for helping me learn how to add links on my page. Now that I know where to look I'm sure I'll be experimenting with the POSSIBILITIES.

But for now I need to get off and keep a eye on the weather. We're in a winter storm warning . We could receive freezing rain, sleet and snow. We're getting rain, sleet, thunder and lightening at the moment. Crazy weather.

Looking Around

Been looking around the net tonight as well as doing a little chatting. Everyone knows to eat healthy, exercise, meditate etc... to help mprove your life.

But exactly what kind of foods should one eat? We all have diffeent prefereces, and different tolerances for some food. What kinds of food help fight off sickness? I know water is really good for me. I'm working on a goal this month to simply get
8ozs a day down. That would be good for me I don't care much for drinking water.

Not everyone is capable of doing strenous exercise so what do those folks do? Personally, I like Denise Ausin simple exercises called Deskercise

http://www.deniseaustin.com/free/getfit/deskercise_invi.asp

So I've been doing some research on the net to help gain more healthy habits.

If you have any tips to share please feel free to comment.

Happy Birthday

It's my granddaughter's birthday so I wanted to say:

HAPPY 7th BIRTHDAY SWEETY.

We love you enjoy your day.

Doing Better

My granddaughter is doing better today. Thank God. She's been up moving around more and letting her little personality shine again. Her apetitite still isn't right but it should be in a few days.

She'll be 7 years old tomorrow. We sent her a Ariel Happy Birthday bouquet today. We put it on a local tv station here and her party is tomorrow evening. She's excited. She got up singing "tomorrow is my birthday". It feels so good to see her feeling better.

I've been working on my goals but it's been hard this week. The water goal isn't going as well as I'd liked. But at least my arms are tightened and toned back up . That's what I love about that exercise it's simple and effective.

I'l l get a chance tomorrow at the birthday party to focus on making eye contact. That's a tough goal for me too. But I know it's something I need and want to accomplish.

Hopefully, next week I'll be able to learn how to post pictures on here. As well as get links down the side.

As always, thanks for reading and feel free to leave comments. I love reading them.

I've been tagged

Ginger at http://gingersjourney.blogspot.com/ tagged me so first I will tell you 7 weird or randomfacts about myself and then I will tag 7 more people.

1. I'm brutally honest sometimes people might get upset.
2. Not vegetarian but I don't have to have meat.
3. My eyes sometimes change colors according to my mood.
4. I have 4 cell phones.
5. I live in a town that was hit by a tornado twice in one month in 06
6. I once had my hubby cut my hair and it took a year for it to grow any.
7. The Mississippi River runs along my town, it a tourist attraction here.

Below are the 7 other bloggers I've tagged.

http://debbieshobbies.blogspot.com/
http://jackshijinx.blogspot.com/ http://decoratingforholidays.blogspot.com/ http://www.rockingranola.blogspot.com/
http://rebeccasdesigns.wordpress.com/
http://loveofchristmas.blogspot.com/
http://seasonalmagic.blogspot.com/

Ok here are the rules:

THE RULES:
1. Once you are tagged, link back to the person that tagged you.
2. Post THE RULES on your blog.
3. Post 7 weird or random facts about yourself on your blog.
4. Tag 7 people and link to them.
5. Comment on their blog to let them know they have been tagged.

Calmer Day

Well the weather is calmer and colder today. We had a scare last night but all is well in my town. Our thoughts and prayers are with the communities that weren't as fortunate.

My granddaughter still isn't feeling well today. She's sleeping more today so far she's only been sick to her stomach once. Her birthday is Saturday hopefully she'll be all well by then.

I've accomplished all my February daily goals except getting that water down about halfway there. I'm not a water drinker lol

I don't have much to say right now kinda wore out.

But let me tell you about a sticker I saw the other day I thought was so cute. It said:

Age is just a number and mine is unlisted.

A little bit anxious

I'm a little bit on the anxious side today. My granddaughter work up sick. She's been vomiting and having diaherria poor thing.



On top of that we're in a high chance of severe weather. In Aprl of 2006 we were hit not once but twice by tornados. The first one being a F3 and leaving major destruction. The weather channel is calling for the chance of dozens to outbreak today.

So I thought I'd come over here and work on my daily writing challenge as well as update on how my daily goals have went so far.

1. Drink at least 8oz. water daily. I know I need more than this. But for me to get at least 8 ozs down is a accomlishment.This goal was reached 2-04-08
Not done yet today working on it.

2. Do my arm exercises. I have a flabby place on my arm that I don't like. You know the place between the elbow and shoulder on the backside. I know a simple exercise that will tone and tighten this I just have to do it.This goal was reached 2-04-08 Done for 2-05-08

3.Start a blog and write in it daily. If you're reading this you know I've accomplished this today.This goal was reached 2-04-08 Done for 2-05-08

4. Meditate daily. My mind need a few minutes quiet time each day. Since it was after 12 a.m when I went to bed...This goal was reached 2-4-08
done 2-05-08

5. Read and practice my emails and ebooks that help me grow in the areas I want to at least 2 times a week. I read some today so half way there for the week. Have the email up to read when I finish here then this goal will be accomplished for the week.

6. Make eye contact with others. This is something I have a hard time doing. But I have been practicing on my family today. Been working on it today 2-05-08

Granddaughter just woke up from a nap and seems to be feeling some better. Now if the weather would improve with no severe weather all would be better.

Feburary Goals

In my quest to find and do things that help me feel GOOD in 2008 I've decided to set monthly goals. Feburary's daily(all but 1 are daily) goals are:

1. Drink at least 8oz. water daily. I know I need more than this. But for me to get at least 8 ozs down is a accomlishment.
This goal was reached 2-04-08

2. Do my arm exercises. I have a flabby place on my arm that I don't like. You know the place between the elbow and shoulder on the backside. I know a simple exercise that will tone and tighten this I just have to do it.
This goal was reached 2-04-08

3.Start a blog and write in it daily. If you're reading this you know I've accomplished this today.
This goal was reached 2-04-08

4. Meditate daily. My mind need a few minutes quiet time each day. Since it was after 12 a.m when I went to bed...
This goal was reached 2-4-08

5. Read and practice my emails and ebooks that help me grow in the areas I want to at least 2 times a week. I read some today so half way there for the week.

6. Make eye contact with others. This is something I have a hard time doing. But I have been practicing on my family today.

Well these are my goals for Feburary I think they will help me grow. Do you set short term goals?

Welcome

Ok I'm taking the plunge. This is my little blog spot in the ever so large blog world.

Gingerbug at http://magicalholidayhome.com/forum has some challenges going on that I wanted to take part in. One is a daily writting challenge. While I'm no expert writer I do believe writing is a very theraputic experience. I like to write about anything and everything.

On the forum we have a thread called choosing your word. We choose a word we'd like to represent our life for 2008. My word is to feel GOOD.but all the other words intertwine with my word(to me) as a way to helping my life feel GOOD. One word in particular really JUMPED out at me. That word was "POSSIBILITIES" when I think of all the good possibilities in the world well it just makes me feel GOOD.

Henceforth, the name of this blog "possibilities". I plan on writing about different things here so you have the possibility of reading about crafts, feelings, cooking, softball, tv, books, goals, surveys, jokes, homeschooling this list goes on and on. Hopefully, what I share will help someone feel GOOD in some way.

Please feel free to leave your comments and suggestions. If you'd like to swap links just let me know. Come back often.