December 7 2017

Ben Franklin Used A BuJo?

I was poking around the internet as writers are known to do from time to time and stumbled across photos of an old journal of Ben Franklin’s. Reading some of his entries are interesting too, but the layouts of some of the pages that were not all text are what caught my attention.

I got really excited because it looks like a lot of bullet journal layouts I have seen. I told hubby, “Ben Franklin was a bullet journaler!”

“How do you figure?”

“I’ve got photos of his journal to prove it.”

“Show me.”

So I showed hubby the three photos above and he agreed they looked like something that might be in a bullet journal. Not that hubby is a bullet journal expert, in fact, he is more skeptic than anything.

Franklin had what basically amounts to a weekly habit tracker.

He also had a 24 hour time tracker

So, there you have it. Ben Franklin may have been one of the earliest known bullet journalers.

The new year is fast approaching and I have been considering how to set up my 2018 bullet journal. Some spreads should be copied into the new one, others will get blank versions of things in the old one, like the list of books read for instance.

What spreads do you find extremely helpful? Have you tried using a bullet journal? I have been using one for over a year now and love it! If it was good enough for Ben, it is good enough for me! Let me know in the comments if you have a favorite page or layout idea you want to share.

Photo of Franklin comes from:

http://leadershipvoices.com/2013/10/07/manday-quote-ben-franklin/

The pages of Benjamin Franklin's Journal are from:

http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/20203
Category: Bullet Journal | 1 Comment on Ben Franklin Used A BuJo?
December 1 2017

Near (Five Minute Friday)

As the end of this year draws near, I find myself thinking about the goals I set and whether or not I will be able to accomplish all of them. I think about the word of the year I chose for 2017, FEARLESS, and all the things I dared to try because I was determined to live up to my chosen word. I have been thinking about my new word of the year to guide me through 2018 and am having trouble deciding which word to choose. No rush, I still have an entire month left to think it over while working on trying to finish up projects that are nearly finished or I am nearly out of time to finish. No, I won’t tell you about them yet, that is what my end of the year goals wrap up will be for.
I know in December I won’t be writing anywhere near the 55,000 words I wrote in November. But I will still be writing, at least every Thursday night. If you haven’t already entered your email to sign up to be notified when I post something new to this blog, I really wish you would. There is a sign-up box near the top right of the page, and it takes nowhere near a minute to do it from start to finish.

Are you thinking about the goals you will work on in the new year? Me too! I feel like focusing on goals this year has helped me to get so much done. I am actually having trouble figuring out what I can do next year to top this year.

December is always a tough month for me. November is the month I really focus all my free time and effort on writing and winning NaNoWriMo, this leaves me in a bit of a funk because I am usually exhausted, and missing the excitement and extra write-ins with my writing people. I miss the community all focused on the common goal. It takes a while to get over that and begin to focus on holiday preparations which always seem rushed because we didn’t start until December to consider what we would do.

So, as we near the end of this year, what are you planning for 2018? How can you make it your most successful year yet? Nope, I don’t know either, but I’m at least thinking about it.

Check back soon. I usually post twice a week on Thursday and Friday-ish. I get super inspired, sometimes I will post something extra over the weekend. Don’t forget to sign up for emailed notifications so you won’t miss any posts!

This post is part of the weekly Five Minute Friday link-up!
The prompt this week is: Near
The assignment: Write for five minutes on the word of the week. This is meant to be a free write, which means: no editing, no over-thinking, no worrying about perfect grammar or punctuation. Just write.

Category: Five Minute Friday | 3 Comments on Near (Five Minute Friday)
November 30 2017

NaNoWriMo Wrap-up

I have come a long way as a writer in the last four years. I have finally become a year-round writer. (As of this month I have written over 113,000 words so far this year!) I am not afraid to call myself a writer. I have put in the work and time and, though I may not have a book published yet, I AM a writer. I have 5 NaNo wins under my belt to prove it (to myself if nothing else).

My motivation for the month was a printout of the image below. This is my 2014 NaNoWriMo progress graph, also the first year I attempted to write fiction. As you can see I got off to a super slow start because I had no idea HOW to write fiction and I just plain had NO IDEA for a plot of any sort. I seriously doubted I could ever catch up once I got started and then around the 25k mark, I began to question whether I had a workable plot at all (I really didn’t), so I didn’t write anything for a few days. Seeing this graph and how I beat the odds, no matter how badly they were stacked against me, kept me going this month. My present-self would like to take this opportunity to thank my 2014-self for sticking it out and winning because if I hadn’t done it back then, I’m not sure I would have believed I could do it this year.

Continue reading

Category: NaNoWriMo, Writing | Comments Off on NaNoWriMo Wrap-up
November 25 2017

Familiar (Five Minute Friday)

By now, you are familiar with the fact that on Fridays, or soon thereafter, I participate in this thing called FiveMinuteFriday.com. Each week,  provides a one-word prompt to write about for 5 little minutes. Sometimes they just flow out of me without much thought. Other times, like tonight, nothing comes to mind and I just don’t know what to write. As a writer, this happens sometimes. Some would call it writer’s block. I’m not sure I believe in writer’s block. In my case, when I can’t think what to write, it is really a case of idea block. Once I get an idea, I can write about it. Sometimes I can’t find much to write, but other times one little spark ignites an entire bonfire of other ideas and I am off and writing.

Writing my novel this month as part of the NaNoWriMo challenge is getting tougher because I am running out of the scenes I had planned to write. I have been adding scenes in along the way as I think of them or find a hole in the plot that needs to be filled. I don’t want to just write stuff for the sake of word count, so no, I will not be adding a dragon to my novel or an unexplained dead body just to boost the word count only to have to cut it all later when future me gets around to editing this novel. I am familiar with the difficulties of editing and future has begged current and past me never to do that to her.

I was on par one day this month, the 12th, I think. I am familiar with the perils of falling behind in my word count, of starting late or slowly, of getting to the 25,000 words stage and questioning everything I have written so far and thinking there is no point in continuing as it is all terrible and no one will ever want to read it. Despite all of these typical doubts and fears, there are only six days left in the month and I still need to write about 11,000 words. I am trying to keep in mind this year that my story needs to be finished which means it needs a beginning, middle, and end. My characters need to grow and change over the course of the novel. I need to get back to writing the novel, but instead, here I am writing this blog post. Really any excuse will do. I don’t feel too bad because I did write 3,000 words today in my novel and these words don’t count toward my monthly NaNo goal. I am familiar with this thing I am doing right now. It is called PROCRASTINATION. Sometimes it comes in the way of writing blog posts like tonight, or doing laundry and loading the dishwasher like yesterday. I know all about it because it used to happen back in college when there was homework to be done. Hubby would catch me cleaning the house and he knew, he was familiar with my tactics. He would ask me what school work I was avoiding by doing housework. Pretty smart that man of mine. Ok, enough of this procrastinating, let’s end this post so I can get back to the novel I should be writing. Stay tuned next week when November ends and see how I did.

This post is part of the weekly Five Minute Friday link-up!
The prompt this week is: Familiar
The assignment: Write for five minutes on the word of the week. This is meant to be a free write, which means: no editing, no over-thinking, no worrying about perfect grammar or punctuation. Just write.

Category: Five Minute Friday, NaNoWriMo | 2 Comments on Familiar (Five Minute Friday)
November 23 2017

Book Review: Life-Changing Miracles

I was very excited to be able to read and review this book. The cover and title grabbed me from the start. I am always a sucker for hearing stories of how God works in other people’s lives.

I didn’t mean to start reading it yet. But somehow I just couldn’t stop myself. Just one story, to see what it’s like. So I opened the book telling myself I wasn’t going to read the stories yet, just the front matter and maybe the introduction. Then as I finished reading the introduction, my eyes quickly glanced at the right-hand page and spotted the title of the first story, Truck Driver Betty by Patti Ann Thompson.

You don’t have time to start reading now, there are other things you need to be doing now I told myself in the stern voice often used to get children to do as they are told without argument. I know that voice, but it doesn’t affect me, it is, after all, my voice. So I flipped through to see how long the first story was because I really wanted to read about the truck driver named Betty. Only 6 pages and the first and last weren’t quite full pages, more like two-thirds pages, it would be a fast read. Just to see what it is like, the cover is so inviting, and it does promise Life-Changing right there in the title. One story wouldn’t hurt.

So I quickly lost myself in the story about the truck driver named Betty. When it ended I realized my eyes we full of unshed tears. It was beautiful. As much as I wanted to read more, I knew I would put it away and get back to the other tasks awaiting my attention all while saying a quick prayer of thanks for that first story being such a good one. I just know that book will get read almost without me knowing I’m reading over the next few days. I appreciate the fact that the stories are short and easy to read in small bites of time. Sometimes small bites are all we can grab to read in, so this book is already a winner to me.

A few hours later, I realized I had accidentally picked up the book and read five more stories. They were all good, but none affected me quite like the first one. There are only 37 stories in the book and somehow on the very day, the book landed in my mailbox I had read 46 of the 235 pages in the book. Now I am wondering if maybe I need to ration the stories to make them last longer because you only get one chance for a first read. I’ll let you know how that turns out.

I hid the book away as I got ready to go on a trip with my husband wanting to save these stories to read on the plane or in the airport. I read several more stories one after the other. They are such quick easy reads that you can’t read just one at a time.

I especially read the one called Taking Away the Desire by Carol Nash Smith with interest. Her story was about alcohol addiction but I wondered as I read if this might help me keep from overeating and thus lose some of the excess weight I seem to always carry with me. As I finished reading this one it was like someone had read my mind. The next story is My Weight Destination by Michelle J. Welcome. As I eagerly read that story, I found myself wishing I too would hear God speak to me as many of the stories talk about.

It didn’t take me long to finish this book after I allowed myself to continue reading it. It was a great book to take along on our trip. Perfect for reading in the airport and on the plane. This book was a very enjoyable read. I especially appreciated the short length of the chapters/stories as this made them very easy to pick up and read one or two at a time. If you are looking for an uplifting book to read, I would highly recommend it.

If you are interested in buying this book, please consider using the affiliate link below. It won’t cost you more and I might make a few cents because you did.

Life-Changing Miracles: Real-Life Stories of Unforgettable Encounters With God

I was sent this book by the publisher to review. I will always give honest reviews on my blog. My opinion cannot be bought.

(This book arrived in my mailbox Saturday, 9/30/17)

Category: Book Review, Reading, Review | Comments Off on Book Review: Life-Changing Miracles