Every year I have the same New Year’s Resolutions: get my house/blog/body/food under control. I’m not really a cold-turkey kinda girl. I like to ease my way into new ideas. I like to get all the details and take baby steps. So, one thing I like to do when making a New Year’s Resolution is to get information. Last year I started reading about whole foods and it changed my diet. You saw the books I bought with my Christmas money, so you know my goal this year is to get my kids/parenting/home in order.
Today, I’m going to share with you some e-books that I’ve downloaded and read or some that I’ve downloaded because I want to read them. If any of these resolutions are on your list, you need to get these books. Most of them are under $10 so it’s a quick and easy way to get GOOD information.
Here they are…
THE TOP TEN NEW YEAR’S RESOLUTIONS AND HOW TO STICK WITH THEM (hopefully)
1. KEEP MY HOUSE CLEAN
My friend Christine has a new-ish blog called iDreamofClean. And oh, don’t you? *sigh* I do. I dream of clean. I’m sure my husband does, too. Anyway, she has a new ebook out called, Creating Your Perfect Cleaning Schedule. I haven’t read all of it yet–because it just came out this week. But I love it already because it works with you individually. I used to do the Motivated Moms cleaning list but it just wore me out because it wasn’t designed for MY house or MY life. That’s where Christine’s book comes in. I cannot wait to put it into practice (the system, not the cleaning…)
2. UNPLUG MY COMPUTER EVERY ONCE IN AWHILE
Sometimes I wonder if my kids think my laptop is connected to my lap. As I’ve said before, “I love my computer, my friends live in it.” But sometimes I wish it could just be QUIET and no one knew if my status was updated in the last 24 hours or not. Enter: Simple Blogging by Rachel at Small Notebook.
Ahhhh. I read this one in one sitting. And I may have cried during it. The basic idea is “Less Computer Time, Better Blogging.” And if that doesn’t make you click, well, I don’t know what would. It’s a gorgeous, simple, full and concise. I loved every word.
3. STOP WASTING TIME
Oh, the internet is calling, that new book is open on my bookshelf, the couch is so comfy and hey–shouldn’t we make some Rice Krispies treats today? And suddenly my day is gone, the laundry isn’t done, I haven’t written anything on my blogs and my inbox is overflowing. I’ve heard people say, “You make time for the things you love.” So, I don’t love my house? My kids enough to wash their clothes? My family enough to cook good meals? *sigh* What am I wasting my time on?!
When I saw Amy from Blogging with Amy’s new ebook entitled, Tell Your Time, I knew I needed it. I just downloaded it this week but the introduction already got me. She quotes Ann Dilliard:
How we live our days, of course, is how we live our lives.
*gulp* I’m not sure I want my life to be as unruly as most of my days. This is on the top of my stack!
4. EAT RIGHT
I have all these great ideas in my head. I know what’s good and bad. I know the good choices to make. But dark chocolate peppermint truffles from Christmas look waaay better than a carrot stick. I brushed off Kitchen Stewardship’s Healthy Snacks To Go and am totally making granola tomorrow.
5. GET MORE TRAFFIC TO MY BLOG
This is the one thing bloggers want–traffic, people, comments, community. If a blogger tells you they don’t, then buy them a journal and tell them they are lying.
The problem is, blogging has mushroomed and the internet has become second to breathing, that if you want to get noticed in the blogging community you have to be famous-amazing-crazy-awesome outside of the blog community OR learn a ton of internet-savvy-mumbo-jumbo. One of the first bloggy ebooks I downloaded was Mom Blog SEO.by Kelby Carr. She takes you step by step through basic SEO (search engine optimization) techniques and then gives you homework with each lesson. It’s brilliant.
6. BE A FAMOUS BLOGGER
OK, maybe that’s not your resolution. Maybe it’s not even a very good one to make. But Michelle from Scribbit is famous to me and she wrote Blogging in the Pink and I love it. Plus, it’s free.
7. BUILD A BETTER BLOG
Darren Rowse from ProBlogger is just insanely bloggy. I don’t understand how he can write a blog about being a professional blogger. That’s just crazy. Anywhoo-he has a 31 Days to a Better Blog and even though I can honestly say I only went through like 1/4 of the lessons, I still have it on my desktop because I love to look at it longingly and say, “One day I’ll be a better blogger…” Seriously, it’s good stuff.
8. GET UP EARLY
I’ve chronicled my get-up-early transition and it’s all because of the Maximize Your Mornings ebook from Kat at Inspired to Action. This is a MUST read. Also: Free.
9. BE A BETTER MOM
Every day I think, “I’m ruining my kids. What if they remember this? What if I wound them? What if they hate me? What if they run away and join the circus?!” This 2nd ebook by Kat called, Mission Statements for Moms walks you through a step by step process of making a personal-mom-mission-statement. I love it so much I just read the whole thing cover to cover and wept. Even if you’re not a mom you can benefit from the personal mission statement. It’s a MUST MUST MUST read. And again, Kat is generous–this book is free!
10. GO GLUTEN FREE
Yeah, this isn’t a normal resolution. But I think my husband is going to go gluten-free this week. He’s had so many GI issues and it just isn’t getting better. In fact, it’s worse. He can already recognize that carbs is a culprit. After reading a few celiac, gluten-free blogs, we are leaning toward doing a 6 week gluten fast. (Well, he’s thinking about it. I’ll just facilitate it for him!) So, I am literally downloading Heavenly Homemaker’s Gluten Free and Good For You book as we speak. Any GF folks wanna point me in the right direction?
So, what’s YOUR New Year’s Resolution? And how are you going to keep it?
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It’s the first Top Ten {Tuesday} of the year! I can’t wait to see this week (and year) has in store for us! So, let’s get to it–just WRITE a Top Ten list on your blog, LINK back to me somewhere in the post (so others can join in), PASTE the url to your post below and then being LOVIN’ on the rest of the participants with tweets, comments, stumbles and facebook love. For specific guidelines and a cute button see my Top Ten {Tuesday} page!
You are the generous one, my friend. Thanks for sharing!
Oh Kat, you so inspire me!!
Great List Amanda! I’ve actually read several of those books/eBooks!
I love the New Year and all the possibilities it brings. I have 11 simple goals I’m going to work on in 2011 — the first one is making my bed every day!!
Happy New Year and good luck with all your goals!
Love your goal – making my bed is something I definitely need to get back into the habit of doing!
AWESOME list! I have some but not all of those! However, since my BIGGEST goal this year is to actually budget the money that comes in this house, I will have to refrain from buying them all at once. Now, I have to choose.
Love it! I try to use blogging income (or money I earn from Swagbucks or taking surveys) to buy ebooks. It’s a win-win!
Great! I just got Amy’s book on time (need it!) and am going to read Kat’s as well! (NEED them too) funny, i was working on goals as I saw your post pop up. thanks for the recommendations!
You’ll LOVE both books! 😀 I’m excited to get back into them as I prepare for next month’s 3 in 30 Challenge – I’m going to be focusing on time management!
We’ve recently waded into the gluten-free pool (my son has always had a wheat allergy, but he used to be allergic to so many foods that he just ate his own stuff, now more of our foods overlap so the whole family has tried GF pizzas, breads etc.). We’ve had a few misses but found several hits. Pamela’s baking mix is like a GF Bisquik–it makes great pancakes, cookies etc. (there’s the general baking and pancake mix but we also love her chocolate chunk cookie mix–delicious and easy); Conte’s frozen GF margherita pizza is excellent; pasta has been the toughest for us to find a good one–our fave so far is Tinkyada brown rice pasta spirals. We’ve had success with Enjoy Life brand of cereal bars and cookies. Oh and Udi’s white sandwich bread. All this to say I’ve done better with buying stuff than making stuff from scratch. It’s pricey, though. Best of luck to you!
Oooh, thanks for all the recommendations! Like I said we are just dipping our toes in it but I think we’re gonna have to take the plunge!
Thanks for hosting! My mother recently said she was going to go on a gluten fast as well. Just to see if she feels better. Can’t hurt!
Oooh, these are great suggestions!! I have Kelby’s book, but have yet to read the whole thing! And I really need to get on that!
Very interesting list! I am going to be off my feet for a bit so I might have to look in to several of these. Thanks for the suggestions!
Several of these resonated with me so I will definitely be back to get the titles so I can load them on my eReader. I have vacation coming up so it will be a perfect time to read them. Thank you!
Not only did you recommend a bunch of ebooks that I’d love to read, but you also introduced me to a bunch of new great blogs! I should be writing but now I just want to be reading them all 🙂 Looks like I need Simple Blogging too!
Have fun blog-surfing! These are some great blogs that you will want to read again and again!!
What a great list! I’ve recently been introduced to the world of e-books, and at first I was a little wary. Tell Your Time was the first one I bought, and I enjoyed it. It didn’t solve the problem of there being only 24 hours in a day, but it had some good exercises to help me realize what to prioritize. I’ll have to pick up a few more of these!
Wow… so many GREAT books on your list!! I’ve read three of them {Tell Your Time, 31DBBB, and MYM} and have several more of them on my “to read” list.
I decided rather than making resolutions that I won’t keep this year to find some accountability and set attainable goals instead. Meghan Tucker and I started the 3 in 30 Challenge to help ourselves and other make our goals reality!
Love it Ashley! I’m off to check it out! 🙂
If you need any GF recipes, let me know! A good friend of mine is GF and I’ve learned a lot of her recipes over the years.
Oh my word, what an awesome list! Thanks for sharing all these great resources! (bookmarking now…)
My main resolution for the New Year: health. And this time I mean it, because I made the jump and went off my meds for depression and will be handling things entirely with diet and exercise. So, see, I have a real vested interest here. 😀
I’m glad to be back in the Top Ten Tuesday swing of things – I’ve been missing it!
I’ve missed your posts, too! 🙂
OoH-Ooh-Ooh and making more time to read for myself is one of my goals for this year. Thanks for the great list! I’m interested to see if idreamofclean actually works for me. If so, my husband will be in heaven.
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