Journaling in July
Posted on by Debbie

Journaling in July Week #1

#JournalinginJuly – My Week 1

As I wrote in a recent post, Journal Ideas in July, I’m joining Sue at Sizzling Towards 60 and Beyond, for a month of writing to Sue’s list of journal prompts. I’m hoping to extend myself by writing a short response to each day’s prompt and linking up my post on Saturdays throughout July. Feel free to join in – the link is open to everyone.

So without further ado – here are my responses for the first week of #JournalinginJuly prompts

1. What makes me special?

Monday July 1:

It’s sometimes hard to write positive things about yourself – well it is for me anyway! I have made an attempt at describing what makes me special and have tried to be honest!

I am a bit quirky, excitable, full of energy, funny, enthusiastic, into social media, sharing things and looking for the positives. 

I’m unique, and you are too!

I love stepping on crunchy leaves, playing on the equipment in parks, laughing at myself and trying not to take things too seriously. I’m usually fun to be around and don’t always act my age 🙂

I try to pretend I don’t take things to heart but I often do and I get upset easily. I’m sensitive and although I might exude confidence, it’s not always the way I feel inside.

I’m a loyal, honest, supportive and caring friend. I make commitments and try hard to keep them even if it isn’t always easy. My daughters always tell me I’m very special 😂

My About Me page has a list of 10 things you may not know about me. I believe everyone is special in some way 🙂

Playing in the park - Debbie
Playing in the park – Debbie, not acting her age!

2. Dreams and Goals

Tuesday July 2

Dreaming of the future is fun but I don’t want to dream my life away before I get to live it!

My dreams for the future include happiness for my daughters, a good long life with plenty of love and laughs.

I dream of a time when we are gentler with each other and respect each other more, rather than idolising celebrities and sports-people the way we seem to be doing these days.

I’m often told that I’m living the dream with my retired lifestyle, and in some ways I agree!

3. What makes me feel happy?

Wednesday July 3

Little things make me happy. Taking in the everyday beauty around us, noticing the small things, observing life…

Not major things like winning the lottery or being famous.

Happy Days
Happy Days

Crunchy leaves, singing out loud, reading a good book, swinging in the hammock on a summer’s day, cuddling my granddaughter Emilia, relaxing with a cup of tea, blue sky and sunshine, smiling at people, chatting with friends, the ocean, blogging…..

These are a few of my favourite things!

4. Write about a special memory

Thursday July 4

Memories – they can be happy or sad or both at the same time

July is a big month for us memory-wise. Five years ago my brother-in-law died suddenly and unexpectedly within days of feeling a bit off. He was only 55 years old and had a wife and two young teenage children. We can be happy that we had fun times and made lots of memories with him but we can be sad that he was taken so early and we had no way of knowing his last days were near. I wrote this post at the time –Shock

Just last year at the very end of our wonderfully amazing three month trip overseas, seeing family, friends and making new memories of our own, we got word that my lovely father-in-law had died suddenly and unexpectedly, just days before we were to return home. It was a devastating end to our trip and we went home with heavy hearts to be with our family. This was just a few short months after we had lost my father. It was a hard time but we did have some fun memories to cling to which helped ease our grief a little. A sad end to our Odyssey, in more ways than one

On a happier note

I don’t know about you but I like the reminders that pop up in Facebook, telling me what I was doing, and who with, in previous years. This week I was reminded that six years ago we took our Rotary Youth Exchange student Hannes, on one last road trip and did the Sydney Harbour Bridge Climb with him. Such fun memories! One last road trip with Hannes

Sydney Harbour bridge climb
Sydney Harbour bridge climb

5. What I did today

Friday July 5

I did a LOT today!! It started with a cup of tea in bed before making breakfast and enjoying it on the deck in the cool wintery morning sunshine. I then had an hour long Thai massage, which showed me how tight my calves and hamstrings were.

I did a few jobs in town and came home in time for a tele-conference with ex-colleagues, as we’re arranging a reunion dinner in August. It was good to be involved with people in my previous correctional education area and I’m now looking forward to catching up with my friends and former colleagues. I spent the next hour contacting people via phone calls and emails and enjoyed it immensely.

After sitting in the warm sunshine for lunch, and chatting to my daughter and granddaughter on Facetime, I moved to the sunroom in the backyard for some reading time. I went out for a walk in the forest and listened to a podcast as I walked, enjoying the crisp winter day.

We had a fire in the fire-bucket in the yard and I lost some time dreaming while watching the flames. Then it was time to sort the washing and clean up a bit before cooking dinner.

After I checked that my Friday Feature, Winners and Losers, was published on my blog early in the morning (it was scheduled but I never quite trust that it will work), I managed to stay away from my blog and most social media until later in the day. It can become all consuming sometimes and having a break is good for us.

Copious cups of tea later and it’s time to update this post ready for tomorrow’s linkup.

6. 3 things I’m grateful for

Saturday 6 July

I could cheat and say my 3 daughters and my family, but I won’t, although I’m extremely grateful for them all and the huge part they play in my life.

Sisters together at the wedding
Sisters together at the youngest’s wedding

I’m grateful for many things, but I’ll try to narrow it down to just three.

  1. Living in a beautiful little country town as a part of a very supportive community.
  2. The ability and freedom to have an opinion, speak my mind and think for myself. In some places in the world this would be impossible, especially being a woman.
  3. I’m grateful for my wonderful blogging friends, all around the world.

So that’s my first week of #JournalinginJuly done and I must say I’ve really enjoyed the process!

What is #JournalingInJuly all about?

Sue and I are looking at this month as a challenge to extend our creative writing and get into journaling.

  • Sue has put together 31 topics – one for each day. The writing prompts are designed especially for those of us who have difficulty putting pen to paper or for the more experienced journaler and perhaps provide some new ideas.
  • It can be bullet points, a few paragraphs or as long as you wish. The idea is to think, write and perhaps learn more about yourself.
  • Sue will be having guest contributors each week to write about journaling and/or taking a topic from the list to write about.
  • For the Bloggers, we are hosting a link up each Saturday for the month of July only and we’d love you to join in with us.

Sue has written a Week 1 post which you can find here.

What works for me?

What I have found that works for me, is to set a time to write my responses and a time limit. I usually have some idea of what I want to write but once I settle down and get started it often changes of its own accord! I try not to overthink my responses. Once my time limit is up I quickly edit the writing and I’m done 🙂

I hope you enjoy my Week 1 recap post and if you’re keen to get involved leave a comment or linkup with Sue and I using the link below.

You are invited to the Inlinkz link party!

Click here to enter

https://fresh.inlinkz.com/js/widget/load.js?id=ef8b06cc10bc6002458d

Have a great week ahead!

Next Saturday I’ll be responding to the prompts for Sunday 7 July through to Saturday 13 July.

Happy journaling 🙂

Deb xx

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33 Replies to “Journaling in July Week #1”

  1. I am sorry for your July losses and congratulations on your beautiful family. I love to journal, but getting down to it sometimes is a lot of work. But once I get going, like you, pages fill and I always feel better.

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  2. I enjoyed your posts- especially the part about what is special about you. It is always good to remind ourselves of our uniqueness. I am not doing the daily challenge but I did recently start a journal again after many years. I wanted to place to reflect and think and remind myself of the things I am grateful for. I am going to copy some of the prompts into it.

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    1. Thanks Michele, telling others why we’re special is always hard for me to do but we are all unique in our own way. Good on you for taking up journaling again. I’m enjoying the time for reflection. Lovely to hear from you!

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  3. So enjoying this opportunity for creative writing. I will put my first week into a post and link up tonight. Just compiled them all in a folder on my desktop.

    The little village you live in sounds so perfect. Quaint. A loving community. I live in a fairly large city but the area of town in which I live is kind of the same way.

    I am often told how fortunate I am to be retired. Some days, yes. Other days, no. I miss the purpose that working brought to my life. I miss the children. The work!! But today has been a good day on the patio!

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    1. Thanks Leslie, it’s great to have you joining in. Yes our little town is very nice and has a good feel to it. I know what you mean about missing the purpose of going to work but I’m coping OK so far!

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  5. Hi Deb – what a great start to the Journalling Challenge. I liked all your positive stuff (and that you were real enough to include some of the sad stuff too). Lovely to see the family pics and I always smile at the pics of you in your mirror sunnies looking like such a cool dude!
    Thanks for linking up with us at MLSTL and I’ve shared on my SM 🙂

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    1. What do you mean ‘looking like a cool dude’? I’ll have you know I am very cool 😎

      I enjoyed the first week of journaling and will be back for week 2 🙂 Thanks for your lovely comment and shares!

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  6. While I haven’t blogged the prompts, I have been following along at home with my own journalling. I will, however, pop up something on fave books for next Saturday’s link up. As an aside, I love the Facebook & Timehop reminders too. I journal daily, but it’s usually a few bullet points of things that I noticed or listened to or happened.

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  7. Hi Deb I enjoyed catching up with your first week of #journalinginjuly I detect a theme in some of the posts I’ve read of those who are participating. It seems to me that as we get older, the important things are most likely to be the simple things. Another advantage of ageing #MLSTL Will be sharing

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    1. Thanks Jennifer. I agree with you, the theme is definitely there. We seem to be looking at a more simple life, staying positive and ageing as best we can. Thanks very much for your comment and shares. I’m enjoying your posts in the challenge too!

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  8. I love journaling! Happy, sad, thoughtful, trivial. I write about it all down. Sometimes I save my journal entries and other times it feels good to discard them and be glad to have got “all that nonsense out!” haha 🙂 One thing I have enjoyed doing in my journal this year is writing letters to my mom like I did when I was in college back in the day. She passed away in 2003 but I always have so much to tell her. I like to believe she still can read my letters and know what I am up to these days.

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    1. I agree, writing a journal is always a great feeling, even if it’s just snippets of the day! I love that you’re writing letters to your mum too, that’s very sweet. Thanks for your comment Laura, always love hearing from you.

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  9. Debbie, I agree that people have forgotten who the real heroes are and have misplace their admiration. If Bloggers ruled the world, it would be a kinder, gentler place. We seem to have a lot in common, but mostly sensitivity, a positive outlook and gratitude for the life we are living. You exude sunshine!

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    1. Yes, I love that Suzanne, if bloggers ruled the world it would be a much nicer place! I also love that you can relate to my words and outlook on life 🙂 . Thanks so much 🌞

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  11. Always like a glimpse into a person’s life via these prompts. I noticed in the Sydney Harbor Bridge photo – yourself surrounded by the tall men in your life…another subtle perspective revealed!
    Belated condolences on the losses of those special persons in your life.
    peace

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    1. Fabulous Terri, I’m so glad you’ve linked up with us.
      I do try to be positive and I am very enthusiastic 😂 so I’m happy this comes across in my words. I’ll go and read your post. Thanks so much.

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  14. Wonderful post Deb and I thoroughly enjoyed reading all of your answers. Journaling’s such a powerful way to reaffirm all we’re grateful for. And it sounds as though you have plenty of that. Have a beautiful weekend my lovely friend and keep smiling (and playing!) xx

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    1. Thank you my good friend! Life is good and I do enjoy the process of sitting and writing words in response to the prompts. I agree journaling is a great way to reaffirm what we’re grateful for. Enjoy your weekend xx

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