Welcome to Friday! Our family has made the full transition into all things holiday prep including gift ordering, holiday travel plans, and figuring out childcare coverage for days my son doesn’t have school. This week I’m sharing my November recap, thoughts on having a curated algorithm, a few holiday gift ideas, Swiftie School vocabulary lessons, and diving into what my 2016 reading year looked like!
Month in Review: November
It’s the first week of December, which means it’s time for a November recap. Check out the books I read and my progress against my writing and mileage goals!
I finished two books in November which puts me at 34 books for the year so far. The first was for book club: Amazing Grace Adams by Fran Littlewood. I thought it was going to be a light-hearted read, but it ended up being kind of heavy.
The second book I read was Swan Song by Elin Hilderbrand. I had picked up this book at the Friends of the Danville Library book sale earlier this year. It’s the fourth book in Hilderbrand’s Nantucket series. I loved the strong sense of place and the characters!
I signed up for NaNoWriMo in November to help me focus on my own writing and idea generation. For the first half of the month, I also took a break from social media – always a good idea to get the creative juices flowing!
I walked 75.6 miles this month which puts me at 492.6 miles for the year. I’ve been tracking my mileage since 2008 and I’ve never surpassed 500 miles in a year, so that will be a major milestone for me when I (hopefully) hit it in December!
A Curated Algorithm
A few months ago, I was helping my mom with an Instagram setting and I saw her Explore page. I was shocked to see that almost every single box on the screen was about interior design. It was so different than mine!
This experience helped reinforce for me that we really can curate our own algorithms when it comes to social media. I’ve been working on mine over the past several months. Right now, here’s what my Explore page looks like: Gilmore Girls, Wicked, The Eras Tour, Ilona Maher on Dancing with the Stars, books, neuroscience-y stuff, walking, slow strength training, and flexibility/mobility workouts.
Here’s what I’m doing to curate my feed:
- Unfollowing accounts that don’t make me feel good about myself, other people, or society.
- Following accounts that align with my hobbies, values, and creative pursuits.
- Watching, liking, and sharing the content that I want to see more of.
- Another trick is to have two Instagram accounts. One is to keep up with friends, family, and other news that I should know. The other is to explore my hobbies and interests. My hobby account is the one that I’m mindfully curating.
Gift Ideas
If you are looking to give an experience this holiday season, I have two ideas!
1. The Conqueror Challenges. These are virtual challenges in interesting locations where you can walk, run, swim, bike and more to receive virtual postcards and real medals. I’ve completed six challenges of all different lengths. There are over 50 to choose from including Harry Potter, Lord of the Rings, and Game of Thrones. I love that it tracks my progress against my goal and it is a really user friendly app!
2. Modern Mrs. Darcy Book Club. I signed up for the MMD Book Club earlier this year when I was looking to get more out of my reading life. Not only have I been able to attend some wonderful author chats, I love the classes that are offered and the ability to meet up with other readers in my area at local bookstores!
Swiftie School: Vocabulary
I used to volunteer for a literacy council and one of my favorite ways to teach conversational English was through song lyrics. It’s also a great way to teach vocabulary (SAT words, anyone?).
This section was originally going to include vocabulary from multiple songs from The Tortured Poets Department album, however, the song “But Daddy I Love Him” provides plenty of material to dive into. Check out the full lyric video here! All definitions are from https://www.merriam-webster.com/.
- Precocious: exhibiting mature qualities at an unusually early age
- Revelry: noisy partying or merrymaking
- Remedy: a medicine, application, or treatment that relieves or cures a disease
- Saboteur: one that practices sabotage
- Viper: a vicious or treacherous person
- Empath: one who experiences the emotions of others
- Sanctimonious: hypocritically pious or devout
- Soliloquy: a poem, discourse, or utterance of a character in a drama that has the form of a monologue or gives the illusion of being a series of unspoken reflections
2016 Reading Recap
This is my second to last reading year recap! Check out 2023, 2022, 2021, 2020, 2019, 2018, and 2017.
In 2016, I traveled quite a bit for work, so I remember reading many of these books on a plane. That was also the year I got serious about writing every single day, including book reviews and favorite quotes! Some of my favorite books of the year were The Nightingale by Kristin Hannah, The Power of Habit by Charles Duhigg, and After You by Jojo Moyes (the second in the Me Before You series.)
That’s it for this week. A few questions to think about:
- What worked well for you in November? What didn’t?
- Have you considered curating your social media algorithm?
Happy Reading!
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