Where have I been, you ask?

Hey, everybody! If you read my other blog (www.explorevirginia.blogspot.com), you know that I haven’t been keeping up with either blog very well as a little thing called "Life" keeps getting in the way. You see, since January, I started home schooling my son; have been trying to simplify my life by getting rid of things (that’s actually been going on for years!); lost a family member; have been doing work to sell my home; looking for a job that will enable me to work part-time from home; trying to be a good Mom; cooking, cleaning, paying bills; learning some new job skills via online classes; trying to maintain a spiritual routine; etc., etc. And, for me, it gets really hard to focus on too many things at once. I can only keep so many balls in the air at one time. Inevitably, one or two drop for a while until I can pick them up again. In this case, my blogs were dropped for a bit.

Plus, truth be told, I got into a little funk there too. You know, self-doubt. What’s the purpose of my blogs? Who is even reading them? I’m not a good enough writer. Wah, wah, wah! I have to say that it is very heartening to look at my blog stats from time to time and see interest from people all over the world. I don’t know how you guys stumble upon my blogs but it is the coolest thing ever to know that people from Russia, Indonesia, Brazil, Germany, the U.K., Japan, Latvia, Columbia, South Korea, and many more places are checking out my blogs! So, thank you!!

And, yeah, I am definitely a wanna-be world traveler! The only times I have been out of the U.S. I went to the Bahamas and Canada. That was great but not enough. There is a vast, interesting world out there full of fascinating people, languages, cultures, wildlife, and topography. Hence, one of my major motivations for simplifying my life--getting out of debt to live the life I want and teach my kids a thing or two about what is really important. I recently stumbled upon blogs by two families that are doing this very thing. You can check them out at www.manvsdebt.com and www.discovershareinspire.com.

For me, these families have helped me solidify my plans for the future. I have a goal to work toward and I'm very excited about that! I'll have more about the changes I'm making and how I’m working to accomplish my goals in future blog posts. I hope you’ll keep coming back and give me feedback or even just share how you simplified your life in the comments section! Maybe we can inspire one another! Until next time, this southern fried and tied up girl wishes you all well on your life’s journey!