Welcome to Friday,it's Joy Diet time. This week was about making connections. Throughout the course of this book Martha oftentimes catches me off guard with her innocent chapter titles. I know her premise is that by chapter nine, we are hip happening people so why not share the wealth. Maybe she is getting us ready for the feasting part and didn't want us to be alone. The truth of the matter is that many of the dieters are still trying to wrap their brains around skill number 1, and that is to master doing nothing.

Honestly this chapter felt like it came out of nowhere. Maybe she was trying to catch us off balance after the chapter on laughing but the truth of the matter is that I don't feel fit for humanity just yet. Connecting with people is really easy for me. The harder connection has been with myself. What I've greatly appreciated about this book is that I've had some new insights along the way, even using my own pick and choose style.

So continuing on is the light of choosing what I want off of the joy diet smorgasbord, I've decided to take the weekend for myself and have a writer's retreat. I want to connect with the memories of my family and write them down for my children. I want to start all of those books that are constantly running in my head. The Joy Diet has taught me how to create a safe haven to do this. So dear dieter friends I'm off to the Smoky Mountains to write for the weekend. I'll tell more about it on Monday.Next week is the last week of the Joy Diet and I can hardly wait for our feast call. Have a great week and a happy Thanksgiving next week.

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Today's photos are from Pen to Paper online. I first ran into them when I was in Brighton and now they have this sweet little online store with all of the favorite journals,ink pens, and ink. Just a perfect gift for the writer in your life.