A couple months ago I started hearing a lot of talk about Whole30. Several of my favorite bloggers were filling my Reader, Facebook feed and Instagram with posts about Whole30, including Stacy, Anne, Tsh, and Jessica.

I was curious and after reading up on it a bit more, decided I was going to do it.

So…what is Whole30?

Whole30 is a 30 day nutritional reset, during which you eat real food and eliminate sugar, alcohol, grains, legumes, and dairy. According to the founders of Whole30, Dallas and Melissa Hartwig, it is “designed to help you restore a healthy metabolism, heal your digestive tract, calm systemic inflammation and put an end to unhealthy cravings, habits, and relationships with food.”

Are You With Me?

I had been talking with a few friends about doing the Whole30 challenge together, so I set up a Whole30 Facebook Group as a place for us to share resources, ideas, and encouragement as we go. We’re starting April 1st and would love to have you join us!

I’m In. What do I do next?

1. Request to join our Whole30 Facebook Group where I’ll be posting valuable resources I come across, recipe ideas, and sharing my progress. We can check in with each other, and provide encouragement and support for each other as we go.
2. Read up on the Whole30 program either on the Whole30 Website, or in the book: It Starts with Food: Discover the Whole30 and Change Your Life in Unexpected Ways.
3. Start to plan for your Whole30 challenge. For me to succeed, I have to plan, so I’ll be spending the next week or so coming up with Whole30 meal options and meal planning using Plan to Eat.

Resources:

• Official Whole30 Website
• It Starts with Food: Discover the Whole30 and Change Your Life in Unexpected Ways (book written by the creator’s of Whole30)
• Plan to Eat: Plan to Eat is an online meal planning tool that I use and love. You can join Plan to Eat free for the first 30 days and  request me as a friend (kjeldy) which will give you access to all my recipes. I’m adding Whole30 recipes and tagging them Whole30 so they’re easy to find.
• Our Whole30 Pinterest Board
• Jessica’s Whole30 Eating Log

Want a challenge, but not into Whole30? Check out Beth’s 30 for 30 Challenge where you can choose your own goal and commit to it for 30 minutes a day for 3o days, also starting in April.

**This post contains affiliate links which means if you make a purchase through one of my links, I’ll receive a small commission. Thanks for supporting More Than Mundane!

For the first few months of the year I was really good about setting monthly goals and posting them here. And then…I don’t know what happened! But I’m going to try and finish the year out strong with a couple more months of goals. Here’s what I have planned for this month:

Family:

• Go on a date night with my husband.
• Take Charlotte out for a fun outing with just mom and dad.
• Take Isaac out for a fun outing with just mom and dad.
• Plan something for our anniversary in December.

Health and Home:

• Write our family purpose statement.

Make & Do:

• Essential Oils Party: I’m hosting an essential oils party on November 17th. If you’re in the San Diego area and interested in coming, let me know!

Personal:

• Book: finish two books this month so I can reach my goodreads challenge for the year!
• Quiet Time: continue waking up before the kids every morning for my quiet time.
• Healthy Living Goal: bring my lunch to work so I don’t stop and pick something up.
• Fun: participate in this thankful challenge. Join me?

Also, don’t forget to check out the Healthy Living ebook bundle–only $29 for over $300 worth of ebooks, plus free products from some great companies. This deal ends tomorrow, so don’t miss it!

March seemed to fly by for me. We were all sick for a couple weeks, so that made it so I didn’t get as much done as I wanted, but for the most part I did pretty well on my March goals. Here’s a recap:

Family: I met my family goal of doing a fun outing/activity each weekend (even when we were sick!) And my goal of going on a mama/daughter date with Charlotte–we got some yummy gelato as an after school treat one day.

Home: Project: Simplify 2012 is one of the things that never got fully accomplished. I did the first week of decluttering kids’ stuff and then the sickness came and I never finished the rest of them.

Make & Do: I loved the Ginger and Coconut Oil Sugar Body Scrub–making scrubs is always an easy one for me to check off the list. But I never did get around to doing anything with the old windows.

Personal: I really enjoyed reading The Dirty Life: A Memoir of Farming, Food, and Love by Kristin Kimball. Once I picked it up, I sped right through it.

As for my Spring cleanse, I’m actually in the middle of it right now…so I technically didn’t meet this goal in March, but I’m doing it now!

I do still need to set the date for our cookbook club party. I did manage to try out lots of recipes from our chosen cookbook though! We’re using Joy the Baker Cookbook: 100 Simple and Comforting Recipes.

And here are my goals for April:

Family:

• Continue with our weekend outings/activities. We had so much fun last month! We went to the aquarium, rode trains, went strawberry picking, and had some fun at the park.
• Write our sponsored child.

Home:

• Finish the decluttering that I started last month. Specifically these areas: paper clutter and countertops.
• Clean up the back patio so we can start enjoying some of our meals outside now that the weather is so nice and it’s staying lighter out later.

Make & Do:

• Try some new recipes for Spring!
• I would love to make these seed pods with Charlotte to go with the fun book we’ve been reading, Miss Rumphius by Barbara Cooney.

Personal:

• Book: I’m having a hard time deciding…I have several books that I’m in the middle of right now, so it might just be a good plan to finish all of those up.
• Fun: Go out with the girls! I need a girls night and I already have one planned, so I know I’m going to meet this goal. Plus, I still need to schedule the cookbook club party so I’m keeping that one on the list.

That’s all for now. Any fun goals on your list for this month?

Linked up at Simply Rebekah.

I’m changing it up a bit and using categories (Family, Home, Personal) for my monthly goals, similar to Emily at Live Renewed.

Family:

• Schedule one fun family outing/activity each weekend.
• Plan a fun mama/daughter date with Charlotte.

Home:
Organizing: I’m going to do Project: Simplify 2012 with Simple Mom, which will focus on decluttering 4 areas (Kids’ Stuff; Kitchen/Pantry; Closets, Countertops, and Drawers; and Choice)  throughout the month of March.

Make & Do:

• Ginger and Coconut Oil Sugar Body Scrub
• Do something with the old windows I found. I’m thinking this upcycled window chalkboard or this photo frame, or putting some fabric/paper behind the glass and adding some lettering, like this window to outdoor wall art.

Personal:

• Book: Well…turns out I never even started the book I picked out for February, so I’m going to make it happen this month for sure! So…the plan for this month is to read The Dirty Life: A Memoir of Farming, Food, and Love by Kristin Kimball.
• Word/Verse: Trust. Proverbs 3:5-6 “Trust in the LORD with all your heart
  and lean not on your own understanding;
  in all your ways submit to him,
  and he will make your paths straight.”
• Healthy Living Goal: Do a Spring Cleanse. Last year I participated in Lisa Byrne’s Cleanse Your Life course, so I’m going to revisit that and do a 5 day whole body cleanse.
• Fun: Choose the date and plan for my first cookbook club party.

How about you…do you have any fun projects, plans, or goals for March?

Linked up at Simply Rebekah.

Last month’s goals went really well. So far, I am loving setting goals just one month at a time. I did notice that I need to be more specific in some of my goal setting. For example, my Healthy Living Goal for January was: Drink more water. What exactly does that look like? A little vague I think. I ended up deciding that for me, my more specific goal was to drink a minimum of 6-8 glasses of water a day, and I was able to stick to that. But I probably should have spelled it out more to start with. So from now on, I’m going to try to be more specific with my monthly goals.

Book to Read: The Dirty Life: A Memoir of Farming, Food, and Love by Kristin Kimball.
My birthday was in January, so over the last couple months with Christmas and my birthday, I’ve received lots of great new books, so it’s hard to choose, but I’ve been wanting to read this one for awhile.

One book I got for my birthday is The Rhythm of Family: Discovering a Sense of Wonder through the Seasons by Amanda and Stephen Soule. It’s broken up by month, so I’ll read each month as it comes along. So far I’m loving it.

Word for the Month: Love. Appropriate for February, right?

Verse: “Do everything in love.” 1 Corinthians 16:14 Several months ago I read this post by Stacy at A Delightful Home and it really resonated with me. I wrote the verse on sticky notes around my home and in my car and most of them are still lingering around. This month I want to focus again on doing everything in love. Yes, it’s a tall order. And no, I won’t always get it right. But I’m going to try.

Healthy Living Goal: Take Vitamin D daily. I had a physical in January and found out that my Vitamin D levels were low so I’m trying to get in the habit of taking Vitamin D supplements daily, unless I’ve already spent enough time in the sun that day. Read more about Vitamin D here.

Scrub of the Month: Geranium-Lemon Sugar Scrub inspired by Simple Scrubs to Make and Give.

Make or Do: Depending on what my CSA box brings my way, I’m planning to make either these Roasted Brussels Sprouts and Cranberries with Barley, or these Sauteed Lemon Brussels Sprouts, or this Crunchy Kale and Coconut Bowl. And I’m also planning to make these lace and twine votive jars or this adorable book page paper hearts version.

That’s it! Do you have any goals for the month? I’m linking up over at Simply Rebekah. Head on over to see her Insane Goals.

I used affiliate links in this post.

I have to admit that as much as I love planning, list making, and goal setting, I’ve been a little overwhelmed when it comes to making goals for 2012. Or coming up with a book list for the year, like I did last year.

So instead I’ve decided to take one month at a time. And come up with a random assortment of goals for each month. So for January:

Book to Read: Kisses from Katie: A Story of Relentless Love and Redemption (given to me by this sweet friend.)

Word for the Month: Gratitude. Last year I read One Thousand Gifts by Ann Voskamp and began writing down my own one thousand gifts but haven’t been as diligent about it in the last few months. My mom had a journal made for me specifically for journaling a thousand gifts and it’s amazing. I’m going to start this year off getting back into the habit of writing down blessings in my life every day.

Verse: In everything give thanks; for this is God’s will for you in Christ Jesus. 1 Thessalonians 5:18. This ties in well with my word for the month, don’t you think?

Healthy Living Goal: Drink more water. I’m pretty good about starting my day off with a glass of water with lemon, but I’m not as good about continuing the habit throughout the rest of my day. Read more about the health benefits of water here and here.

Scrub of the Month: This one is just fun for me! I love making scrubs and ever since I got Simple Scrubs to Make and Give I’ve been having fun trying lots of new scrub recipes, so I decided I would try out a new one each month. This month I’ll be making a facial scrub for the first time–the Lavender Peppermint Facial Smoother. Can’t wait to try it!

Make or Do: Other than finishing off my 32 Before 32 list (hopefully), I have some other fun projects planned, such as making a pom-pom garland, and trying out this baked oatmeal.

So that’s my plan for January. Anyone else with me on this whole making goals for a month plan and not for the whole year? If you’ve made any goals for this month or year, please share them with me in the comments.

I used affiliate links in this post.