Wayne County Extension Homemakers. Newsletter NEW YEAR S RESOLUTIONS

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1 January 2011 Wayne County Extension Homemakers Newsletter Cooperative Extension Service Wayne County 255 Rolling Hills Blvd Monticello, KY (606) Fax: (606) NEW YEAR S RESOLUTIONS Many people start the new year with good intentions making this year different. A New Year s resolution is simply a goal that individuals set for themselves and family members to follow for the next 12 months. People often make New Year s resolutions which focus on improving health, reducing stress, or saving money. Unfortunately, good intentions alone will not lead to change; to be successful you need to develop a plan that will outline how you will make this year different. Ways to Achieve Your Financial New Year s Resolutions: Post your goal in a visible place; it will serve as a daily reminder. Determine what steps you must take to accomplish your goal. Identify the obstacles which may limit your success. Take the opportunity to learn from these obstacles. Track your progress. Recognize small accomplishments, which add up quickly. Do not feel discouraged if you need to rework your game plan. Written by: Jennifer Hunter Source: O Neil, Barb. Got Financial Resolutions? Develop a Plan, Rutgers NJAES Cooperative Extension. Retrieved on November 28, 2010 from Happy New Year!! Wow this year has flown by so quickly!! So many exciting things have happened along with sadness and sorrow. My prayers are with each of you that you will have a very blessed New Year. The thoughts of a new year seem to sparkle and shine with a clean slate and fresh start. Thank you all so much for all that you do for your families, your friends, and your community. You are truly a shining light to others. Thank you so very much! I am so proud and thankful to be your FCS Extension Agent!! Jody G. Paver Wayne Co. Agent for Family and Consumer Sciences JGP/clm

2 January-March 2011 Calendar of Events Homemaker Council Meeting January 11, 5:30 pm Lower Level, John Rickett Room. County officers and club presidents and vice presidents or two club representatives are asked to attend the County Homemakers Council meeting at the Extension Service. We will start the meeting with a light meal. If you have anything for the agenda, please call This meeting will include updates and information regarding the new IRS and UK requirements for club finances and record keeping. Crockpot Cooking Thursday, January 20, 5:30 pm Upper Level, Georgia Burton Meeting Room. Enjoy an evening of trying new recipes and learning how to save money and time as you learn to prepare meals using your Crockpot/slow cooker. Participants will learn how to operate the slow cooker, the benefits and effects of slow cooking, food safety concerns, and the best types of recipes for slow cooking and revising traditional recipes. Invite your friends and please call to register Project Day Tuesday, January 25, 2:30pm-7:30pm Upper Level, Georgia Burton Meeting Room. We all have projects and craft ideas that we would like to start or need to finish, come and enjoy a day of light refreshments and fellowship as we tackle those projects. Scrapbooking, quilting, crocheting, sewing, painting, are just a few of the many projects you may need to finish. Drop in for a while or stay all day, whatever works with your schedule. Bring your supplies and be ready to have a great day! Please call to register. Go Red For Women - Spa Day February 4, 4-6 pm Heart disease is the Number 1 killer of women, taking the life of 1 in 3 women each year. This means women just like you mothers, daughter, sisters, friends are dying at the rate of one per minute because they don t know: heart disease kills. February 4 is National Wear Red Day for Heart Disease Awareness. Join us at the Extension Office for Go Red for Women Spa Day Event. Sessions will be offered at 3 different times for this relaxing and educational event. Please RSVP at with the number of participants and time you will be attending. Benefit from learning about the signs and symptoms of heart disease in women in a relaxed and fun spa environment. Enjoy light refreshments during the 10 am and 2 pm sessions. Lunch will be served at the noon session. Participants will also relax and make their own bath salts, lip balm and lip scrub. A registration donation of $5.00 to the American Heart Association is appreciated.

3 January-March 2011 Calendar of Events Blood Drive February 15, 12-6 pm Clubs to work the drive: Silver Thimbles Club 1-4 pm and Fireside Friends 4-6 pm (Town and Country Plaza marquee sign). Bring 3 dozen homemade or deli cookies, or something good for donors to eat. All Homemakers are asked to tell others about the drive in anyway you can. *If your club is scheduled to work and bring cookies please see that someone in your club does this. Thank you Homemakers for sponsoring the community blood drive in Wayne County for over 31 years! Project Day Tuesday February 22, 2:30-7:30pm Upper Level, Georgia Burton Meeting Room. We all have projects and craft ideas that we would like to start or need to finish, come and enjoy a day of light refreshments and fellowship as we tackle those projects. Scrapbooking, quilting, crocheting, sewing, painting, are just a few of the many projects you may need to finish. Drop in for a while or stay all day, whatever works with your schedule. Bring your supplies and be ready to have a great day! Please call to register. Wayne County Homemakers March Madness -March 26, 10-2 pm A fun and exciting day for Wayne County Extension Homemakers to enjoy food, fun, and fellowship as you gain new leadership skills and participate in a variety of hands on break out sessions. A variety of topics will be taught ranging from foods, nutrition, cultural arts, health, wellness, and money management. Watch for more details! 2011 KEHA State Meeting -May 9-12 Holiday Inn University Plaza and Sloan Convention Center, Bowling Green, Kentucky. We have some rooms reserved. Please let us know if you are interested in attending. We will have more information of cost, registration, and the agenda coming soon.

4 Ready for a Change? New Eating Habits for the New Year Now that we have entered the new millennium, many people will take time to reflect on the past and make plans for the future. Some will decide they are ready to make some changes to improve health and well-being. One way of doing this is to adopt a fresh, new approach to achieving a healthy weight. Research suggests that people who are successful at managing their weight have three things in common: They have carefully considered what goals are right for them. They have made a commitment to be more active. They know what eating habits they are willing to change. Advice about how to manage weight has usually focused on eating behaviors such as portion control and fat intake. While these are still good ways to manage weight, your odds of success are better if you make a commitment to be more physically active and set some goals for better health habits. We now know that perhaps the most important step toward better health is to take a good look at what changes you are willing to make. Carefully consider what is important to you and how you can achieve your goals. Identify behaviors you can change with success such as drinking more water, walking to the mailbox, or eating more fruits and vegetables. It is important to design a plan for better health that works for you. To succeed, research shows that you need to be at least moderately active on most days of the week. To achieve a healthier diet, there are many ways to change eating habits. It is a good idea to first look honestly at what you are in the habit of eating and drinking. Then decide what you can do to move your diet closer to the recommendations for good health. Over 30% of Kentucky adults need to lose weight and over 66% are inactive. These Kentuckians can benefit from the good news that losing even a small amount of weight or engaging in moderate amounts of activity will benefit health. The key to success is to decide what is right for you. Prepared by Janet Tietyen, Ph.D., R.D., Extension Specialist in Food & Nutrition KEHA Mission Statement The Kentucky Extension Homemakers Association (KEHA) is a volunteer organization that works to improve the quality of life for families and communities through leadership development, volunteer service and education. FCS Extension Cancellation Policy Due to the early arrival of winter, I want to make sure everyone remembers that if there is no school then the FCS Program will be canceled. We want to make sure that everyone is safe and warm. If you have questions please feel free to call the office at *If you have access to and we haven t already received your address, please send it to Jody at jody.paver@uky.edu so that we can add you to the ing list. Thanks!

5 Bring in the New Year With a Blaze of Light How would you like to add a new twist to the regular New Year festivities? Something that might be different and fun, yet meaningful and helpful? Something that could make you feel lighter and freer? Something that could add a little extra fire, warmth and light to your life? If you're game, here's how it works. Invite some good friends to a New Year's Eve party. Early on set aside plenty of time for this activity. Arrange for silence or quiet background music, and provide paper and pens. Then invite all present to spend a little time thinking back over the past year and all the years before that. As their minds walk among the joys and hurts of the past, ask them to briefly jot down some, or many, of the situations which have triggered strong and painful emotions like guilt, fear, and anger and that seem, in little or big ways, to still linger on. Point out that they should not dwell on the hurts; just recognize them and jot them down. Most of us, if we take our time, will come up with many possibilities to add to our lists. Be sure to allow adequate time for this exercise. Those who finish early might take a walk outside or chat quietly in another room. When everyone is finished, if it seems appropriate, invite those who want to share some of the items from their lists with the whole group. They might, for example, tell one or two of the hurtful things they did, or others did to them, that they have learned from and want to forgive and release. Next, instruct everyone to fold up their lists and put them away until the magic hour of midnight begins to approach. When that time comes, build a fire in the fireplace or light a candle in an appropriate metal bucket or similar container placed on a fireproof surface. All those who choose to do so can then gather around the flame. Shortly before midnight, everybody gets out their lists. Without much talking, each person should briefly read over their list to themselves. Then all involved close their eyes, and with deep concentration, try in one sweeping motion to both forgive and forget. Midnight should be about a minute away now--a perfect time to burn up all those troubles. With a sense of ceremony, set fire to all the lists and watch as your problems symbolically shrivel and fall into ashes. Feel release, freedom--even joy--rise along with the smoke of your now-dissolved troubles. As you feel the sense of a new beginning, smile, laugh, hug, shout, sing, dance, or whatever. Happy New Year! As the days go by, if one of the items on your list starts to haunt you again, remember that it's gone, that you let it go. It has been burned in the fire of forgiveness. It can't hold you down the way it did before. Of course, some hurts from the past cannot be so easily dismissed. But a collective New Year ritual like this can go a surprisingly long way toward helping us forgive, let go, and make fresh starts. It can also help us see when it might be good to talk more about a lingering hurt with a trusted friend, family member, or professional counselor. Old, unforgiven hurts hold us back. They drain our energy and impede our overall well-being. The sooner we can face them, deal with them, and let them go, the better. Why not think about adding a new twist to your New Year's celebration? Put a little extra warmth and light in the world. Set fire to some of those old grudges, worries, hurts, and shortcomings that often weigh so heavily upon us. Gather up unwanted mental and emotional clutter and let it go in a blaze of light. Prepared by Sam Quick, Ph.D., Human Development & Family Relations Specialist, and Peter Hesseldenz, M.A., Staff Support Associate