Today is the end of the long Thanksgiving holiday weekend in the States. I hope each of you reading has had a relaxing time, spent with those you love and focused on the things you are thankful for.

The next 27 days will be filled with preparation for the Christmas holiday. Everywhere you go, you see lights going up and decorations being put out. It’s the hustle and bustle of the season and it’s definitely upon us.

One new thing you now see on the site is that I have added a “share” button on the left of the posts for Facebook and a couple of other social media sites. If you have a profile there, please help spread the word about MT Tools by sharing posts that you like and inviting others to join us. Thanks!

We’re going to have some fun with this time and do some great things as well. This weekend, I’ve spent some down time watching a few movies.

The first movie I watched was “Eat, Pray, Love.” If you haven’t seen this, it’s an excellent movie about finding yourself and your purpose in life. The woman in the movie spends a year traveling, spending four months in Rome, India, and Bali. The scenery in the movie is amazing as well and sure puts Bali on my list of places I’d like to visit one day. I was drawn to this because she speaks of the need to find balance in her life. Isn’t that something we all struggle with? And the holiday season will be no different as it brings on extra challenges in how we spend our time. I’m still reflecting on the things I learned from the movie. One thing that stuck out for me was when she was told that sometimes balance is NOT equal, but about doing those things for yourself that you really love, even if it means your “balance” is off a bit. I’ve never really thought of it that way before.

The other show I watched is a Hallmark movie. It is about a young man whose grandfather passes away and leaves him with several challenges before he gets his inheritance. The challenges are ones that take a young man who has always had it all and teach him how to be self-sufficient and actually do for others. I do love the holiday season for the great movies that are out there. Be sure you take some time somewhere in there to enjoy one or two during this time!

Christmas Contests!

We’ve been blessed on this site by our friends at Interfix. That means I have two one-year subscriptions for the Benchmark KB product that we will be giving away for the holidays! I’m excited about this as it gives two of you an awesome tool to add to your tools that you use every day.

My question is this: What should our contest be? I’ve thought about a contest where you refer people to sign up here. I’ve thought about a contest related to comments on posts. So what would you add? Let’s hear your ideas and we’ll be announcing the contest details sometime this week.

25 Days of Christmas

Okay, I know it’s supposed to be the “12 Days of Christmas,” but why do we only have 12 days? Why can’t we have 25? I see no reason!

And so, starting on December 1, we will celebrate the 25 days of Christmas. Every day, we’ll have a new topic about the Christmas holiday. I hope this will follow much like our 30 days of gratitude challenge as we focus on the season and all of the things we love about it.

Don’t Forget Gratitude

While our 30 days of gratitude challenge came to an end on Thanksgiving Day, I hope the exercise hasn’t stopped for you. Stay with the habit and stop every day to remind yourself of something you’re grateful for. I am currently reading The Power, which is a sequel to the book The Secret. I do believe we have the power to change our lives if we embrace that. I hope these exercises do just a bit of that for you.

Okay, over to you! What ideas do you have for contests this month? I look forward to your suggestions!