1. Lines in the Sand: When the Beach Becomes a Canvas a video from Great Big Story. “Anyone can write their name in the sand, but Jim Denevan uses the beach to create stunning large-scale art. What started as a hobby over 20 years ago has resulted in worldwide recognition, and he’s created masterworks from Russia to Chile to Australia. At the end of the day, though, Jim’s just happy to find a new beach to make his canvas.”

2. Old Man Blogs At Cloud, a great post about blogging from Chuck Wendig on his blog Terrible Minds.

3. Good stuff from Dances with Fat: Stealing from Fat Positivity to Sell Diets – Looking at You “Biggest Loser” and Jillian Michaels Continues To Be A Horrible Human Being, This Time Dragging Lizzo Into It and The Minnesota Starvation Experiment Was Less Strict Than Modern Diets. In related news, Lizzo Issued A NSFW Clapback After Jillian Michaels Commented On Her Health, And I’m Clutching My Pearls.

4. Reading lists: I Read More Than 100 Books in 2019—Here Are the 10 I Recommend and The ZORA Canon: The 100 greatest books ever written by African American women.

5. The Next Generation of Meditation Teachers. “These eight young meditation teachers are so gifted, bringing a unique integrity, open-heartedness and wisdom to their work, that they’ve already earned a strong following.”

6. Grove Collaborative. “Grove started as an idea between three friends talking in a spare bedroom in San Francisco: ‘what if it was easy to find healthier home essentials?’ The belief that what we bring into our homes contributes to that homey, cozy feel prompted them to try to make their idea a reality.”

7. EP52 – The Diet Binge Cycle with Isabel Foxen Duke: Intuitive Bites Podcast.

8. Thanks for coming to my TED talk, an actual TED talk from The Bloggess.

9. advice to your high school self from Karen Walrond on Chookooloonks.

10. “Home” by Warsan Shire, (video).

11. 80-Year-Old Tortoise Becomes A First-Time Mom.

12. A letter to…my angry father. “What I do know is that you have never dealt with it, never sought help. Your deep feelings of loss and hurt come out at night, during family dinners, and instead of addressing that trauma, you blame yourself: you hate, you spit and you rage.”

13. A staggering 1 billion animals are now estimated dead in Australia’s fires.

14. She’s 7 and was born intersex. Why her parents elected to let her grow up without surgical intervention.

15. Haut-Relief Portraits of Animals Come Alive in Detailed Paper Sculptures by Calvin Nicholls.

16. ‘Star Trek: Picard’: Patrick Stewart on Why He Returned to the Final Frontier.

17. Here’s How the ‘Health at Every Size’ Movement Made Me a Better Trainer.

18. The Secret We’re Keeping from You. “Listen, your friends are hiding their mental illnesses from you.” In related news, Woman Explains A Lesser Known Symptom Of Depression And People Are Thanking Her.

19. Smirking All the Way to the Bank: Nick Sandmann Settles Lawsuit With CNN. Gross. He needs to divide the money up and compensate all the people he’s bullied and trolled online, because you absolutely know that the suffering he claims to have experienced is nowhere near the suffering he’s caused. In related news, His reaction when asked to name something President Trump has done well…

20. This Husky Picked Out Her Own Kitten To Take Home From Shelter

21. Recipe I want to try: Old Fashioned Buttermilk Sweet Bread.

22. How to Break Your Single-Use Plastics Habit.

23. The Meat-Lover’s Guide to Eating Less Meat on The New York Times. “Reducing your meat and dairy intake can help mitigate climate change. Melissa Clark has ideas for how to do it deliciously.”

24. America Has Never Cared About Sacred Sites. “Trump’s threat to destroy Iranian cultural sites is a dark national tradition, with the desecration of sacred tribal sites offering the blueprint.”

25. I Remain A “Catfish” Queer: On Love, The Midwest, and What We Think We Deserve.

26. Installation Reveals the Metaphoric Power of a Single Book Distorting a Solid Brick Wall.

1. A New Year’s wish from Jena Schwartz from a recent newsletter: “My wish for you in the new year, and for myself, is that we remember the things that bring us back to ourselves, and make space and time for them. I know this sounds simple and sometimes is anything but, so I also wish for you lots of patience, self-forgiveness, and grace…No matter what else, remember to start, keep going, and be good to yourself. Repeat this often, as you will probably get distracted by shiny objects, competing world crises, kids and pets, bosses and bills, the antics of your own monkey mind, and a thousand other things. That’s ok. That’s more than ok. That’s life! And life is here, now, for the living. Let’s not miss it. Just come back to ‘start’ and remember that you are always welcome here. ” Amen.

2. Paul Jarvis’s State of the Union 2020, his most recent Sunday Dispatch where he summarizes his year and looks forward to what comes next. I can’t stop thinking about what he says about “THE FIRE” and his “bottom line” at the end is that weird sort of dark optimism I love so much, giving me something to hold onto, to keep me afloat as the world burns.

3. Good stuff from from Dances with Fat, If You’re Considering Joining a Gym, and Health at Every Size and the Burden of Proof, and What Research Would Prove that Weight Loss Works because this:

To me (understanding that health is not an obligation, barometer of worthiness, or entirely within our control) the research that exists around weight and health made my choice to follow Health at Every Size blatantly obvious. Of course other people are allowed to make different choices for themselves, but if they want to try to convince me – including and especially if they are a healthcare practitioner trying to tell me that weight loss will make me healthier – they’ll need to provide some actual evidence.

Finally, just to be clear, even if there was research that becoming thinner was possible and would lead to greater health, fat people still wouldn’t be obligated to pursue it (just like nobody is forced to get enough sleep if they can, just because it’s shown to improve health,) because fat people have a right to live in fat bodies without shame, stigma, bullying or oppression and it doesn’t matter why we’re fat, or if we could become thin(ner).

4. ‘Yoga With Adriene’ Shares How Yoga Can Help You Achieve Your New Year’s Resolutions. (video) “Kicking off a Start TODAY series to help you achieve your New Year’s resolutions, correspondent Harry Smith joins the show to talk about the month-long yoga challenge he’s taking. ‘Yoga with Adriene’ YouTube star Adriene Mishler visits the show to explain what yoga can do for you.”

5. Minimalist Family HOUSE TOUR. (video)

6. Walls of Love provides Cleveland homeless with hope. (video) “Walls of Love founder Holly Jackson of Cleveland, Ohio, collects items for the homeless and displays them on pop-up walls. Having once been left homeless herself after escaping an abusive relationship, Jackson knows firsthand the stigma that comes with asking for help.”

7. 20 Questions that Will Open Your Mind in 2020. These would make great journaling prompts. Another set of great prompts came from Melissa Toler‘s most recent newsletter. They are: “What if you realized that you don’t need to fix anything about yourself? What would you do? How would you feel? Where would you go? Who would have the pleasure of spending time with you? What conversations would you have with your friends? With yourself?”

8. My decade in a zine from Austin Kleon. “I accepted this challenge from Malaka Gharib (author of I Was Their American Dream) on Twitter: ‘december 31st challenge make an 8-page zine about your decade don’t spend more than 20 minutes on it.'” This is a fun idea!

9. Priorities from Seth Godin. “Your boat, your compass.”

10. Write With A Knife To Your Back, The Cliff’s Edge At Your Feet from Chuck Wendig on Terrible Minds. His yearly new year’s writer’s resolutions are one of my favorite things.

11. 9 Climate Activists of Color You Should Know. “Canadian water protector Autumn Peltier, the indigenous-led Guardians of the Forest, and Zero Hour’s Zeena Abdulkarim are helping lead the youth climate movement.”

12. Here’s how you can help Australia’s bushfire victims. In related news, Australian fires: Everything we know and how you can help, and How To Help Animals In The Australian Wildfires, and How to help victims of Australia’s apocalyptic wildfires, and How to Help Victims of Australia’s Fires on The New York Times.

13. Cello Teacher Calls Out Student’s Mom Who Sent Racist Email Saying Her Son Smelled ‘Ethnic’ After Lessons.

14. Artist turns wood into amazing things. (video) “Watching the process was honestly sort of boring, but the finished products are really cool.”

15. This Korean tattoo artist is helping pet owners show their love. (video) They are SO realistic!

16. Why I’m Not Dieting In 2020, a video from Fat Girl Flow. “#nodiet2020 starts now! Every year for the last 7 or so years Ive re-commited to not dieting for my well being. Do you. I’ll be over here doing me…and here’s why!”

17. Recipes I want to try: Lemon Meltaway Cookies, and White Cake Recipe, and 5 Ways To Make Chickpea Taste Delicious.

18. 6 Ways Growing Up With A Toxic Father Figure Turned Me Into A Stronger Woman.

19. 2020 So Black: 20 Black Films And TV Worth Looking Forward To.

20. These 22 alternatives will let you live a Facebook-free life in 2020.

21. How To Recognize A Fake News Story. “9 helpful tips to stop yourself from sharing false information.”

22. The Next Storm Comes, a New Year’s poem from Rosemerry Trommer.

23. 50 Wonderful Things From 2019.

24. 17 Memoirs Feminists Should Read in 2020.

25. Maria Bamford Melds Speed Dating and Standup Comedy on The New York Times.

26. Couple find novel way to downsize after 45 years in the same house. What a great idea.