Scribophile, a fiction writing community, is launching a new contest in the spirit of the new decade–and new beginnings.
Scribophile’s New Beginnings Contest gives budding writers the chance to write a short story featuring the theme of new beginnings. How you intepret it is up to you, but the best work gets a $100 Amazon.com gift card and a 3000 word editing credit for Elite Editing. You’ll need to sign up on Scribophile.com to submit your short story, however.
Here’s the rest of the specs:

Submit: To submit, post …

Skirt! Magazine is seeking personal essays covering interests pertaining to women, including family life, health and spiritual issues.  Although they ask for an emphasis on topical women’s issues, it is not a feminist or pro-woman magazine.
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Requirements: 900-1,200 words in rich text format (.rtf), detailing your personal experience dealing with a woman-oriented topic.  A short two to three sentence biography is also required.  Humor and thought-provoking essays preferred.  Increase your chances of acceptance by writing an essay that fits under one of their monthly themes.
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Query/Manuscript: Queries are preferred by email but …

Smithsonian.com
Smithsonian, a national monthly magazine that chronicles popular culture, the sciences, history and art from an American perspective, is looking for humor pieces to fill The Last Page, their monthly humor column.  They are specifically looking for stories, ideally from the writer’s own experience, about a typical event that had a surprising or humorous twist.
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Requirements: 500 to 650 words, detailing a short but humorous story from a writer’s own experience.

Query/Manuscript: Do not query.  They only accept completed manuscripts through their online submission form.

Payment: $1,000 per accepted article for first North …