One of the great things about having this blog is letting folks know about interesting happenings — globally or locally.
Next Thursday evening, May 7 at 6:30, Strengthening Your Immune System will be one of those events.
Most of us around these parts know and love Drs. Elise Faust and Vince Campbell through their chiropractic practice, Madison Family Chiropractors.
The immunity workshop is the brain baby of Dr. Elise and will be held at her Madison office. RSVP 706-342-7115.
I have been a regular visitor to Elise since early fall — and it has changed my life. As a runner for over thirty years, I had accepted pain as part of the aging runner package. I still have aches and squirrelly knee, but everything is so much better especially, my neck and back pain. I would not exaggerate about something this important.
When I heard that Elise was planning a holistic immunity workshop, I welcomed the opportunity to help spread the word.
The evening is geared to parents of children, though Elise said, “The talk will be focused on caring for children but really children of all ages.” She will discuss common sicknesses and ailments and how to address them with food and herbs, and other tools. And strengthening the body before it becomes sick. Heck yeah.
I remember those mommy, early childhood years. Constant runny noses, ear infections, sore throats. And that was just me. My oldest caught every stomach bug known to humankind and then some undiscovered Amazonian types.
In discussing ways to strengthen the immune system, Elise hopes to empower parents. “The only option people (especially mothers) feel they have is to do the pharmaceutical route.”
Strengthening Your Immune System will outline:
* How the body self regulates and self heals.
* How symptoms speak to us, and how we don’t listen.
* Food, herbs, supplements, essential oils, chiropractic and acupuncture — and other things available to help the body heal. All things that are respectful of the body, have no side effects and help strengthen the body and fight off recurrent, chronic aliments.
Elise has two grown daughters, a child bride that girl. She raised her daughters practicing this healing mind, body and spirit lifestyle. And they are gorgeous, strong, intelligent women (like their mom).
A chiropractic and nutrition/wellness counselor for over 19 years, Elise is currently finishing a program on Ayurvedic Wellness. A manner of healing focused on food, herbs and lifestyle to create health, vitality and wellness.
At this point in her life journey, Elise feels led to share her knowledge with the next generation of mothers.
Mark your calendars. Thursday, May 7 at 6:30. The program will last an hour and a half and there will be handouts to take home. So please RSVP : 706-342-7115.
Strengthening Your Immune System. Expand your mind about the body. How physical, intellect, emotions and spirit weave together.
Call Elise today and let her know you’ll be there.
Besides, she is such a cool lady. You’ll thank me just for getting to know her.
If you live in Morgan County, if you live anywhere remotely near Morgan County —
You don’t want to miss this.
Tuesday night, April 28 at 7 p.m. the MCHS gym will be transformed into a theatrical venue for a Patriotic Fine Arts Extravaganza featuring over 600 Morgan County students grades PreK – 12.
Karisa Seymour, Morgan County Middle School Band Director, came up with the ambitious idea after seeing a event by an Avon, Indiana student fine arts program. “This performance has been in the works for over a year,” said Seymour. “It’s designed to showcase the outstanding work being taught every day in the four Morgan County schools.”
The patriotic Extravaganza will feature Pre-K through 12th grade performances including: Middle and High School Bands, Chorus, Dance, Drama, Art, R.O.T.C. and Color Guard. Special lighting and sound will transform the gym into a theatrical venue. A prism performance allows for seamless transitions without waiting for performer or set changes. One act flows into the next with entertainment positioned around the venue. A dramatic monologue might follow a swinging jazz quartet, which leads into lyrical dance. Student art banners will serve as backdrops enhancing the red, white and blue theme.
The high caliber of the system wide fine art instruction and programming not only enriches student life, it brings recognition to the schools and profits the community as a whole. MCMS Art Teacher Marjean Meadow pointed out that many Morgan County students go on to fine arts studies at the collegiate level earning degrees in all areas of: theater, dance, music, graphic and studio arts, voice, art education and architecture — just to name a few. As for long-reaching effects of the Extravaganza, Seymour hopes a dreamed-for performing art center would come a little closer to reality. “Having a state-of-the-art performing arts center would not only benefit the student population, it would allow us to bring in other quality performing and visual arts for the entire community.”
See you there!
Okay, maybe I won’t actually see you there because there are gonna be a TON of folks.
Get there early. Not like 6 a.m. early, but you can figure it out.
I’ve been wondering about cats and death this week. We decided to end our Oreo’s suffering on Tuesday.
Oreo. The cat my daughter slept with every night the last eight years. For as long as I can remember she would periodically announce, “When Oreo dies, I’m taking a week off of school, you know.” And there was the time, we almost lost him in the spin cycle.
I’ve read that adoptees often develop intense feelings for animals. Pets filling that bottomless unconditional love tank.
So I was worried about our daughter when it became clear that cancer was so entrenched in Oreo’s neck, he could neither eat or drink without suffering.
Oreo and Hannie in January before he got so very, very sick.
Tuesday, leaving the vet with Hannie in tears and Oreo at rest, taking one final ride home, I said I’d take care of burying him and go pick out a plant to place over his grave like our vet had suggested.
I decided to bury Oreo by the garden fence and bought a climbing rose which hopefully gravitates to the wire.
* * *
I missed the ornery furry cuss myself and had shed a few tears.
I wondered about our other pets. Our dog and cat, Daisy, must realize something is up?
Daisy had to have known how sick Oreo was — did she wonder why he disappeared?
Yesterday out tilling up my garden plot to plant tomatoes, peppers and squash, I saw this.
Daisy had been hanging out by me, then I realized she was on top of the spot I buried Oreo.
Yes, there’s the rose bush and the rocks I’d gathered around the new plant, not so much to enshrine the grave but more to keep someone from mowing the rose down. That kind of stuff seems to happen around here.
The rest of the afternoon, Daisy came back to that spot and lounged.
I can’t help but wonder if she knows that’s where her buddy is?
Thoughts?
Linking up with the Finish the Sentence Friday gang.
I debated whether to post this pic. Full disclosure — In cropping out my thighs, my beer also disappeared from the photo where it rested a few inches from my left arm.
This is what I do well. Sit in the sun while reading. A reformed magazine-o-holic, my mother brings me all hers and the few I do get pile up. Then when I get away, I binge read Good Housekeeping, SELF, Oprah, Country Living, Southern Living — the assorted Anything Living magazines.
Part of me likes to think it helps me write a smidge better since I write for print. How other writer’s handle interviews and home redo stories interest me.
The other part of me likes to veg. Check out. And a good magazine helps.
When I see a recipe, self help or house idea I like I rip the page out old school as in the days before Pinterest.
Like this article on to-do lists in Martha Stewart’s Living. Which is ironic to me, since every issue of her magazine can be considered one big TO DO.
Martha Stewart does. And she does whatever she does well. Dang, she even did her stint in prison better than I did some 5-year-old birthday parties.
Not that I don’t try with the to-dos.
Just like the beer was in my wingspan out by the pool, this stack of 3 x 5 cards stays at my right elbow on my desk.
I recently purged the piles on my desk but that said, these were the to-do cards I found scattered about his morning.
Just looking at the photo, I can already tell the chance of that swim happening are about nil.
Also the write for an hour. On my book. That needs to become a priority and here I blog.
The Living article stated the point of writing things down is to get them off our minds. To make things less overwhelming.
It also said to find a system that works for you. I need visual reminders or I run to the brightest, flashiest object and forget the dull, yet extremely important task — like pay the water bill before it gets shut off. Who remembers that stuff when there are posts to write and seeds to sow?
There are the tasks, I move from day to day. Mail off my racing medals to Medals-for-Mettle. And tasks that don’t seem pressing but need to get done or it will be too late, like putting in my summer garden.
Am starting to get a little antsy because I need to draft a column for magazine. That needs to get done today. But so does a trip to the bank, and dinner and I want to pick strawberries with the kids this week they are out of school.
The article promises to help us “get control of our to-do list — rather than the other way around.”
I’m not sure that applies to me. How can I be controlled by a list when so much is left undone each day? The only thing it controls is my stress level by causing it to skyrocket.
Dolly Parton called sweet tea ‘the house wine of the South” in the movie Steel Magnolias.
Just between you and me and a box of Tetley, when I came on the scene, my mother was a iced tea sweetened with Sweet-n-Low drinker. Therefore I became same.
It wasn’t till a couple of summers ago writing a piece for local magazine — that I began to question why had my South Georgia momma sweetened iced tea with Sweet-n-Low? For in researching my story, seemed like everyone else with a South, North, East or West Georgia momma had a pitcher of sweet tea in their refrigerator.
In talking to my mom when writing the earlier piece, I learned that my maternal grandmother did have a pitcher of sweet tea in their fridge, but that my mother — when pregnant with me in the 1960s — turned to Sweet-n-Low to save calories.
In the 60s, doctors told women to gain only 6 ounces during pregnancy. Thank you 1960s obstetrics. You are why I grew up deprived in the iced tea department.
I had to learn the ways of sweet tea from my friends.
* The brand of tea is important. (Though depending on who you talk to, the best kind changes like Falcons fans after a loss.)
* Color is important.
* Clarity is important.
Yes, it sounds like we are talking about diamonds.
Wanting to give up soft drinks, I started making sweet tea that summer and was baptized in beauty of steeped tea leaves.
I picked up a few things from my sources for that article that have grafted their way into my sweet tea mystique.
Heather — Tetley is king. Therefore I use Tetley. And this is the only reason I use Tetley, because Heather says it is smooth. Not sure what smooth means to tea but it seems to be an important factor.
Bob — Bob was big on clarity. Therefore I always look to see just how clear a batch is. Some people say a pinch of baking soda is the key to transparent tea.
Mom — Talked about the color of her mother’s, my grandmother’s, tea: Amber. I know. Sounds like a exotic dancer, but it’s a color you strive for in tea. Not sure exactly what Amber tea is but as Justice Stewart said about hard-core pornography in Jacobellis v. Ohio, “I know it when I see it.”
You just know if your tea is the right color.
Pam — I have Pam to thank for the half sweet/half unsweet rule. She grew up with sweet tea in the fridge as did all my sources, but now she cuts it in half.
That’s what I do. I order it way in restaurants. Fix it that way at convenience stores. And in my home.
It still tastes plenty sweet for me and saves a few calories.
Today was the day to make the first sweet tea of the season.
I dug out my two pitchers and fixed me a glass.
I use a recipe from Allrecipes. It’s pretty standard operating procedure from listening to all my sources and it works for me.
First, put the kettle on.
Have your pitchers waiting with six tea bags. You can put a pinch of baking soda in the bottom.
When the water boils, pour two cups on the bags and let steep 15 minutes.
Once that is done — you are almost there.
Take out the tea bags, stir in 3/4 sugar in the sweet tea container.
Then put six cups cold water into the concentrate in both pitchers.
Now that’s the color I’m talking about. Untouched photo, promise.
Beverly Morris, the supergal who’s allowed us into her breast cancer recovery event, now has a new challenge.
Listen to this . . . .
Yes. The plastic surgeon said he needed fat to harvest before he would schedule her reconstructive surgery. And Beverly doesn’t have any. Poor thing.
I know. The easy answer would be for all of us to donate our fat.
A win-win right?
Charitable soul that I am,
I marched to her doctor’s office and dropped my tights to reveal black Sharpie circles around the back of my thighs.
“Take all you need. And more. Please.”
After politely telling me to pull up my tights — and before calling the Athens police, her doctor said that he could only use Beverly’s fat for her body.
What’s up with that?
So I baked her chocolate chip cookies.
See how much I love the rower. You can’t hide that kind of love.
In three weeks, Beverly heads back to the doctor to see if she’s ready.
What would be your advice to an uber-healthy eater to gain 10 pounds in three weeks?
April Fool’s Day. I love a good joke within reason.
Looking at the date, my already keen Spidey Sense was on high alert.
Or so I thought.
Having finished some work, today was the day to check some of those tasks that had been piling up off my list.
Number one being my camera.
It’s been sitting on my desk since it took a direct hit from a bit of spilt water. Darned if I can remember who I sent it to last time to repair. So I contacted my amazing fabuolismo photographer friend Angelina Bellebuono to get the company name again.
This was such a relief.
Because last time I thought I was texting Angelina — I had the wrong number.
I remember putting the correct number in my contacts — or did I?
To be honest I wasn’t 100 percent sure.
I was overjoyed that I did indeed have Angelina on the case to help my fix my silly camera.
So I told her the sorted tale.
Hmm.
This made me wonder if it had dried out? I put in new batteries.
Yes. I rejoiced!
Things worked.
And then they didn’t pooh.
I shared this real time tale of woe with Angelina. 🙁
Or did I?
UUUUUGGGHHHHH!
Do you believe this sh*?
I am flippn’ loopy.
I spent the next ten minutes trying to convince Not Angelina that I wasn’t hoppin’ a ride on the Crazy Train.
Which only confirmed the Crazy Train Yurail Chip embedded in my cerebellum.
