The Joy of Reading

You could say reading runs in my blood.  My grandma on my mom's side still reads a lot at age 91.  My own mom has always been a voracious reader.  My dad reads a fair amount too and I've followed in their footsteps. 

I've read many people don't read after they finish school, whether that be high school or college.  Maybe they get burned out on reading in school, or maybe they never enjoyed it in the first place. 

I was one of the lucky kids who had both parents read to him from a young age.  I watch my parents read to my kids now and it brings me great joy to know that's how I was raised too.  Now I get to pass that joy onto my own kids.  I am very animated when I read bc I want them to fall in love with reading themselves one day.  I think it's working bc David already loves to tell stories that start with, "One day..."

Reading should be done with inflection and animation in your voice, and later in the voice in your head.  That's what makes it fun and engaging.  If you read monotone of course you're going to hate it. 

So, pick up a book and rediscover the love of reading.  I promise you won't regret it.  As long as it's a good book lol

It's All About the Heart

Back in March, a dear couple of friends gave me a book titled The 30 Day Heart Tune Up.  I finally finished reading the book last week and thought I'd share some thoughts on it below.

One of the key takeaways for me was that you can have arteries or arterial plaque growth within 10 years either way of your age.  So for me, this means I can have the heart capacity anywhere from a 29 year old to a 49 year old, which is crazy to think about.  This obviously depends on how well you take care of your heart.

There were a ton of recipes in the back which I quite frankly rarely pay attention to.  I'm more interested in the guidelines and then going from there, or rather requesting Steffani go from those guidelines since she's the cook in our home.  Some of the main rules were to stay away from processed foods in general and also away from dairy and red meats.  He also suggested fish were good for the heart.

This book was interesting to me because it didn't focus on weight much.  He mentioned of course that you would most likely lose weight if you ate that way, but he was much more focused on cardiovascular health and how diet and exercise effects it.  If I were to guess, I'd guess I was closer to the 49 year old in terms of arterial plaque growth than the 29 year old.

I've always thought of exercise as less important than diet, and it is in regards to weight loss.  But it is every bit as important as diet in regards to your cardiovascular health.  This last week I've done a lot better with exercising as a direct result of reading this book and hope to continue to do so.  

My dad has exercised basically every day since he was 35 and found out his father had been diagnosed with diabetes.  In fact, he's turning 65 this summer and truth be known he's fitter than I am right now as a 39 year old.  I need to be a chip off the old block in regards to exercise.  I have plenty of discipline spiritually speaking with spiritual habits but not so much with physical ones.  I haven't had a soda in 31 days so that's certainly a start with the diet side of things too.

So, here's to our hearts.  We only get one of them, so if you're like me, it's time to start taking better care of the only heart you'll ever have.  The good news is you can even reverse arterial plaque growth no matter your age so there's some light at the end of the tunnel.

Been a while

The last time I wrote was fall of last year, wowza.  It makes sense though, I mean we did have a baby and all haha

Darcy is her name and she is just darling, we love her to pieces in exactly the same way we love David to pieces.  It's true what they say, your love expands as your family grows.  With David I felt my heart would just burst and the true can be said of Darcy.  When they're teenagers I'm not sure I'll be saying my heart could just burst but I'll enjoy them while they're at the stages they are  :)

David LOVES to rough house, he's my little wrestler.  I often comment to others I wish I could bottle his energy and sell it, I'd be a millionaire many times over by now!  It's great to have a young son who pushes me to keep up with him already.  I was hoping I'd make it till he was 14 for him to beat me in a foot race, now I think I'll be lucky to make it till when he turns 11.  He's already super fast, and likes to use 'super cat speed' like on his favorite show, PJ Masks.

Darcy is a dream baby, the kind you almost feel guilty to have.  She's only fussy when she's tired or hungry, and most adults have their own versions of fussiness for the same reasons haha  She already sleeps through the night so hallelujah for that!  She's very sweet and I cherish with all my heart the times she lays her sweet head on my chest, just like I did with David.

I've heard a comedian say, "Children are like farts.  You don't mind your own but other people's.  Whew."  I don't mind other people's kids though, maybe that was why I was a teacher for a while.  I am of course partial to my own though, they are great kiddos.  David struggles with sharing but that's most 2 and 3 year olds that have to learn that lesson repeatedly.  Sometimes we adults even struggle with that lesson, don't we?

Work is going well.  We're hopefully starting a cafe soon, all we have left is to connect the electricity and plumbing and then we should in theory be good to go.  I say in theory because this has taken much longer than any of us expected.  As a missionary friend in Haiti likes to say though, "Things just take longer than they take."  If you've ever worked in a developing country you can relate to that saying I'm sure.

We're also starting a plantain business soon that we're super excited about.  We'll be planting about 2 acres of land with almost 2,500 plantain trees.  One of my coworkers down there studied ag business so it's fun to see him take the lead on this.

Anyway, that was a bit scatter brained so bless you if you've read to the end  :)  Just felt the need to get back into writing.  We'll see if I can stick with it for a while again now.