Somehow I got carried away in Gimp and ended up with a bird on my shoulder and my . . . → Read More: Grandma Inspired]]> I kept thinking about Grandma Jewel’s hair all swept to the side.  While I won’t be sporting any bright red lipstick, I decided to get a bejeweled (no pun intended) hairpin and sweep my hair over to the side.

Somehow I got carried away in Gimp and ended up with a bird on my shoulder and my shop name blaring across the front.  I just have way too much fun with a computer. 

In other news, I have not said anything, but two weeks ago tonight I spent the evening in a cardiac bed in the ER.  PVCs (premature ventricular contractions) dotted the rhythm strip.  Lots of them.  Lots of tears.  Lots of stress.  Numb hands.  Anxiety.  And lab work showing a low potassium.

Do not underestimate the power of stress.  I am not sure what happened.  I am going to believe that my body is not going haywire, but that I diuresed myself free of potassium with too much caffeine two days prior, which was likely helped along by running on the treadmilll, and oh yeah, it’s been about 100 degrees.

I was given potassium.  And Ativan.  I have been eating lots of potassium rich foods, resting more, and today I made some potassium broth with this recipe:

http://www.thehealthyhomeeconomist.com/2011/03/potassium-broth-for-rapid-recovery-and-rejuvenation/

There have been a few times that these palpitations have come back.  It’s scary, but the doctor assured me that my heart looks fine on x-ray and EKG, while he gently patted my arm and said that the amount of stress I was under was surely a large part of this.

Anyway, I am running after joy.  Don’t try to catch me!  But you can run with me if you want to! 

Enjoy this day!

This recipe was modified from a recipe found on a Hodgson Mill Milled Flaxseed box.

Flax, Apple, Chocolate Chip Muffins

I have always loved these muffins, but the recipe has been modified to make them even more healthy.  They came out great. 

Thomas and I try to elbow each other for the tiny little space in front of the stove.

Chocolate Chip Bran Cereal Muffins

1 cup all-purpose flour 1/4 cup wheat . . . → Read More: Chocolate Chip Bran Cereal Muffins]]> We are actively converting all recipes to heart-healthy recipes. 

I have always loved these muffins, but the recipe has been modified to make them even more healthy.  They came out great. 

Thomas and I try to elbow each other for the tiny little space in front of the stove.

Chocolate Chip Bran Cereal Muffins

1 cup all-purpose flour
1/4 cup wheat flour
1/3 cup sugar (can use 1/4 cup honey instead of sugar, I like sugar better)
1 TBSP baking powder
1/4 teaspoon salt
2 cups bran flakes cereal (Wal-Mart has one by Great Value that includes whole grain wheat and wheat bran; there are actually many brands and many types of bran cereal that would work, based on what you like.)
1-1/4 cups low-fat milk
2 egg whites
1/4 cup olive oil
1 cup of chocolate chips (preferably semi-sweet or dark chocolate or you can mix half and half)

1. Stir together first five ingredients in a large bowl until mixed. 
2. Add cereal, pour milk on top and let stand for a few minutes for cereal to soften.
3. Add the rest of the ingredients except the chocolate chips and mix with a mixer until well blended.
4. Stir in the chocolate chips.
5. Pour batter into muffin pans coated with healthy, low-fat cooking spray or lined with paper cups.
6. Bake at 400 degrees for about 20 minutes or until light golden.

Makes 12-14 muffins. 

These muffins offer a healthy alternative to some other not-so-healthy sweets.  These are good for a quick, occasional out-the-door breakfast.  They are great for picnics and lunch-box snacks.  They make for a healthy dessert.  

These muffins offer fiber, including whole grain fiber, which is good at reducing cholesterol. 

Whole grains are part of our heart-healthy diet.

My husband is a . . . → Read More: Each Day Is A Gift]]> Each and every day we live is a gift, though it’s easy to take a day for granted.  I knew this to be true already, but after the close call we had Tuesday…  Well, it heightened my awareness of all that my husband does for us and how strong his presence is in our home.

My husband is a man who loves to be outside. I can honestly say he’s the hardest working person I’ve ever known. He does not like to stop. When he comes home from work, he works again. He loves going out to a dear friend’s land and observing nature and trying to get an idea of how the deer hunting will be for the season ahead.  He washes clothes.  He cooks.  He reads.  I’m so used to him that the sound of him is like a fan whirring in the background.  He’s my white noise, and I don’t even know it sometimes.

Joe puts out corn.

Bringing a man like Thomas home after a heart attack is like taking care of a caged animal. I do not say that lightly. He is used to going and doing, in a big way! Yesterday I knew he needed to get outside and would find a way to do so no matter what. A couple of the children and I took him out to our friend’s very beautiful land. We were my husband’s hands. He walked, observed, rested, enjoyed the sights around us, and gave us each chores to do to keep this little area he loves looking like a state park.

I think he looks great.  I would like to keep him around.  Oh, there are times when I would like to wrap a frying pan around his head, but aren’t all marriages that way?  We’ve had 21 wonderful years together and have four little carbon copies of us running around, so the 5% of the time when I think of, uh, the frying pan thing, well it’s small in comparison.

What are we looking for here?  Well, that’s a deer rub above.  See how the bark is rubbed off of that little tree?  A deer has been here.  Doesn’t it just give you goosebumps?  (You don’t have to answer that.)

That there’s a hickory nut.    They are everywhere.  Last year they were falling to the ground green in August.  Maybe due to the drought last year.  This year they are plentiful and more mature and falling at the right time.

I know the leaves are a sight up New England way, but I love our North Carolina leaves.  I love our North Carolina woods.

Ah yes, Thomas is coming back to life.  He hears something.  I heard it too, but he’s ready to determine exactly what it is and where it’s coming from.  There’s hardly a plant or tree or animal or track or rock that he can’t name.  He calls things by their common names of course.  It’s me who comes home and looks up the scientific name.  I know which one of us would survive the longest in the wild.  I would be found, bones and shredded reference books, under a tree somewhere.

Around this time of year you could spend your days picking up little boughs that have fallen from the hickory nut trees.  There’s a beetle called the twig girdler beetle.  It cuts a ring right around the branch, high up in the tree, but does not cut all the way through.  The beetle then lays an egg beneath the bark, out beyond the cut, because the larva needs dying wood to grow.  The twig falls to the ground and there you have it.  Hubby had us picking up these twigs and taking them to the brush pile.

Me?  I could spend all day looking at things like this lichen growing on dead wood.  Isn’t it beautiful.  It’s a world unto itself.  Well, almost.  It could be under the sea for how it looks.  It could be anything.  I get lost in it.

Here again, it’s just beautiful.  Some of this could be jade growing out from the dead tree trunk given its rich green color, but no, it’s some type of lichen or fungus, etc. 

I made a little twig doll with an acorn head and dressed her in a pretty fall-colored leaf.  She’s waiting under the tree while we work.  My sister and I used to make these to play with when we were little and we would set up house under big trees around the yard.

The hickory nut has an outer shell and then another inner shell.  A regular nutcracker will not break open this baby.  You need a brick and a hammer, so it’s going to take some time, but I decide to gather hickory nuts while Miss Priss and Big Joe carry out Hubby’s orders to get things done.

I have spared you by trying to focus in more on the grass, but one of the things some of us (I won’t name names) get very excited about is deer poo.  Just in case you wanted to know what it looks like.

The hickory nuts are so abundant.  I’m not sure which ones to pick up, but start to feel more sure as I check a few out and take off the hard outer shells.

Getting outside and doing things like this as a family is so relaxing.  It does something to the brain that being inside won’t do. 

Picking up hickory nuts may be the most therapeutic thing I’ve done all week.  It’s requires thought, but not any real serious thought. 

I go among trees and sit still.
All my stirring becomes quiet
around me like circles on water.
My tasks lie in their places
Where I left them, asleep like cattle…

Then what I am afraid of comes.
I live for a while in its sight.
What I fear in it leaves it,
And the fear of it leaves me.
It sings, and I hear its song.

Wendell Berry

The picking up could be endless.  There’s something very satisfying about the weight of the bag.  At some point, though, my hickory therapy feels complete.

I have always loved to climb trees.  I climbed up one small one, as far as it would hold my weight, and then swung down with it like we used to do as children.  Miss Priss thought that was a grand idea!

Up she goes.

More leaves.  

Trees
by Joyce Kilmer

I think that I shall never see
A poem lovely as a tree.

A tree whose hungry mouth is prest
Against the sweet earth’s flowing breast;

A tree that looks at God all day,
And lifts her leafy arms to pray;

A tree that may in summer wear
A nest of robins in her hair;

Upon whose bosom snow has lain;
Who intimately lives with rain.

Poems are made by fools like me,
But only God can make a tree.

You know me, and my delight in wonders like this.  This hickory nut had a tiny hole in it.  Upon closer inspection…

Do you see the tiny little ants in there?  What a cozy little home they have.

Like I don’t already have enough to do.  Still, all the things on my to-do list are very man-made things.  God made the trees and their bounty, and I think if I can crack these and try my hand at roasting hickory nuts this week with the children, I’ll have something going that checking off everything on my to-do list can’t touch.

Every time I think of it, I’ll think of Thomas and the day we spent helping him get back into his routine.  I want to keep him around for a long time yet.

Lynn

If any of you noticed comments on my previous post regarding prayers for my family, it’s because my husband had a heart attack on Tuesday of this week.  I hesitated to put that very personal information on my blog, but my husband said it was fine with him.  We have many friends who stop by . . . → Read More: Take Heart]]> Take heart. Literally. 

If any of you noticed comments on my previous post regarding prayers for my family, it’s because my husband had a heart attack on Tuesday of this week.  I hesitated to put that very personal information on my blog, but my husband said it was fine with him.  We have many friends who stop by and read from time to time.

All I can say is thank goodness for this boy right here.  Well, thank goodness for all of our children, but he’s our second oldest son and he has held down the fort for me while I’ve been at the hospital so much this week. 

I can tell you that Princess of the Universe has had a long week.  She’s been to the hospital to sit with her daddy a couple of nights, but she has also had playtime cut short and lessons have been more worksheets than unit study.  You know she loved it when her big brother Joe decided to break out his old stash of Playmobil toys and play with her.

Here’s one of several drawers of accessories.  I think Miss Priss had fun setting up a jungle, castle and moat and making up stories.  I know Joseph deserves a special thank you for giving his days to her like that.

I’m sure you’re wondering about my husband.  I think he is going to be fine.  Obviously there is a family history of premature cardiac disease and one cannot help what one’s genetics are.  However, a person can certainly make lifestyle changes and you can expect to see information here regarding the changes we make to help prevent him from having another heart attack.

Do you know how men sometimes ignore symptoms?  I know that Thomas could have easily gone on working and not had a friend take him to the ER on Tuesday.  At any rate, he made the right decision, and he’s on the mend after a catheterization today, but we are still not sure what more the doctors will want to do.  We are going to just be hopeful and think positively and make positive changes for him. 

My, my!  Look at the weapons!  Joseph used to play for hours.  Hours.  He worked out so many scenarios in his mind.  He was constantly busy making sounds of men working and riding and fighting and debating.  I hope his sister was as impressed today as I used to be. 

As far as weapons against heart disease, we are just beginning to learn.  Overall, I try to be a very healthy eater.  I’m conscious of what I put into my body, but I’m far from perfect.  This is an exciting new road we’re beginning to walk.  I’ll share info about what we find to be real weapons in the fight against cardiovascular disease.

Setting things up.

I would not want to go in there alone. Would you?

This poor unsuspecting traveler is crossing a bridge.

Suddenly it’s a trap and the traveler is falling through!

Oh no! The traveler has landed in dangerous water. Here comes a huge alligator right now! What will happen?

In spite of it all, we have managed to do some very fun things for school this week. I’ll post a school update tomorrow.

Take Joy,
Lynn