Living a Balanced Healthy Life

Photographer: Wendy Spickerman

Growing old gracefully isn't just about fitness but eating right, getting the required amount of sleep needed for your age, and your lifestyle such as hobbies. Today, I'm sharing with you, my love for gardening.

I just picked up a fresh pineapple from the store and today we're cutting it up. Part of it will be saved to add pineapple into shakes and smoothie. The other part of the pineapple will be placed in the frig so if anyone feels like a snack, it's there.

How to grow a pineapple plant

We're also doing something else today. After cutting the top off the pineapple we planted it! That's right! If you want to plant a pineapple it's as easy as 1-2-3.

Get yourself a medium size pot and fresh soil. Next, pull off the bottom leafs until you start to see the roots. The more roots the better. Place the top, down in the soil but not too far, then water. When you see new greenery growing let it grow a while til it gets really nice and big looking like a fresh plant.

What to do when you want your pineapple to fruit

You'll need a plastic bag and an apple.
Cut the apple and place it in the plastic bag with your planted pineapple.
The apple will make your plant bring fruit.

There are many things I like to grow myself like lettuce, cherry tomatoes and beefsteak tomatoes as well as watermelon, You might say I live in town or the city, a complex. Don't let that stop you from living a balanced healthy life.I don't!

I grow everything in pots myself. I love my windowsill lettuce and my neighbors are amazed each year as my tomatoes grow so well. I may not live in the country anymore but I'm still a country girl at heart.

Eating right is just as important as daily exercise. So, why not grow yourself some pineapple! I hope you enjoy the photos.

My Biggest Trade Secret to Staying Fit, Will Shock You

Today, I'm going to share with you one of my biggest trade secrets to staying fit. It's so simple it will SHOCK you! Here's a list of things you'll need.

·         Bucket

·         Sponge

·         Rubber Gloves  

That's right folks. When I clean my floors I don't use a mop. I do it the old fashion way. I get down on my hands and knee and clean my floors. I've been doing it this way for well... as long as I can remember. 

There's something about scrubbing the floors that really works. You get your heart rate up, The upper body, arms, and thigh gets a good workout and it costs nothing. 

 I recommendiIf you have sensitive knees, use padding to make it more comfortable. We don't want you doing anything that would injure you in any way. I'm just here to tell you, it doesn't have to cost you a fortune to get healthy and stay fit. 

In fact, I just did my floors this morning and I feel great! Who says you can't grow old gracefully!

Be sure to stop back in and tell your friends about my page. When I'm not working publishing breaking news, health issues and political pieces I'm busy being a mom to three children. 

I do physical therapy to keep my body healthy and strong, love my kitchen where I cook up just about anything and do walking therapy for my severe tinnitus, severe hyperacusis with vertigo and directional hearing issues. Oh and let's not forget my hobbies like gardening, photography and biking.

Hope to see you again soon.

Growing Old Gracefully - Fitness and You

How's that non-workout working for you

It's Friday, Today I get a chance to relax and I plan on jumping on the biking and going a few laps. There's a light rain outside so that makes having a stationary bike that much more important, if there is anything like a scheduled therapy one needs to do.

I use the stationary bike for my knee therapy. Throughout my youth and teen years, I was a runner. I ran the mile and country cross. After that, I continued to run to relieve stress. I started to take up riding a bike.

It wasn't until I hurt my right leg a few years back, which I mention in earlier articles, that I decided to give up running altogether. I found biking was easier on my injury and continued my therapy.

For a person with no set workout schedule, just doing what I like to do to help me stay fit, I'm beginning to see some muscle tone take shape. Mind you these are photos before I started writing about my no workout, workout.

As you can see, I'm already in pretty good shape and that's because I've always believed in taking care of my body, and eating healthy (okay, not so healthy... I'm eating a sheet pizza tonight) but you get the point I'm trying to make.

You probably wondering how on earth I could have three children and still look this great! My every day is a workout. Just doing what I do every day. I do walking therapy, there are 30 some step to my place, I travel by taxi, walking or bike. That means I carry all my groceries, and I do my physical therapy for ankles, knees, shoulders and upper back.

I'm not looking to have muscles. I'm looking to be just me. So ask yourself why you want to lose weight. Is it because you feel you have too or because something within you wants to change?

If you want to change your mindset about exercise and workout out, I'm your go-to gal. 

If you want to go on a diet, do a workout it for a couple of weeks and then stop, then you want to connect with someone else.

I'm in it for the long haul. I'm in it for life. 

Growing old gracefully doesn't have to be hard and sweaty.

All you have to do is change your mindset, love the foods YOU make, and nurture your body. 

Make yourself the best you, you can be.

Growing Old Gracefully: Don't skip meals

How many times have we heard it before, someone wants to get healthy, they diet, start skipping meals but that's not actually the smart thing to do. In order to remain alert and active, we need to fuel our bodies just like we fuel our vehicles, so we can get around in the world.

Could you see yourself saying, I need to save money so I'm only going to fill my tank half full of gas? No of course not! Because we all know the destination remains the same which would need a full tank of gas.

Why fill your body with only half the fuel needed, to give your body energy, for a full day.

Today, I made a light lunch consisting of a sandwich and berries. It is so important to give our bodies what they need. When we skip meals we feel sluggish, unable to focus on our work, possibly make mistakes we would not normally make. And in some jobs, those mistakes could be costly.

Don't forget to keep in mind the more active you are the more you need to "fuel up"!

Photographer: Wendy Spickerman

Why not share some of your healthy lunch ideas with us.

#foodfans #familymeals #loveyourkitchen #fooschat

Living a Stress-Free Life Starts With YOU

If you think about everything that happens during your day, you most likely fall under one of the following three types of stress-filled lifestyles.

·         90% lifestyle filled with stress, which is anything that could happen does happen. You just seem to be in the bad luck group.

·         75% stress filled lifestyle where it’s usually those around you stressing you, whether it’s family members, friends, co-workers or negative people who have nothing better in life to do.

·         15% lifestyle where you make an effort to live a happy, healthy lifestyle and still find you have to deal with negative people in one form or another.

The important thing to remember is that you control your life and if you don’t like your life you can always change it. At some point in our lives, we all face difficult times; the good news is many people don’t live their whole life in that 90% stress filled lifestyle.

Most people live a lifestyle filled with stress due to those around us. That’s because we think we have no control over how others make us feel or that we have to put up with these types of people due to them being family members or co-workers. We feel trapped. But that’s not true!

Living a stress-free life starts and ends with you. It’s a lot like quitting a bad habit those who surround themselves with positive people and remove the negative aspects in their life start to feel happier and yes even healthier because all those negative stress hormones aren’t floating around in their body anymore.

While no one lives a 100% stress-free not even Buddha himself, how we react to those around us can greatly reduce our stress levels. Throughout life people come and go and in knowing this it was very helpful in changing my own life to a 15% lifestyle of stress. I’ve learned to look at the bigger picture in life and realized many people act out in negative ways because they don’t know how to handle the stress in their own life.

So, while I still may run into negative people who act out, it’s how I deal with it that matters. And for the most part, I treat these people like people of opinions allowing them to say what they want, but it really doesn’t have an effect on me. Sometimes people just need to vent and want to feel heard. In these times, humble yourself by showing empathy and understanding.

Healthy Eating = Healthy Living

I didn't always love to cook and there was a good reason for it, I didn't know how. Sure I could cook a few meals, but that didn't make me a chef by no means of the word. As my family grew so to did I, as a person. It was very important to me to be able to cook a good healthy meal for my family, at any time of day... morning, noon or night.

One of the ways I started learning how to make different meals was by watching different food shows like Lida from Italy, The Food Network, and a ton of others. I also started getting food magazines just so I could try new recipes.

About five years ago, I took a nutrition course and that really put me over the top. I suddenly fell in love with my kitchen baking, frying, steaming, cooking anything and everything. For me, it wasn't just about making a meal to eat anymore. It was about mixing and blend ingredients, creating something for my family that was healthy and would help them live a healthy life.

If you're tired of cooking the same old meals every night I highly recommend you try some of the things I did or even join an online free nutrition course. That's one of the great things about the internet, it's filled with endless possibilities.

I also found out I'm allergic to spinach. One day we were making food at the nutrition course and suddenly after touching some baby fresh spinach we were using, I brushed my hand up against my lips before washing them and I started to itch, my tongue felt funny, the back of my throat felt like it was filled with spikes. Not a fun experience.

Today, being such a windy day I decided to make homemade pizza. I've got the dough rising, cut up some onions leftover in the frig., grabbed some cheese, pepperoni, and the sauce. If you never made homemade pizza before you should. I don't know why I never did before it's so simple and quick.

To me, pizza is the four basic food groups. You got your bread, veggies, meat, add on the fruit and cheese and it's one meal everyone can have fun making. My girls love making homemade pizza with me.

My youngest is home sick, so I'm going to separate the dough, which will make two ten inch pizzas, pop one in the oven to surprise her, and the other dough will be wrapped and put in the frig for another time.

Embrace Your Age

Wendy Spickerman

When you think about aging, most people fear aging and dying, rather than embracing what comes naturally in the circle of life. Some go through life ignoring the truth to time until something serious happens and they are forced to grip the reality of it all.

While there are others, who fear aging so much, they will try anything to strip away the truth. There are a lot of products on the market that take advantage of your fears. If you are going to use anything, go as “natural” as you can.

In order to embrace ones age, we all need to take a close look at our personal habits, how we deal with different situations and maybe the lack of acting with a balanced mind. What I mean is, there are those of us who get stressed and eat. This is called comfort foods. It helps sooth us from our disappointments and heartbreaks in life.

Others might find smoking and drinking to be an escape from our everyday worries and problems that build with time. For the most part, people tend to focus on a very small image of their world never seeing the full picture of LIFE… Ones beginning to end…

Everyday Stressors Can Age Us in Many Ways

·         Sleepless Nights

·         Putting on Weight or Losing Weight

·         Health Issues like High Blood Pressure, Eating Disorders

·         Depression, Anxiety, Moodiness

·         Lack of Concentration

·         Inability to Work with Others

The list goes on and on…

After reading today’s article, I want you to use the comment section and post the TOP three causes which you think enhances your age. Whether it’s stress causing premature graying or depression and anxiety causing you to eat or lose sleep.

Which THREE causes do you believe affects you the most?

Remember to look back at your life, not just the here and now, most people see the small image and we want you to grasp the bigger picture of LIFE. Over your lifetime, how did you react to different situations?

Here’s an example:
As a child, I was clumsy and would spill things. The more I was told about it, the more anxiety I felt, and the more it happened. It got to a point that I was fixated on getting everything right. It wasn’t until my mid-twenties I realized I was wound tighter than a rubber band.

Once I realized this and learned to let that glass sit there and not run around with my head cut off trying to do everything myself, in a growing family; that’s when “what people thought and said didn’t bother me as much”. Of course, it took a lot to get to that point, but that was me growing as a person inside.

When you start to embrace your age, you gain so much more.

·         You Sleep Better Because You’re NOT Worrying

·         Feel More Energized and Happy

·         Less Stress, Say BYE BYE to All Those Things You CAN’T CONTROL like What People Think or Say.

·         You Learn About Your Strengths and Weaknesses

·         Let Small Matters Go

·         Stop Enabling Others

·         Set Goals for YOU

·         Take Better Care of Your Mind, Body, and Spirit

It doesn’t have to be one or the other. You’re either healthy or not. Life is about growing, learning and yes aging. You’re not going to do it ALL overnight! It’s going to happen over TIME!

So, if you don’t like how you LOOK, FEEL or ACT you’ve got time to change that! Starting with TODAY!

Embracing your age is all about how you perceive yourself. The more you like yourself, accept who you are, the more your age is going to show it. 

Stepping It, Made Easy

I'm sure by now you're starting to realize a pattern here. That pattern is...just how easy it is to exercise without even knowing it! I'm going to share a story with you about what happened to me over my weekend, and see if you can relate to the situation I went through.

It seemed to be one of those days I was constantly on the go. With like next to nothing in the house I set out to do the grocery shopping. After getting that all done, the mail came. It had been a very busy day for everyone so we decided to make it a pizza night.

Of course with no cash on hand I ran to the ATM. I the  phoned in the pizza order then went to get the pizza. Mind you we have 35 steps. So let's calculate that up and see just how many stairs I climbed that day.

Activity 1: Grocery Shopping 70 Steps
Activity 2: Getting the Mail 70 Steps
Activity 3: Go to the ATM 70 Steps
Activity 4: Picking up the Pizza 70 Steps

Total: 280


That's 280 stairs on just doing normal everyday activity. So I really don't need to worry about working those leg muscles anymore with an actual "workout" because I already got a workout!

You might say, "But I don't have that many stairs." Okay, I'll give you that. We've got to use what we got. Even if you only have one step you can make a workout of it.

Why make it more difficult to workout than it has to be and set people up to fail!
This this my tip for the day on "Stepping It Made Easy".

The Secret why Diet and Exercise isn’t Working for You

Photographer: Wendy Spickerman

Wendy Spickerman

The one thing I have learned about staying fit is “You have to enjoy it”.

If you’re starting a diet or exercise routine, ask yourself why you are doing it. Are you doing it because you have a health issue with your weight, maybe low self-esteem or are those New Year resolutions kicking in?

If you’re starting a diet or exercise routine because you feel you have too…

Nine times out of Ten it’s NOT Going to Work.

And here’s why…

Not even I, myself like to do something because I have too. Did you ever really like do something because you were told too? No!

People tend to GET MORE out of things they LIKE DOING. We tend to ENJOY DOING things we have an INTEREST in doing . And we KEEP doing it because it makes us FEEL GOOD inside.

It makes a lot of sense if you think about it. Women go shopping for clothes all the time because they LOVE buying clothes! Men LOVE their cars, building things, working out, sports… do you see where I’m going with all this?

So today… RIGHT NOW… grab a pen and paper. I want you to write down all the things you LOVE doing and we are going to turn that into a working fitness, healthy life, and healthy living tool.

If you love shopping I don’t want you to go to just one place. I want you to make a day of it. Trust me it works! If you don’t have a pedometer get one. You can find them at Five Below, Walmart, Target any fitness store and ladies if you’re at the mall trust me, they are there too!

Slap that bad boy on your hip and walk. I walk everywhere! Are you really driving to the store three blocks away! Step out that front door and walk! I walk anywhere from around the corner to fifteen miles. Don't freak! I’m not expecting you to walk fifteen miles. Some of you just turned white as a ghost!

I’m not saying do it all the time. I’m saying just do it once a week. I want you to start sending in replies whether it’s in comments here or an email to wendyspickerman@gmail.com . I want to hear you ladies say, “Hey, I went shopping today and we walked the whole mall.” Or how about, “We parked at one store and we walked to two other stores shopping, than back to the car we went.”

Don’t put those packages away! Carry them! Here’s why… you’re walking.. you’re carrying things… you’re now walking with more weight then what you started with. Ladies.. you’re working out and you don’t even know it! Does it feel like a workout! No! Why… because you’re doing something you LOVE doing!

It’s that simple! Do you love to garden? Great! Spend two hours in the garden pulling out those weeds, carry that waste to depose of it, bending, lifting. It’s a natural healthy workout. Plus, you’re getting sun, something the body needs.

Guys, that goes for you too. Shoveling that snow is a natural healthy workout if done right! Why not carry those groceries in for that special someone. You get a workout, she feels respected as a woman because you offered to help her or even better yet do it for her! And it doesn’t even feel like a gym plus, you’re working on your relationship. It’s a WIN WIN situation!

At 45 years of age, I like to stay active. Trust me; if you had trouble sleep before, this is going to help you sleep too. Just remember to say hydrated whatever you plan on doing. I don’t want you to worry about a scale or over doing it. When we start making demands on ourselves that’s when we start losing interest. And if you lose interest you’re not doing it right. Change it up go shopping one week, clean out your closet the next.

I like to do a few things to keep tone. That’s all I really want, that feminine body look. You’re probably thinking, “Good like with that.” I’m sure you’re thinking, “Nothing works.” Ask yourself does it not work because you stop to soon or is it because you have a very low metabolism to start with?

Here at Growing Old Gracefully – Fitness and You, I’m going to share many of my secrets to getting fit and staying fit. So be sure to follow, share, even tweet my blog posts. Until next time!

Share Your Personal Trials and Tribulations

Photographer: Wendy Spickerman

Share your personal trials and tribulation. Whether you're trying to stay fit, finding that work/life balance or wish to share with us your triumphs.

All you need to do is...

Contact: wendyspickerman@gmail.com
Email: Header should read  "Submission to Growing Old Gracefully"
Include: Your name, age, state or country.

We will contact you and let you know when your submission will be featured in the blog.

Welcome to Growing Old Gracefully

Wendy Spickerman

As you can see from the photo I’ve load, I’m a pretty fit person. I have a high metabolism, which allows me to eat whatever I want. I know… “you hate me” for it!

So many people have a hard time keeping weight off, especially women after having children. I have three children, who aren’t quite children anymore. At 45 years of age, I still like to stay very active. I used to be a runner in my youth.

I ran the mile in school plus cross country. From time to time in my adulthood I’d still run, but it was more of a tool for de-stressing than anything else. There really wasn’t a need to lose weight not even during my pregnancies.

Running gave me the chance to burn off unwanted stress. It was a way to work things out during my run. The harder I ran the better! It was never just a jog. It was a fast pace or sprint.

A couple years back I injured my right leg during a run and it’s never been the same. The x-ray showed nothing was broken, but it sure felt like it! I couldn’t walk on it! It didn’t swell nor bruise, yet the pain was so bad and the injury so great I was put on crutches and given something for the pain to help me sleep.

For the better half of the year I was going in and out of physical therapy, but it didn’t help! Each time they told me I was healed and could again; I was right back in there. It happened three different times.

Of course, I clearly told them they didn’t know what they were talking about. I’d show up on crutches and they’d ask, “What did you do?” My reply, “I thought you said you fixed me? You told me I could run, I ran and it re-injured again.”

Being I could no longer chance running I switched to biking. I still run maybe once or twice a year. You know, those moments when you just get so stressed you just have to burn off that energy. Those it does injure the leg each time.

The injury is right below the knee on that bone. It hurts so bad it feels like it want to pop right out of the skin. I can’t put weight on it or walk. Doing stairs is totally out of the question, yet they can’t seem to figure out what is wrong.

I like to do a few things to keep tone. That’s all I really want, that feminine body look. You’re probably thinking, “Good like with that.” I’m sure you’re thinking, “Nothing works.” Ask yourself does it not work because you stop to soon or is it because you have a very low metabolism to start with?

Maybe you had a high metabolism when you were younger, but then as you got older it started to slow right down, like an old watch needing to be winded to keep it going. Here at Growing Old Gracefully – Fitness and You I’m going to share some of my personal secrets.

So be sure to follow, share, even tweet my blog posts. I also want to encourage my readers to share your personal trials and tribulation of trying to stay fit, finding that work/life balance as well as telling me all about your triumphs.