#TrueBeautyIsLivingLife

This is hard for me to write, but I definitely fee like many of my precious friends can relate to me. And honestly God has been dealing with me on this subject since last year and I'm finally coming full circle to embrace the big picture.

Do you know that I haven't worn shorts in public for several years?I live in Tennessee for crying out loud! It is hotter than two goats in a pepper patch.  Because of my utter disdain for my legs, I almost always wear capri pants. 

Why? 

Because I am ashamed of my body. Years and years of hating my body. Hating what I see every day when I look in the mirror. Focusing on my lumpy thighs and big butt. You name it. I probably hate it. 

Friends, this is no way to live. I've struggled with my weight for as long as I can remember. I even had lap band surgery to aid in weight loss when I was 29 years old. I lost almost 100 lbs and have kept off 65 lbs of it. Last year when I had the knee drama, I gained around 15 lbs and have been unable to lose it. Now that my knee has rehabilitated finally, I feel that my weight will slowly go back down.

As many of you know, I've been on a journey to get healthier by taking baby steps and this has been going on for nearly 18 months. I screw up and still make bad choices, but I've come a long way from where I was many years ago. Unfortunately, it isn't making me thinner and for once, I'm finally okay with that.

One thing that became abundantly clear to me, is that when I was unable to do much because of knee pain - I was miserable. I was unable to be active and quite frankly it sucked. I was sitting on the sidelines of my life.

By nature, I'm not an athletic person. I do not like to play sports. If I have a choice between crocheting or playing volleyball, you better believe that I will be hooking it up (with yarn) in here. But I do enjoy being active in things that I enjoy. I like being able to hike, ride bikes, swim, garden, and go on walks. I really, really missed being able to do all of those things when my knee was being ridiculous. 

I've been thinking about this a lot lately. Since spring sprung, we've had some fun family outings with hiking and camping. I'm so thankful that I've been an active participant. During all of this,  I've made an important decision. 

I'm going to wear shorts and a bathing suit this summer.

I'm going to enjoy life. I'm going to enjoy life in this body that I was given. This wonderful body has carried me around for 37 years. It has grown 3 amazing babies and nourished them for over 5 years. I've earned every stretch mark on my belly for growing babies. I have loose skin on my tummy because I lost a bunch of weight and became healthier. I am not going to let lumpy thighs and a big butt keep me from living my life.

I'm going to set an example for my daughter that real beauty is not defined by the size of my tummy or a wrinkle free face. Women are beautiful because we love. We are beautiful because we experience pain. We are beautiful because we laugh and we cry. We are beautiful because we can grow humans and nourish them. We are beautiful when we survive tragic things and become stronger because of them. We are beautiful when we create. Women are beautiful when we live life. Women are beautiful when we are thankful for the blessings that God has given us.

Right here. Right now. I'm claiming that my body may not be perfect, but it serves is purpose quite well; and I'm going to enjoy my life and more specifically, my summer as a beautiful woman. Not because of outer beauty, but because I'm living my life and that makes me beautiful. 

"I believe that happy girls are the prettiest girls." - Audrey Hepburn

If you would like to join me, I ask that you share this post and hashtag any of your IG/Twitter pictures with #TrueBeautyIsLivingLife

Let's be beautiful, happy, living life to the fullest women together! 

Peace out,  beautiful ladies. 

Why we drink REAL milk

First of all, let me start out saying that several years ago I thought people who drank real (raw) milk were weirdos. But of course that was before I took time to research it. My parents were raised on real milk and suffered no adverse reaction because of it. Which leads me to my question....why are people so freaked out by real milk? 

I will start out saying, if you choose to switch to real milk, you must be very careful. You absolutely would not want to drink real milk from just anyone. If you go the real milk route, know your farmer. A big part of why milk is pasteurized is that the cows that are raised in close quarter feed lots are not sanitary sources for fresh real milk. Factory farmed cows are not fed a natural diet and are often given shots of bovine growth hormone to increase milk production. Some of them even routinely receive antibiotics. These animals are not kept in their natural habitats and live in stressful conditions and do not produce quality milk that would be safe to drink raw. A commercial dairy cow has an average life span of less than 4 years. A pastured cow can easily live for 10-15 years.  Pasteurization destroys certain disease-carrying germs and prevents milk from souring as quickly. Pasteurization can be beneficial because it destroys dangerous germs, but it also kills harmless germs and germs that can actually be helpful. It also destroys some of the most nutritious aspects of the milk. 

First of all, if you decide that real milk is the best route for your family, you need to ask your farmer the following questions:

1. Are your cows raised on pasture? If so, how long do they spend grazing? If not, how are they raised? They should have many, many hours access to pasture all day long.

2. Do your cows eat anything besides hay, grass, or grass silage? Some farmers give their cattle candy, manure, or even corn - cows are not meant to eat corn. Some people mix candy in the grain because the cows love the sweet taste. If the cow gets any feed, you will want to know if it is non GMO/soy free.

3. Do you give your cows rBGH or any other type of hormone? If the answer is yes, RUN!

4. Do you give your cows antibiotics? If so, do you keep the milk from the sick cow while on antibiotics? 

5. How long do you keep the cattle in your herd? Average should be 10-15 years

6. Do you test for pathogens (For farmers with a larger herd - small farmers probably can't afford this testing)? If so, how often? What do you do when you get a bad test result? It isn't uncommon to have pathogens from time to time. You should be more concerned with how they handle it.

7. What kind of equipment do you use for milking? How often do you clean it? Milking area should be clean and equipment should be sanitized often.

8. How quickly do you cool down the milk and how do you cool it? This should be immediately.

9. Do you feed your cow anything during milking? Some cows get grain during milking. Find out what kind of grain.

10. Do you rotationally graze your cattle? This provides a better quality diet for the cows.

Lastly, go visit the farm. Most farmers welcome you to see their farm. If you are not welcome, that is a RED flag.

Now, here are the reasons that we enjoy REAL milk.

1. Lactose intolerance is not an issue. I had a milk allergy as a child. Milk would make me very sick. It was because of lactose intolerance. Real milk comes with its own lactase to digest the milk. Pasteurization damages lactase, which is delicate. You need lactase to digest lactose and when you drink it raw, it is digestible for many folks. This doesn't work for everyone, but I can personally attest that it works for me.

2. Our child on the spectrum can tolerate it without stimming. If he drinks pasteurized milk, he has a visible reaction. This was very noticeable when he was preschool aged. He would have a very visible reaction within 20 minutes. He would rock back and forth and become aggressive or have a tantrum. We switched to alternative milk sources for many years (almond, rice, hemp). There are some technical reasons as to why children on the spectrum can digest real milk and I'm not going to go into that in my blog post. We tried and found that it indeed works for him. He can drink real milk with no reaction.

3. We are healthier. We switched to real milk late summer/early fall of 2013. Since we've made the switch, we have been healthier. Real milk has higher Omega 3 fatty acids and the pasteurization process does not destroy as many of the natural nutritional content. The vitamins, minerals, and enzymes are all intact.  Combined with our Fermented Cod Liver Oil (which I will post about on a later date), we have been sick only minimally.

4. Asthma and allergies. Our youngest is borderline asthmatic. All of us have suffered from some type of allergy. A lot of the research on real milk shows that it protects against asthma and allergies. We have seen much improvement with his asthmatic flare-ups since we made the switch. Our allergies are slowly improving as well.

5. We are supporting local farmers. We are helping local farmers make a decent living and investing into our local economy. Farmers make much more money when they sell their milk directly to the consumer. This allows them to take better care of their cattle and gives the farmer a higher wage as well. Farmers gotta send their kids to college too!

6. Promotes gut health. We are trying to heal our guts. Years of eating a standard American diet (SAD) has destroyed our guts. We are still transitioning to a Traditional Diet. The polysaccharides in real milk encourage the growth of good bacteria. There are wonderful food enzymes in real milk (amylase, catalase, lactoperoxidase, lipase and phosphatase). All of these enzymes have an important function!

7. It tastes DELICIOUS! Seriously, I don't really like pasteurized milk, but fresh milk is absolutely delicious. I find it creamy and sweet. Not to mention incredibly filling.

8. It is a REAL food in its truest form. It hasn't been altered by a chemical process. It is in the form that God intended it to be. An amazing thing happens when we eat foods the way God intended them. Our bodies start getting healthy. Crazy huh? We are trying our best to feed our family a diet with as little processed ingredients as possible. This is just one of the ways we make that possible.

 Now, I know there is a lot of scary information out on the internet about how awful and unhealthy raw milk is for human consumption. That is up to you to make the decision for what is best for your family. I did not write this blog post to debate the topic. I wrote it to explain why we made this choice for our family. It may not be a choice for which you are comfortable and that is okay. We've had nothing but positive changes in our life since making the switch. And again, I will mention that when my parents were children, this was the norm and they did not suffer ill consequences. The incidence from food related illness from dairy products is actually very low anyway. The highest instances from food related illness actually come from salads, fruits, and vegetables. You are more at risk of listeria from deli meats than real milk. Here is an interesting blog post by Cheeseslave that discusses some dangers of pasteurized milk. The bottom line is that you must make an educated decision on what you feel is best for your family. I'm certainly not trying to change anyone's mind on the topic - just saying why we choose to drink this creamy goodness!

Some resources that you can read lots of good information are as follows: 

http://www.realmilk.com/
http://www.westonaprice.org/
http://www.hfa.org/ 
http://www.gardenstaterawmilk.org/documents/Chapter15ofRonSchmidtbookpdf.pdf
http://www.raw-milk-facts.com/raw_milk_health_benefits.html

I would encourage you to watch the following food documentaries. I believe all of these can be found on Netflix or Amazon.

Food, Inc. 
Fed Up
Farmageddon

Making Little Disciples

I performed a monologue for Mother's Day at my church. The gist of it was to help all of the moms out there see that we have an important job, even though some days it doesn't feel that way. One of the things I love most about my heavenly Father is how He times things in my life. The things that the skit dealt with are things that I've been dealing with in my life a lot lately. So when I got the script, I was blown away by how much I could actually relate. God has been revealing so many things to me lately as I pray and seek guidance in my journey of motherhood. 

Some of us who are moms gave up careers to stay at home with our children. Many of us work in some capacity whether by choice or necessity. I've done both and can honestly say that not one is harder/easier than the other. They are different. The grass probably seems greener on the other side, but I can assure you that the grass just tastes different. That is all. With whatever path you chose, you have to figure out your priorities and make it work for your family

I spent three years as a full-time working mom. I've spent two-ish years working in some capacity (babysitting, house cleaning/organizing, independent agent doing web-based work, direct sales, and selling my crafts). For the past five months, I haven't been doing anything to earn extra income because my life has been so stinking hectic. 

Since I left my full-time career nearly six years ago, I have felt like I'm not contributing much to society. When I was a full-time working mom, I wanted nothing more than to stay at home with my baby. It took me three years and the birth of another child to reach that goal, and we made it happen. Since we made it happen, I feel like  my contribution to this world is minimal. Most days I teach children who complain about schoolwork, stay behind on chores and laundry, run children from one activity to the next, and never really have my act together. 

I want to do great things for God. I want to serve Him. I want to go out into all of the world and make disciples. I have definitely felt like what I'm doing is nowhere near that. 

That's where I'm wrong. Dead wrong. I have three little disciples right now. Sure, making their breakfast, lunch, and dinner may not seem like a big deal. Making sure they have clean clothes to wear may not seem like a big deal. Teaching them personal boundaries and how to get a long with other people may not seem all that huge. Telling them Bible stories and working on basic Scripture memory may not seem like it is making a difference, but it is. It isn't a difference that I see right now. I may not see it for quite some time. One day when they are grown and they hopefully will have a strong foundation in faith and know how loved they are. They will know that I was called to disciple them. Hopefully they will know that all of the things I did for them wasn't because I wanted to do them, but because He called me to do them and I obeyed. Hopefully they will see that as an example to answer God's call on their lives. I may be raising a pastor, missionary, Sunday School teacher, musician, stay-at-home parent, engineer, doctor, lawyer...only God knows. Thinking about all of these things makes me realize that my role isn't glamorous, but it is important. It is important because God has entrusted three tiny humans to me. There is no doubt that I will fail often - honestly, multiple times a day. But at the end of the day, if my children know that God loves them perfectly because of something they see in me - then I've done my job and have done so only by the grace of God. 

So my sweet mama friends and even the ones who aren't mamas yet, you are important. It may not feel like it when you are folding towels, sweeping floors, balancing the checkbook, or making dinner. But let me assure you....you are important. You matter to God. You are answering His call on your life and that is a BIG deal. Your little ones need to know how much He loves them and God has blessed mamas with an amazing gift - to love our babies like no one else can. (Drink deeply of her glory even as an infant drinks at its mother’s comforting breasts.” -Isaiah 66:11, I will comfort you there in Jerusalem as a mother comforts her child.” -Isaiah 66:13) They will carry that love with them through their entire life. We live in a world that is obsessed with fame and recognition. You may never see that and that is okay. You just keep scrubbing those toilets and wiping those snotty noses. Our children don't care if we are famous or world renowned. Our children care about the way we love them and show them God's grace. So keep on keeping on, sweet mama. You're doing a good and honorable thing. 

 25She is clothed with strength and dignity,

and she laughs without fear of the future.

26When she speaks, her words are wise,

and she gives instructions with kindness.

27She carefully watches everything in her household

and suffers nothing from laziness.

28Her children stand and bless her.

Her husband praises her:

29“There are many virtuous and capable women in the world,

but you surpass them all!”

30Charm is deceptive, and beauty does not last;

but a woman who fears the lord will be greatly praised.

31Reward her for all she has done.

Let her deeds publicly declare her praise. 

-Proverbs 31:25-31

Peace out and much love.

Our love grows more perfect

This past weekend my husband and I had a passionate disagreement. Let's be honest. Anytime the two of us disagree, it is passionate. We are both insanely stubborn and still haven't learned that we don't always have to be right. That is not a good combination at all. We've grown to this really cool place and it has taken us nearly 13 years to get here. I sure pray this happens sooner for everyone else, because like I said...we are stubborn.

Many moons ago, after we would argue, I would panic. I thought this must be the last marital disagreement we will ever have because there is no way we can make it through this. I would think about how I was going to survive as a single woman and start praying that God would change His heart because there was no way this was my fault.(Hey, I'm being honest.) Eventually, one of us would relent and apologize. Grudges were held. It was a mess. We were a mess.

I'm not saying that we are any less messy. Let's face it. Life is messy. However, now after we have a disagreement, one of us will pretty quickly want to talk things out again. You know, when we've had time to process things and can be more rational. 

So on Saturday we had one of those crazy disagreements. It was all because we just didn't understand each other. There wasn't really someone at fault. We ended up working through things pretty quickly. I had to leave to get groceries and I got a text from my husband that said, "I love you. I love to make up with you. It allows my love for you to grow deeper".  And my response was, "I love you too. I'm thankful for how far we have come in our arguing. That's definitely a God thing. I agree that I feel more secure and rooted in our love when we can work through something. It is just a taste of God's love for us. Very exciting!" (Yes, I'm more longwinded when I respond, but as someone who expresses herself through written words, what do you expect?)

Friends, I'm here to tell you. This is not how we argued several years ago. There was gnashing of teeth and lots of ugliness. This is a God thing. There is no other way to explain it.

Then the next day, our pastor preached his sermon from 1 John 4.

16 We know how much God loves us, and we have put our trust in his love.

God is love, and all who live in love live in God, and God lives in them. 17 And as we live in God, our love grows more perfect. So we will not be afraid on the day of judgment, but we can face him with confidence because we live like Jesus here in this world (1 John 4:16-17 NLT)

Wow. It all makes sense now. We are growing in our faith. We are growing in our walks with Christ. We are seeking to live in God. He lives in us. As we live in God, our love grows more perfect. Perfect love. Is that actually attainable?

So all of these thoughts are swimming in my head. If my husband loves me just a fraction of the amount that God loves me, I simply can’t fathom it. And here I go again getting all freaked out by how much actually God loves me.

Then there’s this other really cool part. We CAN love others better. I CAN love my husband more deeply than I ever imagined. I CAN love my children and family more. I CAN love my friends more. I CAN love people I don’t even know. I CAN love more perfectly because God lives in me. Just think about that for a minute. Really think about it. We are capable of loving more perfectly because He lives in us. That is really HUGE. It is something we should really strive for in our Christian walks.

This doesn’t just apply to marriage. This applies to all of our relationships. I pray that we can allow God to help our hearts grow to a size that we didn’t know was possible and love all the people. Even the people we don’t want to love. The ones that make us angry. The ones who cause us to dig deep inside and find that love. You know, those people. 

Peace out and keep loving people! You CAN do it because He lives in you! 

 

A post Lenten update

Well, as many of you know that I decided to give up yelling for Lent. I kind of thought I was crazy, but I really wanted to do it. I will say that the first week was the most difficult. I caught myself several times and slipped twice. After the first week passed, it definitely became easier.

It's about 2 weeks post Easter and have I started yelling again? Yes, I have yelled some. I can honestly say that the hardest week was the one immediately following Easter. I failed many times in that week. My trigger during that particular week seemed to be hormonal, which has always been one for me.

What have I done to eliminate/reduce yelling?

1. I stop and take a deep breath. It sounds silly, but sometimes just taking the time to breathe before you respond can totally change the way you respond to a situation.

2. I started eliminating stressors in my life. In my case, my stressors were directly related to be over committed. It hasn't happened overnight, but I'm prayerfully eliminating things.  Many of these things won't actually change until the next school year, but knowing change is around the corner has been helpful.

3. Making sure that I eat breakfast. I will admit that I am a horrible breakfast eater. I know that it is a terrible habit. I'm still not perfect on this one, but I know that low blood sugar and hunger are definite triggers for me. I'm also trying to add in a high protein snack during my mid day crash.

4. Trying to reduce my distractions AKA apple products. This is pretty hard because I try to keep my phone on me all day, so it is really easy to pick it up and start playing on Facebook or Instagram.  I love reading blogs and researching and having my iPhone at my fingertips makes it really easy to do just that. However, by not using it as much during the day, I don't snap at my children nearly as much.

5. Offer grace rather than anger. To myself. To others. Everyone deserves grace. Again, I'm nowhere near perfect, but it is a start. During that breath that I'm taking, I try to ask myself if I'm showing grace in my reaction.

6. Getting more sleep. Because I'm a night owl, I often stay up way too late. My burst of energy comes after dinner time. My kids aren't super early risers, but they usually wake up between 7:30-8:00 am. I'm making an effort to get in bed by 11:00pm and allow myself 8 hours of sleep.  When I'm awake until 2:00 am and waking 6 hours later, it catches up to me quickly. I can assure you that sleepyhead Alicia is grouchy and snarky. Also, the more I research, the more I think my sleep issues are hormonal...which brings me to my next point.

What else am I going to do?

I'm going to make some dietary changes. I had gone gluten free with my entire family last year and slowly started introducing it after about 6 months. I realize now that I really felt better when I wasn't consuming gluten. I'm also going to slowly cut out caffeine and sugar. This is going to be really difficult. I'm going to start in about two weeks, when I don't have as many early morning obligations. After doing some research, I think these three steps will help with my hormonal issues that cause so many mood swings for me. I have never officially been diagnosed with thyroid issues, but I have almost every single symptom of hypothyroidism and borderline TSH levels. I've been researching how to heal it with dietary changes and praying this will help the out of whack hormonal issues I deal with regularly. It also seems as if adrenal fatigue and hypothyroidism go hand in hand. Honestly, even if these are not issues, changing my diet won't hurt me at all. I don't expect this to be an easy change or a quick fix. I'm more focused on long term healing with these dietary changes.

1 Corinthians 6:19-20
19 Don’t you realize that your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit, who lives in you and was given to you by God? You do not belong to yourself, 20 for God bought you with a high price. So you must honor God with your body.

So there you have it. God really blessed me during this Lenten season. I truly feel that ending my Lenten journey with the Walk to Emmaus was such fabulous timing. It really gave me an opportunity to re-focus and re-prioritize. For my friends who dove into this challenge with me, I'd love to hear your feedback. What was hard for you? What changes did you make?