I Find True "Courage" High in the Mountains

I just spent the last three days in Vail, Colorado with my great college friend Laura. We cycled for 125 miles to support Children’s Hospital Colorado. Riding up and down the high Colorado passes was beautiful and challenging. The ride stretched us physically and emotionally, but our real reward was the opportunity to ride alongside Team Courage. Team Courage is comprised of former and current patients of Children’s Hospital Colorado, as well as some amazing adults. It was a humbling experience for me to pump my way up Battle Mountain (9400’), thighs burning, barely able to breathe, only to ride up behind a member of Team Courage, propelling himself up very same the hill on a hand-pedaled bike! Unbelievable!!! 

Our final climb up to Leadville (10,100’) was a real tearjerker. As Team Courage rode up toward the finish line, one hand pedal cyclist cried out in anguish, “I can’t make it!” The crowd was spellbound and I felt my insides tighten up. The other cyclists, volunteers, family and friends shouted out, “you can do it, you can do it!” Bolstered by their support, he pulled out everything he had and began to move forward. The crowd roared as he crossed the finish line. There wasn’t a dry eye among us. He made it, and you know what? Most of us barely did.  He and the other Team Courage kids are a testament to the resilience of the human spirit.  

Team Courage 2011

Our team at the Courage Classic was called The Rocky Roadies.  Form your own team for this event at www.couragetours.com or join up with a walk, hike or ride in your hometown to support strong kids everywhere!

Since this is the Morningside Soapbox, I want you to know that I am a committed child advocate, and you can help kids too, by buying Morningside products.  I have formed a foundation called Every Child is an Original. A percentage of the proceeds from sales of every Morningside product go to this foundation. It supports advocacy for children on a range of issues. Our goal is to help better position children in life, with the tools they need to become successful adults.  So, please explore our site and stock up for every occasion at www.morningsideproducts.com. You’ll feel doubly good as you lather and moisturize yourself with our wonderful, quality products knowing that you are also helping kids.

A Tool that Tracks, Measures and Inspires!

I’m training for a 3-day, 180-mile charitable cycling adventure in the Colorado Rockies, scheduled to begin next week. I’ve been working on improving my fitness level for months. It has been tough to stay consistent with a 9 year old at home and a busy work life. With all that, I haven’t always succeeded in getting to the exercise. Another big challenge for me has been eating the right foods in the appropriate amounts to fuel my increase in exercise. But what confounds me the most is how to measure or quantify if everything balances out on a daily basis. A good web site I found to help understand and plan for my daily nutritional needs is:

<http://www.helpguide.org/life/healthy_eating_women_nutrition.htm>

We all know that good nutrition for women includes several servings a day of fruit and leafy green vegetables, fiber from whole grains, beans and legumes to give our bodies power, and minimally processed foods as a mainstay. Of course, we also need to make sure we have lots of calcium for bone strength and understand that over-eating protein can cause bone decreased bone density. That is a lot of information for me to juggle with my daily life. I try to do well but often fall short of achieving these goals. Measuring the good, bad and the ugly is the key to inspiring me to strive to greater nutritional and exercise heights.

Coincidentally, I discovered a tool that helps me manage this complex process. It takes into consideration my age, current weight, fitness and weight goals, and measures my food intake against my exercise levels to give me, with a tap of my finger, my carb/protein/fat intake measurements on a daily basis. It is called Tap & Track, and I purchased it for my iPhone. I’m just getting started, but so far I’m loving it. The only drawback I’ve discovered is that you cannot go back and edit your food intake or exercise once you have entered it. The food you need to enter is not always exact, but there are similar choices and they even have a host of popular restaurant menus with specific items listed. Last night, I picked up food from PF Chang’s and thought, oh, no there goes my plan to track my diet, but I was very pleased to find that I was able to log what I consumed, down to the dish!  Tap & Track can also be managed online <http://www.tapandtrack.com/home/index>, as can similar programs, such as the Pyramid Tracker on the USDA site <http://www.mypyramidtracker.gov>. Check these and other out and start tracking, measuring and being inspired to improve your fitness!

Three tips I thought worthy of sharing as you train for your next exertion adventure:

1.      Eat to control cravings and boost energy

Eat breakfast, Eat regularly, Cut the junk and Eat more complex carbohydrates

2.      Don't cut out the fat

Your body needs fat for healthy brain function, vibrant skin, hair and nails and helps 

control cravings

3.      Get plenty of calcium - 400 to 1,200 mg/day,  magnesium - 500 to 800 mg/day,  vitamin D - 400 and 1,000 IU daily

Let’s keep the fun in summer!

A few weeks ago, I had to take my son Samuel to swim team practice. So I packed the cats along, as I planned to use the hour he was at the pool to take them to the vet. It felt nippy out, not particularly hot. I loaded all parties in the car and set off for the pool. I dropped Samuel off and headed off to the vet.  The cats got their shots and we zoomed back to the pool. On the way home, Samuel was famished, so we stopped at a diner for a quick piece of toast. It was probably 70 degrees and raining intermittently. We weren’t in the diner for long, maybe 20 minutes, so boy was I surprised when we got back in the car and discovered how warm it was inside. Poor Climber and Pica, they were panting!
Many people - ahem, yours truly included - have left a child or a pet in the car when running a quick errand. It seems like it would be all right, especially if one leaves all of the windows open a crack. And, summer really hasn’t yet heated up to every day HOT. But here are three things I’ve discovered that I'd like to share with you:

·         it doesn’t take outside temperatures above 90 to really harm or even kill a person or an animal.

·         cracking all the windows even an inch or two doesn’t really work to bring down the temperature in the vehicle. FYI, the interior temperature of a car can reach at least 114 degrees even with four windows cracked on a 101 degree day.

·         it is a crime!

To quote Canyon County’s own Coroner Vickie DeGeus-Morris, leaving a child or pet in a hot, parked car “...is the equivalent of putting them in an oven, with the body temperature rising as high as 160 degrees in a short amount of time... They’re basically going to cook to death."  What amount of time is safe under those conditions? Officials say that  no amount of time is safe.  I didn’t know it, but leaving a child unattended in a hot car is a felony, depending on the severity of the case. Leaving an animal in a hot car becomes a case of animal cruelty and could elicit a misdemeanor charge.  As tempting as it is to run into the cleaners for a quick second with little Johnny or Fido in the car, don’t let yourself do it. And if you see that someone else has, the right thing to do is to call 911.

It's so easy to get distracted when doing an errand. And the clock is ticking, the heat is rising and you could be endangering the person or pet you love the most. Summer is a time of fun in the sun but it can also be dangerous. So let’s take the extra time it takes to get everyone out of the car and let's keep the fun coming!

Ben and I Might Have Been Friends - Happy 4th of July

As we head into the 4th of July weekend, I am always somewhat awed by the amazing intellect and foresight of our founding fathers.  I just read some fun facts about Benjamin Franklin taken from a book by Carmella Van Vleet that made me think that his spirit is alive and well today.  Americans have always been the leading innovators, never afraid to think outside the box and we have certainly not been the most conventional!  Here a few fun facts that are guaranteed to make you smile:  

• Ben earned piles of money, but he could have earned a lot more if he had patented his inventions. He never once patented any of his inventions.
• Ben was bad at math!
• Ben taught himself how to swim when he was eight, and often taught his friends how to swim. At one time he considered opening up a swim school.
• At the age of 16, Ben read a book about vegetable diets and decided to become a vegetarian.
• Ben wrote a letter that convinced Congress to publicly debate slavery for the first time.
• Ben liked to take "air baths." He would sit naked in his bathtub and let the cold air from an open window clean away any germs!
• Ben nearly electrocuted himself to death while trying to cook a turkey with electricity!
  

Safe travels my friends,  and remember we should always follow our dreams and never stop appreciating our eccentricities!