Our house and shop 1/20/2012

There’s no place like home…there’s no place like home….

I love to travel and I love to be home.

How can that be?

Isn’t that some sort of impossibility?

A paradox?

Swimming in Miami one day, ending up in freezing rain the next.

Seattle Airport virtually closed after we landed.

Renting a Jeep at a horrific price because there are no flights leaving and the hotels are full.

Driving through the Columbia Gorge where traction devices are required for vehicles over 10K.

Does that mean the semis get to stop in the middle of the freeway to put on their chains? Seriously?

Powerline poles crashing down on the roads…arcing fire.

Doesn’t anyone clean the ice off the lines now that the farmers aren’t allowed to?

Has anyone considered…underground power lines????

Coming home to no power…and beautiful snow!

Broken tractor... Road closed due to four more broken poles. So much for Wasco Electric and Sherman County maintenance...where does all that wind tower money go?

Lighting all my candles…the house smelled like a fir-pina colada-fruit salad!

Watching a movie on Colt’s computer, snuggled up on the couch…enjoying it?!

Our frozen deck

Power lines almost on the ground...

Icicles. Sunlight shining. Snow covered foothills and stubble.

Beautiful wheat fields and wind towers

Decadence. Pure decadence.

Sledding down the hill…with a Ranger on tracks to pull the sledders back to the top!

After all, home is where the heart is!

Except this heart dessert was on the Panama Canal cruise we just came back from!!

The symposium speaker, Ken Andes, was fascinating. He has had phenomenal success with autistic kids in his practice. Out of the hundreds of cases he has treated, according to Ken, none have failed to show progress. I would suspect the progress is directly related to patient and parent compliance, however.

http://naturalchinesemedicine.com/

So in a nutshell, our treatment philosophy is to restore homeostasis and the capacity for self-healing to the body.  We do this through three approaches:

1. Detoxify the body of harmful substances (chemicals, metals, cellular waste, etc.)
2. Support the body with the nutrients that it needs to repair itself but are lacking
3. Correct the communication grids within the body so that proper physiological function can take place.  The body is naturally programmed to heal itself.  If this communication grid is corrected, disease will not occur and only health will remain.

Theoretically, and most likely, Ken says, these kids (1 in 86 in his area of NY!) are suffering from heavy metal mercury poisoning. Vaccines aren’t the cause, just the straw that broke the camel’s back. Unfortunately, often the mothers are toxic before birth (fillings, injections, etc.) and the baby gets the mercury through the placenta. And no, this mercury isn’t from eating fish.

So why doesn’t mercury show up in their systems? Most likely it is at a cellular level, not in the connective tissue. Also, we don’t have any good tests for heavy metals. Hair analysis doesn’t show positive unless the body is actually actively excreting the mercury. In the absence of good minerals, the body hangs on to anything it might need.

Ken Andes has had good luck giving them organically bound minerals (Standard Process).

 combined with heart support. Usually the kids muscle test for heart first and for Cyruta Plus (Standard Process).

http://www.standardprocess.com/display/StandardProcessCatalog.spi?ID=57

These are all whole food supplements. Some of the products have wheat, and those obviously aren’t suitable for gluten sensitive people. Standard Process products have been around since 1928.

Sometimes it’s the gut that needs support first – he always muscle tests. But Ken says the heart eats first, and that it is much more than just a pump (1983 research – the heart is an endocrine organ). The heart gets stronger and then, in a cascade effect, the gut is next. Since the gut is responsible for making 90% of the neurotransmitters, as it heals, so does the blood/brain barrier. The blood/brain barrier is very selective and does not let much pass through it without the correct pathways being open – allowing the transfer of mercury across the barrier. The toxins go into the liver (but only when the liver is ready to handle them) which empties into the gut. Cholacol II is a bentonite clay product:

Cholacol II Promotes Natural Intestinal Cleansing

The entire gastrointestinal (GI) tract is a muscular tube lined with mucous membranes and is approximately nine meters (29.5 feet) in length. All of the nutrients we ingest are digested and absorbed in this canal. Solids and liquids are taken in through the mouth, and travel down the esophagus and into the stomach where the first stage of digestion takes place. The contents of the stomach are then emptied into the small intestine, the longest portion of the GI tract. The small intestine accounts for nearly seven meters

(23 feet) of the entire nine-meter digestive tract. It is here that further digestion occurs and the majority of food absorption takes place. Material that passes through the small intestine and into the large intestine is then passed out of the body as waste. Bentonite, also known as montmorillonite, is a colloidal, hydrated aluminum silicate with highly adsorptive properties. The bentonite in Cholacol II works like a magnet to help carry waste materials through the intestines for proper elimination. Bile salts contribute further to intestinal cleansing by helping break down fats. Collinsonia root has been used for centuries by the Chinese as a “bowel tonic” to help keep the intestines clean and functioning properly.†

How Cholacol II Keeps You Healthy

Promotes intestinal health

The ingredients found in Cholacol II work together to help cleanse the intestines. Collinsonia root helps keep mucous membranes that line the GI tract in good working order. Bile salts contribute to the breakdown of fats in the intestines. Bentonite attracts and helps carry waste materials through the intestines for appropriate elimination.†

Encourages regularity

The combined cleansing and emulsifying properties of the ingredients in Cholacol II help keep the intestines free of the debris that can cause some types of irregularity.†

The body knows it needs minerals, so it hangs on to even the bad ones (mercury) until it gets good quality replacements. Then, and only then, does it let it go. None of this is treating a disease – it is just encouraging the body to heal itself with proper nutrition.

Ken says you really have to separate the kids from their cell phones, computers and video games. These EMF components act like magnets for metals and the body won’t let go unless you get rid of them, at least temporarily. And often the kids are addicted to them, so it isn’t easy.

What a mess. But the kids Ken has worked with have had amazing success. He doesn’t mention mercury, usually, because the parents are already beating themselves up enough. And he doesn’t set a time frame, but often twelve weeks is a minimum for progress.

This isn’t a sprint, it’s a marathon that can take years. And of course, diet is important. But autistic kids will only eat certain things. And even getting them to take supplements is tricky. I learned a lot more than this, of course. The room full – hundreds of chiriopractors/massage therapists/medical practitioners was mesmerized for more than an hour while Ken spoke. He is an incredible speaker, and very believable.

Ken is pretty disgusted with the powers that be. When they say there are no published studies, it only means not in their approved medical publications.

Vaccines are now being made without mercury, “just in case” but there are years of vaccines out there in storage that still have it. So, when your doctor says they are no longer putting mercury in vaccines, it’s true. But it’s also lawyerese: The vaccine could still have mercury in it. And many do: too many have been made and sold already. Why was mercury ever in vaccines to begin with? Google it, but as I understand it, thimersol/mercury was used as a stabilizer in such small amounts…they never dreamed it could have the effect it has. This wasn’t a malicious act, but the ongoing denial is sad.

Ken isn’t a big conspiracy theory guy, but what he does believe that what is going on is wrong. We (nutritional testers) are actually making sick people well, and that’s a good thing. We aren’t treating the symptoms like modern medicines do. The big pharmaceuticals are getting sued left and right…it is starting to fall apart. Because right is right, but too many people believe in the system. Doctors went into their fields to help people. They aren’t the bad guys – they just don’t know.

Bryzinki’scancer treatment was fought for 14 years…big drug companies have all the clout.  Cancer is big money.

 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stanislaw_Burzynski#2010_film.2C_Burzynski_-_Cancer_is_Serious_Business

Do your own research, and let me know what you think.

Could nutrition be the answer for our problems? It seems too simple. Could white sugar and flour be responsible for many of our diseases and ills? I never thought so.

The more interested I have become in Nutritional Response Testing (muscle testing), the more I have learned about the human body and disease. I’ve been clearing the cobwebs off my biochemistry, microbiology, anatomy and environmental health background. It is exciting to hope that we have a place to start – that we can reverse many of the health concerns and declines through diet and supplements.

Me, with Taylor, on a downhill slide....

For years I’ve taken vitamins, antioxidants and tried to eat right. Yet I still had cancer (twice), joint issues, stomach trouble and a racing heart. I could feel myself declining, and it was scary to me that I couldn’t do anything about it. I changed my lifestyle completely:

                                            1) Retiring from a job I loved that was slowly killing me

2) Eating better

3) Getting more exercise

                                            4) Being stress free (Having fun, only doing things I loved, etc.)

Yet I still didn’t feel great. I just couldn’t get on top of things.

Tough to get on top...

I didn’t eat badly. Really, I didn’t. One cup of coffee in the morning, one glass of red wine at night. I love salads and vegetables more than fruit…I like fish and grass-fed beef and free range chicken and eggs. I switched to olive oil and butter, and tried to eat whole grain breads and pasta. Last summer I took a healthy gourmet cooking class. White sugar was out of my house. So why is my weight still creeping up and why did I feel just okay?

Muscle testing showed my heart needed support, and also that I had parasites and titanium in my system. I had tried muscle testing before, but no one had placed me on a long-term program with bi-weekly monitoring. The biggest point that was hammered home:

                                        1) Diet, diet, diet. Supplements can only do so much. Diet is the other 70%. Eat protein for breakfast. Cut out white sugar. Completely. I had it out of the house, but not totally out of my diet, especially at restaurants.

                                         2) Keep a food log…pay attention to how I feel and how I am sleeping. Look back over the last 4 days of food when I have issues.

Getting back on top...

Within weeks of taking the whole food supplements that I tested for, I felt better.

Now, months later, the trend continues.

I’m taking Standard Process whole food supplements to help my body heal itself. No covering up the symptoms anymore. I have more energy. My heart is stronger. I even ran my Mom’s little dog, Ruffy, around her complex without getting short of breath, and no, I haven’t been working out per-se. My heart has stopped the up-in-the-throat beating that was so annoying and scary. (But a stress test on the treadmill was fine….)

The white dog in front is Ruffy. At 14, he can still run around the building with me! I ran with him in June and I could only run for a minute, period.

All I know is that if I can feel this much better this fast, maybe there is hope! And if we can get kids and pregnant moms to eat better, future generations should get healthier and healthier.

Pilots look down the road, not right in front of them....

Wrapped pictures, a few decorations...I'm ready!!

What does it take to be happy? Gratitude for what I have seems to work the best. Being with people I love is the most important part of the Christmas holidays for me.

Colt and I had this puzzle together in record time!!

A girlfriend of mine who doesn’t celebrate Christmas was telling me how the whole Santa Claus, presents and celebrating Jesus’ birth at the wrong time of the year just doesn’t work for her. I get it, really I do. The media and “Buy, buy, buy more” mentality is way overdone.

But I loved the Lego set the boys bought me!!

I think that the Christmas holiday, for me, is just a cool way to make winter more bearable and to remember how lucky I am. I don’t need the presents, and I already believe deeply in God, but I love the songs and the lights and the decorations and the season of giving. It makes me happy!

My perfect tree....

This was such a laid back Christmas. I didn’t get everything out…just enough to be festive. The guys used the bucket truck to decorate outside, and picked up a beautiful tree I bought at the Christmas bazaar. I wrapped all my canvases, and put out my favorite decorations.

I was fast enough to get a candid picture of Kevin on Christmas morn...

But not Colt!!

My friends all baked goodies for Colt because they know I’m trying not to eat sugar. (I can’t bake without tasting…sad but true.)

We had Kevin’s parents over for Christmas day, and Kevin’s turkey and stuffing, rolls and mashed potatoes were awesome!! (Pecans, sausage, celery, onions, sage…etc.) I made a spinach salad and fruit salad and deviled some eggs. We just took life easy, talking and eating and enjoying everything life has given us…like the roof over our heads and food on our table.

Then we drove them back to their house and went to see the new Mission Impossible movie as long as we were in the big city of The Dalles! Colt went to a bonfire with friends. Life is good, and I am just happy to see another birthday and Christmas. Now that I’ve had a life-changing illness (yes, the big C) every birthday and holiday is even more special.

Only 1068 pieces!!

Colt found the pieces for me...a true role reversal!!

Memories of Christmas’ past…shades of It’s a Wonderful Life or Scrooge’s The ghosts of Christmas past!!

For my Barbie!!

An Oregon filbert/hazelnut orchard.

We went down to Oregon’s Willamette Valley to visit our son at college for father’s weekend. Trying out our large toy hauler for the first time, our friends John and Charlie Scharf let us park in their backyard. Looking out their living room window, the view was incredible. They, like us, are surrounded by farmground.

Emerald beauty

John and his brother, Jay and dad, Bob, grow everything from grapes to grass seed to corn to wheat to hazelnuts. Er, I mean filberts.

Apparently filberts and hazelnuts are really the same nut. It just depends how they are processed, according to my girlfriend. She says they are trying to market the name as filbert in Oregon because theirs are better for use in chocolates and candies – they are larger and don’t go rancid as quickly as the sun-dried Hazelnuts of Europe.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hazelnut

Filberts, filberts everywhere...and really good to eat!

I couldn’t find verification on the internet, but I believe her. She’s a wonderful cook, and knows her nuts! Charlie even helped test the recipes for “Hazelnuts and More”, a cookbook full of yummy recipes.

http://www.amazon.com/Hazelnuts-More-Lucy-Gerspacher/dp/1558682031

I learned a lot about them when I toured an Oregon hazelnut producer’s operation. For example, it takes two kinds of nuts to pollinate, and they use a Barcelona and a Daviana.

I’ve been eating filberts all week and they are my new favorite nut!

http://www.leftoverqueen.com/2008/07/30/you-say-filbert-i-say-hazelnuta-schitzoid-daring-bakers-gateauwith-some-serious-issues

http://oregonhazelnuts.org/

Great words to live by...from Robert Rodrigues' photo album

Me thinking about retirement...

Kicking and screaming, I retired. Well, I didn’t kick too hard. I was jet lagged and tired. I felt like an old clock that was running down. But my whole being was still hooked into being a pilot. It took forever to unplug. Every bit of self-importance and identity was orbiting around that “pilot” center. I didn’t realize it, and I sure as hell didn’t want to be that way, but I didn’t know who I was if I wasn’t flying.

Six years later, I think I know. I’m the same person I always was, but better. I’m more relaxed, happier – just okay being me. You don’t like me? That used to be a bad thing. Now I realize, finally, that trying to get people to like me is nuts. What is even more nuts is trying to get people to like me when I don’t like them. As a copilot, I used to try so hard. Why didn’t I just fly the airplane and let it go? Why did I care so much about what they thought? Because I was a people pleaser to the max. Sad but true.

I love people, and I love doing what I can for them, but I know I can’t live their lives for them or fix them. I want to be the tool box: I’m glad to share my tools, but I don’t want to be their carpenter. They’ll have to build their own house…I just don’t think it helps to help too much.

I’m not angry that so much money is going to welfare or inner cities or any of the causes that seem so good. I’m just sorry that it doesn’t help. Giving and giving and giving until you have nothing doesn’t work. I wish it did. But I think the best way to teach others is to show them. Just live life the best you know how, and hope people want to emulate you.

So many kids nowadays are not surrounded by happy adults. The people around them are just getting by – just getting through the day and their life. How can you be excited about growing up and going into the world if it doesn’t look like anyone is enjoying their life? Why do kids dream about being athletes and movie stars? Because those people look like they are having fun! Look like is the key phrase here, and that discourages kids even more, because if those who “have it all” aren’t living great lives, how can they?

I’m not trying to oversimplify or be a Pollyanna, but I don’t know how else to put it. Enjoy your life. Wake up every morning and spend a few minutes looking at the ceiling and thinking about the day. I ask God to help me be the best I can be: loving, kind, full of integrity, caring, grateful. I honestly don’t think most of us can live our best lives without asking and listening for guidance.

We human beings are reactive. We don’t, for the most part, live from “the inside out” as Christina Sestan says. http://www.citruscoaching.com/ But we would be happier if we did.

I don’t get up in the morning and watch the news. I can’t handle all the suffering in the world before breakfast. Hell, I can’t even handle it after a bottle of wine with friends. It is too much to know all the sorrow and trouble in the world. I don’t care if someone in North Carolina just got murdered. Wrong, I do care: I care too much and that is the problem, but I live in Oregon. To quote John Mayer, it’s not that I don’t care – it’s just that the fight ain’t fair.

It is too overwhelming, too all-consuming, for me to think about the tsunami in Asia, the nuclear melt-down in Japan, our government’s huge debt, the lives lost in an airliner crash. My inner psyche gets overloaded – it’s all too big, depression sets in, and nothing gets handled. None of us have the capacity or the knowledge to handle so much sadness and chaos. My niece used to come home crying because her biology teacher told them about all the animals going extinct and how the world was falling apart.

Really? Seriously? What is going on in our schools today? How are we teaching our kids to cope? Maybe we aren’t. I’m not sure we are even teaching logic any more, but if you don’t learn to think logically, you can never think anything through. You can never put anything in perspective because you can’t reason through it.

So, if you want to wake up every day and enjoy your life, you better decide what you are going to let in. Neighbors who gossip and are negative do not share morning coffee with me. But sometimes they sneak in my back door or into my head and I can’t get rid of them.

When did people get so judgmental and cruel? Oh, I guess they always have been…thinking about Nellie Olson and her mom on Little House on the Prairie.

So how do we fight the negativity, the meanness? Because I want to go to bed every night with a heart full of love and kindness. I like to think that, if my dad and grandpa are up in heaven watching, they’ll be proud of how I turned out. I want to live the virtues they taught me: integrity and kindness, love and thoughtfulness.

When I hear people badmouthing others it just makes me sad. I want to cry for them. I want to have compassion and try to understand where they are coming from. Instead I get angry. How can they be so cruel – so mean? I want to run far and fast before I get dragged down into the muck and mire with them.

I want to live consciously, caring for others. I want to be compassionate, feeling empathy, not judgment.  It is so easy to forget how much our words can cut and hurt another person who does not deserve our cruelty. I know that I am accountable for my thoughts and actions.

My first thought? I don’t have time for more web time! But this site is right up my visual-brain alley.

Good ideas are at my fingertips without all the Google Trash. Seriously, every time I Google it takes me forever to sort through the crap. Pages of paid advertising when all I wanted was the straight scoop or to see what other innovators like!

The first thing I looked up was “barnwood painting” because our old barn fell down. Great ideas!

Lots of good wood....http://pinterest.com/search/?q=barnwood

http://pinterest.com/pin/244837288/

Voila!

Barnwood coasters - more ideas!!

http://pinterest.com/pin/175628521/

Moving onto home decorating…baking…cooking…art…my friend’s names started popping up, and I could see their ideas.

My pinhole pumpkin popped yesterday once I lit the candle, and I can’t wait to get to the beach and try the colored circle chalk game with Taylor! Oh, and the string balloons….

See the old shed on the right? What to do...

Oh, and I needed ideas for my garden shed.

Google sheds and get good ideas on images, but they are all for sale. Pinterest sheds and get tons of great ideas just for fun.

Cute!

“Think of Pinterest as a virtual pinboard — a place to catalog and share the things you love. Pin anything that catches your eye: memorable …” Apps store

It’s fun to see what other people like – a quick and easy way to feed your optic nerve. Great ideas…fun to share.

I love the idea of collaging, but never have the time. Now I can collage in seconds, with no mess!

http://pinterest.com/kathymccu/holiday-magic/

Life is just fun.

Staying young..that’s the key!

I don’t think I will ever be someone who is bored in retirement. As long as I can keep learning, I hope and pray I can stay young mentally.

I still love to fly. I know airports are more of a hassle and I know people say it isn’t as fun as it used to be. But I still love to travel. There is so much to see in this world.

I love to learn by taking photography classes, cooking classes, writing classes, nutritional classes and art classes.

I never want to be the know-it-all who tells everyone one else what to do and how to do it…the one who judges everyone else and has all the answers.

People who have to be right are probably just insecure and scared. But they are hard to be around because they project their fears. It’s hard to be happy if you are afraid, I fear.

The older I get, the less I have figured out. Or is it the wiser I get, the less I know? Everything from politics to religion – the unmentionables, to new ideas and a changing world: I don’t want to be the one talking about how much I miss the good old days or how this world is going down the tubes.

Too often if I take a hard-line stance on something I turn out to be wrong. For me, the key is staying open-minded, listening, and considering viewpoints counter to my own. I want to keep trying to understand: Why do they do that? Why do they think that? Why do they believe that way? What am I missing?

It’s the old Indian “walk in my moccasins” cliché, but it’s true. Different cultures, upbringings, and experiences create completely different ways of thinking and doing. It’s not black and white or right and wrong. It’s shades of gray, with lots of middle ground.

I could stay in one place, do the same thing, and enjoy my life just as much. But meeting new people with new ideas stimulates me. Observing and questioning the world around me, I grow and change. Then I go home happier and, hopefully, more interesting and positive to be around.

This is the most beautiful time of year and I love the cooler days, the smell of fall, and the colors of autumn.

But I hate hunting season, especially the first day of deer hunting. No, I am not a vegetarian, and yes, I love meat. I don’t care if you shoot Bambi as long as you eat venison.

What is it in the air that makes guys come out of the woodwork with their shotguns and turf wars? What kind of craziness cause normally sane men to lie and trespass? It can only be a combination of gun powder, blood and caveman instinct that appears when the moon is full, or in this case, when antlers have sprouted.

The land we farm zigs and zags through canyons and draws. Most of the fences have been torn out, and the fields run together. Only the farmers seem to know exactly where one field ends and another begins. To add to the confusion, what is fallow or unplanted one year is in crop the next, so the landscape changes from year to year.

All the more reason for hunters to know their boundaries and not wait until the last-minute to contact the land owners for hunting favors. The hunters come, leaping for joy – their only care in the world to shoot the elusive 10 point big buck. They can’t understand why you don’t want to hunt with them or listen to their stories about the big one that got away.

Unfortunately, they don’t realize farmers here just finished harvest. Now they are seeding thousands of acres within weeks. My husband has tunnel vision, and all he can think about is getting the next crop into the ground. This is a busy and critical time of year. Unless a farmer hunts, he probably isn’t interested in stories and camaraderie right now. He’s tired from twelve hour days on the tractor, and it isn’t a picnic to have people camped on your living room floor – it is a royal hassle.

I love the company. And I love the treats hunters bring…wine, cheese, smoked salmon – yum! But oh, I feel like I am in the middle of a kindergarten class of children pointing fingers. Yes, I know who is lying and telling the truth – especially if they mention some long-dead relative who gave them permission to be here.

Hoards of  ”friends” and long-lost cousins come out of the woodwork. They fight each other for canyons and draws, arguing over who was first and who said who could hunt where.

“But last night Kevin told me I could hunt here.” No, actually Kevin said you could hunt there if no one else was already there…ah, semantics.

“What do you mean this is your ground? Kevin said it was his.” No, Kevin showed you the borders and you forgot where they were. You crossed the road or fence line you shouldn’t cross, and now you’re scared you’ll be thrown in jail, so you throw Kevin under the bus to deal with the problem instead. Nice.

Every year we end up telling people they can’t hunt here anymore. “Don Macnab told me I could hunt here. He gave me permission.” Hmm, Uncle Don has been dead fifteen years at least.

When you catch them in a lie, they back-pedal fast. But what makes them lie to begin with? Who does that? Some of our landlords have land leased out for thousands of dollars…others come to hunt on their own ground. You can’t trespass – they will call the sheriff.

And then there are the idiots on their four wheelers or in gas pickups who go cruising through the tall grass and wheat stubble. We haven’t had rain for so long that I could start a fire just by rubbing two sticks together. My girlfriend almost lost her house today. Maybe this isn’t my favorite time of the year after all.

I might have to get my gun-toting neighbor to come help me deal with trespassers....

Look out, here comes my neighbor!!

Okay, some parts of hunting season are fun!

The end!