Sharing Our Journey

As I've shared before, this past year our family took on a new adventure.  After a three week Daniel Fast, we moved to a Whole Food Plant Based diet.  As a fun way to track our progress, we decided to get a photo of ourselves on the 10th of each month. We started this on July 10th, and I wanted to get to our anniversary the following year on June 10th and see just how much we had changed together.

I have to say, it's amazing to look at these photos. Yes, it's a big transformation on the outside, but that barely tells the story of how we've grown on the inside. 

With all this change, we've been asked often about what has made the biggest impact on our health.  It's fun to share with others what we are learning and how we make it work.  We've had many friends and family join us in working toward a life filled with foods that are rich in nutrients and enjoying improved health as they go.

Recently, we were invited to speak at a lunch meeting for a company in Maine.  This was the first time we had done anything formal and it was such a great event! 

 

We prepared a power point presentation, packed up our trusty kitchen machines, a packet of recipes and menu ideas, and some samples of our favorite foods to share with everyone. 

We spoke twice that day, sharing our story with about 65 people.  We were so encouraged by the positive feedback we received from both groups.  My dear friend who coordinated the event was very excited by the large turnout. 

I loved this opportunity.  It was such a treat to work with David on a presentation like this. I loved it that some of the children were there helping us. Benjamin took on the challenge of doing the video work. Once he gets the editing done, I just might have that to add to this post.

 

It would be great to have more opportunities to speak and share our story.  In the meantime, we continue to learn, work hard, and look at new opportunities in encouraging and helping others find healing and strength from the Lord and the foods He has created uniquely for us to thrive on.

Midwifery Training - Heard a Heartbeat!

We are so thrilled that the Lord has helped my body heal in many ways this past year. One of the biggest blessings in that is that we can now plan and pray for a healthy home birth again with our dear midwife and friend attending the birth. 




Another fabulous gift in this is that our 8yo, Susannah, is eager and excited to learn all about midwifery and nursing care.  Amy, our midwife, has been so gracious to coach Susannah along and work to *train* her at my appointments.

 

Our first appointment in April was such a treat!  Ruth and Susannah came along.  Susannah got her first lessons in routine care as well as filling out a chart on my pregnancy progress. 

 

 

Both of the girls took turns holding the Doppler to listen for the heartbeat. Everyone was sure they were hearing train which would be a boy heartbeat. ;) 

 

 

We left with a life-sized 12 week old gestation baby to bring home and share with the family.  Kindred has been completely in love with this little baby since the moment she saw it and continues to snuggle, kiss, and love on it every chance she gets.

 

 

 

 It is an amazing gift that our whole family can have such an active role in my pregnancy and care. They are learning so much and I am so proud of them in their eagerness to do so.  This is me at 13 weeks pregnant. I am simply thrilled to be enjoying this pregnancy with my girls. Their excitement makes mine overflow!

Juice On!

This past year has been a life-changing year for us.

There are a lot of details to share, but I'll stick to the highlights for now. Starting in June, our family completed a 21 day Daniel Fast, seeking direction from the Lord regarding our health and diet. After completing our fast, the Lord directed us to tranform our diet from a meat and dairy based whole foods diet to a plant-based whole foods diet.

During those early weeks, we also watched the documentary Fat, Sick, and Nearly Dead starring Joe Cross. What an inspiration that film was to our family. Just days after watching the movie, David and I began a juice fast. I only lasted a few days, even though I kept trying intermittently as the weeks went on. David, however, completely 6 weeks of a full Reboot Juice Fast, resulting in about 50 pounds of weight loss. What a transformation!

From there he joined us in our plant-based diet, following many of the recommendations given by Dr. Furhman in his books, End of Diabetes, Eat to Live, and Disease Proof Your Child.  The results have been amazing!  From July to February, David has lost 100 pounds and I lost 60 pounds.  My many health struggles have disappeared, our cholesterol, blood pressure, and blood sugar results are all showing we are healing and thriving now.

We are so thankful to the Lord for directing us in this path. We are also thankful to him for using various people and resources to help us understand and make the needed changes in our lives.  Joe Cross is one of those people.  When we found out that he was doing a book signing in Boston, we couldn't resist the opportunity to meet him, thank him, and share our story.

 

 

We packed in a small café in downtown Boston with many other folks. We enjoyed a great presentation given my Mr. Cross and then excitedly shared our collage of before and after pictures with him while he signed it for us.  It was great to share David's story of his juice fast and then our journey into plant-based eating.  Joe was great and really enjoyed meeting David as well as our boys, who are aspiring film-makers. 

The photo collage Joe Cross signed for David

 

 

It was a great night of bringing many pieces of this past year together.  We met so many people looking for health and answers to their struggles. It's such a joy to share our journey with them and encourage them to try something new and watch and see what can happen. 

What we've learned in this all is that the Lord is the creator and sustainer of our lives.  Not only does he provide all we need for life and godliness in his word, but he is the one who provides what is best to nourish our physical bodies as well.  While we share our story of healing, we are eager to point others to the truth that the Lord is the one with the answers to every struggle we face.  When we build our lives on what He has created and given for us, we will find strength, hope, and joy.

 

 

"His divine power has granted to us all things that pertain to life and godliness, through the knowledge of him who called us to his own glory and excellence, by which he has granted to us his precious and very great promises, so that through them you may become partakers of the divine nature, having escaped from the corruption that is in the world because of sinful desire. For this very reason, make every effort to supplement your faith with virtue, and virtue with knowledge, and knowledge with self-control, and self-control with steadfastness, and steadfastness with godliness, and godliness with brotherly affection, and brotherly affection with love.  For if these qualities are yours and are increasing, they keep you from being ineffective or unfruitful in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ."  1 Peter 3:1-8

Sweetest Sixteen

Today our oldest, precious, amazing daughter turned sixteen.  Yes, I'm a heap of emotions.

It must be the mark of the oldest child that their birthday creates so much nostalgia.  Not only do I spend time looking back on their life, wishing for a few more moments of sloppy kisses and squishy cheeks but I am forced to look over my whole journey of motherhood, since she is the one who began it all.

Okay, so I had to snap myself out of my reverie or I would sink into it for good.  Even though I'm tempted to long for days gone by, looking for moments I could do over or change, I was lovingly chided to treasure the moments in front of me.  The mistakes of mothering in my earlier years are the stepping stones to the work God is accomplishing today.  The work He is about today is the foundation for a beautiful tomorrow.  Yes, I want to soak that up and cling to that promise.

And so we did.  We soaked up our Beauty-girl today as much as we possibly could. 

A day filled with her favorite things:  Her family and the gifts they lovingly gave to show their heart and devotion to their one and only "Bettsy". 

 

 

 

(gifts: wooden bowls, soaps, gold chain ring made by a little sister, antique sewing machine and cabinet)

 

More favorite things: Several hours at her favorite thrift store.  The whole family found treasures but were too busy to take pics. ;)

 

We then headed to an apple orchard we'd never been to before.  Elizabeth has always loved visiting orchards and apples are her very favorite food.  What a perfect day for savoring God's goodness to our family.

 

 

A few favorite foods:  Taco bar with a new twist, baked corn tortilla taco shells!

 

 

And a NEW favorite dessert that Elizabeth invented and dreamed of for the last few weeks, LIVE By Chocolate Nice Cream.  Yep, folks, that's dark chocolate nice cream with bits of raw brownie topping.  She's a genius. :)

 

 

Okay, this is the part where I start getting misty-eyed again and threaten to short out your screen with my own little hallmark commercial.  Instead of going all sentimental on you again, I think I'll take Mary's example and treasure this day and all the many days that led up to it quietly in my heart. 

 

This amazing young woman before me, she's a gift. A gift that I have re-committed to opening with gentleness and awe each day it's placed in my hands.  Thank you, Lord, for the honor of mothering this incredible person.  Oh, how you have changed me with her life!

 

 

"And all who heard it wondered at the things which were told them...but Mary treasured all these things, pondering them in her heart."  Luke 2:19