Let's Hear It for Miss California

Miss California's determined stand on her beliefs deserves nothing less than heartiest laudation. I watch in admiration as Carrie Prejean refuses to back down from or apologize for her statements on marriage as between one man and one woman, despite the recent pressure from the Miss California pageant officials. In my book she is one amazing young woman, a role model for us all. Even though the winner, Miss North Carolina (I don't even know HER name!), claims she was always in the lead anyway, no one will ever know for sure how much Perez Hilton's zero score affected the final outcome. Carrie doesn't have the Miss USA crown, but in all likelihood her name is more well- known than the winner's. Heaven must be cheering!

Day 90 +

"Like an athlete I punish my body, treating it roughly,
training it to do what it should, not what it wants to."

1 Corinthians 9:27, Living Bible


I have always enjoyed physical fitness. In school I played volleyball, basketball, and ran track. I picked up a tennis racket at age twenty-nine and still play a lot. My five-foot-ten-inch frame has always been reasonably slender, even eating anything I desired. So when my body began to change undesirably, it was a whole new game that I'd never before played and the rules were foreign to me. It was only a few pounds, but I noticed that I began to lean more and more toward clothing that covered the little roll starting to appear around my middle. I did not in the least like this. Because I am so tall, most folks didn't notice, but I did, and when I saw myself in recent Christmas photos I knew I needed to find what would work for me.

I have always worked out. After my first baby was born I bought a record album (yes, for you younger ones, an album that plays on a turntable!) called Jazzercise. I open up the accordion-style guide book and laid it on top of the dining room table while I played the album and tried to do the exercises. Talk about the dark ages! I did, however, quickly rid myself of the baby weight. In the past I could just exercise harder, drop sugar for a time, or bread, and get right back to that ideal weight. Enter menopause, and no longer!!

Right before Christmas my Tulsa Daughter-In-Law emailed me asking if I would like to do a session with her and her personal trainer during the holidays. I had never done that before and it sounded like fun. We arrived at 6 a.m. at Body Sculpt and this buff guy takes me back in the office to weigh me and get my body fat percentage. I shucked shoes and jewelry so I could get on that scale and be OK. He weighs me in at 162 pounds and 30% body fat. Here's how the conversation went:

" Are you sure this scale is right? My scale at home says something totally different!"

The trainer chuckles and sighs, and I can tell he's heard THAT before! "Yes ma'm, believe me, it's right."

"Oh gosh, you've GOT to be KIDDING!"

But he wasn't....and since this was absolutely unacceptable to me, on January 15, at age 53, I started a journey into new territory that has not only changed my body but also has helped me to completely renew my mind. Three things were key, actually four.

First, I put myself on 1400 calories a day. Come on...I don't need to do that. I eat healthy. Yeah, I found out I was eating healthy to the tune of about 2500-3000 calories/day! The first week was grueling. I DETEST counting calories. But I did it, and after the first week I didn't have to run to calorieking.com every few minutes. Now I hardly ever look anything up and I can even guess on things I haven't eaten before.

Second, I added a LOT of protein to my diet. The trainer said I needed at least 113 grams/day. If you're an athlete you need a gram/pound of body weight. More is better that too little.

Third, I started a really rigorous weight training program. In the past I had injured myself lifing weights and so I went to other exercises. But I found a really great training program on beachbody.com called Chalean Extreme, similar to P90X. One dvd exclusively teaches you how to correctly lift weights so you don't hurt yourself. There is also intense cardio in between days of strength training.

Last but not least, I dug into God's Word to renew my mind because that is where the real battle is fought.

Was I ever shocked when at the thirty day mark I had lost seven pounds and seven inches. Now, at the 100-day mark, I have lost 18 pounds and that many inches. My body fat percentage is hanging around 20, which according to Chalene's charts is on the lean side of lean for my age. Here are some of the really fun things I have noticed:

~The roll around my middle is gone.

~My cheeks (NOT the ones on my face!) no longer rest on the tops of my hamstrings!

~The little pooches on the sides of the tops of my hips at the back are almost totally gone

~When I'm bouncing my tennis ball getting ready to serve, out of the corner of my eye I can see a cut, defined shoulder

~For the first time ever, I HAVE ABS!! I'm just starting to see the rip in my abs! Oh wow, I didn't have that when I was 18!

I noticed so many other benefits. I have absolutely no pain in my joints after I finish three hours of tennis or thirty minutes of jogging up my mountain road. That would stand to reason since for every pound lost, four pounds of pressure are taken off the joints! And the more muscle you have the better your immune system works. My back is rarely sore or tired because my core is so much stronger. In fact, the only drawback is that now I need some new clothes!


Before



After

I have to say that it took hard work, discipline, and a LOT of talking to God, but the journey has not been unbearable. It was very rewarding to see the transformation week by week, and my husband's compliments are music to my ears. Also, I've been able to help some other folks, especially those my age, who fall into that dreadful, deceitful trap of thinking that "it's just the way it is" when you get older. Nonsense!! Anyone at any age can get fit and healthy.

Well, gotta run now. It's time to go work out, and then I'm going shopping!!

Always the Country Girl

This morning in my prayer room I stood looking out the window at the eastern horizon. The day promised to be a fabulous representation of spring in full bloom. From out of nowhere I had a random thought, something that had not crossed my mind in years. It would be so fun to go horseback riding today! Now, where did THAT come from? The best I could recall, I had not been on a horse in at least ten years, probably closer to fifteen. I had grown up riding horses and had had all kinds of escapades. Once when I was fifteen, I was out riding with my English teacher, who broke horses on the side for extra income. He was training a new eighteen-month-old colt, and so he was riding that horse and I was riding a more seasoned one on a brand new saddle of his. About halfway through our ride, way out in the desert, he said that he would like to ride the new saddle, and since the colt was well warm now that it would be all right for me to ride him. We switched animals. Things were going along pretty well, and I'm still not sure to this day what spooked that colt, but he took off bucking across the sand and the cactus. I stayed on pretty well for a few minutes but eventually the colt went right, and I went left...right into the big middle of a cactus. I had to go to the hospital and get my arm sewn up, and we pulled stickers out of all parts of my body for weeks! I had several adventures like that.

I thought of all the people I knew with horses. My sister had access, but she lives a hundred miles away. All the other people I could think of I did not know well enough to ask. I turned away from the window with a sigh. My attention was drawn to the clock and the lateness of the hour. I sat down for a short time of worship and prayer before getting ready for church. The goodness of God was overwhelming for those few moments. I forgot all about the horseback riding as I dressed for church and headed out. After church, I was talking with my friend Camille. We are both seriously into physical fitness, and on several Sundays she has asked me to come out to her ranch in the afternoons and walk. We had never done it due to conflicts.

"Hey, Camille...are you going walking this afternoon? Because if you are I'd like to come out and go too."

"No, my mom is coming out and we're going to ride horses. Wanna come with us?"

"DID YOU SAY HORSES??? I DIDN'T KNOW YOU HAD HORSES!"

I drove out to the Z Bar and by three o'clock we were saddling up and getting ready to go. I was surprised at how much I remembered about doing all of this. Getting on and off was a breeze!


I rode Camille's horse Rubio, and she rode her husband's horse. We rode for a couple of hours on their 8000-acre place. It brought back so many memories of days gone by. I thought of things I had not thought of in years.

We laughed and talked and just enjoyed God's creation. I just kept thinking of the sweetness of God; it wasn't anything I had even asked for but only thought about, and here I was doing it. Still a country girl........

Thirty-One Years Ago

"Children are living messages we send to a time
we will not see."
John Whitehead


The bluebonnets in Texas are popping out everywhere. Every spring, when I see the very first one, the same memory floods my mind: driving home in our 1977 gold Buick Regal holding our newborn first child. I labored only five hours before the nine-pound-six-ounce wonder was flopped on my stomach. At that very moment I became aware of something I had not known about myself: I would be capable of seriously harming with my bare hands anyone that laid a finger on his precious head!

Along with this thought came another: I am now responsible for the life of another human being. I was twenty-two, and that seemed overwhelming at the time. We took him home, and he cried all night the first night. Neither his father nor I knew what to do, so we took turns walking him and I nursed him a lot. I guess he just finally wore himself out and fell asleep.

Those days seemed to go by very slowly, and so the transformation in me was so subtle that I didn't even see it until years had gone by. I was becoming a much better person. I deeply regret not having at least two more children; just think how terrific I'd be!! He he!

Here are some things I learned from my children:

~What is really important--Don't sweat the small stuff. Sit down and color, go outside and throw the football, go to the park, the dishes will wait.

~Everything doesn't have to be perfect! Throw a couple of sandwiches in a bag, grab some chips, and go impromptu.

~Run through the mud puddles WITH them!

~Appreciation of my own mother--the sacrificER always loves more than the sacrificEE

~Everything I do matters

Where did the years go? This child is grown now with a son of his own. It is both a blessing and an amusement to watch him raising his child, because I know that his son is now teaching him!

TEA'D Up and Ticked Off

Although I did not attend a scheduled TEA party, I think they gathered more steam than anyone anticipated. The liberal media blasted insult after insult toward participants all over the country. A good sign. The grass-roots-organized movement evidently involved both red and blue participants, another good sign.

I do not know how much will be accomplished by these displays, but at least someone somewhere is saying enough is enough. I would like to hear from anyone who did attend one of these events and what your perspective was.

"Help me, Marshal Dillon!"

"Foolishness is bound up in the heart of
a child, but the rod of discipline will
drive it far from him."
Proverbs 22:15

A scene from an episode of Gunsmoke shows a man thoroughly paddling his son out in the middle of Dodge City Main Street. Someone runs into Marshal Dillon's office, arousing him from his nap:

"Marshal Dillon, Marshal Dillon, come quick!"

"What is it?" the marshal asks, reaching for his hat and gun belt.

"There's a man whippin' his boy out in the street!"

Marshal Dillon yawns and lies back down. "The law has no right to tell a parent how to discipline his own child."

I remember a road trip we were on when I was about six or seven. I don't remember why or how I was misbehaving, only that my mother told me that when we got home I was going to get a spanking. I straightened up immediately, because although it was still a couple of hundred miles to home, I knew my mother would NOT forget. You see, the REAL punishment was dreading the spanking. By the time we were turning into the driveway, I just wanted that spanking over with quickly. Sure enough, as soon as we unloaded the car (she tortured me just a little longer), we headed to the bathroom where the hairbrush awaited me. Even Marshal Dillon couldn't help me now! The difference in my mother and most parents today is that she never threatened over and over to paddle and then never came through with the goods. She always told us that whatever she promised us, good or bad, would be delivered! That way, she assured us, we could always trust what she said.

Although a delayed punishment can be very effective, on-the-spot discipline is usually more so. I once jerked up both of my sons in a grocery store and paddled them thoroughly after they climbed up into a refrigerated case and destroyed about twenty decorated cakes. They were about ages three and five. They were MODEL children from that time forth whenever we went into ANY store. I spanked my eight-year-old stepdaughter in the middle of an amusement park, and the rest of the day was quite pleasant. My sister tells a hilarious story of her two young daughters in a department store around the time of Easter. There were racks and racks of girls' Easter dresses. Her daughters had been warned not to play inside and around them, but did anyway. As one rack began to fall over, it created a domino effect and every rack fell all down the line. Her oldest daughter looked up at her mother and said, "We're going to get a spanking, aren't we!" Sure 'nuff!

It is unfortunate that a parent can no longer freely discipline his own child in public. Little by little our government is attempting to usurp parental rights and authority. Last summer H.J.R 97 was introduced by Representative Peter Hoekstra (R-Mich.). It basically stated that it is a fundamental right for parents to direct the upbringing of their own children. The bill failed, but thankfully, is being reintroduced with much more support. J. Michael Smith, of the Homeschool Legal Defense Association, says this: "It's possible that in the near future the United States may significantly weaken the rights of parents to raise their children. Crucial decisions that parents are accustomed to making, such as what our children read, who they associate with, what kind of discipline is used, whether we take them to church or how we educate them, all become decisions of the state if the United States ratifies the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child." Disturbing.

I understand that child abuse exists, but we are raising a politically-correct society of brats who defy authority beginning with their own parents. It's as though parents are afraid to raise their own children. And guess what: even if law after law is introduced, child abuse will STILL exist! I do not suggest that a spanking is always the strategy for discipline, but some of the scenes I've witnessed out in public certainly warrant consideration of such, if only for the benefit of others around those children. Sadly, most parents no long have that option in public.

I find it appalling that it has become necessary to protect by law common no-brainer values and rights such as marriage and parental authority. No laws or politicians can save us when four unelected judges, such as in Iowa very recently, decide that homosexual marriage would be ok there now. I believe there is hope, but it is to be found in an awakening to God all across this nation, just like with Jonathan Edwards in the 1700's. Study that out sometime and see the parallels to our present day society. Colonial America in 1726 was in moral and spiritual decline. The challenges of frontier life and a series of brutal wars had demoralized many. Many existing churches had degenerated into formal religious institutions with no power to bring much-needed change. Sound familiar? Along comes Jonathan Edwards and George Whitfield. Benjamin Franklin, who did NOT profess to be a Christian was a close friend of Whitfield and gave credit to him as having great impact on the people. After Edwards' great sermon, Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God, it was reported that there were far-reaching implications. Reports in New England showed over 150 new churches and a drastic change in the moral climate of colonial America. Harvard professor William Perry stated that the Declaration of Independence of 1776 was a direct result of the evangelical preaching of the evangelists of the Great Awakening.

I hope and pray that our rights and freedoms will not slip away one by one. Marshal Dillon had it right: the law has no right.