Healthy Mother’s Day Gifts

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10 Ideas for Keeping Mom Happy and Healthy

Mother’s Day is coming up, and if you’re looking for some new ways of saying thank you to that special lady who’s done so much for you, you’ve come to the right place. Or, if you want to drop hints for gifts that you would truly love, this is for you as well. The 10 ideas I’m featuring here are healthy Mother’s Day gifts that are appropriate for any age and will help keep Mom happy and going strong for a long time to come.

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Container Gardens for Healthy Living

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Tips from a Pro to Help Get You Started

Growing your own food is about as intentional as it gets when it comes to connecting your mind, body and nutrition. There’s just something about planting a seed or a starter plant, caring for it, watching the vegetables, fruit or herbs emerge from what you planted, harvesting and then eating it that’s about as fulfilling as anything you can imagine. I grew up with a Dad who only knew how to garden the Texas way, which meant that we always had a HUGE garden that could feed us plus our neighbors if needed. While I can’t say I appreciated picking beans out in the hot summer sun as much as I probably should have, as an adult, I’ve certainly gotten back to my roots and truly understand the value of what he was doing for us and teaching us to do for ourselves – even in my little slice of suburbia as compared to the farm I grew up on.

While my entire property isn’t as large as my dad’s garden was, I have learned that it is possible to grow food in whatever space you have – whether it’s a backyard, a patio, a deck or a screened-in porch. That’s where container gardens come in. They make it so that growing our own food – at least to some extent – is something we can all do no matter our income or space limitations. Because Bountiful Backyards specializes in edible landscaping, I went to Operations Manager Keith Shaljian to find out how we can fuel our health with container gardens and to get some tips on how to get started.

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Courtesy: Bountiful Backyards

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Spring Cleaning for Your Health

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8 Tips and Tricks to Make Spring Cleaning Easier

It’s Spring! And that means it’s time to breathe some freshness into our homes and our lives by getting the winter out and letting the spring in. This is important for the cleanliness of our homes as well as for our physical health and mental wellbeing. But for many of us, spring cleaning is one of our least favorite tasks to do. That’s why professional organizer Jenna Fischer with The Arranged Abode is offering some tips and tricks to make spring cleaning easier and more enjoyable. Yes, you read that right – enjoyable.

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Benefits of Cooking for Yourself While on Vacation

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7 Tips for Making Cooking a Fun and Relaxing Part of Your Vacation Routine

Summer vacation means keeping things simple and easy. Which for many, means very little to no cooking. But when it comes to what we eat, giving someone else or packaged convenience foods the power over what fuels us during this sacred time off can backfire if we’re not careful. With a little extra planning and a willingness to think outside the box, cooking for yourself can become an important and meaningful part of your next vacation. That’s why I’m taking a look at what those benefits are as well as 7 tips for making it a fun and relaxing part of your vacation routine.

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Organizing for Your Health and Wellbeing, Part II

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6 Tips for Tackling the Organizing Process

There’s no doubt that organizing is all the rage right now, but did you know that it’s more than just the latest “it” thing to do? As we found out in Organizing for Your Health and Wellbeing, Part I, it’s not only good for your state of mind, it’s important for your overall health too. As we know, what affects one, affects the other.

Jenna Fischer with The Arranged Abode has already shared why getting and staying organized is good for our health as well as some budget-friendly tips to help get us started. If you missed that part, be sure and check out her valuable advice. Next though, is figuring out how to tackle the organizing process. Fortunately, Jenna’s here to guide us again and to help us make our organizing dream a reality while potentially helping to tame those stress hormones in the process.

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Organizing for Your Health and Wellbeing, Part I

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Budget-Friendly Tips to Get Started from a Professional Organizer

The popularity of Marie Kondo’s Netflix show Tidying up With Marie Kondo and the KonMarie method shows that many of us either secretly or very openly want our lives to be well… more tidy. While Marie Kondo’s system may or may not work for you, there is an organizational system out there for each of us and finding it sooner rather than later could actually do wonders for our overall health and wellbeing. That’s why I went to professional organizer Jenna Fischer with The Arranged Abode. In this first of a two-part series, she explains why getting and staying organized is good for our health and shares some budget-friendly tips to help get us started.

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Photos Courtesy of The Arranged Abode

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Craving Connection: The Importance of Intimate Relationships

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4 Tips for Nurturing Your Relationship

With Valentine’s Day just around the corner, our relationships – especially those with our spouse or partner – are top of mind. While we know there are many benefits to being in a healthy intimate relationship, there are studies that show it’s actually good for our wellbeing – especially as we age. These relationships are something we all need because we crave connection with others, but that doesn’t mean they come easy. That’s why I went to the experts to find out why intimate relationships are so important, why we need to focus on them for Valentines and throughout the year and how we can nurture them even when kids, work and day-to-day life are calling for our attention.

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The Importance of Traditions

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Tips for Beginning New Traditions

From marking birthdays, to Sunday dinners, to Fourth of July picnics, to any of the other ways we mark milestones, events or simply being together – our cultures are full of traditions. While these can be found in daily life or on special occasions, they’re extremely important during the holidays. Some of these traditions have a religious foundation, while others are centered around simply sharing a common experience that unifies and brings us together. Either way, they help to center and ground us and help to add meaning to the ordinary and the extraordinary. That’s why we’re going to explore why traditions are so important, as well as how to start new ones for you and your family.

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Intentional Gift Giving

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Creative, Unique and Meaningful Gift Ideas

It’s so easy to get caught up in the busyness of this time of year that sometimes we forget a very important aspect of what the holidays are all about. Giving. To others and for others. No wonder we can end up in the middle of all the hustle and bustle feeling deflated, depleted and broke. If our main objective is simply crossing off a list or filling a gift bag, we, as givers, get nothing from it and more than likely, the recipient doesn’t get much from it either. If, on the other hand, we put thought, energy and intention into the gifts we give, we’re not only giving joy, we’re creating it for ourselves as well.

Coming up with creative and meaningful gifts is something my family enjoys doing. That’s not to say that we don’t have crazy, busy years where we just check off a list, but those are the holiday seasons I enjoy the least because it means we’re too wrapped up in ourselves and the craziness of life. Intentional gift giving gets us out of ourselves and prompts us to stop and think about what would not only make others happy, but what would bring them joy. Here are some creative, unique and meaningful gift ideas to help get those juices flowing.

For it is in giving that we receive.

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Essential Oils: A Natural Alternative That Promotes Health and Healing

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How They Work, How They Help and How To Get Started

If you’re tired of popping a pill every time you get a headache or looking for an alternative for that nightly glass of wine to help you unwind, or you’re tired of having a cabinet full of cleaning products that contain chemical ingredients you can’t even pronounce, essential oils might be something you’ll want to explore. While the science behind them is young, their use is not. We’ve come full circle to what our ancestors and indigenous people knew long ago. Essential oils are natural alternatives that promote health and healing, and we’re going to show you how they work, how they help and how to get started.

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