1. Commemorative gift we had made…
My daughter, Quincy, graduated from Ohio State University last month. She was on the Ohio State Water Ski Team, and last fall won the Women’s D2 Jump National Championship. I posted about that last fall. We wanted to commemorate this accomplishment with something special, but couldn’t figure out the best way to do that. We came up with the idea of framing the bib that she wore over her lifejacket while competing and surrounding it with a few pictures and the medal she won. The pictures included one of her in the air on her winning jump, another picture of her jumping, one of her on the podium, and one of her as she came out of the water holding her skis. We also included the Ohio State logo and a placard with her name and some details about the event. We used Michael’s to do the framing, and they did a great job helping us design it. We were really happy with how it came out. We wanted something special to commemorate Quincy winning the National Championship, and this was perfect. To make it even better, for the bib she wore this season she chose the number “10” to honor her mother, whose birthdate was October 10th (10/10). Check out the pic below to see it…
2. Fact I re-read… and re-pondered this week…
One of my biggest goals is to come to the end of my life with no regrets. One way to help ensure we have no regrets is to find out what it is that most people end up regretting on their deathbed. One thing that I learned, found very interesting, and have pondered, is that people tend to be haunted by regrets of inaction more so than regrets of action. It’s not so much the things they DID that they regretted, it was the things they DID NOT DO that they regretted most. So… what is it that you really, really want to do before you die? GO DO IT!!! (While pulling up an image to post with this, I scrolled through a bunch of quotes about regret on Quotefancy. Wow! Those got me thinking. I recommend clicking here and reading some of these quotes.)
3. Informative video I came across this week…
I have been a proponent of grass-fed beef for decades. One of the key benefits of a cow eating grass is that the meat will be rich with omega-3 fats which are essential for human health. When a cow is fed grain, as it is in a feedlot, those healthy omega-3 fats turn to omega-6. And a feedlot cow is also given hormones, antibiotics, cannot move around freely, and is not treated well. For many years, one of my best friends would raise a cow for me on his parents’ farm. We experimented with different ratios of grain and grass. We did find that the best meat was grain fed in the beginning, but finished on grass-only. This way, the cow could gain a lot of weight, the meat would be very flavorful, and the grass-finishing allowed the meat to be loaded with those healthy omega-3 fats. They were free to roam the land, never got any hormones, antibiotics, or other chemicals, and he treated those animals with love and respect. I did see a video this week that explained how meat labeling in the grocery stores is deceiving and facts are manipulated (surprise, surprise), and it opened my eyes even further to the poor, unhealthy practices of factory-farmed cows. I do believe a cow can be properly “grass-finished,” but only if you know the farm and know that it isn’t getting any synthetic and toxic chemicals. Check out this video from Dr. Berg explaining more about the meat you are likely buying. (Thanks, Dr. Jon Snyder for sharing this video with me! And it was his late twin brother, Dr. Jeff, who used to raise those cows for me. To this day, that meat was the best tasting meat I have ever eaten.)
