sweat and smiles

A highlight twice weekly for me has been these staff women in my Jazzercise class. This was our fourth week together, working out after work at the Campus Crusade headquarters.

last class (for 3 weeks): thursday

We’re in West Main and will enjoy our last time together until
Monday, April 24th. (I’ll be in Nebraska support raising.) Hope to see
you Thursday!

health tricks

That sounds like I’m a contestant on a late-night talk show. Sadly, I’m still 15-minutes-of-fameless.

In the meantime, here are some helpful tips I sent my brother today when he asked how I had such great results for my last diabetic 3-month bloodwork. It’s not been easy. These 8 years as a diabetic have often been a rocky road.

1. Eating food that I know, with almost certainty, what amount of carbs are in it. For instance, I buy sweet treats prepackaged individually. It’s a little more expensive, but I know what I’m getting–as opposed to eating ice cream out of the container and guessing at what 1/2 c. was and usually shoveling more like 2 cups in my bowl. I have memorized the amount of carbs in the fruits and crackers and such I commonly eat.
2. I don’t eat 2 hours before I go to bed. That way, my fast-acting insulin is completely out of my body (lasts 2 hours) and I stay steady blood-sugar-wise all night.
3. I shoot for 4 units of insulin per meal. This causes me to eat more veggies and low-GI foods.
4. Working out consistently (3 or 4 times a week). Anything with weights seems to help my blood sugars for up to 2 days after.
5. I set myself up for success with a good breakfast. I starve by 10am, I finally figured out, if I don’t have a good carb and protein for breakfast. Right now what I eat is Kashi vanilla oatmeal (good for cholesterol and whole grains) with 1/2 c. frozen blueberries and string cheese (or cottage cheese or 1 c. milk).
6. I pack healthy snack options at my desk. Single-serving microwave popcorn, single-serving applesauce, granola bars.
7. 10am snack is usually yogurt. 3 pm snack is usually 1/4 c. almonds (love them!) and 1 small apple.
8. A good friend of mine says she only eats food she pays for. It’s challenged me about how often I eat something because it’s offered (free) at the office, at a meeting, etc.

Leave a comment with your best health trick!

Saturday Jazzercise classes

If you’d like to get another workout in over the weekend, headquarters ladies, come to the Saturday morning class I help teach at 8:45am!

garbage day

I saw this in my neighborhood on my way to work this morning. How sad. They’re a hola-hoop-less household now.

breakfast fave

I mentioned this at Jazzercise tonight–my new favorite hot oatmeal. Add 1/4 c. frozen blueberries (love those antioxidants) and you’re set!

March newsletter: “The Da Vinci Code”

Mona Lisa Smiles
Mona Lisa intrigues me. She seems wedged between shyness and sworn secrecy.

I wonder what her expression would be if she was alive today, with the buzz surrounding the soon-to-be-released “The Da Vinci Code.”

The movie, starring Tom Hanks and directed by Ron Howard, follows Dan Brown’s worldwide best-selling book by the same title. (The book has sold over 25 million copies and is translated into 44 languages.)

According to The Internet Movie Database, the plot is summarized as: “A murder in the Louvre and clues in Da Vinci paintings lead to the discovery of a religious mystery protected by a secret society for two thousand years –which could shake the foundations of Christianity.”

“Our response to the movie,” Campus Crusade staff member and author Josh McDowell says, “can give us a marvelous opportunity to explain the difference between fact and fiction, truth and imagination, and history and hoax.”

The Staff Web’s Response
About a month ago we launched a Da Vinci Code Special Section on the Staff Web. It’s a marketplace of Da Vinci resources, Web sites and articles—all at the fingertips of our staff members.

This is the kind of thing I get pumped about—helping provide useful tools so that people don’t have to go searching for them or, heaven forbid reinvent them, not knowing they already exist.

That happened a lot within our organization when “The Passion” came out in theaters. It seemed like every Campus Crusade ministry made their own evangelistic Web site because there wasn’t a common ground place to go, like the Staff Web, at the time to go to and see what was available.

We hope this Special Section will provide helpful resources staff members might not even know exist, equipping them for relevant conversations regarding the film.

My Recommendations
Here are a few of the resources that you might consider as you think about the upcoming movie and your response:

• The Da Vinci Code: A Quest for Answers by Josh McDowell and companion mini-magazine (great for giving to friends to begin conversations)
• Insightful articles about the the movie’s claims and what is biblically true
• Jesus and Da Vinci, a Web site clearly explaining how you can have a personal relationship with God. Oh, and this is cool–my brother, Chad, is helping the Campus Crusade staff members working on it. Chad’s putting to use his expertise in how to get Web pages more readership (optimizing key words). Thanks, Chad!

prayer and thanksgiving

Prayer Requests:

• For me to not rely on my own strength at work—it’s so easy to slip in that! Instead, I want to walk by faith in all I do.
• For people who might never have considered Jesus before, to think differently about Him after engaging in conversations about “The Da Vinci Code.”

Thanksgiving:

• Our Wed. night Purpose-Driven Life Bible study with neighbors is going well with 5 of us.
• This is week two of teaching Jazzercise for staff women after work on Mondays and Thursdays. It’s been so much fun and an unexpected ministry. Here’s an e-mail that made my day:

Dear Angie,
I planned to email you this morning to encourage you in your MINISTRY of Jazzercize. I have been wanting to begin exercising and treating the temple of God with a little more respect for quite awhile now but have been unable to make the move towards that goal. I had prayed for help & feel as though your class is a beginning.

healthy for life

A few years ago it hit me: This is my life. And I’m living it right now.

I realized that if I wanted to be a healthy diabetic 10 years from now, it necessitated that I be a healthy diabetic today. So I started going to Jazzercise classes regularly the fall of 2003. Soon, I was surprised by how much my schedule and body had grown accustomed to an infusion of health three times a week.

Then, in the fall of 2004, I decided to become a certified Jazzercise instructor. I knew that, to teach, I’d have to take my health seriously. And I’d have to actually show up regularly to class…since I’m the instructor and all.

I’d like to say that being an instructor has erradicated all of my health issues. But that wouldn’t be true. I’m still on the journey of making good food choices and health choices.

The choice is before me: if I want to be healthy for life, it starts today. And it starts with what I choose regarding the small things (like the big slice of cake on a platter literally in front of me).

I think I’ll choose to go pack my bag for Jazzercise class tomorrow.

learning the moves

For those of you Campus Crusade staff women who are thinking about coming to the after-work Jazzercise classes I’m teaching, and have never been to a class, check out some of the moves we use! (Look at the list of moves down the left sidebar.)

All levels of fitness are welcome and you don’t have to be coordinated. A side note: it took me time, too, to catch on. Just come and have fun and give your heart a little workout!