Lifestyle

This will come as no surprise to my long-time blog followers, but I just love fresh strawberries. There is nothing quite as delicious as a fresh strawberry right off the vine. A bite of strawberry is like a bite of summer sunshine.

We had a free day and visited a you-pick strawberry field. Little Buddy has matured a lot since last year and could actually do a decent job picking strawberries. Sure he picked a few of the green ones (which we added to our basket and paid for), but generally speaking, he could tell the difference between the ripe strawberries and the unripe ones.

The farm also had pre-picked strawberries that only cost a few more dollars per gallon than picking your own. Mr. Handsome started out by trying to convince me that we should only bring home strawberries that we had picked ourselves. He said it was cheating to buy strawberries from a you-pick farm. I decided that instead of debating, I would let the hot summer sun make my argument for me. It worked, and after a couple hours in the heat, Mr. Handsome declared that “rules are meant to be broken” and happily agreed to supplement our hand-picked strawberry supply with some pre-picked berries. My plan had worked.

On the way home, we stopped at a quaint little Amish restaurant and enjoyed some delicious Amish desserts. Mr. Handsome adored the pastry, and we all loved the chocolate milk.

The real treat, however, was the homemade, pectin-free strawberry jam (link below). The process of making it is long but completely worth it.

Link to Strawberry Jelly Recipe

Has anyone else had a chance to pick strawberries this year?

This post is partly a product review and partly a post on wellness. About ten years ago, before I was married, I was having a minor health issue, and a doctor determined that it was caused by low Vitamin D levels. I started supplementing Vitamin D3, and the problem diminished in a matter of a few weeks, never to return. I continued supplementing daily.

Fast-forward several years, and we were at Little Buddy’s one-week checkup. I was breastfeeding, as I am right now with our second son, and the doctor randomly brought up the subject of Vitamin D3 supplementation. He informed us that, based on his extensive research, he believes that virtually everyone is low in Vitamin D and should supplement. Humorously put, unless you live on the equator and spend your days sunbathing in a bikini, you would likely benefit from a daily dose of Vitamin D3.

It should be noted that our doctor is only an advocate for other vitamins on a person-to-person basis. I find this worth mentioning because it is what caused Mr. Handsome to get on board with Vitamin D supplementation. Like our doctor, he does not believe multivitamins to be necessary for those who eat a healthy diet. (We have different opinions on this subject, and I take a daily multivitamin, as well as a couple other supplements that were recommended by a specialist years ago. Mr. Handsome is on board with the supplements, but he does not believe that a regular multivitamin is necessary outside of pregnancy. So multivitamins are one of very few subjects that we have agreed to disagree on.)

To make a long story short, all four of us take Vitamin D3 daily, in dosages prescribed by our medical doctors. Mr. Handsome and I take softgels (our current brand is NOW), and the boys take it in liquid form. (Babies that are formula-fed have different Vitamin D requirements, depending on the levels in their formula.)

What is so noteworthy about Vitamin D? There are a host of health issues that can either be caused or made worse by low Vitamin D levels, making it a very essential vitamin for overall wellness. A common misconception is that humans receive enough Vitamin D from foods like conventional milk and eggs, but that is false.

Vitamin D helps build a strong immune system. In today’s world, I think it’s interesting to note that Vitamin D has been shown to help prevent severe COVID symptoms and aid in recovery.

What are your views on vitamins?

Last month, at the request of some of my readers, I shared a post with healthy eating tips. Rather than cram everything into one post, I figured I would break it up into two parts.

Ice cream is Mr. Handsome’s weakness. Honestly, homemade milkshakes are usually the only sweets he eats aside from baked goods. And the once-in-a-while donut from Five Daughters. Several months ago, he decided to only eat ice cream on weekends and has done a fantastic job sticking to that about 90% of the time. I’ve been really proud of his self-control.

My principle of choosing items with the shortest ingredient list is very applicable to ice cream. The vast majority of ice creams on the market are filled with artificial ingredients.

Another thing that I keep in mind is that products that are advertised as having low or no sugar or fat aren’t automatically healthier. In fact, you could make the argument that they are often “less healthy” than their conventional counterparts.

Low sugar or sugar-free dessert items almost always contain artificial sweeteners. My opinion is that if you are going to have a treat, go with the real thing (real sugar). Not only do artificial substitutes often taste fake (at lease in my opinion), but studies have shown that they can be quite bad for the human body. Here is a specific example: Cottage cheese that is low fat or fat-free often contains stabilizers to make it creamy, so I opt for the full-fat (4%) cottage cheese and just make sure to control my portion sizes.

We both really enjoy a cup of coffee each day, whether it’s decaf or caffeinated. Well, Mr. Handsome won’t drink decaf, but I will. Neither of us takes sugar in our coffee, but we do like a bit of heavy cream. In the evenings after Little Buddy is in bed, I enjoy a bit of snack food. The “natural” section of grocery stores like Kroger has a great selection of snack foods that don’t contain artificial ingredients and are lower in fat but are still satisfying. They certrainly aren’t health foods because they do contain some fat and salt, but they are much better than conventional potato chips.

I’ve also trained myself to see frozen fruit as a treat. Slightly thawed in the microwave, so it’s soft but still cold, and it makes a great reward after a long day.

It’s crucial to do everything in moderation. Choose a few things that really make you happy (cream in your coffee, a piece of chocolate, a single homemade cookie) and find ways to make those treats as healthy as possible.

As far as exercise goes, my goal is to exercise 4-5 times per week. There are a lot of great YouTube videos (I like Blogilates) and DVDs (Walk away the Pounds).