It’s dedicated to helping people clear clutter in their home, office, business, to create living spaces that are really life-enhancing. I walk alongside people in the de-cluttering process. They decide what to put in the “keep” and “donate” piles and we find a place for what will remain.
I use the Marie Kondo method, organizing by categories—first clothing, then books, papers, and each room, going through everything. For example, we take all of your clothing out so you can decide with each piece whether you really love it, wear it, and want to keep it.
We look at what books really bring you joy and enhance your life, and release things that trigger guilt. We ask with each of your papers, “Do I still need this?” What a relief it is to know where everything is—car title, check, gift certificate, things that had been misplaced, and to have things organized so you know where everything is.
Little things can make a huge difference in how people feel and how they can work, especially in the kitchen. In the bedroom, we take out everything that doesn’t belong and make it look comfortable. Memorabilia collected through the whole process is saved for last. Piles can be made to pass things on to different people.
Every single one of my clients says they have more energy after de-cluttering.
Some hire me because they don’t want their kids to have to clean up after they’ve moved into a nursing home or passed. Young families with small children want their homes more organized so they can have more time together, and want to teach their kids “This is where this goes.”
Most kids have too many toys. Studies show they play better and in more depth when they have less toys. A connection’s also been shown between clutter and ADHD, especially in children. Plus, it’s hard to clean with lots of clutter.
Clients say their mental health is so much better afterward. I feel very honored that people trust me to help them with this intimate process. Some don’t want people they know to help them because they’re embarrassed, but there’s nothing to be embarrassed about.
What led you to start Shepherd Organizing?
I’ve been helping people for over ten years—family, friends, some paid jobs. I’m pure Finnish. We did a lot of cleaning and didn’t have much clutter. And I had twins, so I had to be very organized. I realized it makes such a difference in people’s lives…. If I were a millionaire and didn’t have to work, I would still do this. It’s just so rewarding!
What other experiences have helped you to run it? I studied a lot—Marie Kondo and other organizers. I continue to learn almost daily about the psychology of hoarding and different things that seem to create clutter. It’s an ongoing education. Having worked with many people now has taught me. Every session I have, I’m learning.
What do your clients enjoy most about your services?
One woman said “I’ve lived in this house for twenty years and never felt at home before.” People say they have breakthroughs—now there’s space and they’re not thinking about the clutter. One said she started writing again. Now they have time—for relationships and to start businesses. A father said, “I can’t wait ’til we’re done. We’ll have so much more fun!”
Future plans for Shepherd Organizing?
I’m connecting with more realtors for home staging. It’s crucial to de-clutter before you put your home on the market. Clutter takes away equity.
I am available for presentations at events and gatherings, and will do one at the Mind Body Spirit Fair in April. I recently launched my website, shepherdorganizing.com. There’s info on clutter-free gifts, where you can donate things, and more pages are in the works.
Excerpted from the Spring 2023 issue of Health & Happiness U.P. Magazine. Copyright 2023, Empowering Lightworks, LLC. All rights reserved.
The late Helen Haskell Remien inspired many in our community and beyond to greater creativity, boldness, and optimism, to claim their talents and live more fully. In 2007, this grew into her opening Joy Center, expanding the depth and reach of her impact.
Helen described Joy Center as “a charming cottage in the woods in Ishpeming that’s a creative sanctuary for people in our area and elsewhere to come and play and dream and expand…. a beautiful place where you can connect with your biggest, highest part, and also connect with the community.”
As Helen explained, “I had a seed of a dream in me thirty years ago. At that time I was wondering if I wanted to be part of the academic world, in an institution, and teach writing, or part of a place in the community where things like writing workshops could be held in which everyone could be included. I wrote in my journals in the early 90s that there should be a place in the community where we can drum and sing, and dance, and have writing workshops, and events like ones I loved when I went to Omega Institute and Kripalu, and that I would love to be a part of something like that.
“About twenty years ago, I began encouraging people to find their own creative paths.
Then in the spring of 2007, I started to feel dissatisfaction…. It was no longer enough to teach writing in my house and yoga in the basement of my husband’s dental office.”
“When I built Joy Center, I kept expanding my mind—‘This will be a place where I will teach yoga, writing, creative workshops. And people can offer other creative things. It will extend our home in some way when our kids come back to visit….’ I realized, ‘Oh, my gosh! There are so many awesome dreams people are having in the community!’ And at that point there weren’t the places available now offering yoga and energy work and so on.”
“For example, Amber Edmondson and Raja Howe knew they were poets, but didn’t know they were book binders yet. They sold a book at Out Loud, our open mike night, then began offering book-making workshops at Joy Center. Now they have their own shop. Kerry Yost had never sung in public until one night at Out Loud, and she just blew everyone away.”
“Early on, Joy Center took on its own life to be a safe place where people could take a seed of a dream, like I did, and allow it to blossom.
Sometimes their offering has stayed at Joy Center, and sometimes it flourishes far beyond. And I get to play with people that way, and be the person who holds the space and is a cheerleader for people’s dreams.” “ “I think people feel something when they walk into the physical building because it’s really welcoming and beautiful…. People feel safe to really be brave and find parts of themselves they haven’t felt before, or to love themselves more deeply than they’ve loved themselves before. Joy Center was built with a really positive, high vibration…. It was such fun working with a young man who put his heart and soul into it…. We really co-created together, him doing the actual work, and me doing the dreaming.” (1)
Helen’s dreaming supported some as-yet-unknown dreams of others. Singer/songwriter Kerry Yost explains, “She made you feel like what you were doing was important and worth sharing, and created a space for it to become important and worth sharing through her support and encouragement and also through the community she built at Joy Center. She gathered all these people who wanted to create meaning in their lives, and gave them a space and encouragement to do that.”
“As a bigger-than-life kind of person, she had that level of impact in everything she did—within the writer community, yoga community, artist community.
Even though she had such a far reach, Helen still made me feel like that reach went directly to me specifically. I think she had that effect on many people.”
Her biggest impact on me was with my music through her encouragement and sometimes outright loving pressure to make something of what I was doing. Most of my music is just in my house for me. Helen would say, ‘Kerry, so when are you coming to Out Loud to play music next? Here’s the calendar, pick a day when you’re going to have your show at Joy Center.’ I’d be like, ‘I don’t know, Helen. Nobody needs to hear that.’ Next time I’d see her, she’d say ‘Okay it’s January; what day do you want to do that?’ and I’d turn her down again. This went on for a solid three months.
Helen could have kept what she built for herself, but instead she used her resources and energy to build Joy Center for others to utilize. She was also like, ‘And it’s for me too!’ I love that she was so real about it, unabashedly so! She took her dream and made that same dream accessible to others and encouraged them to do it because she had the privilege to do that for herself.
I remember going to Joy Center and hearing Christine Saari read excerpts of her work and being completely entranced by the stories of her childhood. I got to hear Keith Glendon play ukulele in front of people for the first time. She created space for people both physically and in a very deeply spiritual way.
Helen really did see and want to help people where she could.
She invited me to be the Joy Center gardener, even though I knew nothing about doing that, back when I was a broke part-time social worker, part-time musician. I always felt very cared for by Helen. She’s so special to me, and everyone, for good reason.”
Keith Glendon recalls, “I found Joy Center when there was a lot of chaos in my life. And in finding it, I also found the heartful community that I didn’t have here even though I’d moved back to my hometown—people like Kerry Yost, Matt Maki, Christine Saari, and all these folks that would turn up at Out Loud and nourish a part of me that had been put away for a long time. That really began the rebirth of my creative self, my authentic self, my healing self, my musical self. Joy Center was a great place of friendship, safety, respite, and renewal.
“I’d been about to go back to school for my MBA, but I didn’t really want to. I was just searching for something. I went to a grueling three-hour session of a 12-week GMAT prep course and thought, ‘What am I doing?’ I went to Out Loud that Thursday and discovered Matt Maki was starting an Artist’s Way class. I thought, ‘I could do this thing I don’t bleeping care about, or I could do this class with this weird dude who’s a poet. Why would I condemn myself to a future in what I don’t want to be doing?’”
“My experiences at Joy Center also began to influence my children with both poetry and music. Now I have a teenage daughter who’s very adept at busking and singing and art-making.”
“Helen even inspired a big project of mine.
During one of her monologues at Out Loud, she said, ‘It feels so much gooder when I’m able to step into my bigness.’ I said, ‘Hold on—can I use that?’ And that became the title of Gooder with Bigness, a Shel-Silverstein-meets-Dr.-Seuss kind of book I’m creating with Hancock artist Katie Jo Cudie.”
“Joy Center literally changed the course of my life. It resuscitated an essential me that had not had nearly enough nourishment and exposure and attention.”
Ishpeming resident Cece Korpi’s time with Helen at Joy Center led to a turning point in her life too. She explains, “A friend recommended her yoga class. When I found out it was an hour-and-a-half, I said, ‘I cannot do a class that long, but I’ll give it a try.’ Helen welcomed me with open arms. When the first class was finished, I felt like—“What?! I don’t’ want to go home. I just want to stay here!”’
Helen loved life and people, and shared her joy every day.
At the end of yoga class she would say, ‘All is well,’ and I would think ‘You do not know my life!’ But I took more classes and I learned all is well in this moment.
Helen was so accepting of everybody. By spending time with her and going to a lot of Joy Center offerings, I became more accepting of myself and others. Her joy and compassion were contagious. I came out of my shell and became more confident.”
Like Helen herself, though Joy Center is no longer with us physically, its spirit continues to inspire. Keith Glendon describes a “Joy Center Junior” shed in his backyard where the adults can do art and music. In the spirit of Out Loud, Keith is working with Marquette’s Unitarian Universalist Church leaders to offer Music & Myth Monday, where youth can play music live, or music they like, or read mythology they’ve enjoyed that has spiritual meaning.
UP Poet Laureate Marty Achatz continues the Out Loud tradition each third Thursday on Zoom. All are welcome to join in, whether as listeners or by taking a turn on the Zoom “stage.” You can email him at machatz@nmu.edu for info.
You can also dip into Helen and Joy Center’s creativity and beauty through Undone with Wonder, a poetry collection Helen had been working on now painstakingly published by poet friends Gala Malherbe, Marty Achatz, and Ron Ferguson, with an inviting cover photo of Joy Center’s entryway by wellness consultant and former Joy Center manager Pam Roose, and a warm introduction to Helen by local author B.G. Bradley. Copies are available at the Marquette Regional History Center gift shop and Blackbird Boutique in Marquette. All profits go to the Peter White Public Library.
Ideas are also percolating for a Joy Festival later this year. See the Summer 2023 issue of Health & Happiness UP Magazine for more info.
1 Health & Happiness U.P. Magazine, Spring 2020 issue, copyright 2020.
Excerpted from the Spring 2023 issue of Health & Happiness U.P. Magazine. Copyright 2023, Empowering Lightworks, LLC. All rights reserved.
How is your New Year going so far? Are you keeping the resolutions you set? If not, you are not alone. Every New Year, 87% of adults create new goals and resolutions. There is about a 54% chance you will be unsuccessful and give up by the end of January. Research shows that 95% of New Year’s resolutions are health and fitness related, but after just three months, only 10% of people think their resolution will last.
Why do I share this? Because most of us want to be healthier, happier, more fit, and truly feel our best, but the data shows a New Year’s resolution is not the solution. What I have found to be the best approach is focusing on small habits and creating accountability in your life. It is the healthy habits that will continue to bring success and the accountability that will inch you forward to achieving your goals.
I may be a bit biased, but having a naturopathic doctor in your corner to help set these habits in motion and offer you accountability can make all the difference in working to optimize your health.
Naturopathic medicine has so much to offer.
It provides individualized care and focuses on creating the conditions for health to support the body in healing itself. This is one of the things I love most about this medicine.
When someone comes to Upper Peninsula Natural Wellness for guidance on their health journey, more often than not they have many challenges taking place. My goal is to implement the most gentle intervention to make the biggest shift in their health. One way I do this is through the SHAPE ReClaimed program.
It’s a health restoration and lifestyle modification program that combines a patented homeopathic supplement with the nutrition protocol for a simple, effective and safe way to achieve optimal health. The goal is to teach you new skills and help you embrace a healthy lifestyle. We work on creating those small HABITS that will be a part of your life well after you complete the program.
I find this program simple and effective. It is organized into three phases: cleanse, stabilize, and live. These three phases are designed to first balance your brain chemistry, strengthen your immune system, and cleanse your body of excess weight and toxins. Then you reincorporate new foods and begin to stabilize your weight and brain health, and lastly, learn to maintain this healthy lifestyle.
This program is customized to your bio-individual needs,
meaning I use your health history, symptoms, and urinalysis results to adjust this protocol specifically for you. This will ensure you feel satiated and achieve optimum results. You receive your own program guidebook, nutrition guide, dietary supplement, and any other recommendations I have found beneficial for your healing journey. A urinalysis is used to measure your improvements, and we meet weekly to answer questions, hold you accountable, establish positive health habits, and learn how to take control of your health.
Individuals have experienced a decrease in inflammation, fewer joint problems, better digestion, normalized blood pressure, lower cholesterol and triglycerides, balanced blood sugar, cognitive improvements, reduced dependence on prescription medications, optimal weight, and better overall health.
I look forward to the opportunity to help you on your health journey and would love to be a part of “Creating Your Best Me in 2023.” I work with individuals locally in my office, and remotely via phone or Zoom. Call, text or email the office to schedule a free twenty-minute consultation to see if you are a good fit and ready to take control of your health.
Dr. Linzi Saigh is a naturopathic doctor (ND) and a certified nutrition specialist (CNS) with a Masters in acupuncture (MSAc). Naturopathic medicine is a system that uses natural remedies and therapies along with lifestyle changes to help the body heal itself.
Excerpted from the Spring 2023 issue of Health & Happiness U.P. Magazine. Copyright 2023, Empowering Lightworks, LLC. All rights reserved.
Tamarack Builders is a small company primarily doing remodeling and light commercial construction in Marquette since about 1998. We specialize in older buildings, some that might be considered tear-downs. I like that kind of stuff compared to more modern houses and buildings.
Very nice, talented, thoughtful people work with me. When we’re doing projects, we make sure things are done correctly. Sometimes previous work by others has to be corrected. It can be easy to breeze by those things and say they’re fine, but we try to make sure things are done properly.
For example, with remodeling for energy efficiency, we do insulation and venting to prevent ice dams, which can be a huge issue here. Water infiltration issues, proper flashing techniques—all are very important. By doing so, you extend the life of that building, increasing its energy efficiency and decreasing the likelihood that it will get torn down later.
By extending the life of a building, you’re minimizing its carbon footprint because of the embodied carbon in the materials.
For instance, concrete lasts a long time but it’s really carbon-intensive to make. If you can save a building, you’re preserving that embodied carbon. When things get torn down, it all goes in the landfill, plus you use new materials that have their own carbon footprint.
A lot of these old buildings in Marquette were built with old growth lumber. As they get torn down and their components are thrown away, it’s just gone. I try to save building materials. It often doesn’t take that much effort to save stuff. I put old two-by-fours in a pile. When you get enough stuff, you can make something—countertops, sheds—out of the recycled building parts. I’m a little bit of a hoarder of vintage building materials and try to re-use them the best I can. Old studs are beautiful. I try to save those for re-use.
The other day when it was raining, we had enough stuff saved up that we could build a couple of things at the shop out of recycled materials. It’s rewarding and fun to be able to do that. Not always cheaper, but very rewarding. We built a small boat shed entirely out of recycled materials. We installed a couple of recycled doors using recycled materials and re-purposed what we took out. Small stuff but it adds up.
It’s a personal thing.
It feels really good to be able to put something together, like a boat shed, from salvaged materials. It’s good practice for my employees to think it through and make things work. It’s always good for people to practice all these techniques, use them on a small scale. It’s a good way to gain more experience with something like this.
Three good-size commercial projects we did recently were in buildings that were in really bad shape. Little updating had been done to them; one even had some original wallpaper. We spent the time and money to bring them up to code. One building was far from meeting current codes. If there had ever been a fire there, it would have been devastating. We extended the life of these buildings for a very long time.
One of them was the McLean Chiropractic building on Third Street. It had been slated to be torn down for the last twenty years. Now since we’ve done the work on it, it’s up and running, and good for another hundred years.
I’ve worked on a lot of historic buildings—Donckers, Downtown Eye Care, Evergreen Market, what’s now Queen City Running Company on Baraga, the previous flower shop there, and many vintage residential buildings. I really enjoy that. It’s a lot of fun.
How did you get into this line of work?
I’d worked as a carpenter on Mackinac Island in the ’80s and ’90s. I moved to Marquette and building was a way I could make a living with my skill set, and offered a flexible schedule. When I had kids, I could take time off to be with them, go to their events, drive them around, or whatever. was needed. That was a huge draw for me, enhancing my life and hopefully the life of my family too. Having the ability to take care of someone when they’re sick is important. You can’t do that as easily if you run a retail store. Contracting gives a little flexibility. I extend that flexibility to my employees too. It usually doesn’t make a huge difference if we need to take a few hours off. People need that time to have a healthy balance. Work-life balance is number one. I’m not doing this to get rich, and that’s okay because my work-life balance has been very good.
What do you find most challenging about your work? Doing the paperwork–billing and trying to keep track of that end of the business is not something I like to do. I love being on the job, being with my employees, and working on projects.
Anything else you’d like our readers to know? As a builder, I think people should know these old buildings are worth investing in. It’s worth coming up with a systematic, comprehensive approach. These older structures are valuable and contain a lot of embodied carbon. If we have any hope for climate change, we need to take care of them.
It’s astounding to see what’s thrown away—it’s unreal, all the building materials. It’s heartbreaking to see what goes in the landfill. I’m not saying we can recycle everything, but we can do more. We’ve got to make efforts toward sustainability. I’ve encouraged green building, energy efficiency, and presrvation. The luxury of building a new green structure is not achievable for a lot of people, but in every structure, there’s potential for comfort, energy efficiency, and financial savings.
Excerpted from the Winter ’22 – ’23 issue of Health & Happiness U.P. Magazine. Copyright 2022, Empowering Lightworks, LLC. All rights reserved.
The latest Emissions Gap Report from the United Nations Environment Program (https://www.unep.org/resources/emissions-gap-report-2022) states that the world has just emitted a new annual record amount of carbon dioxide (CO2). Given this increase, to limit global warming to 2°C, we must cut CO2 thirty percent by 2030. A stepwise approach is no longer an option. We need system-wide transformation.
Who is at the top of the emissions list? Americans, emitting over twice the world average CO2 per person. Even though we like to think we are protecting our environment, that “other” people are the problem, we are the actual culprits breaking world CO2 records.
New record: U.S. population–333 million people in November 2022, increasing by 1.4 million Americans per year (https://www.census.gov/popclock/). We must build a new Dallas, Texas (population 1.4 million) each year to accommodate our new Americans. New record: world population–8 billion people by November 2022, increasing by 70 million each year.
Those new additional 1.4 million Americans, our youth, our future, need a slice of our American pie–food, water, land, housing, heat, transportation, all from the limited environment already supporting 333 million Americans. Each must share a smaller, cleaner piece of green pie.
But what more can we Americans do?
How can we emit less and still be Americans? Since most of the rest of the modern world seems able to emit less, how can we break their lower emission records?
We need to learn to live without CO2, then teach the next generation. Eliminate old, fossilized thinking and think anew. That’s hard. But if nothing changes… nothing changes!
Imagine a life without fossil fuels. Cars emit twenty pounds of CO2 per gallon of gas. How would we still drive? We must shift to electric cars (rebates available). No excuses. How would we heat or cool our homes? Homes must rely entirely on electricity so we must install heat pumps (for heating and cooling–rebates available).
How can we clean all that electricity? It still depends mostly on fossil fuels. Our only clean, cost-effective, sustainable option is using renewables. We must install solar at our homes (rebates available). Encourage wind and solar farms in our neighborhoods. Learn to love the look of solar and wind.
Some fossil fuel use will be irreplaceable, but if you think better, most can be eliminated.
Yes, there is a price to pay for changes. Fossil fuels were dishonestly cheap, so cheap that we used them for everything, everywhere. Cheap because we didn’t pay then for our CO2 consequences. The honest, responsible bill is now due. We must pay for the fixes, and fortunately, the fixes create jobs.
Existing homes and apartments must convert to all electric with solar and heat pumps. New construction needs to use less wood to keep trees alive and absorbing CO2. Use less concrete and steel. Making a pound of cement emits a pound of CO2. Making a pound of steel emits 2 lbs. of CO2.
Smaller homes are better, cheaper, have lower emissions, and are easier to clean and maintain. McMansions are fossil thinking. It’s time to upgrade to smaller. Upgrades always have a cost but fossil thinking costs more. That’s the honest price of a healthy environment. We cannot afford to wait for the environment to be on sale.
Let’s break good records this holiday season. Upgrade to eliminate CO2. Get rebates for efficiency, energy, and electric cars. Emit the least CO2 in your life, ever. Let’s have the cleanest water and air, ever. Let’s consume less than ever. These are records waiting to be broken. The next generation is counting on us.
Steve Waller’s family lives in a wind- and solar-powered home. He has been involved with conservation and energy issues since the 1970s and frequently teaches about energy. Steve can be reached at Steve@UPWallers.net.
Excerpted from the Winter ’22 – ’23 issue of Health & Happiness U.P. Magazine. Copyright 2022, Empowering Lightworks, LLC. All rights reserved.
Naturopathic medicine has so much to offer. It provides individualized care and focuses on creating the conditions for health to support the body in healing itself. This is one of the things I love most about this medicine.
When someone comes to Upper Peninsula Natural Wellness for guidance on their health journey, more often than not they have many challenges taking place. My goal is to implement the most gentle intervention to make the biggest shift in their health. One way I am able to do this is through a program called SHAPE ReClaimed.
This is a health restoration and lifestyle modification program that combines a patented homeopathic supplement with the nutrition protocol for a simple, effective and safe way to achieve optimal health. The goal is to teach you new skills and help you embrace a healthy lifestyle.
I find this program simple and effective. It is organized into three phases: cleanse, stabilize, and live.
These three phases are designed to first balance your brain chemistry, strengthen your immune system, and cleanse your body of excess weight and toxins.
Then you will reincorporate new foods and begin to stabilize your weight and brain health, and lastly, learn to maintain this healthy lifestyle.
This program is customized to your bio-individual needs. What this means is that I will use your health history, symptoms, and urinalysis results to adjust this protocol specifically for you. This will ensure you feel satiated and achieve optimum results. You receive your own program guidebook, nutrition guide, dietary supplement, and any other recommendations I have found to be beneficial to your healing journey. A urinalysis is used to measure your improvements, and we meet weekly to answer questions, hold you accountable, establish positive health habits, and learn how to take control of your health.
Individuals have experienced a decrease in inflammation, fewer joint problems, better digestion, normalized blood pressure, lower cholesterol and triglycerides, balanced blood sugar, cognitive improvements, reduced dependence on prescription medications, optimal weight, and better overall health.
Is the program hard? Well, to answer that I often challenge those who come to see me with a mindset shift: Choose your hard!
This means that taking a risk is hard. Staying stuck is hard. Getting in shape is hard. Being out of shape is hard. Meal prep and choosing health over convenience can be hard. Feeling sick, bloated, and inflamed from eating processed food is hard.
Prioritizing self-care is hard. Not making time for self-care is hard.
The moral of the story is: Life is hard. No matter which direction you choose, it’s going to be a challenge. The solution? Choose the hard that pushes you to be better and closer to your goals! You are stronger than you think, and can do hard things!
I look forward to the opportunity to help you on your health journey. I work with individuals locally in my office, and remotely via phone or zoom. Call, text or email the office to schedule a free twenty minute consultation to see if you are a good fit, and ready to take control of your health.
Dr. Linzi Saigh is a naturopathic doctor. Naturopathic medicine is a system that uses natural remedies to help the body heal itself. It embraces many therapies, including herbs, massage, acupuncture, exercise, and nutritional counseling.
Article sponsored by Upper Peninsula Natural Wellness.
Article excerpted from the Winter ’22 – ’23 issue of Health & Happiness U.P. Magazine. Copyright 2022, Empowering Lightworks, LLC. All rights reserved.
Matthew Wheat, founder of Superior Performance Training, Doctoral Student of Physical Therapy & Certified Strength & Fitness Specialist
The World Health Organization’s (WHO’s) current physical activity guidelines are 150-300 minutes of light to moderate exercise or 75 minutes of vigorous activity weekly, as well as participating in strength training twice/week, including exercises that stress all major muscle groups. Adherence to these guidelines can improve and preserve quality of life, reduce healthcare costs, and reduce the risk of all-cause mortality.
Learning a new sport or activity can be an exciting way to get exercise this winter. Examples include snowshoeing, cross-country skiing, or even getting together with friends to join a group exercise class.
When exercise does not feel like a chore, it makes adherence to a lifetime of physical activity much easier. Celebrate the holidays this year by implementing or maintaining the WHO’s physical activity guidelines. It can increase the number of holidays you get to spend with your loved ones.
Melodie Alexander, Owner of TM Fitness, Certified Personal Trainer & Certified Wellness Coach
Winters can be tough on our mind, body, and soul. But after many years of utilizing fitness and nutrition to fuel my health, I now feel the best I have overall in the winter months!
In addition to starting my day by setting myself up for success, noting what I’m thankful for (i.e. “a house full of kids and laughter”), what I will remember for tomorrow (i.e. “I am in control of my success and health”), and one word of the day (i.e. “FORWARD”), I also plan when I’ll do my workout and set out key points for my nutrition.
Moving and sweating takes care of a lot of those stress hormones naturally. Making good food choices continues to aid both my positive mindset and physical health.
Through the holidays, I always suggest if you enjoy certain sweets and meals, have a portion and be done with it so you don’t overindulge.
One of my core mantras is “If it doesn’t challenge you, it doesn’t change you.” Working with someone to keep you accountable and having long and short-term goals also helps set you up for success.
Kari Getschow, Licensed Athletic Trainer & Certified Personal Trainer at Synergy Fitness
With the holidays approaching, our routines can become cluttered with family commitments, holiday parties, and school performances. Though we may have good intentions to exercise, it can be difficult to make time. A proactive strategy is to write down your normal daily schedule. Be specific. For example, in the morning you get out of bed, brush your teeth, make your coffee, walk the dog, and check your email. The list continues until you go to bed. Circle or underline the healthy habits you can continue throughout the holiday season. Add new habits or specificity before the schedules get busy. For example, in the morning, after you brush your teeth and drink a cup of coffee, you go for a 30-minute walk/exercise, and then make breakfast.
Everyone’s schedule is different. Maintain an exercise habit that fits in your schedule. You can honor commitments to yourself by inviting family and friends to walk with you, or block exercise into your schedule as you would a standing appointment. Make a small and attainable fitness habit to maintain your health through the holiday season. Most people miss a day of exercise but focus on the next day to quickly return to their routine.
Connor Ryan, founder of Unity Human Performance and Unity Yoga Co-op & Certified Physical Preparation Specialist
It’s time to set the tone for winter. A simple daily discipline to help you open to the calmness of being in the present moment (in addition to incorporating moments of silence and gratitude first thing in the morning and before going to sleep), is breaking up the middle of your day both mentally and physically with movement.
With changing weather conditions, determination is required to persist in the variable elements. No matter your method, indoors or outdoors, consider and commit to moving your body daily for at least twenty to thirty minutes.
Some exercises I recommend to help keep fit are the squat, hinge, lunge, step up, horizontal push, horizontal pull, vertical push, vertical pull, and plank variation. If you don’t know these movements, it’s best to learn them from a professional. If you do know them, you can incorporate them into a daily routine that takes anywhere from twenty minutes to two hours.
Newton’s First Law: An object at rest will stay at rest, and an object in motion will stay in motion. Find a way. Keep moving forward to stay moving forward.
Excerpted from the Winter ’22 – ’23 issue of Health & Happiness U.P. Magazine. Copyright 2022, Empowering Lightworks, LLC. All rights reserved.
MFC Outreach Director Sarah Monte (right) and Education Coordinator Amanda Latvala (left) at a Feeding America distribution site this summer.
Feeding America West Michigan (FAWM) sends monthly trucks to locations all around the Upper Peninsula to distribute food to people in need. FAWM recently performed a detailed assessment of their mobile pantry distribution program and learned that attendees wanted to learn more about how to prepare healthy meals with the ingredients they were receiving. FAWM, the Marquette Food Co-op (MFC), and the Northern Michigan University Center for Regional Health (NMUCRH) teamed up to create a food education program that would specifically serve attendees of the mobile pantry distribution.
Funding from the Superior Health Foundation has enabled the team to create this multi-faceted project with a virtual and in-person food education component that links food educators across the Upper Peninsula. Seven mobile pantry locations whose attendees indicated strong interest in food education were selected for live food demos or sampling. These locations include Marquette, Ishpeming, Newberry, Sault Ste. Marie, Manistique, Norway, and Ontonagon.
Comprehensive kitchen equipment kits were put together so that our partners had the tools necessary to prepare and serve the food.
At mobile pantry distributions throughout the summer and fall, our partners prepared food in certified kitchens and brought it to the pantry distribution so attendees could taste the prepared recipes. Depending on the location, our team of food educators would demonstrate recipe preparation, or move from car to car serving the featured recipe and chatting about how they prepared it.
This is a particularly fun and challenging partnership, as what food will arrive on the truck often isn’t known until twenty-four hours before the event. FAWM notifies the food educators of the products, and the team gets to work finding the right recipe that features food participants will be taking home that day. Recipients get a copy of the recipe so they can recreate the meal at home.
The MFC and Food for Life Nutrition services developed a suite of recipes tailored to the items most often delivered via the mobile pantry, so the demo team has resources ready to go. These recipes are housed on the NMUCRH website. NMUCRH also worked with the MFC to put together video demonstrations to accompany the recipes. These demonstrations and recipes are available to anyone and can be found at nmu.edu/ruralhealth/recipes.
The MFC provided staff for the demos at the Marquette and Ishpeming locations.
We used our experience with food demonstrations offsite to create equipment kits for each team of food educators at each location. NMUCRH, as an organization that serves the entire Upper Peninsula, travels frequently and was instrumental in dropping off the kits to our partners.
Preliminary evaluations indicate that the recipes are a big hit. For example, out of the 128 evaluations at the Marquette location, 115 people indicated they would make the recipe at home, with another 11 saying maybe they would make the dish at home. 119 people stated they would share the food and/or recipe with other people. It’s not just the participants enjoying the event. As one food educator said, “I loved getting to interact with so many people, cracking jokes and chatting with them. This filled my cup.”
We are thrilled to announce renewed funding for the Recipe for Success Program and are looking forward to another year of bringing food education to sites across the Upper Peninsula. Be sure to visit the NMUCRH site above to learn more about our partners and to try out some of the recipes in your own home!
*Article sponsored by the Marquette Food Co-op
Excerpted from the Winter ’22 – ’23 issue of Health & Happiness U.P. Magazine. Copyright 2022, Empowering Lightworks, LLC. All rights reserved.
Halls of fame have etched the names of influential figures on their walls, placing notoriety and accomplishments on an eternal altar. There’s a hall of fame for football, the NCAA Hall of Champions, and even the Hollywood Walk of Fame. What about locally? In 2017, Marquette’s musical community saw a need to create a hall of fame for local entertainers and honor Marquette’s musical history. The Marquette Music Scene Hall of Fame inducts Marquette musicians plus musical entities and promoters.
“I did it because if we didn’t get down some of those facts and history, they would be lost,” said Marquette Music Scene Hall of Fame founder Cindy Engle. “Right now, if you ask somebody about a venue like The Diamond Club or The Brockton, they have no idea what you’re talking about because those buildings have become other things or are gone.”
The Marquette Music Scene (MMS) is under the umbrella of non-profit organization MÄTI, the Masonic Arts, Theatre, and Innovation Company, which promotes artistic innovation in Marquette. Currently, there are fifty-seven members in the Marquette Music Scene Hall of Fame. Anyone can nominate an individual, group, ensemble, institute, event or venue. The Marquette Music Scene Hall of Fame even inducts musical talents posthumously, making sure their legacy lives on.
A nomination form is available on the Marquette Music Scene website,marquettemusicscene.com. Qualified nominees must be born, raised, or founded in Marquette County, and may represent any music genre or be associated with a music-related vocation from Marquette County’s historical eras.
“It’s a great honor being picked for something like that because you’re chosen by your peers.
We feel strongly about our musical community. It means a lot,” said Dave Zeigner, a 2017 inductee. He plays Latin jazz and blues with the guitar, bass and piano for enjoyment and composing music. He has also played Latin jazz, Afro-Brazilian music, rock, and performed in a symphony.
Zeigner described the ceremony as similar to being at the Grammys or Oscars. There were many guests, people gave speeches, a couple of bands played, and a jam session ensued.
“A good amount of music is going on in our community, and shining a light on that and the people that created it is important,” said Zeigner. “[The Marquette Music Scene] puts in a lot of work to do it every year. My hat’s off to them….. They shine a light on our community and hopefully pique interest in our musical history founder—not just in the county, but the whole UP.”
Judging criteria is based on three categories: impact, influence, and reach.
The inductee must have had a remarkable effect on developing Marquette County’s musical heritage. The inductees are the backbone of music in Marquette through their musical art, teaching Marquette the technique and joy of music, or taking bands and musicians under their wings to promote their voice and manage their growth.
Inductees have a renowned artistic force, compelling their network of fellow musicians to be inspired by their voice or sound. Marquette music fanatics and connoisseurs, even the community at large, are moved by their work.
Also, the musician’s reach must go beyond the boundaries of Marquette’s county lines—their contributions to the music world must be recognized across regions, the nation, and even across the globe.
Cindy Engle is the sole judge for the Marquette Music Scene Hall of Fame, but does have Andrew “Bear” Tyler, a business consultant and marketer, assist. A board of directors for the Marquette Music Hall of Fame is in the process of being established.
Engle conducts an intensive and thorough review of nominees’ applications.
She encourages including any letters of recommendation, awards, multi-media, compositions, discography, or other career highlight documentation. Nominees’ activities in the community, technical innovations, musical teaching experience, and much more are also considered.
Additional awards are gifted to approved nominees. For example, the Music Mafia is an annual award granted to a local business owner or venue operator that has helped the music in Marquette thrive the previous year.
“Renee Prusi at The Mining Journal does all sorts of local music write-ups and stories,” said Engle. “Most of the other Marquette Music Scene Hall of Fame inductees have been bar owners that have kept playing music and promoting live music as much as possible.”
As the title suggests, the Marquette Music Scene Hall of Fame awards Rising Stars to bands formed in the last five years who have heavily influenced the local music scene. The award tells the public and music community to keep an eye out for these rising musicians.
The Marquette Music Scene Hall of Fame induction ceremony is held every year on Small Business Saturday in the Upper Peninsula Masonic Center’s Red Room.
The decision to hold the ceremony then ensures everyone can participate.
“It enables more band members to come and share [their music and time] with the new inductees,” said Engle. “I try not to be in competition with the other venues when they have big events because we all need each other. I don’t want to take away from someone going to see a band at a bar, so if I can pick a weekend when there are not too many places holding live music, that makes it better for everybody.”
Each inductee speaks to the audience about themselves and receives a trophy that acknowledges musical accomplishments. The Marquette Music Scene Hall of Fame will also display inductees’ names on a wall with those of past nominees.
There are hopes to build a showcase where the Marquette Music Scene Hall of Fame can display memorabilia. The 2022 induction ceremony will be at 6:00 p.m. on November 26, the Saturday after Thanksgiving, in the Red Room of the Masonic Building in downtown Marquette. All are welcome to join and celebrate Marquette’s musical best.
Julia Seitz is a Northern Michigan University student pursuing a Bachelor of Arts. You’ll find her either writing creative fiction or researching a new fixation. She enjoys reading scary stories, but is too scared to watch horror movies.
Excerpted from the Winter ’22 – ’23 issue of Health & Happiness U.P. Magazine. Copyright 2022, Empowering Lightworks, LLC. All rights reserved.
Wild rice is known for its rich, black color and mild, earthy flavor, but did you know that it is a fantastically healthy food that can help slow the signs of aging?
Its high antioxidant levels, thirty times higher than other rices, can help do this and offer many other health benefits. Antioxidants neutralize free radicals, the dangerous by-product of cellular metabolism that may cause healthy cells to mutate or turn cancerous. Our bodies may form free radicals from eating refined processed food, smoking, drinking, environmental pollutants, eating sugar, and taking pharmaceutical drugs.
When you eat wild rice, the high antioxidant content may help neutralize the free radicals that accumulate under the skin, which can cause wrinkles and other blemishes. It is important to note that white rice has no antioxidant capabilities.
Wild rice offers other wonderful health benefits too. It has high fiber content, which can help improve digestion, is good for the heart, and may help reduce the risk of colon cancer. Wild rice’s high phosphorus, vitamin K, and zinc levels are good for strong bones, bone mineral density, and healthy joints. Wild rice also contains vitamins A, C, E, B6, niacin, calcium, iron, magnesium, selenium, and omega-3 fatty acids. Wild rice is best cooked with other brown rices to create a nice chewy texture, sweet, earthy flavor, and colorful combination.
Wild Rice Mushroom Pilaf
1/4 cup wild rice 1/4 cup short grain brown rice 1/4 cup long grain brown rice 1 1/2 cups water 1/2 onion (diced) 2 garlic cloves (minced) 2 cups chopped assorted mushrooms (shiitake, maitake, cremini, or your favorite) 1 carrot (diced) 2 celery sticks (diced) 1/2 cup walnuts (chopped) 2 T. minced parsley 2 T. raisins (optional) toasted sesame oil tamari 1/2 tsp. thyme 1/4 tsp. rosemary 1/4 tsp. sage 1/4 tsp. sea salt
Directions
Put the rices and water in a pot and bring to a boil. Reduce to the lowest possible temperature, cover, and simmer for one hour until all the water has been absorbed. Sauté the onion in a little toasted sesame oil and tamari until soft and translucent. Put the sautéed onions in a large mixing bowl. Using the same pan, sauté the carrots in a little toasted sesame oil and tamari for a couple of minutes until they are browned and add to the bowl. Sauté the mushroom and celery the same way, then add to the bowl.
Chef Valerie Wilson has been teaching cooking classes since 1997. She offers weekly, virtual cooking classes that all can attend. Visit http://www.macroval.com for schedule, cookbook purchases, phone consultations, or radio show, and follow her on Facebook at Macro Val Food.
Excerpted from the Fall 2022 issue of Health & Happiness U.P. Magazine. Copyright 2022, Empowering Lightworks, LLC. All rights reserved.
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