Dear Friends,

Happy May 1st! Our new Habit of the Month is Moving in May. Taking care of yourself is important. Intentional movement each day will help your overall health. If you have not exercised in a while, this habit is for you. You will start with an attainable goal. You will not be pushing yourself beyond your limits.

Spend 15 minutes a day in purposeful movement. That can be any kind of movement. You can walk for 15 minutes. You can track your steps and increase your daily steps. You can do stretching, strength training, or just play with your kids.

If you want to combine it with your homeschool, you can go on a nature walk, or you can do some exercises with your kids. My little ones used to love to do stretching and light exercises with me in the mornings. Now that I have bigger kids, they like it when I play basketball with them in the yard. We have also had a lot of fun biking as a family.

I know how easily you can put off daily exercise. I started and stopped for years. Finally, I decided I wanted to be around long enough to see all of my children grown up and see my grandchildren. I made it a point to change my exercise and eating plans to take care of my health.

Some of you have read my story, but I will share it briefly. Five years ago, I was overweight with high blood pressure, high cholesterol, and borderline high blood glucose levels. I was on several prescriptions, and I felt awful. I was lethargic.

I made the decision that I wanted to start running, and I started slowly. I walked way more than I ran to start with. I had to learn to breathe. I have asthma, so that was no small feat. I had to add on small amounts of time and distance. It took me months to be able to just run 1 mile without walking. But I kept at it. I kept improving a little at a time. I set small, attainable goals.

As I ran more and ate better, I lost weight. I gained strength and energy. I added in other kinds of exercise with strength training, biking, and swimming. I played with my kids more. They did a lot of activities with me.

Daily movement became a part of my life, and I did it by starting slow and steady. I found a time of day that worked for me to be consistent in exercising. I started going to bed earlier, so I could get up and exercise before the children were out of bed. If I did something with them later in the day, it was for enjoyment.

Thanks for sharing your ideas for daily movement. You can incorporate daily movement into your homeschool, too.

Your Home Blessing for today is to dust and vacuum.

Your Zone Mission for today is to declutter in the Entryway for 15 minutes.

My menu plan for Tuesday is Taco Tuesday for the boys. Veggies and salad for me.