20 Ways You Can Reduce Stress By Doing Things That Make You Feel More Alive

This post is primarily a reprint of a message I received this morning from Pemo Lhamo, a member of Free Yoga Miami. She's right on, and for those of us here in Miami with kids, and families, and jobs, and houses to clean, and bills to pay, and, and, and....well, you get the picture. It's well worth reading and taking to heart. None of these ideas are new ones...but let me ask you this--are you doing any of these things to take care of yourself during these difficult times? If the answer is "no", you should read Pemo's tidy little list, and try adopting some of these practices.

I work with the public a lot and the most popular topic of conversation lately is the dwindling economy. This is proving to be a source of immense stress in a lot of people. Stress is related to most major illnesses, so we must do what we can to create a stress-free environment for ourselves. Besides a regular yoga and meditation practice, here are 20 ways you can reduce stress by doing things that make you feel more alive...

1. Start a breathing practice.

2. Express gratitude when you rise in the morning and before each meal.

3. Ride the bus or bike instead of driving.

4. Begin each morning with a light stretch.

5. Get a massage on a regular basis.

6. Smile at strangers.

7. Plant a garden.

8. Take a class.

9. Write a letter.

10. Spend time outdoors!

11. Enjoy a 15 minute afternoon siesta.

12. Anoint your feet with oil and a little massage.

13. Follow a child around doing what they do for half an hour.

14. Smile in the mirror every morning.

15. Make dinner for friends.

16. Take a 24 hour media fast.

17. Visit an elderly relative.

18. Return to a hobby you love.

19. Sit under a tree for an afternoon.

20. Tell your family and friends how much you love them!

Namaste, everyone! ♥

photo: sxc.hu/juliaf

URGENT! Thomas the Tank Engine Coming to Miami

This is a quick post letting all parents of crazed, young Thomas the Tank Engine fans know that THE Thomas the Tank Engine is rolling into Miami this weekend and next. You can find all the detailed information about the event, Day Out With Thomas, here.

I bought tickets for a friend and her son online last night as an early birthday present for him, and I'm telling you, these tickets are HOT. The Day Out With Thomas event includes a 25-minute ride on a train pulled by the "real" Thomas the Tank Engine, and several of the rides were already sold out. Wow.

And if you think I'm being harsh by calling young Thomas fans "crazed", well, all I can say is, maybe you've never met one. These kids LOVE their trains...at Cool de Sac, the overwhelming majority of the fights that I see at the facility are at one of the two train tables.

I've learned from talking to my friend that it's a brilliantly marketed toy...they basically market it like any kid's doll or character, with accompanying "friends" for Thomas (other trains and vehicles), "houses" for the characters (various roundhouses and stations), carrying cases, mats that the trains can drive on, train tracks, and the ultimate accessory--The Train Table. They offer both plastic and wooden trains, which hit different price points. The wooden trains are more expensive. When I asked about getting her son Thomas gear for Christmas, she informed me "he only collects the plastic trains; no wooden trains," and cited price as the reason.

OK, enough about Thomas. Even if your kid isn't crazy for Thomas, he or she would probably enjoy the Miami Day Out With Thomas event--it sounds really cool. And they'd surely recognize Thomas from the pervasive books, toys, and television programs. Then again, the host venue, the Gold Coast Railroad Museum, offers free train rides on Wednesdays that might be just as much fun for your kiddo minus the $18 ticket price.

Revamped Curbside Recycling Program in Miami-Dade County!

So, this post was originally going to be about how Whole Foods now accepts #5 plastics for recycling inside their stores, and how this was such fantastic news because the Miami-Dade County curbside recycling program is, well, TERRIBLE! And then, when I went to the solid waste management website for the Miami curbside recycling program, lo and behold, up popped the news that the curbside recycling program in Miami has been majorly revamped.

City of Miami Solid Waste Management is now going to provide 65-gallon wheeled recycling bins, all items can be mixed together in the bins--this is called single-stream recycling--,and curbside recycling pickup in Miami-Dade will be every other week rather than weekly.

Most importantly, the Miami curbside recycling program is now going to accept SO much more than it previously did--before, we could recycle plastics 1 & 2, aluminum and steel, some glass, and newspaper. Now, they will accept a wide variety of paper, including office paper, magazines, and mail, flattened boxes like cereal boxes and corrugated cardboard, and a much wider spectrum of plastics--all numbers 1 through 7. Wow! A complete list of items eligible for curbside recycling in Miami-Dade county with the new program can be found here.

As a mom, this means you will now be able to recycle all of the following items that you weren't able to before through the Miami-Dade county curbside recycling program: juice boxes, plastic yogurt containers, single serve applesauce containers, the cardboard boxes that popular "kid foods" are packaged in (granola bars, crackers, cookies, cereal, oatmeal), toy packaging, diaper boxes, and paper used for arts and crafts.

Remember, you'll still need to take your plastic grocery bags back to the store to recycle.

The Miami-Dade county website says that the new bins and new program will be rolling out over the next few weeks, and that in the meantime, Miami residents should stick to their usual curbside recycling program rules.

I'm excited about this, because I've always been surprised that Miami curbside recycling was so lame--I used to live in the small town of Bloomington, Indiana, and their curbside program was fantastic. They also further encouraged people to recycle by requiring a $1 tag to be placed on every can or bag of trash set out for pickup--but recycling was no charge. So theoretically, you would recycle as much as you possibly could from the list to avoid having to pay for garbage tags.

Anyway, FYI in the meantime, Whole Foods IS now accepting #5 plastic (like yogurt containers) at bins inside their stores. I guess if you haven't gotten your new recycling containers from city of Miami yet ( I haven't), you'll need to recycle #5 plastic this way for now.

Happy curbside recycling, city of Miami!