A Holiday for Health

Since 1960, the first Monday in October has been set aside to celebrate and focus on the health of children.  In the spirit of that, we decided to take a few moments to share our take on childhood health and how we can help the children in our lives be the best that they can be, both inside and out. 

Promote Activity 

According to information compiled by the Department of Health & Human Services, only one in three children is physically active each day.  Here are some thin...

Getting Real About Routine

With only a little over a week until the first day of the 2018-2019 school year and all the hustle-and-bustle that goes with it, we took some time to reflect recently on the importance of routine in our quest to achieve the best possible version of ourselves...and our children.  Routines are a powerful force that drives productivity, organization, and in some cases, sanity.  So, while you’re sending the kids to bed earlier and setting wake-up alarms for perhaps the...

Summer Scholars

The early morning alarms are silent and the buses aren’t rolling now—for the next couple months anyway.  While you may be glad for the less hectic start to the day and the lighter traffic on the road, there is a downside to summer break: “summer learning loss.”  Statistically, children and teachers must spend six weeks of each school year re-learning old material to make up for the knowledge lost over the summer months.  Because our hope for your children and ours is for the...

A List for Life

Graduation season is upon us, and we thought we would use this festive season, when we celebrate the students in our lives, to share a few thoughts to both encourage these young people as they embark on their next journey in life and also to remind the rest of us that there’s still time and need for us to pursue our dreams, as well.

Build Your Bucket List

Make a list of a few things that you want to do between now and Labor Day.  To help motivate you, we’ve included a few of o...

To Keep or Not to Keep: The

Reality of Resolutions

We’re all familiar with the time-honored tradition of people committing to goals at the start of a new year.  We’re all probably just as aware that the majority of those people do not continue the pursuit of those goals much beyond the end of January.  Because we truly want this to be your best year yet, we decided to take a few moments to jot down some tips for making...and keeping...those resolutions of yours.

Determine your “why”

Friedri...

The Truth About The Holidays That No One Really Talks About

The Christmas season is now in full swing, and there’s always much that gives us cause to feel that “holiday cheer” mentioned in many of our favorite yuletide tunes.

However, for many, this time of year brings with it increased feelings of stress and anxiety: the American Psychological Association once completed a study to measure the increase of stress that takes place and discovered that as much as 38% of participants reported fee...

A Community That  Cares

There are nearly 1,000 non-profits in Grand Traverse County, nearly 100 of which are designated as “public charities.”  We are blessed to live in a place where giving is at the center of what we do.  A few short weeks ago, we were fortunate to be able to participate in the 2017 Circle of Friends Luncheon benefitting the Traverse Bay Children’s Advocacy Center.  As we listened to the speakers share their touching stories and looked out over the crowd of attendees, we we...