BOCA BALANCED LIVING CHALLENGE – VOTING PERIOD CLOSE

Am I unbalanced??

I readily admit that I am nowhere near the gardener my mother in law is. And my sister inherited our mom's green thumb (I got her penchant for adopting stray animals). So, even though I try, it boggles me why I cannot make the front and back yards and vegetable garden a little more . . . well, alive.

My first excuse is this is Texas and we are in yet another drought (and it is only January!). I have tried planting grass and watering as much as allowed and planting veggies with limited success.

Our little vegetable garden has been untended since before the toddler came along (2 years and counting). Between time constraints, being eaten alive by mosquitos and not being able to kneel because of recent knee surgery, our backyard veg garden is in sad, sad shape.

There was a time when the tomatoes and serrano peppers yielded us so much homemade salsa that we could freeze enough to make it till the next growing season.

My 2 youngest have never seen the veg garden, never picked their very own cherry tomatoes. Sad, I know.

I wish the garden and surrounding grassy area was better maintained and I could spend meditative time cultivating it. The whole family could enjoy the space better. A mosquito machine, some expert advice, some help with my gardening - that would help balance my life and my family's.

Deanna Limon

BOCA Balanced Living Challenge

Balance something everyone strives for, and in the recent months I think I've come a long way towards a more balanced life. 2008 was a crazy year - both my husband and I had new jobs, had just moved to a new city, we were getting our daughter adjusted our new life, and we were sorely missing our support system from our old town. But we have begun to take back control. We're eating better, working out more and meeting new people. We are feeling more centered and healthy. But while so many other aspects of our lives are back on track, my husband and I feel distant from each other.

We work full time, spend as much time with our daughter as possible, and try to workout each day. That leaves the weekends dedicated to maintenance of our old house and not much else. Even though we do these things together it feels like we never see each other. While our life has gained some order our relationship has taken a back seat. Money's tight, babysitters are expensive and time for just the two of us is scarce. But we both believe that our relationship deserves just as much time and dedication as a daily workout or time with our daughter.

$5000 would mean two things: a dedicated date night fund and a fund for a housecleaning service. It would mean we would have the time to pay more attention us -which makes balanceing everything else so much easier.

Kate Davis

How BOCA can make an artist's life balanced!

Being newly married, moving away from home, no friends and not working can make any woman unbalanced. My husband is in the military and can be gone for weeks at a time leaving me alone in a small apartment with our dog. Luckily with my pencils and paper, I keep happy and content. Though my pencils and paper keep me company, meeting some new friends up here would be wonderful. I have always loved photography, but have never had the means to get a good camera or take classes. Taking photography classes and purchasing a good camera would connect me with people similar to myself and would help me learn more about an extenstion to my passion all at the same time. BOCA could help me achieve this goal. People assume being in the military we are being well taken care of. Our situation is a little different. By the time bills are taken care of, we barely have the money to get groceries. I am in the process of looking for a job, but have been unsuccessful. Learning photography would help me expand my skills and make me an overall happier wife for my husband to come home to.

Ashley Riner

A Journey with Boca that Leads to a Broader Journey

There was a day when I realized I had almost 80 extra pounds on my body and that in just a few short months it could be 100. I knew on this day that my eating habits were out of control and that my life had to change. I started slowly, by beginning to eat healthier (Bye, bye greasy hamburgers; Hello Boca burgers and ground crumbles!) and exercising. Then, I started to more closely monitor my calorie consumption and to calculate my calorie output. In less than two years, I went from weighing 205 to 135 pounds.

During this journey I developed a passion for health and fitness. This passion is another journey I want to follow to its conclusion. My ultimate goal is to become a personal trainer, and after many hours of research and sifting through web-sites, I found an accredited public four-year University that offers a ACE (American Council on Exercise) certified personal training program on-line. It is a dream of mine to enroll in this course, to complete their program with flying colors, and become a trainer. As an ACE-certified trainer not only would I be leading a balanced life of my own, but I would be qualified to help other people balance their lives. I am accustomed to hard work, so if I am able to start this program with help from Boca, a company whose products have already assisted me through a long journey, I know I will succeed and bring everything full circle.

Ashley M.

The change I'd like to make in my life and how BOCA can help me achieve balance

To achieve better balance in my life, my goal is to buy a home so my husband and I can move out of our tiny one bedroom apartment and live a little larger. I'd like to plant a vegetable and herb garden to provide fresh produce for a healthy diet, and learn how to start canning so that we can make use of everything we grow. While our current kitchen barely has room to turn around, our future house should give us room to spread out and prepare more elaborate meals. Eating delicious home cooked meals every day is very important to us, and BOCA products provide delicious and convenient foods to fit our lifestyle. My goals also include exercising more often, which may be easier with a living room that I can stretch in without bumping into furniture. With some extra living space, we plan to rescue a shelter dog as soon as possible. Having more than one bedroom is also one of the first steps toward our goal of starting a family. Having a house later this year to make into our home and sanctuary is my goal to help create a more balanced life.

Mandi Rogier

A More Peaceful Mom

I've recently started on a second career after almost 20 years in "corporate" America and being downsized. I've returned to the community college and am working part-time in my "new" career. I have 3 children (one in elementary school and 2 in middle school) so balancing work, school and children/home management is becoming overwhelming. I'd love to get some help in reorganizing my home so that it doesn't always look overrun with homework (kids and mine), papers (coupons, articles, school papers) and stuff (kids and grown-ups alike!). I'd also love a space in my home that is just mine. The computer I use mainly is also used by 4 others, so I'm competing for time and space. My stuff is shoved to the side when someone else sits down and the piles add up! I spend too much time cleaning and looking for stuff. I also need a good calendaring system that can accommodate all our needs, yet is portable. Our entry area is also in need of help. Finding space for jackets, hats, mittens, backpacks and boots for all of us is real challenge. We have a small mud room and it's always a mess. Our budget for home improvements is zero right now. I'd love my interactions with my husband and kids to be positive and fun, rather than stressed and nagging, plus have more time to do something relaxing together! I know my family would like a more peaceful mom! Help!

jackie d.

Balancing Act

I am exhausted! I work full time outside the home. My daughter is in 3 dance classes, soccer and basketball. My stepson is in 2 dance classes, bowling, and boy scouts. We are always eating meals on the go because of having to rush off to activities. Eating healthier meals would help give our diets more balance. If I won the $5,000 I would put some of it toward incorporating more organic foods into our diet, and buy a few sessions with a local nutritionist for advice on quick meals that are good for us. Always running around with the kids doesn't leave any time to exercise at a gym, so I would love to get a treadmill for home and a portable exercise bike for under my desk at work. Next, a Wii Fit would be great for the whole family to enjoy exercise with. To balance emotionally, I would buy some bubble bath and good books (for the whole family to use) to help relax and relieve stress! I would replace our mattresses too, so we can rest better and get more sleep. Finally for romantic balance I want to take my husband to our local murder mystery dinner theater for a relaxing and fun night out. I would get their favorite babysitter to spend a fun night in with them playing their favorite games. I believe these small changes would help restore a healthier, more restful balance to our crazy, hectic lives.

Kimber L.

Balance = Living Life

Everyone has stress. It's a burden that we all share with this modern life. We all deal with stress differently and have different stressors that plague us. When you have children and work outside of the home, you lead a demanding lifestyle ALL the time. Then, if you throw getting an education into the mix, it just becomes more muddled. I have a 1 1/2 year old daughter, a full time job and I'm trying to finish my Bachelor's Degree and move on to my Master's. As a family, we really try to stay balanced. My husband helps out in every way that he can to make my life easier so I have time to finish homework, work late, or just spend time with my daughter. We also believe that eating healthy and staying fit are major keys to staying balanced. In order to stay in balance, with all of these things on my plate, I am going to leave my job come fall to dedicate myself to my education. That is where BOCA could help me achieve balance in my life, by helping ease the transition between work and school.

Jessica Contreras

Balancing Cancer and No Cancer for My Family

I would like my family to be done with cancer! For the past year, I was sick most of the time and unable to do the basic tasks of raising my kids. My husband had to watch me suffering AND take care of the kids, feed them dinner, put them to bed… while working full-time an hour away.

My four-year-old acquired quite a vocabulary! She knows about colon cancer, chemo, radiation, oncology nurses, ostomy bags, and surgery. She was with babysitters so much of the year when I couldn’t care for her. She would cry and beg me to take her with me to doctor appointments.

My son was in complete denial. “If mom says she’ll be okay, she’ll be okay!” Except he had trouble at school. Poor little guy, he was full of stress and didn’t even know it.

My oldest daughter was sad. She would tell me all the time, “I wish you didn’t have cancer,” and I would say, “Me too.”

This was a tremendous financial strain on our family as well. We have an enormous deductible, so we have had to cut a lot of extras out of our life at a time when extras would have helped a lot.

Now that I am recovering, what would help us find balance would be a chance to transition to our cancer-free life and relax as a “normal” family on a vacation. If there were kids activities, all the better, so my husband and I could reconnect.

Frances Fischer

Feeling Fine in 2009--My Boca Balanced Living Contest Entry

For me, balanced living is having a healthy body, mind, and spirit. I work with eight very active toddlers, and it is very hard for me to take proper care of myself because at the end of the day, all I want to do is put on my flannel pajamas and sleep. There are a few things that I would do with this gift from Boca. I love to buy organic produce, but my budget does not permit this very often, so I would set aside a portion of the money to buy some organic produce. I also recently attended a yoga class for the first time, and I really would like to continue taking classes, so another portion would be set aside for yoga classes. When I was in the Yoga class, I was able to shut out all of the noise and the busyness of the week and concentrate on me. Because I am constantly picking up the children and getting down on their level, I have to deal with back and knee pain. I have had massages twice before and they are extremely beneficial to my body, so I will set aside some of the money for therapeutic massages, as well. I also believe that when one has taken care of themselves, they are then able to help others. Finally, I will donate a portion of my gift and my time to the hospice that was of great help to my family in my grandmothers last days.

Kylee **is always dancing up storm ** S.