Tips on how to adopt healthy eating habits were provided by club member Rae Clarke at the October meeting of the Obadiah Homemaker Volunteers Club.

“The secret to a long, happy and healthy life doesn’t come in a medicine bottle!” Clarke said. “Go to your kitchen, instead of your doctor.”

Clarke shared information gleaned during a recent visit to the doctor.

”I was there in the doctor’s office and picked up some pamphlets and the first one I read was about bananas, raisins and almonds and how those three fight the syndrome that leads to heart disease and diabetes,” she said.

“Another (pamphlet) described five nuts that are listed as the ‘King of the Nuts,” Clarke continued. “The nutritional benefits of just seven a day is all it takes to combat heart disease, cancer, gallstones, diabetes and weight gain. They are peanuts, pecans, pistachios, macadamias and almonds.”

Clarke also spoke about an “amazing fruit” that fights four big health problems: red grapes.

“Underneath all the sweet flavor of the fruit is something more powerful,” she said. “Red grapes are tiny wonders loaded with amazing phytochemicals.” 

Phytochemicals are nature’s way of helping bodies lower blood pressure, improve cholesterol levels, deflate inflammation and help preserve memory to fight against dementia, she added.

The impact of Vitamin D in fighting dementia concluded Clarke’s presentation.

”Give your brain the fighting power it needs with Vitamin D and yellow foods like oranges, bananas, fresh peaches or the canned ones,” she said. “You see, your brain invites Vitamin D into its system to get rid of nasty toxins that can lead to Alzheimer’s and dementia to help boost memory and your overall mental function.”

Current world events prompted Barbara Stinson to choose a devotional reading from Psalm 46: 1 and 10:

— 1 God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble.

— 10  Be still, and know that I am God: I will be exalted among the heathen, I will be exalted in the earth.

“Along with those two verses, the words to a gospel hymn kept going through my head,” Stinson said, “And I think it is important to remember that what ever is going on around  us or with us, to remember that it is well with our souls.”

When peace like a river, attendeth my way,

When sorrows like sea billows roll

Whatever my lot, thou hast taught me to say

It is well, it is well, with my soul

It is well

With my soul

It is well, it is well with my soul

• Lyrics by hymnnist Horatio Stafford

 

Stinson concluded her devotion with prayer and blessing for the prepared refreshments.

During the business session, the following announcements were made:

• Thursday —Central Area Fall Meeting, Bay Springs.

• Oct. 23 — Members will deliver cookies to the Welcome Center as an expression of Southern hospitality to visitors to Mississippi who stop at the site.

• Nov. 4-5 — 33rd Annual Homemakers Arts and Craft Show and Sale at MCC Tommy Dulaney Center. Times: Nov. 4, from 10 a.m.-5 p.m.; Nov. 5, from noon-5 p.m. According to organizers, more than 65 vendors are signed up for the event, which features all homemade goods for sale.

The meeting adjourned with the Pledge of Allegiance.

• Submitted by Cathy Clearman, reporter.