Baker's heartbeat

The snowy view outside the house during a historic cold spell. The historic cold weather in the Midwest -- most particularly in my home state of Iowa -- reminded me about growing up in Minnesota. According to the National Weather Service in Scott County, Iowa, the high today is -15 degrees Farenheit, with a low of -29 degrees. We are on the national news and there are stories in the newspaper of how part of the Polar Vortex has broken off and settled over the Lower 48 States, including Iowa and Minnesota. Radio commentators mention these are the coldest temperatures in several decades, not seen since 1982, for example. Residents who are Millennials have never experienced such cold weather. That's not the case of a Baby Boomer born in Minneapolis. One time was when I was about 9 years old I went skating with my sisters and neighbor kids, and we all stayed out for hours on the rink in subzero weather. We finally went home and Mom told me to take a bath. That warm bath h...

Girlfriends from Tipton, Iowa, reunite in 2018 at the Tipton Country Club The strength of friendship is well known, but did you also realize that strong friendships are good for your health? Research shows friendship, especially the lasting kind, are commonly connected to better health, including heart health. The data shows that the more rich, and the number of friendships you enjoy, the longer your longevity. As an example, several of my girlfriends are now 60-61 years old, and we all met when we were students at Tipton Elementary School in Tipton, Iowa. We've kept in touch over the decades, through letters, phone calls, texts these days, parties, and in the last 10 years, trips. As our children grow older, the strength of female friendship becomes more, and more important. As a daily newspaper reporter for health and wellness, I once interviewed several women from Rock Island. Those girls had been friends since childhood, and vouched for the the connections that las...

Craft room set up for scrapbooking hobby About 45 years ago I started sorting my photos into a scrapbook, of sorts. It was a rudimentary effort, but the first example of what evolved into a full-fledged hobby after I met my husband. Luckily we have had a momentous 31 years of marriage, and I, the former journalist, happily chronicle the Baker family life. Scrapbooking, the hobby, is one of the fastest-growing in the United States, according to Smithsonian magazine, at Smithsonian.com. The value of scrapbooks has spanned the centuries, according to a report by graphic designer Jessica Helfand, as cited in a 2009 story, "The Cherished Tradition of Scrapbooking." Hefland once wrote negatively about the hobby and was taken aback by a response from scrapbook hobbyists. She then went out and acquired 200 scrapbooks, and wrote a book, "Scrapbooks: An American History." In the Smithsonian account, she talks about 19th century scrapbooking, which tended to the ma...