I love Baffin and Tea!

Okay, two totally unrelated things that have both entered my life in the last few days and I love them both.

The first are my Baffin Impact winter boots. These things are worth every penny! My feet are so warm and they are so comfortable. Yes, they are on the huge side, so when I change to my regular shoes, I walk funny for a while. Like my legs are dragging or something. But when I walk outside in -20 degree weather, my feet are oh so toasty!

I would recommend Baffin to anyone living in extreme cold weather areas. These boots totally ROCK!

As for the other, I've been drinking tea off and on for a few years. Green tea mostly. I put honey in it, but it never really thrilled me. And you had to wait for the water to heat up, which I told myself I didn't have the time to do.

Well, a few days ago I got knocked to my knees with a head cold. It made me panic because the last time I had a cold, it took my voice away for a month. I am at this point two weeks away from my show opening. I need my voice!

On day two of my cold, more than half of my vocal range was gone. I could speak, but not very well. And definitely no upper range at all!

I refuse to take cold medicines. Most of them will actually prolong the cold because it dries up the symptoms, which are actually your body's processes of cleaning out the disease. And usually when I take those medicines to sleep, it's a drugged sleep, not a restful one.

So I stalked the internet, looking for natural remedies to cure my cold. Read about the usual hypes, echinacea, zinc, blah, blah, blah. Zinc has never worked for me. Read about garlic, may try that one next time.

The one I saw over and over again was tea with honey and lemon. So I started drinking at least three cups a day (I have several versions of green tea). I was also drinking as much water as I could manage throughout the day. And spending a lot of time running to the bathroom.

I even tried a variety box of teas specifically for colds, like Throat Coat, Breathe Easy, Organic Echinacea, and Gypsy Cold Care.

I think this cured me of my cold in three days.

The night before the third day, I spent two hours coughing and coughing while trying to sleep on the futon. Then all of a sudden it stopped. When I woke up, I was feeling fantastic. My voice took another day to start coming back.

I still have some phlegm floating around between nose and lungs, but the temps have been in the negatives for the last week (today, -24, the coldest we have seen yet). I wear thermals, my Baffins, my heavy coat, gloves, and my turtle head thing that covers my head, neck, and face except for my eyes. I think everyone is in the same boat as me at this point!

Anyway, I'm in love with tea + honey + real lemon and my Baffin boots. I think these are true necessities for dealing with your health in cold climates like Alaska.

Just my humble opinion, of course! ;)