At CPR Choice we get to train heroes almost every day.   We train fireman, police, doctors, nurses, EMTs, soldiers and more. When you think of heroes those are usually the people that come to mind, right? While all of those people are heroes we also train a totally different group of heroes…TEACHERS!

This week is Teacher Appreciation Week and we want to take a minute to say “thank you!”. Teachers sacrifice so much of their lives and time for our children and they don’t get thanked nearly enough. Now that I have a child in the school system (First grade), I can say that my son’s teachers have truly amazed me. They do so many little things to try and make his learning experience better. I know that they spend money out of their own pockets to decorate their classrooms and to have little treats for the kids.

Summer is almost here! Don’t forget to acknowledge and appreciate your child’s teachers. I read a quote once that said, “summer vacation is a time when parents realize that teachers are grossly underpaid”. This is so true!

We want to extend a special discount for our teacher heroes. Many schools require teachers to be CPR certified but they expect teachers to pay for it on their own. We recommend that all school staff be certified in CPR and for several staff members to be certified in first aid. We read stories every day about teachers preventing fatalities at school due to their CPR knowledge. You never know when you might need to use those skills and we want you to feel prepared. Sign up for a CPR class today and take advantage of our discount for teachers!

It’s April, that means the Dogwood Arts Festival is here! The kick-off celebration starts today and offers a variety of events and festivities.  Dogwood trails, live entertainment, arts, crafts and live music.  Market Square will be buzzing, starting today, with vendors and local craftspeople and it is worth the trip to visit and meander thru the tents and people!  Actually the fun doesn’t end in April, Dogwood Arts has blossomed into a 12 month celebration to sponsor and celebrate our region’s art, culture and natural beauty.  Here’s a full list of events:

Dogwood Arts in April

April 1, 2015 :: A Very Special Arts Festival

April 2, 2015 :: SYNERGY [Student Art Exhibition & East Tennessee Art Educator Exhibition] Openings

April 3, 2015 :: Art in Public Places Knoxville and Regional Fine Art Exhibition Openings

April 8, 2015 :: Dogwood Luncheon

April 8-26, 2015 :: Dogwood Trails, Open Gardens & Camera Sites and Walking Trails

April 10-12, 2015 :: Rhythm N’ Blooms

April 11, 2015 :: Chalk Walk

April 11-12, 2015 :: Dogwood Art DeTour

April 17-19, 2015 :: Dogwood Arts Festival on Market Square

April 25 & 26, 2015 :: Featured Open Gardens

April 25 & 26, 2015 :: Bikes & Blooms

Knoxville Film Festival

September 17-20, 2015 :: Knoxville Film Festival

Bazillion Blooms

December 5, 2015 :: Bazillion Blooms

House & Garden Show

February 12-14, 2016 :: House & Garden Show

Take some time out of your schedule and enjoy all the events!  For more information visit www.dogwoodarts.com!  Enjoy!

Congratulations to all the runners, walkers and volunteers who participated in the 2015 Covenant Health Knoxville Marathon weekend.   In its 11^th year, Knoxville welcomed over 7000 runners and walkers to the streets of Knoxville this cold Sunday morning. If you’re a runner and/or walker or both this race offers something for you. A marathon, half marathon, 5k, 2 relay options and a kids run.  We also saw a lot of race teams today.  Team t-shirts and groups of teams were sprinkled through out the race, all supporting their business, employers and running groups.  What we loved was the fact that these teams, training behind them now were holding each other accountable and supporting each other every step of the way.  This is the exact reason why Covenant Health uses this race as a motivator to help people improve their overall health and help bring an awareness of the importance of physical activity and quality of life.

Even though the race course can be challenging and has grown to become one of the largest competitive road races in East Tennessee, this race is my favorite of all time!   The finish line is in Neyland Stadium, home of our Tennessee Volunteers, and you get to enjoy your victorious finish on the 50 yard line! It is such a thrill to see yourself on the jumbrotron and see the crowds in the stands cheering you on!

Again, congratulations to all the participants who ran today and a big thank you to all the countless volunteers and medical staff that were present before, during and after the race.  CPR Choice hopes to see you all next year!

Click here for WBIR’s photo album of today’s race.

Last week was such an exciting week for us!  We love this time of year as it brings a lot of attention to the things we are passionate about.  With February being American Heart Month and yesterday being National Wear Red day we wanted to do something to help raise awareness and to give back to our community.  We thought that the best things that we could do is offer a free community CPR class.  We also wanted to help inform people about the signs and symptoms of heart attack and stroke and equip people with some ways that they can improve their own heart health.  Although heart disease is the leading cause of death in America, 80% is preventable and we want to help our community learn more about prevention.  Here are 7 simple things that you can do to create a healthier heart!

We were asked by, WATE Channel 6, to come and interview to share our event with the community.  I did two interviews; one for the morning news and one again at 5:30PM.  It was a great experience. Although I have been doing public speaking for over 15 years it was still a new experience.  I definitely think it was easier the 2nd time.  The first time I wasn’t really sure what to expect and wasn’t given much prep.  It was fun though and a lot of people heard about our free class and we had a full house last night.  A big thanks to Shelby Miller & Kristin Farley for having us on their show.

Last night we taught the friends and family CPR course and helped people learn: hands-only CPR, how to help someone that is choking, how to use an AED and child CPR.  We all had a great time!  All the participants did a great job and left with lots of goodies.  Not only did we provide some informational tips but also gave each participant some goodies including a CPR face mask and valentine!  We are so grateful to be able to share our passion with our community!   

It was awesome to see so many people wearing red yesterday!  Every where I went people were proudly wearing red.  We challenged our followers to post their selfies wearing red and offered a free gift.  Our free gift winner is Charissa Knouff!  

If  you didn’t get a chance to make it to our free class but you still want to learn, come join us for a CPR course in Knoxville, Maryville or the Tri-Cities area of East Tennessee.  We offer CPR classes multiple times per week in west Knoxville and at least once a week in the surrounding area.  We are offering all participants a $5 discount the entire month of February if they wear red to class!  So join us and register for CPR today.  

Did you know – 1 in 3 women die of heart disease and stroke every year and approximately 80% is preventable!

In 2004, the American Heart Association (AHA) created Go Red for Women^® campaign to provide education, support and increase funding for heart disease and treatment. One of the major events from the Go Red for Women^® campaign includes the National Wear Red Day^®! Every year since the National Wear Red Day^® was introduced Americans are challenged to wear red, paint your community red, and create activities to focus on helping save women’s lives through support, research and funding.

The AHA can boast about some major shifts in the lives of women since their program was developed.
Here are a few accomplishments:

• Almost 90% of women have made at least one healthy modification
• Exercise has increased and weight has been lost
• Fewer women are dying from heart disease and stroke
• Death rates have decreased by more than 30%

Continue this tradition by helping us raise awareness to end this killer of women. Celebrate National Wear Red Day^® with Go Red for Women^® on Friday, Feb 6, 2015. It’s easy and fun to participate and the best part is help give back to your family and community.

Here’s some ways you can help:

1. Wear RED to show your support!
2. Share your RED! Use the hashtag #GoRed on all social media
3. Donate to help raise money for awareness and research.
4. Learn CPR and AED Functionality -CPR Choice is your source to learn the skills needed to save a life!  It is a very small price to pay versus watching the ones you love pass in front of you. Sign up for a CPR course in Knoxville or the Tri-Cities today!  Teaching CPR is more than our job; it is saving lives.

Visit GoRedforWomen.org for more information including fundraising, how to donate and utilize free tools and resources to make this National Wear Red Day^® the best one yet!

This year’s Peanut Butter Drive turned out to be a great success.  Originally we had set a goal to collect 250 jars of peanut butter.  We had to keep increasing the goal!  We are proud to announce that this yesterday we dropped off over 800 jars of peanut butter to Second Harvest Food Bank of East Tennessee. We had been collecting the past 3 weeks.  Our PB drive was even featured in the Daily Times newspaper.

Our mission is to SAVE LIVES!  Not only do we want to accomplish our mission by teaching the valuable life saving skills of CPR but also by doing charitable work that can help others.  Every year we pick a project to help save the lives of others.  This year we chose to collect Peanut Butter for 2nd Harvest Food Bank.  Peanut butter is a highly sought after product for food banks as it has a good combination of carbs, fats, proteins and nutrients as well as a good shelf life.  We offered our customers discounts for brining in jars and worked with past customers to help collect.  Some of our collection spots were schools, dance studios, hair salons, gyms and individuals.

It feels so good to be able to make a small difference in our local community.  We teach heart health in our CPR classes and that includes encouraging others to exercise their hearts by reaching down and lifting up others.

We are all ready looking forward to next year and what projects we can get involved with to help our community.  On Jan 23 & 24 we will be offering a community CPR class at The Health Living Expo for only $10 at the Knoxville Convention Center.  All proceeds to benefit our local American Heart Association.

Learn CPR-Save Lives!

The Healthy Living Expo is coming up!  Get ready for Knoxville’s largest Health & Fitness Expo.  AND…Guess What??  CPR Choice will be participating this year!  We will be doing live CPR demonstrations as well as teaching classes and handing out information at our booth.  Come visit us and learn “hands-only” CPR and get some information and goodies!  We will also be teaching a Friends & Family class each day of the expo. The class will be $10 and all proceeds will be donated to The American Heart Association.

Friday, Jan 23, 2015 9am-3pm (Family & Friends CPR @ 2PM, click to sign up)
Saturday, Jan 24, 2015 9am-4pm (Family & Friends CPR @ 2PM, click to sign up)

Knoxville Convention Center, Booth #121

Admission to the expo is $10 at the door or FREE if you get your tickets ahead of time.
Seniors FREE on Friday, Children 12 and under FREE

FUN! FIT! FABULOUS and FREE!

The area’s largest event focused on health, fitness, nutrition and living green returns for it’s eleventh year to the Knoxville Convention Center January 23-24, 2015. Over 130 individual companies fill more than 250 exhibits. The Expo continues to grow each year from its launch in 2005 and expects approximately 10,000 visitors!  The Healthy Living Expo offers interactive, educational exhibits, demonstrations and presentations.  Best of all, it is FREE when you get tickets before the doors open.

Some of the features for the 2014 Expo:

• Natural Awakenings Natural Health Pavilion
• Life Saving Skills taught by CPR Choice
• Chiropractic Care Pavilion
• Various Important Health Checks
• Healthy Food Sampling Booths
• Hundreds of prizes given away both days!

FREE WELLNESS PROGRAM FOR EMPLOYERS
Cigna Healthcare takes the lead promoting employee wellness by sponsoring tickets to the expo for any company that registers on The Healthy Living Expo website. Whether you have a handful of employees or one of the largest employers in our region, registration only takes a few minutes at the website, TheHealthyLivingExpo.com then you can offer:

MANY WAYS TO GET FIT and GET HEALTHY!
From natural health products to fitness companies, you will find a plethora of new ways to get fit and get healthy at The Healthy Living Expo, including life saving techniques from CPR Choice!

CPR CHOICE
What could be more important than knowing how to save someone in a life threatening situation? The Expo is proud to have CPR Choice demonstrate on stage some of the techniques you can learn when you take a CPR class. You can even take a class while you are at the expo, so by the time you leave you can be prepared to properly assist someone with life saving skills!

Natural Health Pavilion
This section of The Healthy Living Expo has companies with products and services that have a natural health aspect. Natural Awakenings Magazine, the foremost leader in our community promoting natural health is the sponsor of this area. Everything from household products, nutritional supplements to local green suppliers are found in the pavilion promoting a healthy mind, body and planet.

Chiropractic Care Pavilion
In keeping with the natural health approach to wellness is the Chiropractic Care pavilion. Three top chiropractic health professionals host this section with information about whole body wellness using natural health solutions.

FUN Outdoors
Getting outdoors, taking walks and hikes, visiting local parks are all part of living healthy so the City of Knoxville sponsors this area to inform our community of these available resources. Look for many associations and businesses offering information and products for outdoor fun for the entire family available right here in East Tennessee.

Get FIT with Health Checks
More than a dozen free health checks are available at the Expo. Screenings for allergies, blood pressure and a list of other simple tests will be listed at TheHealthyLivingExpo.com under the health check tab.

FABULOUS FOODS
Local Chef Walter and other experts using healthy products create FABULOUS foods at the Eat Right stage then share samples with visitors.  And after each segment, prizes are drawn for those attending. In addition to the stage presentations, numerous exhibitors offer samples of healthy products.

Get Active to stay FIT!
Fort Sanders Health & Fitness Center takes the lead on this stage with plenty of ideas for getting active. Music fills the area for two days highlighting numerous ways to become more active. Demonstrations are exciting to watch, inviting to participate and created for visitors of all ages.

It is informative and fun!  Come check it out!  This is a prime opportunity to find ideas, products, and services from the many exhibitors! CPR Choice is offering these Family & Friends CPR classes as a public service. All proceeds from this class will be donated directly to the American Heart Association.