By Colleen Fielding

Welcome to Colleen’s Corner. This is a column meant for fun and some information About myself: I am a Freelance Photographer you often see me on the side of the road  or in various places taking photos of different things animals, birds, places, people etc.  l have lived in Lumby just over 8 years you have seen my photos in the newspaper (Lumby Valley Times) and once in awhile in the Vernon Morning Star, and the Lumby Art Gallery. Photography is my passion. Disclaimer:  The information on some of my photos that I write about a lot of times come from the Internet or books I research them, hopefully the facts are as close to the truth as I can come.

This week is brain awareness week, so I thought I would dedicate this week’s column to our brains. Did you know that playing certain games helps to improve your cognitive thinking and can help to slow or even stop dementia? That’s right, doing a crossword puzzle, jigsaw puzzles, sudoku, chess, scrabble memory games,optical illusions, and so many more can help to improve your brain function.

My mom did about 10 – 20 crosswords per day, so it was always easy to find her the right gift. Dementia never had a chance with her, she outwitted it on a daily basis.

I like crosswords, optical illusions, scrabble, jigsaw puzzles. I try to do at least one or more of these every day. 

Anything that makes your brain think is good for you.

Did you ever trick your brain? It’s a simple thing to do. In the mornings when bruising your teeth or your hair use your less dominant hand. If you are right handed, use your left or vice versa. Using your less dominant hand makes your brain think, it is so used to you doing everything with your dominant hand that it is unsure what you are doing when you change it up. Your brain now has to wake up and think, you could trick your brain on a daily basis. 

Have you ever thought about writing or printing the alphabet or writing your name with the opposite hand? Don’t be afraid, give it a whirl. The more you can do things like this to improve your memory your brain wakes up, the more your brain wakes up, the less chance you have for dementia to sneak in and take over.

If you don’t have any type of games at home, go and get some, wake your brain up, don’t let it sit idle. There are games that you can play by yourself, and with others. There are even games you can play on your computer.

Let’s play a game, wake up our brains and have fun!