Look at us, making healthy choices!

I've never liked vegetables a lot. Sure, I've gone through phases when I ate whole bowls of cucumbers or cauliflower for lunch (covered in salad dressing, of course), those times always pass quickly, and I'm back to cereal and sandwiches. Fruit? Ah, fruit. I love it. I could eat it all day. I could probably live on just grapes for quite a while. Berries? Kiwi? Peaches? Bring it on. All of it.

As chubby people, my husband and I have been on plenty of diets over the years, or tried to eat better in this way or that. We've tried low & no carbs, weight watchers, spiritual angles, and I've attempted to be a vegetarian more than once, but none of it has really stuck. We're able to make some sweeping cuts, such as HFCS, and partially-hydrogenated oils, and after realizing we were sensitive to gluten & dairy, we've cut 90% of those out of our diets. (Husband can't get on board with any gluten-free bread, and there isn't enough of a variety of affordable goat & sheep cheese to cut off all cow cheese.)

Enter Pinterest. Oh, I love it. If you haven't investigated it yet, please do so now, but only sign up if you want to have hours of your life sucked away in looking at recipes, outfits, crafts, and home decor and then feeling bad about not having the time, money, or stamina to do any of it. Here, you can look at my boards: http://pinterest.com/robeena/

The things is, unlike many people, I've actually done a number of things I found on Pinterest. I've made a few kid crafts and tried a number of recipes. It's the recipes that have really been a godsend in our lives. I've gotten e-mailed meal plans, I have hundreds of recipes bookmarked in my browser, cookbooks sit wasting away on my shelf, but something about the visual nature of Pinterest drives me to actually cook (or have my husband cook) what I see there. I think it comes down to a few factors: seeing a picture (unlike in most cookbooks, where the majority of the recipes don't have photos), having a real person comment on whether the recipe worked or not, be they the "pinnner" or the blogger that put up the recipe in the first place, and being able to easily visually organize recipes I'm interested in. It takes no effort at all to scan a page of pictures for what looks good to me, then buy the ingredients and get to work.

So here's the exciting thing: our absolute favorite things to eat lately are VEGETABLES! And not just any old vegetables, but roasted vegetables. Oh, man. Seriously drool-worthy. I was skeptical when I saw all the pins of things like roasted cabbage, roasted carrots, and even romaine lettuce (Seriously. Romaine lettuce.), but I'm always trying to get myself to eat more veggies, so we tried cauliflower.

OMG! This is so freaking good. We haven't tried the linked recipe from REMcooks yet, mostly out of laziness, but there's no way it could be anything but amazing. We have made roasted cauliflower at the homes of multiple friends, and they're always pleasantly surprised by it. You can put any flavor you want on it. We've made it spicy, we've put nutritional yeast on it for a cheesiness, and every time we gobble it up like candy. 

But wait! We now have an even favoriter (yep) roasted veggie: BRUSSELS SPROUTS! Om nom nom. 

We had tried brussels sprouts a few times and I decided I was done with them, because they were always meh. When I saw these balsamic roasted sprouts, though, I figured I'd give them a try, because balsamic vinegar covers over a multitude of nastiness. Truly, we love to eat these more than almost anything else. I might even choose these over pizza, were the two placed in front of me. We're going to have to keep a constant supply in the house. 

So this is an exciting development. We'll roast almost any veggie, and they are scrumptious. I doubt I'll ever be a vegetarian, because it's just not practical, what with tri-tip and fajitas to eat, but at least we are expanding our food horizons and can happily fill up on healthy stuff instead of carbs, which we hardly even make anymore.

The Perfect Crime

Not really. I just discovered a great way to torture myself & my husband: I made a delicious dinner including both bacon (hooray!) and onions (booooo!). We acknowledge that onions add good flavor to things, so I sometimes will either shred onions very small so they basically turn to mush, or I leave them in big pieces so they are easily dodged. The problem with the carbonara I made the other day? Well, the bacon & the onions are the same color, & roughly the same sized pieces, so you really can't tell what you're scooping up.

Ha! Fooled us!

Kickin' back, reading for fun, yo.

Hi, friends.  This is the first I've blogged since Thursday since I haven't been in a house with an internet connection.  So sorry.

I'm still adjusting to being out of school, so I'm still doing that thing where I feel a twinge of guilt & think that there must be something I should be doing, and then I remember FREEDOM and I sit back down.  Aaaaaahhhhhh.   It's lovely. 

Right now, I'd say I'm in the midst of 2 books, kind of 3, ignoring a 4th that is the one I meant to read this weekend.  Hmmmm....I should pick that one up. 
I'm currently focusing on Perelandra, which is a short read and I may finish tomorrow.  I haven't had a lot of reading time this weekend before this evening, though.  What I need to get on is College Ministry 101.  I tell you, friends, I'm hoping for some real gems there.  Knowledge.  Downloaded into my brain.  Revelations.  But my expectations aren't too high or anything. 

Tomorrow is Labor Day, and we will grill a tri-tip somewhere, preferably with a few family members.  Sleeping in is also on the agenda, and I want to go for a run at the high school track. 

What else have I been reading?  Ads for apartments and lots of websites about family law.  It's a glorious time.

Power Point!!

No, I did not blog yesterday.  What are you going to do about it?  Nothing, that's right. 

I have had a crazy weekend, but it has been mostly good.  Yesterday, I read a scoreboard, and it was great.  Nineteen of us went to an Oakland A's game, which I was feeling pretty meh about, but it ended up being, to quote Napoleon Dynamite, "Flipping sweet!"  First 2 innings: boring, quick, no score, out out out, etc.  Third inning?  A's get 8 runs.  EIGHT.  Two innings later? 5.  We thought it would be a shut-out, but the Angels woke up for a little while and got one run, for a final score of 15-1.  Wow.  Best baseball game ever.  But there's more!  We then got to go down on the field (I sat in a seat instead, though) and there was an amazing fireworks display.  Seriously, it was awesome.  A little late night stop with friends at In 'n Out on the way home, and we were fat and happy.

I taught tonight at Core (the young adult group), so I read and studied for that a bit.  We talked about Leviticus 22, Hebrews 4, and Mark 5.  Cleanliness laws in the OT versus our freedom to approach God under Christ and his humanity, and how the woman with the issue of blood demonstrates this new order that Jesus kicked off.  It was pretty great, with lots of good conversation. 

And my movie clip?  Oh, I showed a clip from Elf, with the thin thread of relevance being the phrase from Hebrews "throne of grace" and Buddy the Elf accusing the fake Santa of sitting on a throne of lies.  It rocked. 

Mel's Diner and the Deathly Hallows

Wait.  That's not right. 
Well, I didn't do any homework today, and that's fine.  All I wanted to do was read Harry Potter, so I did that as much as I could, even though I was quite busy most of the day.

What did I not read?  I did NOT carefully read the e-mail I received with my free pass to see Despicable Me tonight.  I did not read that the start time was at 6:30, so I got there and had friends drive into the city and meet me there around 7:30.  Boo.

So we had dinner.  Remember, this is only day 3 of our new diet, so I was a bit hesitant to go out to eat.  We went to Mel's diner and while our 3 friends were happily choosing which cheeseburgers they were going to get, Seth and I pored over the menu for quite a while, trying to find anything without gluten or dairy.  I really did want a burger, but nothing clearly stated that I could get it without a bun, and I realized that a patty with no cheese and no bun would be sad, indeed.

We ended up splitting a hot dog w/sauerkraut and a cobb salad w/o cheese and with Italian dressing.  When my friends got their side salads with blue cheese dressing, I looked at them longingly, completely expecting our salad to be disappointing when it came.  I mean, Italian dressing?? C'mon. 

But?  It was delightful.  Delicious.  We inhaled it.  I wanted another one.  Huzzah!  That was such a victory, due to both being out and the fact that I woke up this morning wanting nothing more than a baked good and a Coke. 

Now we shall share a mango for dessert, and it will be awesome. 

Food labels

Today is day 1 of the no gluten, no dairy, no sugar diet.  After looking through the book a bit more and trying to figure out what to do, we went to the grocery store to stock up.  While the author wants us to stay away from all processed foods and sugar, we have to be realistic.  We will be eating very differently, but we know that going completely without snacks of any kind is crazy talk.  We have been looking at labels for years, so that wasn't any hardship, but we had to be a little more careful when spotting gluten.  Did you know that soy sauce has wheat in it?  What the heck?  We found some gluten-free soy sauce, though.

Also, as far as crackers and cereal goes, rice options don't seem to be all that healthy, so we had to do some more comparisons of nutritional info.  I mean, I'm pretty sure that rice krispies have very little nutritional value.  Also, some things do have a little sugar in them, or molasses or other fruit-based sweeteners, but we have to be honest with what we'll eat.  We're already changing a lot at once, and I'm still a little bit obsessed with food, so I have to have stuff around that I'm going to like.

In that vein, I am going to be spending money and living it up on grapes and sugar snap peas. I also bought yummy Frontera salsa, and it will be a chips and salsa kind of life.

We could have spent even more money and gotten bread made from rice flour and fake cheese, then just pretended that hardly anything had changed and had sandwiches every day, but we resisted.  I may buy some alternative flours or bread mixes in the future and get out the bread maker, but I want our habits to change into eating more salads & small snacks like fruit and nuts. 

Right now, we're not stretching that much, and it's great:  chicken in the oven, brown rice cooking in the rice cooker, and we're having tacos!  Huzzzah for corn tortillas! 

Today? Oh, it was mediocre

I was up till past 5freaking30 this morning, so I ended up skipping church, which I guess was okay because I missed all the Father's Day whoo-hah.  After attempting to call my own dear father, I went back to bed. 

But I did buy him a book!  I bought him the audio version of The UltraMind Solution on iTunes, because I'm really digging on it and I think my parents will, too.  This book is blowing my mind, and part of me can't wait to try the dietary changes the author recommends because he makes it seem like magical fairy dust will come down and everything will be better. 

Believe me, I'm going into it with skepticism and not a ton of enthusiasm, because I'm not particularly excited about giving up gluten & dairy, if even for 6 weeks.  But if I see a change, you know I'll tell you about it.   Everything this guy is saying makes a lot of sense:  that our medical practices have gotten all out of whack and that we now treat every part of our bodies as completely separate and disconnected from the rest, and then we throw different pills at each part whenever something goes wrong.  He posits that our diets are so dysfunctional that many many of our ailments, both physical and psychological, would be greatly improved, if not cured, by taking better care of ourselves, with the chief manner being a change of diet.

Like Pollan & Schlosser, he says tat we eat entirely too much processed food that is lacking in basic nutrients.  The FDA guidelines for vitamins and minerals really only get us to a survival level, not a place where our bodies are healthy and thriving. 

I'm excited about this approach because I have noticed and lamented the fact that I could make a fairly long list of things that are amiss in my body, and in Seth's.  I'm entirely too young to have a laundry list of medical problems and not wanting to bring them up to the doctor because I don't want to have to get one more prescription. 

So, I read the book.  The author repeats himself a lot, and I'm skimming a lot, partially because he doesn't really have to convince me and I'm not wowed by his illustrations of lipids and cell walls.  At times, it feels a little like a horoscope, in that he's casting such a wide net that everyone would have to say yes to some things in his checklists.  The thing is that I find myself wanting to check off nearly everything in his list of woes, and I do believe that medication mainly addresses symptoms instead of causes.

I suspect that, starting in July, we're going to be eating very differently, at least for a while.  And we'll see how it goes.  I really want it to help with a lot of things, because that will be our impetus to continue eating healthily. 

Hugs, friends!  Tomorrow I keep reading this book & I'll probably read the C.S. Lewis one I have up there on my Good Reads list.  I don't remember exactly which one it is, so you'll have to look up & slightly to the right. 

Magazines and Nametags

Today was a lovely day spent with my sister.  We both slept in quite late, then got ourselves ready to do some running around.  First, we went over to ADI and played with the 3 litters of puppies that are there, including 3 teeny, tiny pups just born via c-section two days ago.

We then went by the library where I picked up Storm Glass, by Maria V. Snyder, the last week's EW, and Perelandra, which I'll be reading for class. I also returned a book that I thought I returned, but Seth found it in my car after I filed a "claim returned" at the library.  Oh, well. 

Then, we had a great time at the park.  We moseyed around a bit, then I had a great 1/2 hour run while my sister moseyed on her own.  We both stood in the lake for a while, then got b.o.g.o. burritos for dinner.  Ahhhh, good day.

Tonight was the kick-off for Big Time, our yearly, week-long party for the junior high students at church.  Last year, I was a small group leader, but I decided to pass on that this year.  I don't like corralling and having to discipline more and keep students in line, which is why it bothers me so much when my high school girls are overly-wacky.  So, this year, I'm working in registration, which is a breeze.  I sit in the back office with some of my favorite students while they put kids' info into the database & make nametags.  I, then, have the fabulous job of cutting the nametags out and putting them into lanyards.  It's a rough job. 
Of course, I also got to help put garbage bags over all the chairs in the sanctuary, since many of the kids were going to be quite wet and/or dirty from the insane games they were playing. 

I'm going to keep trying to just borrow EW from the library and not subscribe again.  I just love magazines.  I did, in fact, subscribe to Rolling Stone since I got an offer of 6 months for $1.  I don't necessarily care to read about music that much, but my love for magazines will carry me through.  I also got a free subscription to Christianity Today, which I have also had on and off over the past few years. 

Ah, magazines.  Such an excellent way to have little snippets of entertainment when I need it.

Hasta mañana. 

This has gotten old.

I've been mostly incapacitated for about 2.5 weeks now.  Well, not quite incapacitated, but it feels like it.  First, I had a week of asthma that truly sucked.  I've never had what I would call asthma attacks before, but this was bad:  very tight lungs and sheer exhaustion.  Once I finally went to the doctor, I found out that both my inhalers were expired, which is why they weren't helping very much.  New inhalers helped a lot, not that the lack of inhalants was what caused the attack.  That remains a mystery.

Or it was from sickness.  (Sweet, fancy Moses, I just typed "frum" at first.)  I had wondered if my complete exhaustion was just from the asthma or from my body fighting something.  Once Seth got sick, I was quite proud of my body for successfully fighting off his illness.  Then I got it.  Blerg.  I started feeling sick 10 days ago, and I am super tired of it.  I had a good, old-fashioned flu.  Achy body, fever, stuffy head and headache, and cough.  I thought I would be over it by the end of the week, but it won't leave!  I missed my last class, didn't visit family with Seth, and missed church.  Gah.

At my professor's suggestion (she's a sicky who totally understands being wiped out and having to take care of yourself), I have requested an incomplete for this quarter.  I thought I could do it, but my sleep has gotten even more jacked up than usual with this sickness draining my energy (naps lead to being up all night, even though I am completely exhausted), and even when I am up, I can't always concentrate on research.  I was feeling kind of guilty about requesting it, but after I took the dogs to the dog park yesterday, barely exerted myself at all, and came home feeling wiped to have my husband say, "You don't look like you feel good," I decided to go for it.  I'll keep plugging away and get my stuff done ASAP (like, next week), but it will be nice to have the stress off. 

This illness has prompted a number of people to say, "You're sick a lot," which has pissed me off a bit.  It pisses me off that I do seem to be sick often, and it makes me feel like it's viewed as a personal failing on my part to have such a weakling of an immune system.  I don't think of myself as an unhealthy person, but maybe I am.  Or maybe my body just doesn't react well to my previous modus operandi. 

Nevertheless, I am changing things.  Seth's health added into the equation, we need change.  We've already begun changing our diets, and I'm trying to shift it into a higher gear.  I'm having more vegetarian days and I'm planning on loading up on fruit and veggies and just concentrating on eating real food as opposed to processed junk.  I've been doing this for a few weeks already and I do love it.  I've also noticed that, possibly due to sluggishness but I'll take it, I just don't care about eating and food that much, which is a fan-freaking-tastic change for me. 

Wrapping up: I'm hopeful about our food and excited about eating better.  I'm kinda depressed today because I want to be well and go running and I just want my sleep to be fixed already once and for all. 

//end depressing and ranting blog post//

Allow me a little gastronomical slumming, won't you?

You may get grossed out, but my favorite FAVORITE meal is what I'll call Mac n' Cheese Goulash.

The basics: mac n' cheese, ground turkey, peas, and tomato sauce of some kind.  This could be leftover spaghetti sauce, pizza sauce, salsa, a can of tomato paste, whatever.
The best goulashes also include worcestershire sauce, but it's not necessary, especially if going for spicy instead.

Tonight's is as follows: 1 box mac n cheese (Annie's Organic- love the bunny), 1 box sun dried tomato something or other pasta & parmesan cheese sauce from Kraft, 1 small can of tomato sauce, peas, turkey, and gorgonzola.  We're out of worcestershire.

I haven't had it yet.  It may be gross, but doubtful.  It will probably be delicious.  Like the other times I make it, we'll probably love it and I'll want to eat it for a midnight snack and for breakfast- no need to heat it up.

You may want me to hang my head in shame, but I shan't.

ETA: It was, in a word, magnificent.

Middle Class Dream

I went into Costco on Tuesday and there was some sort of tasting jamboree going on. Two rows, back to back, of juices, meats, nachos, etc. I thought about resisting, but that didn't make any sense. So, I ate dinner for free, entertained the idea of buying a #10 can of nacho cheese, and got the lettuce I had gone in for.