The Cleanse

So I didn't get all my cleanse days food written down, but I'm done and it was good!!! I highly recommend this to everyone. After day 3 my skin was so smooth! After day 4 my stomach was the flattest its been since I had children. I learned a lot of new healthy alternatives to eat and I want to do the cleanse again. As soon as I started eating regular foods again, I immediately broke out. Next time I want to slowly go back on dairy and gluten so I can see exactly what the culprit is. I did lose a few pounds which was nice.

52 things to do in 2011

I saw this on a friends blog and I wanted to put together my own list because for some strange reason l Love writing lists, so here goes....

1. Do another Kathy Freston Cleanse
2. Plant a rediculously awesome garden
3. Market my photography business more
4. Help Claire learn to read
5. Appreciate my family more
6. Do more service-service projects
7. Talk to my family more
8. Pay off student loan
9. Pay cash for a new car
10. Play lots of games with my kids
11. Research what I need to know about school for Claire
12. Get pregnant
13. Start working on finishing my studio in the basement
14. Live with more confidence
15. Learn to slim down my budget even more
16. Play lots of volleyball
17. Understand the world of camera RAW
18. Eat like healthy people do
19. Make a composting bin
20. Recycle more paper
21. Figure out how to get shiny hair
22. Put more into my calling
23. Write down things I'm grateful for everyday in my journal
24. Write more lists
25. Read lots more books on healthy eating, gardening, politics, emergency prep
26. Floss every night
27. Set up Jake's twin bed and REALLY decorate his room
28. Tame the paper mess
29. Perfect my pizza dough recipe
30. Buy some real snow boots
31. Make a rain barrel
32. Get wheat for food storage
33. Make home ground wheat bread
34. Find some great healthy dessert recipes and actually make them
35. Continue with the Daily Docket
36. Speak more kindly to my kids
37. Rediscover my creativity/crafty side
38. Find some awesome photog props
39. Make curtains for kitchen
40. Stop what I'm doing and look at my children when they are talking to me
41. Put together all of Claire's drawings into a collection
42. Take more baths
43. Be nicer to people I don't know
44. Make homemade pasta
45. Learn to like Yoga
46. Spend less time on the computer
47. Get rid of the VOLES
48. Flirt with my husband more
49. Prepare myself for the end of Oprah
50. Work on genealogy
51. Go to the department store and get a makeover
52. Have fun spending time with family

5 years

I got a new flash set last week and I have had a lot of fun trying them out. Claire needed her 5 year pics, so here they are! I haven't touched these up, and I'm not sure I even will.



I had to throw in these of Jake I made him get in his easter outfit.

Be mine..

Despite having a NASTY cold, we still got a bunch of hugs and kisses in on 2-14. The kids painted blocks for Chris for their valentine. We surprised him at work, and then I made the kids big heart cookies. Every year my mom would make each child a giant heart shaped cookie, with our own little valentine note on each of them. I appreciate that even more realizing she did it for 6 people! I only had 3 to do and I was a bit exhausted-although that might have had something to do with the awesome nasty cold...
Chris brought me home chocolates and a sweet little card :) We were able to go out on Friday to celebrate. Good times.

Well Check and Immunizations

Yesterday Claire had her 5 year well check. I was getting nervous about getting it done in time to register her for kindergarten in March. Luckily they did end up changing the school boundaries so we don't have to worry about a "lottery" system and Claire will be going to school with all the kids from her primary class. Claire was 40 pounds and 43 inches. That puts her about 50th percentile for weight and 60-something for height, just perfect!

She was very brave with her shots, I told her she needed them for school and so she was totally willing! When she got done she said "Now I can go to school!" She is so excited for school, but says she'll miss me during the day when she's gone. Me and Jake are going to miss her too!

This also reminded me of how friendly Jake has gotten. I told him we were going to go see the doctor, so when the nurse took us to the room, he was saying "hi doctor", then when the actual doctor came in he went right up to him, said hi and just started chatting up a storm. He kept calling him doctor, "what's that doctor?" "Here you go doctor" when he dropped something. "look at that doctor" It was just kind of funny.

Another thing I wanted to post really quick. The other day I over heard Jake and Claire playing, Jake was making fighting sounds like usual, then Claire got this deep voice "don't kill my people, I'm Heavenly Father and I made them" then a few seconds later she made some heavenly angel music like he was going back up to heaven. Where do they get this stuff from?!

Update on potty training - it's still going great, Jake hasn't even been using pull-ups even at night, he did have a couple accidents in the morning when he first wakes up, so we put a pull-up on him last night and he kept it dry, he also likes the real toilet, which is SO nice, only problem is getting him to pull his pants down all the way and aiming so he doesn't end up getting his pants all wet. We are very proud of him.

Cleanse: Day 2

Breakfast: banana slices with peanut butter, vitamins, glass of water

Lunch: black bean tacos

Snack: Hummus and carrots, 5 almonds, water

Dinner: rice, green beans, and corn, water

Dessert: peach slices

How I'm feeling today: Definitely more cravings today, but I'm feeling lighter.

Fresh Mango Summer Rolls

This recipe came from the "Vegan with a Vengeance" cookbook by Isa Chandra Moskowitz. I won't post the recipe, but you can find it here.

It was very light and fresh, and it looks pretty too. I love food that makes you fell happy when you eat it, no sick-full feeling here. The peanuts and peanut sauce really compliment the rolls. My 2 year old son actually ate one, but my daughter wouldn't try it. We ate the rolls with coconut rice.

Coconut Rice
1 cup cooked rice
1/2 can unsweetened coconut milk
mango slices

Combine.

I will definitely be making this in the future!

5 ways to reuse plastic containers

We have a lot of yogurt and sour cream containers at our house and I just hate knowing they are perfectly good for something but I'm still throwing them out - even though I'm recycling. So I thought I'd share a few ways that I reuse my plastic containers.

1. seed starters - if you have a garden, or even if you want to keep an herb garden on your kitchen window sill, these are great! I'll be starting my seeds soon!

2. kids stuff - my daughter loves to make little "collections". She has beads, coins, barbie pieces, little paper projects, necklaces. These are perfect for all her little things.

3. Sending meals in them. My mom always saved containers and took meals to people in them, the best are the salad tubs they are wide and clear. It's nice because then you don't have to worry about getting your dish back.

4. In the garage - I think most garages have plenty of uses for these containers, my husband has asked me to save a bunch to put his nails, bolts, and stuff in. You can label the outside so you know exactly what is in each of them.

5. Leftovers - instead of buying plastic containers to put your left overs in, save your money and reuse!

I hope this just starts your thinking of reasons why you can and should reuse, maybe you can find even more ways!

Cleanse: Day 1

Breakfast: Half a grapefruit, vitamins, glass of water

Lunch: Left over corn chowder, peanut butter on celery, water

Snack: Hummus and carrots, 5 almonds, water

Dinner: Mango Spring Rolls with coconut mango rice, water

Dessert: Salted popcorn, water, crystal light lemonade

How I'm feeling today: Surprisingly no cravings! Day one wasn't so bad, but I need to make sure I plan ahead. I talked to a friend of mine about ways to keep up my protein. I shouldn't have had the crystal light, it doesn't have sugar but it is still off limits during the cleanse - woops :)

7 day Cleanse

I have been reading Kathy Freston's book "Quantum Wellness". I remember hearing about this book on Oprah a while back and that Oprah did a 21 day cleanse. She suggests between 7 and 21 days to cleanse the body in order to allow the body to detoxify and give the digestive system a break. It made perfect sense to me so I thought I would try it. Kathy is Vegan and I really admire how consciously she eats and I would love to get to that point, I would also like to look as great as she does! Here is the cleanse:

No sugar - bless my soul, what am I going to do??
No animal or animal byproducts
No alcohol - I don't partake already :)
No caffeine - I don't (usually) partake :)
No gluten

I think gluten will be the hardest thing to stay away from, it seems like it's in everything! Sugar will be hard in the afternoon and after dinner. I'll have to make sure I keep myself busy at those times. So I am starting today and will try to make it to next wednesday. On saturday/sunday I plan on completely fasting since it's fast sunday and I am going to try to go to the temple on saturday. She talks about how we need to detoxify not only for our body's health, but for our spiritual health. I really believe that there is something fundamental about fasting that helps us come closer to Christ and I'm excited to see if I notice any differences, especially during my temple attendance.

Look for daily posts about what I'm eating and how it's going. Wish me luck - I'm going to need it!!

Potty training

Guess who's potty training?? Jacob! I told myself I would start come January when we were bored at home and had nothing to do. I've been dreading it because of how hard Claire was. So last Wednesday we threw away the diapers and said hello to the potty. He caught on so quickly that it has made Chris and I a bit nervous. So we basically didn't go anywhere for 3 days. I hate pull-ups when you are trying to potty train so he was pretty much naked those first three days. I think that really helped him realize that you can't wait when it's time to go. He is staying dry during nap time and last night we forgot to put a pull-up on him and he stayed dry the whole night! I sure hope that keeps up. We are so proud of what a good boy Jake is and we hope this good fortune continues. Good Job Jake!

I had to add these photos. Jake fell asleep leaning over the ottoman, you can see the drool dripping all the way down to the floor. Funny boy.

Corn Chowder

I have touted my love for Tal Ronnen the Vegan chef, but I have fallen even more in love with this recipe I found in his cookbook "The Conscious Cook". It's basically a creamy soup, but get this NO ANIMAL BY PRODUCTS!! The recipe I had always used was my mother's recipe for Cream of California soup it is so good, but has milk, butter, and chicken stock in it. Tal's recipe uses a cashew cream. It is SO yummy! I can't hold back my excitement about this wonderful substitute! There are vegan substitutes out there for just about everything, but this is homemade, a great price, and easy to make. I bought a pound of cashews pieces at Winco's bulk section for $3.34 per pound. I only used 2/3 of a pound for the recipe. The recipe calls for whole raw cashews, but they were a bit more per pound and honestly I can't imagine the soup turning out any better, so I'm fine with the cashew pieces. Throw them in the blender with some water and there you go. What's even better, cashew cream will freeze for up to 6 months! I just had leftovers today for lunch, and it was delish!

Update: Bountiful Basket

We used just about everything up and loved just about all of it. I really think it's something that we will be doing in the future. Maybe once a month? We love love love the bread and will probably be getting that every two weeks. You definitely get more for your money, but you really can't plan a lot of your meals until you know what you've got which is the biggest problem for me, but I think the pros outweigh the cons in this instance!