Plant Based Diet Week 1

I am going to post hopefully every friday a wrap-up of my week on the whole plant based diet thing.  I'll apologize right now to those of you who couldn't care less.  But it's a good way to keep myself accountable if I put things out there that other people can see.  9*9**9*9--------*999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999*

Okay- see all those 9s?  I went to the bathroom and came back to Moyz blogging for me!

Anyway, on to week 1 summary.

Week one was better than I thought it was going to be in terms of me not feeling hungry all the time.  I really thought I was going to feel like I was starving, but not so much.  I ran out of items to make tabouli 2 days ago, and this diet is a lot harder to figure out what to eat if I don't have that around.  But my kids thought it was time for me to move on anyway.  They repeatedly asked me how many times could I eat tabouli, and I have to admit that while I completely love it, even I was getting a little tired of it, not sick of it, but tired.

I have not had one episode where I could feel my blood sugar crashing so I am excited about that.  But I have had quite a few moments where I wished I could have eaten something.  I miss eggs like crazy.  I usually eat some form of eggs for breakfast, and hard-boiled were often snacks.  I also was craving a yogurt smoothie with plain yogurt and fruit, but no go.  It will be interesting to see if I still want these foods after an entire month.

Last night I went to the Hunger Games again, and two girlfriends of mine just happened to be there.  And they had a humongous vat of movie popcorn with them.  I was so sad.  The smell was so wonderful, but I resisted!

One of the biggest issues I have had, and it's not a very delicate one, eating all these vegetables has given me gas like I have never had before.  I am not kidding.  I fart all of the time.  I am hoping that this issue will resolve itself, because I don't want to be known as the lady that farts all the time!  Owen thinks it rocks that I can fart a lot.  And poor Chris, let's just say I feel bad for him!

This is what I am making tonight:

Lentil Soup


Ingredients:

• 1 tsp vegetable oil
• 1 onion, diced
• 1 carrot sliced
• 4 cups vegetable broth
• 1 cup dry lentils
• 1/4 tsp pepper
• 1/4 tsp dried thyme
• 2 bay leaves
• dash salt
• 1 tbsp lemon juice

Preparation:

In a large pot, sautee the onions and carrot in the vegetable oil for 3-5 minutes until onions turn clear.

Add the vegetable broth, lentils, pepper, thyme, bay leaves and salt.

Reduce heat to a simmer. Cover and cook until lentils are soft, about 45 minutes. Remove bay leaves and stir in lemon juice before serving. Makes 4 servings of lentil soup.

I will probably have something meat related for the rest of my family and a salad as well.  I haven't really missed desserts, but I have sort of compensated by eating a lot of strawberries, still I would love a piece of chocolate.  

And of course, the last piece: weight loss.  I have lost 2 pounds this week.  I was kind of hoping for more, seeing as I am only eating vegetables and fruit for the most part, but I am not going to be upset at any loss.  For those who may be wondering how the whole going to Peru thing is going, I have been feeling really bad at a trip that would literally cost thousands of dollars that definitely can be spent more wisely somewhere else (like finishing the basement to get more bedrooms!) but we will be doing something big if I can lose that much weight.  My little trip to Montana set me back big time.  I gained 4 pounds in 4 days.  I don't even want to talk about it!

PS. I know at least one of you is doing this as well, and I would love to hear recipes and how it is going for you!  I checked out happyherbivore.com that one of you suggested and it is a great website for anyone who might be interested in it.

The Green Inchworm

I tried hard to upload a picture for you, but for whatever reason it just wouldn't let me.  So picture a cute little green inchworm.  You know the kind, the ones that hoist their entire middle section into the air to inch along, all that effort and barely any surface covered.

Last night we are all eating supper at the picnic table.  Moyz was on top of the table to help prevent his food from falling into the grass.  When all of a sudden I look over and he has a teeny little green inchworm on the tip of his finger.  He noticed it pretty much the same time I did.  He picked his finger up, looked at it closely, and popped it into his mouth and ate it.

I only had time to say "Moyz, no!"  And down the hatch it went.  Kind of reminds me of the time he tried to eat a live frog.  I don't know what it is with that kid and eating things that are alive and moving.

Plant Based Diet

I have seen a couple of people blog about eating a plant-based diet only and feeling fantastic.  (This would be separate from vegetarian because you can't have any processed foods)  No blood sugar spikes, no tiredness throughout the day (once their body adjusted to eating that way) and no cravings for sugar.  Kind of like what Adam and Eve ate before the fall and meat entered the picture.

So I decided to bite the bullet.  

I originally picked last Saturday as my start date, and I did awesome for breakfast and lunch, and then remembered that some girlfriends and I were going to a Vietnamese restaurant for supper, and I totally ate like a heathen, and it was heaven, and I am already dreaming about going again!

But I pulled myself back together on Sunday and ever since then I have been going on strong.  The main blog that I have followed this is Biblical Homemaking, and while she hasn't updated a lot about it, I think she is going to give people recipes and what they eat and all that stuff.  Her blog is awesome regardless of that, so I would check it out if I were you.  (She might make you a little envious, just a warning.  I think I might want to be her when I grow up!)

Basically the rules are you eat only plants, or food directly from a plant ex. oatmeal.  No sugar, dairy, meat, flour, eggs, processed foods of any kind, no artificial sweetners, etc.  At first I thought, crap, what am I going to eat?  Because when you take away all of that, there isn't a whole lot left.  

Here's what a typical day looks like for me:

Breakfast:  oatmeal with agave nectar and strawberries.  I am going to have to mix this up because after 5 days of this, it's getting kind of old.  

Lunch:  homemade tabouli.  This contains bulgur wheat, onions, tomatoes, lemon juice and olive oil, plus salt and pepper.  I think I am probably cheating with salt and pepper, but I don't care!  They can make a lot of things taste good, and possibly I am cheating with the bulgur wheat, but on the package the only ingredient is whole grain wheat, so I am going to make an exception here.  Plus, it's supposed to be very good for you.  Although I suppose I could try the recipe with wheat berries just to see what it tastes like.

Supper:  potato of some type, either sweet or regular, and veggies roasted.

Snacks: fresh fruit or veggies.

Of course you can toss in salads of any type, just make your dressing with olive oil and lemon juice.  There are a lot of good vegetarian soups out there that I haven't tried yet.  I have actually been felling really good so far, I know for a lot of people that first week is really tough, but I am wondering if the tabouli is helping me with that?  

I am going to do this until June, just a little over 30 days.  I am excited to see how it will make me feel different, if at all.  My kids are not doing it.  Somehow I think they would freak if I made them eat salads or tabouli everyday for lunch!  But I am sure we will implement some things, like beans and brown or wild rice for supper instead of meat, which we kind of do already.  The biggest emphasis will be avoiding all those processed foods, and they will naturally get that trickle down because I am not buying those items anymore.  

Seeing as they are still babies, I feel it is important to make sure they get what they need to help them grow, and they will drink milk for calcium a lot easier than broccoli, and meat still wins over a diet only of beans hands down with my kids.  They take after their dad!

Wish me luck!  

The 300th Post

Wow.  I can't believe that I have made it to 300 posts.   It's a long time when I think that I started it before my kids came home.  And I suppose it's not really just an adoption blog, and hasn't been for awhile.  More like a mind dump for Jess.

I thought I would make post 300 a personal reflection.

So this past week I was reading Catching Fire (again, can't wait for the movie which is probably still a long ways out) and I came to the part in the book where Peeta is doing everything in the arena to keep Katniss alive (again, and really isn't that mostly how it goes the first and second books?) and just the way he is so selfless made me think of my hubby, Chris.  It also made me feel like crap.

This happened the first time I read the book, but then I proceeded to forget about it.  And then it happened the second time I read the book, and then I remembered the first time it happened, and then I felt even worse. The reason I felt so bad is that Chris is a very selfless person, and I AM NOT.  I feel like I need to all-caps that for myself to let it sink in.

He doesn't read my blog, but if he did, I can almost guarantee that he would say he's not selfless and such and is very-self centered.  And he's not saying or doing it for more attention or accolades.  It's really just the way he is.  I definitely married up.

Normally, I don' think twice about how he sacrifices and lets me have more "me" time than him.  I think the babies had been home 5 months before he went on a Saturday and did something fun with friends.  5 whole months.  I know for sure that I had gone on several Saturdays either by myself or with a friend to get away from the madness in those first 5 months. And instead of being happy for him when he left, I was irritated and bummed because it wasn't me getting away.

I have done a lot of thinking this past week about how I act as a person.  Sure, I sacrifice for my kids and am fairly selfless when it comes to them.  But am I that way to adults and others?  Some, but not enough.  Especially when it comes to my husband.

This summer will be our 11th wedding anniversary.  During this time we have had ups and downs and neutral zones.  I call those "roommate" times.  Where you're married but you kind of feel like you are just roommates, living together but separate lives.  I wonder if I had been more selfless and more focused on us, if those moments would have been less.  That's where I wonder if a lot of divorces happen- the roommate times.  Because it seems that if you hadn't made a commitment for life, then it would be easy to bail out when things are neutral.  But marriage is a commitment, and love is a choice.  And you know what?  Every single roommate time has ended and our marriage is great.  Not without flaws, but great.

I  love Chris so much, and he deserves so much more than I can possibly give him, but I can make a conscious decision to focus less on myself and more on him and on our marriage.  I want to be one of those couples who have been married for 50 years and honestly say that each year is better than the one before.

I have a long ways to go, but I am hoping that recognizing it and "taking the bull by the horns" is a good step in the right direction.

Mason Jars

I am not super graceful, a trait which appears to have been passed on to Ava.  When Chris and I first got married, and for several more years, I managed to break a multitude of glass cups.  lots and lots of cups.  Then our first child got old enough to use regular cups, and broke lots and lots of cups.  So I drew the line in the sand.

One day while walking the aisles at Walmart, I came across a set of wide mouth mason jars, and I was hit with a light bulb moment.  Those things are practically indestructable (blogger doesn't like that word, I tried undestructable too, but it doesn't like that either.  Maybe it's not a word?).  So I brought a set home, and had 12 new drinking glasses for $9.  That's the problem with regular old glass glasses.  They break easy and they are expensive.

We have been using the same 12 glasses for about the last 7 years or so.  I have broken two.  Once when I dropped one onto something hard, and once that was kind of a freak thing where part of the bottom broke off when I was washing them.

Moyz has even grabbed one and launched it a fair distance across our kitchen.  To be fair, it's not like he's this whirling dervish of a kid who breaks/throws anything in sight.  Mostly he follows people around and snatches their glasses if they put them down and sucks the last of whatever happened to be in the glass at the time.  But those jars keep on keeping on.  Which is good because we have lots of kids and I am cheap.  Moral of the story is if your family has this same problem with glasses, and I am willing to bet a few of you do, switch to mason jars.  You will never, ever go back.  Just make sure it's the wide mouth ones.

And if you decide that drinking all liquids from a jar makes you too podunk (also not a word according to blogger), you can always do the following:



Here's the how to at the following:  http://karapaslaydesigns.blogspot.com/2010/03/diy-mason-jar-chandelier.html

Looks totally awesome, but the instructions seemed really long, and I am impatient.  However, I just may make an exception for this craft.  Someday.  When I have time.  Which, now that I think about it, will probably be in like 18 years.  Hmmm.

Gross But True

I can tell which one of my kids pooped based on the smell of it alone.  Isn't that disgusting?  Almost every morning when I go to get the babies up one of them inevitably has gone #2, and I pretty much can point to which one it is.

Apparently some gifts just lie dormant until the need arises.

It's too bad I couldn't have manifested the mind-reading gift, or super human strength gift.  Instead I get the who-dun-it crapper gift.

On the plus side, I have taught Kembia to hold her nose and say P-U.  And that's got to be worth something!

Part of Federal Tax Refund

So we got part of our refund back from the Feds.  The part that doesn't have to do with the adoption.  I was quite surprised that they sent that to us, but happy nonetheless.  I did panic though wondering if they were denying us the rest of it since no letter came with it, just a check.  So I gave the IRS a call.

In hindsight, calling on a Monday probably wasn't the best day.  I spent 32 minutes on hold waiting to talk to someone even after their computer system said that I would most likely wait for less time if I called back on Wednesday!  They said that essentially almost all adoptions were being audited this way, that most of them were being resolved in the 45 days that they requested.  She was able to tell me that they started looking at our adoption info. on April 26th.  And for those of you who either haven't sent in your info. or will be, she said that they do not look at any information sent with your original return because it is not stuff they specifically requested.  So I probably wouldn't waste the time to send it with your original stuff.  They will send you a letter anyways asking for all of it again because they won't look at it the first time.  It took 3 months for us to get our non-adoption part of our refund back.  Don't know if that's the norm or not, but now maybe some of you have an idea what to expect.

Can I just say that the money is burning a hole in my pocket!!  Not that we'll do anything what I would consider fun with it.  We need to build a bedroom downstairs and get another set of bunkbeds, things of that nature.  Plus there is always our insurance deductible to save for..... Practical things.  Still, a pretty big part of me wants to run out and by something just for the fun of it, or go to a fancy place for dinner.  Sometimes I just don't want to be practical.

On other news, Kembia and Moyz are starting to talk up a storm.  Not so much sentences, but lots and lots of words.  I was singing Hallelujah, and both of them repeated it out of the blue.  It was stinkin' adorable, and I was quite impressed that they were able to say a word with so many syllables.  Two days ago they both learned the word "no".  I can see that this is going to cause some problems in our family.  Kembia also uses "me" a lot.  Maybe just a tad bit selfish!  She also understands the difference of off vs. on.  She came up to me and said off, while trying to get her shirt off, and then brought me her shoes and said on.  I am so proud of her.  It is so amazing how well they are doing language wise considering that at one year they had to relearn what they had been spoken.  I can remember how I would say something to them and they would just cry and cry because they didn't understand.  Now pretty much whatever we tell them to do or ask them to get they do it.  I know that all my other kids did this, but it still never ceases to amaze me that these tiny little people understand what we are saying.  I mean, they are still babies!

Having two together is really good for them.  It seems that neither one wants to be left behind and that they both help each other to pick things up quickly.  It used to be that Kembia was a lot further ahead of Moyz and we sort of always said it was because she is a girl and older.  I still think that's true for some things, she seems to naturally get things much quicker on her own, but Moyz definitely picks things up by  watching and learning from her.  Probably just two different learning styles.

I am going to try and get a picture of the 3 babies in the cloth diapers, even though we don't cloth diaper Moyz.  Their little bubble butts are so adorable!