Author: heather

Cooking/Recipes, Health & Fitness

Gluten – You are my enemy, I think

heather

We spent 5 days in NYC, eating and drinking our way through the city.  I did what I knew I shouldn’t do and ate whatever I wanted to – the justification being that “I’m on vacation!!  It’s NYC!  I should take advantage!”

As a result, I went from 128 to 131.6.  I’m ok with being 131.6, but I’m not OK with feeling bad from eating all the not-good-for-me food. So, to get back on the wagon again, in August I have 2 goals:

1.  Eat breakfast and supper at home every day.

2.  Absolutely no gluten.  No beer, no mysterious dressings, no ice cream.  Nothing.  No gluten.  I’m going to try to cut it out completely and see how my allergies are affected.

Wish us luck!

Uncategorized

Lazy Hlo

heather

Holy cow, it’s been an age since I’ve written anything.  Why have I been so remiss in my writing?  Who knows?  Vacation?  Laziness?  Busy-ness?  Lack of anything interesting to say?  Probably mostly the latter to tell you the truth.

Well, I’m writing tonight despite not having anything interesting to say.  It’s time to get back on the wagon and start writing again. I’ve been doing a lot of thinking, and now it’s time to formulate some of those thoughts into words.  Well, not right now, but over the next couple of weeks.  Right now I’m just saying hi to my blog and then I’m going to go for a walk.

I’ll give a quick update, at least, on life in general.  I’m still doing the primal/paleo thing.  Still seeing great results.  I’m down to a size 4 and weigh 128.1, a weight I’ve not seen since I was perhaps 6?  I feel really good.  I’m struggling with allergies a little still.  I think that’s because I drink alcohol more than I should, and I don’t drink WHAT I should when I DO drink.  If I reigned that in, I’d probably feel better.  But, we’re going on vacation Wednesday, so the dial-in will have to wait until August.  Anyway, I’m feeling good.  I have some abs now and some arm and leg muscles.  I found awesome running shorts I love.  I’ve been running more regularly, probably because I love the shorts so much.  I’ve been getting up at 5AM and running, in point of fact.  It’s too hot to run any other time.  I’ve also finally started doing squats and lunges.  My ass is going to be to die for by the end of the summer, I swears.  What else, what else???  We took a trip to the beach for 4 days.  It was an awesome vacation of biking, jogging, reading, and staring at the beach, wondering how I can change my life so I can stare at the beach more.  We’re offsetting the relaxing vacation with an NYC vacation.  We’re Amtraking it.  Pray for no delays and break downs.

Work is work and is fine.

I haven’t been doing any art outside of a pencil drawing of Tim that looks like my uncle Jerry.

I’ve sold a few coozies on Etsy.  I’ve made like a whopping $40 bucks which has all gone towards rebuilding my wardrobe as most of my clothes aren’t fitting these days.

I did my first Codeacademy lesson in JavaScript tonight.  I’m going to be writing web pages in no time.  Not.  But I do have the itch to learn something new.  Coding?  Maybe?  We’ll see how patient I am and if I can reign in my frenetic mind for a few minutes each day to learn something.

Been reading a good book – Stumbling on Happiness.  It’s all about how we don’t really know what’s going to make us happy in the future because we are currently in the present and see everything through the present filter instead of the non-existent future filter.  God help us all.

Watched a cool Ted talk tonight. Here are the highlights – Level up your life every day.  Live life deliberately.  Collect experiences not stuff.  At least it made me not watch TV at all this evening.

So how’s that for a stream of consciousness post?  The next one will be more coherent, I swear.

Take care and have a pleasant, deliberate evening.

Health & Fitness, Uncategorized

Vacation from Paleo

heather

We returned from Ocracoke late last night. The drive home was wrought with annoyances and delays, but it did have two positive results.  1.  I think I might be able to convince Tim to fly next time we want to go someplace 1000+ miles away.  2.  We discovered another vacation destination – the Kentucky Bourbon Trail.  Who wants to be our DD??

Since we were on vacation, subject to the whims and offerings of the local restuarants and grocery stores, I decided to relax a bit on my diet while in Ocracoke.  Well, actually, I relaxed it a lot.  As I mentioned in the previous post, whiskey was hard to find on Ocracoke, but you can’t not drink on vacation, so I beered it up.  I also ate hushpuppies, onions rings, chicken strips, clam chowder, fried clams, pizza, amazing tacos, bagel with lox and cream cheese, cream in my coffee, etc. etc. etc.   Keep in mind I ingested all this while wearing a bikini for 6-8 hours a day.  Not a good combo.  I was positive I would weigh 7 lbs more on my return to Iowa.  Maybe it was the steady homeward-bound diet of prunes, apricots, and walnuts, but I actually only gained 3 lbs.  I guess all the biking and swimming and running on the island mitigated some of the effects of the bad diet.

I did notice other ramifications, however.  My general appetite has increased, and my appetite for sweets has skyrocketed.  I want CANDY, and I want it now, and I want A LOT of it!!

Hopefully a week of getting back on track will curb the cravings.  I got off to a good start this morning by making us eggs fried in ghee and sauteed red & green peppers with onions and garlic, garnished with 1/2 an avocado.  After my morning 3 mile walk, I snacked on beef jerky and a date.  I kinda fell off the wagon for lunch though.  Tim’s birthday was yesterday, and since we were on the road for 22 hours, we didn’t have a chance to do much for it.  So today we got a late lunch at Granite City.  You can’t go to GC and NOT get beer, so I got a beer.  A huge beer.  I’m a member of the mug club, so the huge beer was only $3.50.  We’ve been members for a year, so we got a coupon for a free appetizer, so we split the boneless chicken wings (with ranch).  My supper was actually pretty paleo – the Napa Valley Burger with no bun and a side of deeeeelicious steamed broccoli.  I figure we are technically still on vacation since we haven’t gone back to work yet, so I can still cheat.

It’s supposed to be wicked hot this week, so exercising will be a challenge.  Right now, my goal is to wake up at 5AM and jog.  Tim says he’ll do it with me, so we’ll see.  I only got about 4 hours of sleep last night, so who knows how I’ll feel tomorrow.

Tim and I are going on another trip in a few weeks – this one to visit my bros in NYC.  I think eating well will be easier there than on the island of Ocracoke.  Plus, I’m sure we’re going to be doing a ton of walking, biking, and hiking, so things shouldn’t get too OOC.

I’m kind of looking forward to August, when our schedule will normalize.

Take care, and have a wonderful evening!

Uncategorized

Ocracoke, NC — The good, the bad, the ugly

heather

Tim and I have been on vacation since last Saturday.  We drove from Davenport to the Outer Banks of North Carolina.  We’ve been on Ocracoke Island since Monday.

A few comments about Ocracoke.  The beach is super beautiful.  Super beautiful.  Up until this point, I thought Nantucket was the prettiest beach, but I’ve changed my mind.  Ocracoke is the best.  And part of what makes it the best is the people here.  The people in Nantucket are too rich.  This is a more blue-collar kind of place – lots of families and retired folk.

What’s also nice is that Ocracoke is tiny.  You can bike the whole village in about 30 minutes.  No restaurant is more than a 15-30 minute walk away.  The town is clean and pretty pristine.  Biking/walking/golf-carting is encouraged.  It’s an easy place to stay active.

If you are looking for lots of night life and crazy parties, I don’t think Ocracoke would be your place, but for people like Tim and me, it’s perfect.  We’re early risers (especially here, where one whole side of our hotel suite is windows, so our room is bright with sunshine at 5;30AM), and early sleepers.  Ocracoke suits us.

Hmm… what else do we like…  Dogs are allowed on the beach here, which is awesome (sorry Lucent!).  There are funny surfer dudes working at this great local coffee shop.  Yesterday one said to a customer, “I’m slighly bipolar, but in the good way.”

What don’t we like?  Well, two main things.  1.  It’s SUPER hard to find a place that serves whiskey.  According to our server at a local restuarant, serving hard liquor just recently became legal in the county.  Beer and wine are the order of the day.  We finally found a place last night that serves whiskey.  My single whiskey and soda cost EIGHT DOLLARS.  No good.

Number 2 – the mosquitoes on this island are a thing of legend.  Actually, I think they are a problem all along the Outer Banks, due to the marshes that line the ocean.  We tried to do a marsh hike on Pea Island on the way down here, but the mosquitoes were literally trying to eat Tim alive.  For some reason, they really love him.  I’ve been hit maybe 2 or 3 times, but Tim has been bitten dozens of times.  We have to spray him head-to-toe with bug spray any time we leave the house.  They are insane.  We ran yesterday along Highway 12, and they were tailing him as he ran.  Crazy.  They are so intense that I don’t know if we would vacation here again.  We planned on doing some hikes while we are here, but changed our tune after the Pea Island experience.

All-in-all, it’s been a fantastic trip – lots of beach time, lots of biking, lots of walking, lots of relaxing.  Tomorrow we head out to visit my cousin on the mainland, and then it’s back to Iowa for us.  At least we have a trip in July to look forward to; otherwise, I would be mucho depressed.

I am looking forward to getting home for one big reason, though.  I’ve been eating totally non-paleo this trip – lots of tasty fried food and carbs.  My shorts are getting tight, and my energy is waning.  I can’t wait to start eating my avocado and eggs and veggies and grass-fed meat again. I need to CLEANSE.

In a nutshell, Ocracoke = good times

Health & Fitness

Two PRs in One Weekend

heather

The Timmy Tee and I ran the Race for the Cure yesterday.  We’ve both been exercising more than normal, so we were hoping to have good times.  My time from last year was going to be easy to beat, since I mistook where the finish line was and stopped running about 50 feet too early.  However, I was still hoping to beat previous years’ times (around 33 minutes).

We both did pretty well!  My time was 29:06, a personal best.  Tim’s time was 26:01, a personal best for him as well.  You can check our progress here, if you’re interested.  We’re solidly beating our 2009 selves, which supposedly were younger and faster, so that’s awesome!

It was a HOT race too, especially on the eastward loop.  So much sun.  So much heat.  Bah!     But we did it.  And to top it all off, after breakfast at Village Inn and a little putzing around the house, we went out for a 20 mile bike ride.  And, yes, it was still HOT.  It was a good ride, though.  I was utterly exhausted afterwards.  Today I am wicked sore in my hamstrings.  But, it’s a good sore – a sore that reeks of success.  Reeks.

Today was supposed to be a rest day.  Tim has been training really steadfastly for the West Lake Triathlon next weekend, and we figured he needed to take a break to give his body time to recoup.  Well, we ended up doing some of our floor exercises – planks, push-ups, leg and arm exercises, etc.  I also attempted and succeeded in doing a real pull-up!!  I’ve just been doing the flexed arm hang for the past month, but I figured I would try one today and see what happened.  Admittedly, I stood on the bottom run of the later (about 6 inches off the ground), so I had a little boost.  But I did it!  I was able to lift my chin up and over the bar.  I was so happy!! I didn’t think I would ever be able to do that!  I couldn’t complete a second one, but I’m sure that will come in time.  It’s just so nice to see some progress.  Time to start selling tickets to the gunshow!

Cooking/Recipes, Health & Fitness

Tasty, Easy Sunday Supper

heather

Sundays have a way of getting away from you.  We woke up today at 5:50 AM and now, all-of-the-sudden, it’s 6:46 PM.  Where did the day go?  We got some cleaning done, lawn mowed, checkbook updated, lunch at Bent River, and poof!  It’s gone!

But we’ve been eating out quite a bit lately, so I really wanted to make supper at home tonight, so I picked a quick and easy recipe I’ve made before – Asian Pork Meatballs with Dipping Sauce.  They are super easy to make and very delicious.  The recipe calls for mayo, and I know the Hellmans has all sorts of badness in it for you.  But it is oh, so tasty!  Plus, the recipe called for 1/3 a cup, which is all I had left.  So now I have no mayo in the house, which is a good thing.  Next time a recipe calls for it, I’ll make to make it from scratch from avocado oil, which I hear is ultra tasty.  I’ll have to search for a good recipe.

Anyway, I digress.  To accompany the meatballs, I baked some sweet potatoes in our roaster oven.  I made an extra one for breakfast tomorrow.  I’m getting to be so resourceful and foresightful!

The combo of the meatballs, sweet potatoes (and a little sliced avocado) was delicious.  I’m looking forward to sauteeing up the leftovers tomorrow for breakfast with some fresh herbs from my mini herb garden, along with some broccoli, cabbage, and red pepper.  I’m eating out for lunch and supper, so I have to be sure to get a good breakfast in.  I love meals that produce awesome, tasty, healthly leftovers.  Thanks, Health-Bent!

Health & Fitness, Uncategorized

A Primal Primer

heather

I’ve had a couple of friends who are interested in this whole primal/paleo thing.  So I thought I would write a quick post about how to get started, based on my 5 months of experience.  Here are my favorite books, sites, and primal/paleo products.

Good books

  • The Primal Blueprint 21 Day Total Body Transformation – This is the first book I read, and it was a great, simple introduction to the primal lifestyle.  The author, Mark Sisson, doesn’t just talk about how to change your diet.  He talks about how to re-approach your life – get outside more, disconnect from technology, play, focus on the present, etc.  He also lays out a 21-day plan to help you get on the primal path.  I keep promising to send this book to my brothers, but I just can’t let it go.
  • The Paleo Solution:  The Original Human Diet – I just finished this book by Robb Wolf last week.  It’s a more technical, in-depth book on paleo.  If you want to understand the science behind why the paleo diet works, this is the book to read.  Robb also provides meal plans for 30 days and a pretty detailed weight lifting section.  It’s also a pretty funny read.

Blogs:

  • www.marksdailyapple.com – Mark Sisson’s blog – chock full of health information and good recipes.
  • www.robbwolf.com – Robb Wolf’s blog – also chock full of great information and resources.

Recipe Blogs:

Ingredients

Here is a list of the stuff I always like to have in the fridge or freezer:

  • Grass-fed ground hamburger (from our Farmer’s Market.  If you don’t have a local producer, you can buy it online from US Wellness Meats)
  • Frozen wild-caught salmon (from Target)
  • Canned tuna or sardines
  • Fresh veggies – spinach, kale, avocado, carrots, broccoli, cabbage, peppers
  • Frozen fruit – excellent defrosted with some coconut milk drizzled over them
  • Pastured eggs
  • Thai Kitchen Coconut Milk
  • Nuts – Macademia nuts supposedly have the best omega 3 profile, but I find them a little rich.  I eat a lot of pistachios, almonds and walnuts.
  • Gerolsteiner Mineral water – good source of magnesium.
  • Avocado oil
  • Coconut oil – I LOVE this stuff.  I put it in my coffee and cook with it all the time, and it’s the bees knees.
  • Dark chocolate – I love the Ghiradelli Dark Chocolate Chips.  They don’t have a great cocoa content, but they are perfect for snacking.
  • Carlson Super D Omega 3 Cod Liver Oil
  • Magnesium Lactate

Keep all this stuff on hand, and you’ll have everything you need to make a tasty primal meal.

So, that’s an introduction in a nutshell!  Hopefully you found it somewhat helpful.

Cooking/Recipes, Health & Fitness

Primal Tasty Dessert – Coconut milk with berries

heather

As I mentioned in my last post, I have the occasional ice cream cravings.  I AM a hot-blooded American woman for crissake.  Well, I’ve discovered a pretty tasty, primal-aligned alternative.  I’ve been defrosting frozen organic berries, mixing them with fresh-sliced kiwi and copious amounts of coconut milk, freezing it until it’s slushy, and then eating the heck out of it.  It’s SUPER delicious, at least if you love coconut milk and berries.  If you don’t like those things, you will not like this dessert.  I really, really love coconut milk.  I need to move to Hawaii so I have access to more coconut products.

Uncategorized

Biphasic Sleep, or Why I wake up at 3AM

heather

For the past few weeks I’ve been waking up in the middle of the night.  I’m usually awake for an hour or two, but I usually fall back asleep until I need to wake up for the day around 5 or 5:30.  This pattern has been starting to frustrate me, as it sometimes makes me tired in the afternoon.  And, as anyone knows who works in a cubicle at an office job, sleepy afternoons = sugar cravings & trips to the vending machine.

I ran across this post on MarksDailyApple.com this morning, though, that made me look at this sleep cycle in a different way.  Evidently, it was common for our ancestors to wake up in the middle of the night.  This hour of wakefulness was used for meditation and contemplation.  I love this quote from the article:

Robert Louis Stevenson liked the idea, too. Sleep historian (awesome-sounding job!) Roger Ekirch writes of Stevenson who, in the fall of 1878, while trekking through the French highlands on foot, alone, made a remarkable discovery. As anyone who backpacks or spends time outdoors will corroborate, Stevenson found himself drifting off to sleep shortly after sunset. He awoke around midnight, smoked a cigarette, and, only after “enjoying an hour’s contemplation,” fell back asleep. That hour, that “one stirring hour” moved him; Stevenson had never before experienced a “more perfect hour.” He had awoken not because of an interloper, a night terror, or any other external actor, but because of what he later described as a “wakeful influence [that] goes abroad over the sleeping hemisphere” and is unknown to “those who dwell in houses.”

Read more: http://www.marksdailyapple.com/biphasic-sleep/#ixzz1vyifI7dM

The article goes on to say that like most things, perception affects your reality, or makes your new reality.  If, instead of getting frustrated and worked up about the 2 or 3AM wakeups, you view it as an opportunity to relax in a different way, the interruption in your sleep can actually be a good thing.

I’m going to have to try this approach when I wake up tonight at 3AM again.