NEWS

So I've been MIA for a little over a month know, and by now I'm sure you've started to wonder if I had given up all together. I DID NOT GIVE UP!!!!!!!

That was a little theatrical but that's how I'm feeling these days. I'm pregnant! I haven't been blogging because I haven't felt like doing anything. Morning sickness was/is kicking my butt, however I think I might have that under control now. (Hopefully). I will be back with lots of cool stuff, as soon as I get myself together. 

Until next time, 

Kellan

Tips and Prep Work for the Future

A few months ago I came across Nourishing Traditions by Sally Fallon and started reading it. First, this is an awesome book that everyone should own......not rent from the library, BUY IT. There's simply too much information in the book to get any real benefit from it if you don't own it. In short, Sally Fallon talks about the importance of eating a wholesome diet that is prepared in a traditional way. Nourishing Traditions starts off with a introduction section which gives detailed information about the difference components of food, i.e. fats, carbohydrates, proteins. The introduction section is the first 78 pages of the book. Pages 79 through 620 are all receipes, awesome recipes that address every aspect of cooking and eating that ANYONE, including me, could phantom. The remaining 56 pages are appendices, including a sources section, that are really helpful if you're really trying to make a change to cooking and eating in a more traditional manner. 

In the future a lot of my cooking posts/experiments are going to hail from information I found in this book as well as a few traditional cooking blogs. Having said all that, if you would like to experiment along with me you need to know about an important bit of information that I found out recently and do some prep work. 

Important Information

While reading The Healthy Home Economist blog, I recently came across a post entitled "Whole Grains Cause Cavities?" The blog's author, Sarah, attended the 2010 Wise Traditions Conference, where author Remi Nagel presented. During the presentation, Mr. Nagel made an observation about traditional cultures that had been somewhat overlooked in the past: Traditional cultures typically do not use the entire grain, they remove the bran. He suggests that bran from wheat, spelt, rye, kamut, barley, corn, millet and oats be removed through sifting or sieving. Rami Nagel also suggests that whole grains MUST  be soured first to significantly reduce phytic acid. Phytic acid, aside from hindering the absorption of mineral in grains, is a major cause of why whole grains cause cavities. According to Sarah,  Mr. Nagel states the best method for souring grains, thus significantly reducing phytic acid is to soak grains in a mixture of filtered water and liquid whey. The ratio is 1 cup of grains to 1 cup of filtered water plus 1 tablespoon of liquid whey. 

Prep Work

All that information lead to your prep work. Sarah did a great step-by-step post and video of how to make liquid whey (yes, you have to make it yourself). Please watch that and complete the steps. 

Also, grind and sift your grains. Put them in the freezer when done. 

Lastly you're going to need some sort of fabric bowl cover. As soon as my camera is done charging I'm going to do a tutorial on how to make awesome reuseable bowl covers and we will be all set to start on start preparing food in a traditional manner. 

Until next time, 

Kellan

P.S. I'm SUPER excited about this!!!!!!!

Belief and Faith: Luke 8:40-48

I'm going to stray away a little on today's post from what I usually write about. If you've read the purpose of this blog you know that I write this as a means of sharing my experiences with trying to live a healthier and greener lifestyle, and to me that includes working on my relationship with God. I believe that it's important to work on the spiritual aspects of my life as well as they physical, thus from now on there will be the occasional posts about faith. Having said that, I've been in conversation with God a lot lately regarding some aspects of my life and yesterday I had a serious revelation that I feel that I need to share with as many people as possible.

The Faith to Make Things Happen

Have you ever wanted something, prayed for it, had God speak to you telling you that he would bless you with it and then didn’t receive it? Have you ever wondered why? Do you then question if God had really spoken to you or if you were simply all in your mind? I’m going to be honest, I have. Actually I often find myself in this situation and as I’ve been earnestly working on myself lately I wanted to know why. I asked God to show me why these situations occur in my life and I was honestly a little shocked by the answer: We often don’t receive our blessings because we don’t truly believe that God is and can.

Now I’m sure after reading that one line some of you reading this are pissed off. You thinking “Of course, I believe God is and can.” But do you really? Truly think about how you live your life and the words that come out of your mouth. I’ll give you an example from my personal life. At the age of 17, I began having debilitating migraines that grossly affected my quality of life.  I spent countless hours in the hospital and racked up a lot of money in hospital bills. I’ve had pretty much every neurological test run on me possible and from a medical prospective, nothing is wrong is me.  I’m perfectly healthy. No doctor could explain why I continued to have these migraines and the medication they gave me didn’t work, they were stumped and eventually I accepted that this problem would just be a part of my life. I didn’t have them very often so it wasn’t that big of a deal or so I thought. Recently I began having migraines back to back, again the doctors ran tests and again found nothing wrong. I changed my eating habits, my lifestyle and it changed nothing. Finally I became desperate and in my desperation turned to God. I prayed to God asking him to heal me. The next day I woke up and I felt better, everything seemed so clear, it was as if fog had been lifted from around me.  This went on for a few days and then one day I ate something that under my new healthy diet I shouldn’t have eaten and I didn’t drink the amount of water that I was supposed to drink and as the night came to a close I began being fearful of what the next day would bring. I began to fear losing the clarity that I had recently received or even worse having a migraine because of what I had eaten and what I hadn’t done. A few days later I did have a migraine, in terms of pain it was mild but it took a lot out of me. I was in bed, in the dark for almost 36 hours.  When I came back to my right mind I began to pray and ask God why this was happening to me. I believed that God was trying to teach me something but I couldn’t figure out what it was, today God revealed plainly the purpose behind all this. He was trying to get me to understand this point: People pray and say that they have faith in God but then act and/or speak is a manner that is contradictory to what they just professed. I’ll go back to the example I just gave regarding my migraines. I prayed and asked  God to heal me but then when I did something that went against the “lifestyle changes” that I had made in an attempt heal myself, I freaked out and became fearful  of what the outcome would be based on those actions. If I truly believed that God had healed me would it matter that I only drank 50 oz of water instead of 75 or that I ate Little Caesar’s pizza for dinner? No. Now I should try to be as healthy as possible, which would include being properly hydrated and eating a wholesome diet? Yes, of course but one day of compromise shouldn’t make or break me. My healing isn’t due to anything that I have done or could ever do, my healing comes from God. If I could have healed myself, I would have been healed a long time ago.

God lead me to Luke 8:40-48, which gives an excellent example of someone with a similar situation. When I compared myself to the woman in Luke 8:40-48, we had a lot in common.  The Bible says that the woman had been afflicted with hemorrhages, bleeding, for 12 years. She had spent every penny she had and no one could help her. At this point, this woman had to believe that her affliction was a part of her life, as I did. She understood that there was nothing that she could do to heal herself but she believed that Jesus could heal her. Think of how great her faith must have been, she believed so much that Jesus didn’t have to take the time to acknowledge her, that He didn’t have to touch her, she believed that if she touched his clothing that she would be healed.  What could we all do if we had faith like that?

The second thing that I took from this woman is this: When you have faith that God is going to bless you move forward as though you’ve already received the blessing. When the woman explained to Jesus why she touched Him, the Bible says “In front of all the people, she blurted out her story – why she touched him and how at that same moment she was healed.” Now let’s be completely realistic for a second, this woman suffered from hemorrhages aka bleeding, so I wouldn’t imagine that she suddenly felt herself stop hemorrhaging and yet when we presented her case before the crowd she told them that at the same moment she touched His robe she was healed. If you think about a situation in your life in which you’ve asked for something and it seems like nothing is happening have you ever considered the possibility maybe nothing is happening because you haven’t moved forward. So let’s give this point a real life scenario. Let’s say that your dream in life is to own a business. You pray about it, but that’s all you do. You never actually act. How is God supposed to make your business prosperous when you never start it? It’s just as important to move forward as it is to believe that God can and will. The act of moving forward is a outward expression of the faith that you have in God and the belief in what He’s promised you. What’s holding you back? What step do you need to take to start receiving your blessings? I know it’s cliché but everything starts with a leap of faith. 

Until next time, 

Kellan

A Quick Health Tip

Hi Guys, 

So as you know I've been actively working on losing weight. I haven't weighed myself in a while but at last weigh in I had lost about 10 lbs. I'm definitely seeing a difference in my appearance and my family has been seeing the difference (great for my ego). Anyways, I've been really working on being healthier so I've made some life changes and picked up some new habits. One of my new habits is going to Bikram Yoga, which is AWESOME. I've really been enjoying it. I've taken to eating a mostly organic diet, which is a little difficult because I'm trying to do it as inexpensively as possible but I'm making good progress. I'll give some specific examples in next week, I'm trying to compile at least a week worth of real life examples and costs. 

A quick health tip I recently learned is that the number of ounces of water that a person is supposed to consume in a day should equal half their body weight. About 20% of that water comes from your food if you eat a healthy diet. Did you know that? I sure didn't. So for me, I would need to consume about 100 oz of water in a day. That's a lot, but I've come up with a great way to space it out so that I can get it all in. Pray for me, it's not easy.

There will be some new tutorials coming up in the upcoming week. Since we now have a video camera, I felt that I should actually use it. So I did an experiment, video taped it, and was almost finished editing it when my husband watched it. I, of course, usually do experiments while he's at work and we don't have any kids, which means I don't have anyone to hold the camera, so I'm not actually seen in any of the video. He didn't like that. He wants it to be absolutely perfect for you guys so I have to start over with his assistance. 

Until next time, 

Kellan

"Real Food" Evangelist

I think this is a video everyone should see.

Battling the Bulge

Hola!

I have some great new experiments to share, I just need to get a couple of supplies in. I plan to order them Tuesday so hopefully I have some new posts next week. 

In my last post I stated that I was going to start actively working on losing weight............Yea, that didn't really happen. I've created a new clog to follow my weight loss journey, it's called Kellan Battles the Bulge. I would really appreciate if you follow that blog as well, I really need people to be accountable to. 

Thanks so much.

I can't wait to show you what I've been working on. 

Until next time, 

Kellan

New Life Chapter

ALOHA!!!!!

So I’ve been MIA for a while. I’m sorry…….I’ve been preparing for my wedding, then I had my wedding, then went on my honeymoon and since being back I’ve been trying to adjust being at home again. So I’m back and functioning again.

My wedding was absolutely beautiful. This is my favorite picture.

Since we’ve been home I’ve been trying to figure out what changes I need to make to be the person that I want to be in this new chapter of my life. I’ve determined that one thing I really need to work on is discipline.  So I’m assigning myself one thing to master at a time.

Task #1: Weight Loss

I’ve been “losing weight” for going on 4 years now and think I’ve lost a total of 5 lbs (maybe). The reason that I haven’t actually lost any weight isn’t because I struggle, it’s because I never put forth effort. So it’s official, I’m going to lose weight. My first goal is to weigh 200 lbs, I’m currently weigh 225 lbs.

My research has told me that they key to successful weight loss is having a good breakfast every day. Well what is a good breakfast? My grandmother raised me to believe that a good breakfast involves pork of some sort; her personal favorite is Bob Evan’s sausage. While I LOVE my breakfast pork, I’m going to cut back, especially during this first 25 lbs.

My go to breakfast food is going to be oatmeal, but I think instant oatmeal is disgusting and cooking oatmeal on the stove doesn’t come out as creamy as I would like so I make oatmeal in my crockpot.

Overnight Crockpot Oatmeal

Adapted from: Frugal Upstate and Mommy’s Kitchen

Original Recipe

1 cup rolled oats (NOT Quick Oats!)
4 cups water
1/2 cup milk
1/4 cup brown sugar
1  TBS butter
1/2  tsp vanilla extract
1 tsp cinnamon

Combine all in glass or ceramic bowl that will fit in your crockpot.

Fill crockpot about 1/3 full with water

Place the bowl in crockpot

Put on lid and cook on low for 10hrs. 

This is A LOT of oatmeal. There's no way I would ever be able to eat all that oatmeal, maybe half but not all of it. Below is the nutritional information if you were to eat ALL the oatmeal, which I guess if you eat 3 meals a day isn't that bad from a calorie prospective, but it is a lot of sugar. 

Nutrition Facts
1 Serving
Amount Per Serving
Calories		580.2
Total Fat		7.5 g
	Saturated Fat	3.5 g
	Polyunsaturated Fat	4.1 g
	Monounsaturated Fat	4.1 g
Cholesterol		9.8 mg
Sodium		94.8 mg
Potassium		874.5 mg
Total Carbohydrate		184.5 g
	Dietary Fiber	17.7 g
	Sugars	79.3 g
Protein		14.1 g

Vitamin A	4.7 %
Vitamin B-12	0.0 %
Vitamin B-6	9.7 %
Vitamin C	1.5 %
Vitamin D	12.5 %
Vitamin E	5.4 %
Calcium	32.9 %
Copper	59.8 %
Folate	22.0 %
Iron	51.5 %
Magnesium	75.4 %
Manganese	411.9 %
Niacin	7.7 %
Pantothenic Acid	21.0 %
Phosphorus	83.6 %
Riboflavin	13.1 %
Selenium	1.9 %
Thiamin	79.5 %
Zinc	41.6 %

I don't mind refrigerating leftover oatmeal and eating it later but if you don't like to do that then here is a recipe for an individual serving.

Individual Serving

¼ cup rolled oats

1 cup water

2 tbsp milk

1 tbsp brown sugar

1 tbsp butter

½ tsp vanilla extract

1 tsp cinnamon

Combine all in glass or ceramic bowl that will fit in your crockpot.

Fill crockpot about 1/3 full with water

Place the bowl in crockpot

Put on lid and cook on low for 8hrs. 

Nutrition Facts
1 Serving
Amount Per Serving
Calories		111.7
Total Fat		1.6 g
	Saturated Fat	0.7 g
	Polyunsaturated Fat	1.0 g
	Monounsaturated Fat	0.9 g
Cholesterol		1.2 mg
Sodium		14.1 mg
Potassium		197.9 mg
Total Carbohydrate		34.8 g
	Dietary Fiber	5.4 g
	Sugars	7.1 g
Protein		3.1 g

Vitamin A	0.7 %
Vitamin B-12	0.0 %
Vitamin B-6	2.7 %
Vitamin C	1.1 %
Vitamin D	1.5 %
Vitamin E	1.4 %
Calcium	7.6 %
Copper	14.0 %
Folate	5.6 %
Iron	15.6 %
Magnesium	18.5 %
Manganese	116.0 %
Niacin	2.1 %
Pantothenic Acid	5.3 %
Phosphorus	20.7 %
Riboflavin	3.5 %
Selenium	0.2 %
Thiamin	20.0 %
Zinc	10.6 %

You can cook this directly in the crockpot if you want but I find it’s easier to clean a bowl than the crockpot (mine is REALLY big).

I’m using the MyFitnessPal app and website to assist me in my weight loss endeavor. The program has calculated that to lost 1 lb a week, my daily caloric intake should be 1,730, this breakfast is 111.7 calories, leaving me plenty of calories for the rest of the day. I use SparkPeople to calculate calories for my recipes. 

I recently bought a webcam so hopefully they'll be some video posts coming up. 

Until next time, 

Kellan