Wednesday, October 30, 2013

Real Food Detox - the intro

People in my world ask me about healthy eating all the time. All.The.Time. It makes me feel pretty good that people feel like they can come to me. Recently my sister-in-law asked me what I know about doing a cleanse. After talking to her for a bit, I decided this would also make a good blog post topic! Here we go:

I am in NO way an expert and all of this comes from my Google education and life experiences.  This is in now way, shape or form medical advice.  Everybody is different. That being said, here is my opinion:

A cleanse is a good way to sorta reset your metabolism. It is NOT a long term solution for you weight loss plans, but its a good place to start.  A good time for a cleanse is probably when you have been off the healthy eating wagon for a while and want to get back on or if you have consumed way more adult beverages than you should lately and need to detox all that crap out of your system.  SIL's reason is the former, mine is the latter...

Anyway!  I told her I'd come up with a menu or guideline of some kind.  Some of the really important things about a cleanse are to drink PLENTY of water and eat until you are full.  No need to starve yourself.  The point is to keep everything moving through your body, not make it shut down and go into starvation mode.  Eat whole foods, nothing processed (or at least very little processed stuff, you may see some exceptions in my plan), no meat and no dairy.  Basically eat yourself stupid on all the fruit and veg you want!

Smoothies are a GREAT way to get a ton of nutrition on the go and the fruit is already blended and easy for your body to absorb.  I don't generally wake up early enough to sit down and eat breakfast, but it doesn't take long to throw a smoothie together.  I like smoothies all the time, not just for a cleanse.  My normal smoothie would have about a cup of frozen or fresh fruit, a banana, 1/2 a cup of yogurt, about a tablespoon of chia seeds and enough water to blend it to consistency.  For a cleanse, I'll opt for no yogurt.  I like to add spinach because it's a good source of iron and it's a mild flavor usually covered up by all the fruit.  I've read where others use kale or other greens, but spinach is good for beginners because of the mild flavor.  For this cleanse I'll have a smoothie for breakfast everyday, maybe for a snack if I'm feeling it.

Snack on fresh fruit and veg.  Apples are in season, not my favorite fruit, but I might eat a few.  I like oranges, love bananas.  Frozen cherries are delicious.  Be sure your fruit is without sugar.  Just picked and flash frozen, nothing added.  Dinner will probably include squash because the fall squash is in season and that is one of the few things I like about this time of year.  You see pumpkin-flavored everything this time of year, but squash is where it's at.  Don't get me wrong, I'm consuming my fair share of the pumpkin, but I like the squash best.  Maybe I'll work some squash or pumpkin into dessert, too.  We'll see.

I'm working on a full menu plan and shopping list.  I should have it posted by the weekend, so stay tuned friends!  If you have questions or information you want to add leave it in the comments!

Tuesday, October 1, 2013

Update: Project 333

Update on Project 333:  Fail.  Thirty-three items for three months is really hard, but these are some things I learned:  Practical can be fashionable.  A few high-quality, well-fitting clothes is better than a closet full of clothes I don't wear.  Five inch heels are to high.

Jesus said to him, "If you want to be perfect, go, sell what you have and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; and come, follow Me."  - Matthew 19:21

We should all spend more time following Jesus than chasing after 'stuff'.  As I've unpacked more items from the boxes I've also moved more stuff to the donation box.  I definitely want to live with less stuff.  Less clutter in my closet will probably lead to less clutter in my life.  My khaki pants were in terrible shape and never really fit well.  I've replaced them, all is well with Thursday again.  My super fabulous, nude, peep-toe pumps are to high.  I will replace them with lower heels soon.  I'm not in a huge rush because it's warm enough to wear sandals for now.  When fall really sets in I'll have to replace a couple pair of pumps and a pair of boots.  When I do, I'll donate more of the shoes in the boxes.  I have so much stuff that has barely been worn, someone should use it so I'll donate it.  Sometimes less really is more.