Okay, grandparents, here are the girls dancing. :) The girls are on the front row, on the left. Don't forget to go pause the music player before trying to watch the videos. If we had a better video camera, you could see the look on Angelina's face when the audience applauded. You see her head pops up, and she was just beaming. They weren't used to getting applause when they finished dancing!
The girls are on the back row, far right in this one.
David was taping this one as I promised the girls I would stay backstage and be there on the sides while they danced. I should have told him to just tape the whole song, but he tried just taping the girls. Anyway, the 2 year olds went out first, and for some reason, Trinity went out on stage during their part. We got her to come off stage to us, but by the time she got around backstage, her group was already on stage. Thus, there goes Trinity, coming in late and having to run all the way across the stage! This time they are on the back row, far right again.
There was another bit they were in where everyone was on stage, but it is too hard to pick them out on the video, so I'm not uploading that one.
I was hooked after watching this trailer and did my usual search for the title at the library. Not there. Then I checked with Blockbuster and they had it. Luckily, I looked around the site a little longer because I found that on the Food Matters website under the movie section, you can order and watch this documentary right on your computer for the same price as driving to Blockbuster and renting it. Score! Not only that, but there are some movies that are free to watch - titles such as "The World According to Monsanto" and "Homegrown." Check it out! Link to online movies
So I ordered the online movie and really enjoyed watching this documentary. I feel it is well done with good nutritional information and a good look into the problem with our current health care system as it relates to nutrition. Anyone wanting to understand a little more about why to eat more raw foods in your diet should get their questions answered in this movie. They go into a wide arrange of connected issues: nutrient loss in our produce, vitamin supplementation, pharmaceuticals, our health care system, and government regulation.
Here is some information that you are probably not aware of: LEADING CAUSES OF DEATH
#1. Heart Disease 631,636
#2. Cancer 559,888
#3. Modern Medicine 225,000
Now you aren't going to see number three on the chart with the center for disease control, but that number represents the number of deaths each year from unnecessary surgery and other hospital errors, infections obtained at the hospital, and medications. (and that is only medication that is prescribed by a doctor and taken as directed) It comes in number three - isn't that really a staggering reality? It comes in above stroke, chronic lower respiratory disease, accidents, and diabetes. That number should cause concern.
On a more positive note, David Wolfe gave some great information about raw cacao beans and their nutritive quality. Raw cacao are the highest natural source of magnesium, chromium, zinc, and copper. It is likely the highest natural source of iron and manganese, has all the cofactors necessary for a healthy metabolism, is high in vitamin C and has the highest antioxidant content of known foods. Ever heard commercials touting the high antioxidants in blueberries? Here is how they stack up:
ORAC values per 100g Raw Cacao 26,000 Acai Berry 18,500
Prunes 5,770
Raisins 2,830
Blueberries 2,400
Blackberries 2,036
Strawberries 1,540
Spinach, raw 1,260
Broccoli florets 890
Red grapes 739
And can I say, I just love David Wolfe in this show?! He talks about things no one wants to talk about in polite society, but he is right on. :) For those of you who aren't familiar with David Wolfe, he is a leader in the raw food movement and wrote one of the classics, The Sunfood Diet. Just listening to him and all the speakers in this documentary really inspires me to keep eating lots of raw food. I have slacked off in the last couple of weeks and have been eating more cooked food. (the cold weather didn't help!) And just so you know, in this film he highlights eating at least 51% raw food, not all raw, so there is no excuse not to try.
What this movie really has done for me is bring me full circle to the initial thought - you are what you eat. Americans have gotten away from eating based on what your body needs to function and be healthy, and moved to eating what tastes good. Unfortunately, with MSG, high-fructose corn syrup, caffeine, and lots of salt, we have learned to create desire for foods that are extremely nutritionally deficient. We are a society that is fat and happy, but slowly starving our bodies to death and we see this playing out in the increase of disease and death due to our lifestyle choices.
And since you will learn that you need to be supplementing your healthy diet with vitamins, I want to recommend a source of really good ones - Optimal Health Systems. I used to work for this company and I know that their products are of the highest quality. You can get a great wholefood vitamin from them. Here is the ingredient list:
I was listening to the radio and this Third Day song came on. I love Third Day, and I love this song. It takes me back to my early thirties, those first giddy, heady years in love with the Lord. I remember clearly the first verse I ever highlighted in my Bible:
"Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; the old has gone, the new has come!" - 2 Corinthians 5:17
You can see by the joy on the faces of all these people being baptized, that as the song suggests, they feel like they are living for the very first time!
(scroll to bottom of page and pause the player to view the video)
A lot of people are not familiar with Dean Ornish and his work, but he is a doctor who is having fantastic results reversing cardiovascular disease through a regimen of eating and exercise. He wrote a book called "Eat More, Weigh Less" which essentially advocates a low fat vegetarian diet.
This video will give you some startling facts. If you haven't figured out yet that the way we eat, a relatively new diet and lifestyle, is not health promoting, then hopefully this will help you see the light.
(turn off player at bottom of page before starting video)
Did you ever see that movie with Julia Roberts, "Erin Brocovich?" There was that scene where she was talking to the mom about how the water was making them sick and the electric company knows all about it. At first she just didn't want to believe it. But then she has the wake up moment, and turns and looks at her kids splashing in the pool in the back yard. She immediately starts calling to them to get out of the pool.
Well, that is a great analogy to what is happening in our country right now. Last fall began my wake up call when I first read The China Study. It was the start down the path to learning just how bad our food system really has become in America. I am now faced with trying to pull my kids and husband out of the pool, so to speak, and help them understand why.
I am becoming more and more convinced that we need to change the way we view food in this country. The evidence is overwhelming and I am constantly posting things on Facebook about our food. Now I am going to start posting it here too. We, as a nation, need to have a wake up moment.
(scroll down and turn off the music player to view the video)
Today was day one of the 60 day challenge at Hallelujah Acres. So I started my day with raw oatmeal. (for me this is a challenge to be on a high raw diet more than following the specific guidelines of HA) I thought I would share this recipe because it is easy and delicious - two qualities that I love in a raw food dish. :)
I start with steel cut oats. Before going to bed, I put 1/2 cup of the oats in my liquid measuring cup, put 8 dates in, then add water to more than cover it all. With this amount, a single serving, I filled to 1 1/2 cup line and there was still plenty of water left in the morning. Drain the excess water. If you want warm oatmeal, just run hot water over the oats while in the strainer. If you don't want to have to drain it, then just cover with water. You shouldn't have much if any excess by morning with that amount.
Put the oats and dates into a food processor. Add a few sprinkles of cinnamon and a dash of nutmeg. Process...
Remove from the processor and stir in a handful of raisins and chopped raw pecans. Eat it up. Yummmmm!
To celebrate the beginning of my new era of health (always the optimist, I am) here is a video of the author of The China Study giving a talk in which he basically summarizes the book and info. "Main Finding - The richer the diet is in the kind and amount of nutrients provided by plant-based foods, the lower is the risk for chronic degenerative diseases."
Okay, so over the holiday weekend I talked with my brother and sister-in-law. I knew from talking with my mom that they were eating vegetarian and raw foods so thought I would find out what was going on for myself. I had a great time talking with them both and especially found inspiration from my SIL in how well she has managed to stick to a high raw diet. Kudo's Sharon! I know how hard it is to feed a family that may or may not be completely on the same page with you in what they want to eat.
At least my girls are young enough that I still control what they eat. It is just a matter of weaning them off of the unhealthy stuff. I am trying to educate them so that they will understand why mommy is making different choices for our meals. I may be creating little monsters out of them as last week when I was in Walmart, they were loudly chanting, in unison, "Fruit Loops are not healthy, Fruit Loops are not healthy, Fruit Loops are not healthy!"
Anyway, back to my inspirational siblings. One of the books that my SIL had brought home from the library that got my brother fired up was a book by George Malkmus. He is the guy responsible for the Hallelujah diet which I had heard of back when I was a raw foodist. So I decided to check the site out again, as I am in that search mode - looking for whatever will inspire me and educate me so that I will stick to eating healthy. (and stay away from the lifetime supply of krispy kremes in the basement!)
As luck would have it, they are starting a 60 day challenge on January 7th to do their diet program. I looked over the basics and it is extremely similar to the Fit For Life, Not Fat For Life principles that I wrote about back in 2007. You can read all about the hallelujah diet here but here are the basics:
85% raw, uncooked, unprocessed food
15% cooked
Breakfast - Barley Max
Mid morning - fresh vegetable juice or piece of fruit
Lunch - another serving of Barley Max, followed by a vegetable salad
Mid afternoon - fresh vegetable juice or raw veggies
Dinner - first a serving of Barley Max, then a LARGE salad, followed by cooked vegan whole foods if desired
Evening - fruit or fruit juice
This reminds me so much of FFL principles - eating at least 50% raw food, nothing but fruit til noon, making a big salad the first part of a meal so you won't eat so much cooked food - all great tips to reduce cooked food from your diet. I signed up to participate in the 60 day challenge even though I know I will not do it exactly as written. For one, I am not buying Barley Max. Barley Max is no doubt a great product, as it is a blend of raw organic alfalfa and barley which are highly nutritional. But I will make my own green smoothies and fill them with a variety of greens that are also highly nutritional and not widely eaten. At the very least I can be inspired and have the accountability and support through their program. I'm gettin' excited!
(note: scroll down and pause the music player at the bottom of the page before playing video)
He said he would drink a green smoothie every day if he could have meat.
He hasn't quite gotten it yet. But if I can keep this up, hopefully he will get on board as he sees the changes it is making for me. Plus, I was re-reading some of my entries back in 2007 and he totally feels better when he is eating raw. It is just the need to make it easier for him to eat raw foods and he will do it. Green smoothies is a good place to start. :)
Yeah, read that title with a lot of sarcasm! Trinity sang on stage last night at church with the 4 year old - kindergarten class. Of course, we were sitting on the opposite side of the sanctuary from where she ended up and couldn't even see her. I had to run out and head back in two doors down so I could get her on video. Otherwise, even David and Angelina wouldn't get to see her!
So here she is in all her performing glory. ;)
(don't forget - you need to scroll down and pause the player first so you can hear the videos)
I never did upload the videos I took of Trinity dancing last winter. At the time, we were on dial up so it was nearly impossible.
For awhile, Trinity dancing was the equivalent of Elaine dancing in the tv series Seinfeld. She would crack me up! I never was able to catch some of her more "Elainesque" moves, but these are fun to watch, regardless.
note: you will want to scroll down and pause the music player at the bottom of the page before starting the videos
I never explained why I was looking for vegan recipes that would please my meat eatin' hubby.
Here's the background.
We recently got on WIC. For those of you who aren't familiar with WIC, it is a program designed to make sure that low income families are able to provide nutritious food for children under the
age of 5 and pregnant mom's. They of course follow the standard nutritional guidelines. One of
the things they do when you first get signed up is give you advice on what your kids should be
eating. I got 'ding'ed because I let my children drink lots of juice (very watered down) and only
occasionally give them milk. This flies in the face of conventional teaching on nutrition.
Coming from a background of working for a nutrition company and having been a raw foodist, I
have become ambivalent towards milk. It seems to me I have read information that would
suggest that milk didn't do your body good as the dairy industry would have us all believe. And
certainly my raw food stint left me partial to raw products. But our culture bombards us with the
message that we should all be consuming dairy regularly for good health.
Well, after the gentle verbal spanking from the WIC counselor, I was given my coupons for
loads of milk, cheese, and eggs. (among other things) I decided to do some research about
milk again before I started pumping my children full of cows milk. What I found were a couple of
illness can be prevented simply by adopting a plant-based diet." - Campbell This book essentially lays out very carefully how Campbell went from being a farmers kid and
writing his dissertation on how animal proteins could be more efficiently produced, to an
advocate of a plant based diet. He found that there was a direct correlation between animal protein and cancer. You can
almost hear the food industry giants' heart palpitations even as you read those words. Gee, is there any wonder that this information is not being widely spread?! His initial study injected rats with a deadly carcinogen, then gave one group a diet with 5%
protein and one with 20%. The rats fed a 20% protein diet all developed cancer. The rats fed
5% protein all did not. It also didn't matter how much of the carcinogen was introduced. He
gave one group a very high dosage of the carcinogen and fed them a 5% protein diet, and a low carcinogen dosage to the other group but fed them a 20% protein diet. Anyone care to guess
how that came out? The group on the 20% protein diet produced substantially more cancer than the high carcinogen group. He found he could literally turn on the growth by switching them from
the low protein diet to the high protein diet, then turn it back off by putting them back on 5%. In
fact, the growth was shrunk by the low protein diet. All this initial research was done with casein, which makes up 87% of cow's milk protein.
(making my children drink lots of milk, low-fat or otherwise, is not looking good!) The next step was to test plant based proteins and see if they had the same results. What they
found was that cancer growth was NOT promoted, even at the higher levels of protein intake. All this information is in just the first 60 pages of the book. He goes on to tell of all the
supporting research that is out there and of course, as the book is titled, the China study where
he was able to see how his findings held up when humans were involved. He also delves into
why this information isn't disseminated widely when you would think that it would be a huge step
in resolving the cancer crisis in our country. Good reading. I highly recommend the book. If you need motivation to eat healthy, this book
book. This one looks at four people groups that are known for producing centarians. (def: those who live to the age 100+) Not only do they live long, but they are healthy and vital and maintain
their cognitive abilities. This book is fascinating because it shows that becoming a senior
doesn't mean you have to face the health issues that are common here in America.
Overall, the long-lived groups had very similar diets. (and they couldn't be more different than the standard American diet!) These are the four people groups studied and the percentage of
animal food in their diets compared with the typical American diet:
Abkhasia 10%
Okinawan Elders 5% (this group has the highest rate of centarians)
Vilcabamba 1%
Honza 1%
Americans 52%
Overall, these people ate far fewer calories than we do here in America, at 1800-1900 calories a day. Not only are they eating fewer calories, but they are eating nutritionally dense, whole
foods. (perspective: a quarter pounder with cheese and a large fry at McDonalds will run you 900 calories. Add a chocolate shake and you are 1280 calories for one meal.)
Robbins book covers the other aspects that play a role in the health and longevity of these people groups with lots of great chapters like: Born to Move - why your cells and your bones
crave a challenge, The Strength of the Heart - why loneliness will kill you faster than cigarettes,
and Keeping Your Marbles - simple things you can do to prevent Alzheimer's.
But I will let you read all about for yourselves. Back to the issue of vegan eating.
After reading all this information, I am committed to becoming a flexitarian. Never heard of that? Yeah, me either. A flexitarian is a fairly new term and still being defined. Vegans and
vegetarians apparently have an issue with the term, which is why I have an issue defining myself as a vegan or vegetarian. For most vegetarians, the motivation is animal rights. Obviously,
having butchered my own chickens this summer, I am not motivated by my concern for animals. My motivation is strictly health. And, based on the information at hand, a mostly plant based
diet of whole foods is the key to optimal health. So, am I going to have issue with the occasional meat, cheese or egg that crosses my lips? No. There are definitely nutritive values that can be obtained from them (B12 is the first thing that comes to my mind) and as a small part of my diet, should not be a stumbling block to good health.
Plus, I have to wean the family off our animal centered diet and move towards this flexitarian
eating. We are currently loaded up with milk, cheese, eggs, and chicken. These will be eaten,
but I will try to make them less and less the centerpiece of a meal.
So there you have it. And just for fun, here's a You Tube video that I found about a meat eating
cowboy that went vegan. (for health reasons) And since the weight results aren't in this clip, he
lost 30 pounds! (I knew you'd be curious ;)
(note: you will need to pause the music on the player at the bottom of the page to listen to the video)
This blog started out to be about my journey back into raw food, then quickly became my life line to friends and family as we left the big city and relocated in the Iowan countryside. Sometimes boring... sometimes fun. Such is my life.
Psalm 25:5
Guide me in your truth and teach me, for you are God my Savior, and my hope is in you all day long.
Read the blog; Feed and Educate a Child for $25/mo
Dance Videos
website under the movie section, you can order and watch this documentary right on your computer for the same price as driving to Blockbuster and renting it. Score! Not only that, but there are some movies that are free to watch - titles such as "The World According to Monsanto" and "Homegrown." Check it out! 
26,000
18,500
. Just listening to him and all the speakers in this documentary really inspires me to keep eating lots of raw food. I have slacked off in the last couple of weeks and have been eating more cooked food. (the cold weather didn't help!) And just so you know, in this film he highlights eating at least 51% raw food, not all raw, so there is no excuse not to try.
" which essentially advocates a low fat vegetarian diet. 
. It was the start down the path to learning just how bad our food system really has become in America. I am now faced with trying to pull my kids and husband out of the pool, so to speak, and help them understand why.
