Stress and Love

I have had a busy few weeks! By busy I mean BUSY but life is what you make of it. Some people say life can be stressful but that too is in the eyes of the beholder. Most seemingly stressful situations can also be looked at as exciting (I do admit there are down right stressful times though folks..... I am a glass half full gal but I'm not totally in the clouds.). It's how events are presented and perceived that will cause you to be either stressed or excited. Lets just take moving cross country for example.... Solo and with children and a dog for example......just to make things a bit more spicy. Look at life as exciting and an adventure and others, including children, will view it that way too. Be aware that your children are tiny, little sponges that soak up all of the information around them. That could mean as little as how you treat the woman serving you your coffee at the coffee shop or as big as how you treat them and how you teach them to love each other and the world around them. But guess what? It's all related. If you are impatient, heartless and demanding to every server who brings you food you are teaching your kids by modeling your behavior. Every moment, every second is a teaching experience waiting to happen so grab onto it. Have a long car trip planned with the kids? Play the license plate game (see who can tell what state's plate is in front of you first), or play ABC game (find each letter of the alphabet on signs, billboards and cars. First one to say the letter and read the word wins that letter, keep score and winner at the end can get a prize. I think it was a penny when I was a kid...basically just the glory of winning). 

Yes, this is typically a food blog but this is a busy time of year for traveling, family and outdoor fun. Make it special and educational for your children. And of course I am going to give you some food advice!  

Car snacks! Yummy and fun! Eating in the car is a great way to pass the time while on the way to Grandma's house. But be sure to eat only if you are hungry. Some great, crunchy, light foods to eat in the car are celery and carrot sticks, cheese sticks and some BBL bars! Also, almond milk protein shakes are great too. They are easy to drink and have tons of protein to help keep you fuller longer. Just be sure to sip slowly and take your time. After all, on long car rides time is on your side. So laugh, love and enjoy each other! Happy July friends! I hope the summer has been treating you well! 

Summer's Beauty!

Hello my beautiful, strong friend!

Welcome to summer's long, HOT days, hammocks, flip flops, sundresses, tank tops and hopefully family vacations. Just remember that eating healthy can be just as convenient, quick and easy if you are prepared. 

Spend just a few moments each night planning the next day and preparing your cut up fresh veggies (join a CSA!), writing down your meal ideas and you will be rewarded with the extra time and energy needed to play tag with your kids or throw a football along the water's edge. 

Remember to add power foods every day! You know my love for chia seeds and here are 2 different ways to incorporate them into your day:

Frozen banana chia slices

Just slice a frozen banana, add a dollop of natural almond butter (Only ingredient should be Almonds), and sprinkle with chia seeds (1 Tablespoon total). My kids love eating this frozen treat with toothpicks. 

Ch-offee protein smoothie!

Just blend the above ingredients for a power packed, energy pumping, quick breakfast! 

1 serving of chocolate protein powder (About Time is my favorite but I only had this kind for my example)

1/3 C coffee concentrate (or 1/2 cup strongly brewed and cooled coffee)

1 teaspoon cinnamon 

2/3 cup unsweetened almond milk

1 Tablespoon chia seeds

1 Tablespoon natural almond butter

Blend all ingredients. Add ice if you prefer a thicker shake. Enjoy every smooth, powerful sip as you slowly drink!!!!!

Take a few moments every day to close your eyes and listen to the life all around you. Birds, bugs, increased airplane travel, children laughing, splashing, lawn mowers humming....all tell tale signs that summer is here. Enjoy each moment. Now that is a recipe we can ALL follow!

Maureen LOVES my duck eggs!!!!

My awesome, amazing, gorgeous, beautiful friend Maureen LOVES my dinner! Score for BBL! Yee Haw!!!!!

Use Your Noodle!

What did the paperclip say to the magnet?

Not going to tell you until the end of this post, silly goose!

But that joke is making you use your brain and sometimes your brain is referred to as your noodle and now I want to talk about noodles! Get the connection now? Yay!

I made the best homemade spaghetti and meatballs for my family yesterday. All 3 of my kids wanted seconds....score for Mama! I definitely wanted seconds too but opted to have a side salad instead of a second helping of spaghetti. 

The noodles were not noodles at all though. There. I said it. To be perfectly clear what I mean is that the noodles were not pasta. They were actually zucchini squash cut by my spiral slicer!

What an amazing invention! The spiral slicer! It helps me make noodles out of any vegetable and chips and fries out of nature's very own candy vegetable...... the versatile sweet potato!

Haha! You just had to see Bobby. He finds a way to get into almost every picture I take. Good, sweet boy, Bobby. And here are just 3 zucchinis noodles cut up by my spiral slicer. Enough noodles for all 4 of us!

Spiral slicing vegetables is a fabulous way to get your kids involved in making dinner. All you do is stick the veggie onto the handle part, hold the machine firmly and start turning the handle. The handle turning is what my kids like the most. But if I'm perfectly honest with myself I find it quite entertaining and soothing too. Ahhh, the simple pleasures in life that float my boat. 

So, back to the awesome meal. The kiddos and I just spiral sliced the noodles (smallest choice of spiral). Then we made a quick sauce, added turkey meatballs which were a breeze to create (just lean ground turkey, basil, italian seasoning, nutritional yeast, ground flaxseeds, sea salt, pepper all rolled into little balls and pan cooked with coconut oil for a few minutes on all sides.....or just buy Trader Joe's frozen turkey meatballs. They rock!). And our meal was done.

For the sauce just sauté onions (probably about 2 cups) in coconut oil until the onions are translucent, add 5 cloves of minced garlic, Trader Joe's strained tomatoes (2 cans), a can of TJ's tomato paste, basil, Italian seasoning, sea salt and cracked pepper. 

This is truly an easy, super healthy meal made in 25 minutes or so. You do have time to make healthy meals. YOU get to decide what to do with extra time in your day. Do you waste time sitting in drive through lines? If you have time to do that then you have time to prepare healthy meals for yourself and your family. 

If you don't have a spiral slicer buy one! It's a fun, easy way to make awesome vegetables even more awesome! Here is a  link to my exact slicer:

http://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/B0007Y9WHQ/ref=mp_s_a_1_1?qid=1400822095&sr=8-1&pi=SX200_QL40

See! Almost 3,000 people love it on Amazon. I'm not loco en la cabeza after all! 

Enjoy the awesome spaghetti and meatballs! Oh and I bet you want the answer to the joke?

Answer: "I'm attracted to you!" 

HA! What a knee slapper! Love that joke! My kids only understood the paperclip being attracted to the magnet due to magnetic force. They didn't get the cute attracted to you part. In a few years sweet children you will and I'm definitely not counting down those days. 

Thank you to my thoughtful sister, T, for my awesome spiral slicer! You know me so well!

3 day Cleanse Julie style

The nice, warm, sunshine filled weather is finally here. My house and yard have been Spring cleaned and now I want my body to feel clean too. The heavy carb-laden foods that I so craved this winter (sweet potatoes, pumpkin, oatmeal, soups, etc) have been replaced with local, fresh greens, farm fresh eggs and backyard berries.

And I bought Jus by Julie! It's a NYC based company who makes and ships their awesome JUS combinations. 

This is what my "food" looked like for 3 days. 

I started the first day with Morning Glory. It was tasty. No very sweet, more like a hearty flavor; I guess mainly because romaine lettuce is its #1 ingredient. But I LOVE the little tasty bits in it...that must be the celery. Yummy! I could start my day every day like this!

Then a few hours later I had spicy lemonade. Oh. MY. GOSH! It was AWESOME! It has cayenne pepper! Amazing! Julie is a genius! For sure!

Then for lunch I had a Sweet Spin. I like this one. Tastes earthy, healthy with just enough sweetness from the pineapple, banana and my FAVORITE, mango. YUM!

Chia Berry was next around 3pm. Holy cow I have found another passion! These JUSes! As you know I absolutely LOVE chia and this drink has JUST the right amount of the tiny little power seeds! Thank goodness this is portioned out for me or I would have kept going!

Dinner was awesome! I think I've used that word way too much in this post. But what else can I say? My favorites JUSed into an awesome drink and delivered to ME?! YAY! Island Coconut was hearty, just sweet enough and so filling and fulfilling!

My after dinner treat was another Sweet Spin and I thought it was a fabulous way to end my first cleansing day! Please do not count the amount of exclamation marks in this post. I know I have gone over board but you know how passionate I am and I have found a new passion. <<<<<<I totally resisted the urge to put another exclamation mark there!

___________________________________________________________________________

So all of the above I wrote on my first day which was Saturday. Now its Monday and SIGH my cleanse is coming to an end. Forgive me while I get some tissues. I loved yesterday. Felt so clean, energized and happy! Today is the same. My JUS has been awesome, filling and fabulous. I just went on the website to see how I can get all of my friends into this. Believe me friends and family and those of you who I love and have not met, this JUS ROCKS! I want to do it monthly at least! I want to live on this stuff and I would if I could!

So here is my very special JUS by Julie LINK to buy under my name!

Buy it! Love it! Feel it and then you will thank me and give me hugs. I like warm hugs! Really tight, warm hugs!

Let me know what you think!!!!!!!!! <<<<<<< lots of them for you. Enjoy your day and eat clean!

Such a Tough Winter!

Hi. It's me. I'm your bikini baking lady. I have been on hiatus for a few months. No, I have not been in Tahiti or Florida. I have been enjoying my children each day. However, this has been the sickest, darkest, coldest, snowiest winter I have ever experienced. But, now it's Spring, maybe. We woke to snow today, April 16! It was 31* when we woke! 

Ok. Enough gloom for one post! I will get over this. I WILL GO BACK TO BEING YOUR BIKINI BAKING LADY! Remember, I call myself that not because I bake/cook in my bikini but instead because when I eat I try to picture myself in my bikini. Over the years that has helped me with my intense desire to over eat. (BTW, I over eat healthy foods.... But you do need to know..... Even excess fruits and vegetables WILL cause weight gain!) 

I am into Dr. Joes Fuhrman's brand new book "The End of Dieting". I highly recommend it! In it he gives an awesome Chia pudding recipe which I have been making ahead of time and enjoying in the morning each morning this week. It truly keeps me full until noon! 

Here is his recipe:

Dr. Fuhrman's Chia Pudding

(This is for 1 serving! It's so good that I need to only make 1 serving of it at a time!)

1/2 Cup almond milk (coconut milk if you are allergic)

1/8 cup chia seeds

1/8 cup oats

1 tablespoon raisins (I used 2 chopped cherry essence prunes!)

1/2 a vanilla bean cut horizontally. Scrape out the innards and mix into chia mixture. Then add the 1/2 vanilla bean pod to the mixture.

Stir all ingredients well and let sit at least 10 min in fridge or until firm. Then add 1/4 cup cut up super ripe banana and 1/8 cup wild blueberries. I make the night before so it's an immediate, super fast go to breakfast! Enjoy! It is really SO good!

Control and a Slow Cooker 2 minute recipe

Control. By definition means "To exercise authoritative or dominating influence over; direct."
A lot has gone on in my life over the last few years that I felt I had absolutely no control over. I am not sure exactly who my loyal readers are but if you are not a close friend of mine you may not know that I am divorced. My divorce has been official for a little over a year now. But I have been a single mother to 3 amazing, wonderful, smart, energetic, beautiful children for well over 2 years. I have learned so much about myself in the last few years. One very important thing I have learned that I'd like to pass on to you....whoever you are....the sun, the sky or someone reading this post is this; Most things are not under your control. However, there are 3 things that you can always control. They are:
1. What you THINK.
2. What you PUT INTO YOUR BODY.
3. How you MOVE.
Tonight I had a very tasty and super duper healthy dinner with my 3 lovely children and my absolutely amazing friend who also happens to be my next door neighbor. She said something that really hit home to me. "Alaina, you are doing a really great job with your children. They are happy, energetic and very healthy. What do you feed them?!" That comment truly touched me. Raising my children is what I have always wanted to do. I was raised by a full time Mom (Thank you MOM!!!) and I have always known that I wanted to be a full time Mom too. Notice I didn't write Stay at Home Mom. Whoever thought about that absolutely ridiculous title most definitely was NOT a full time Mom! Full time Moms do not stay home. We have chosen to raise our children and postpone our careers. We have chosen to go without so that our children have us close (that being said I respect the hell out of working Moms! My hat goes off to your ladies!). But that healthy children comment made me think about control and all of the control that we really do have over our children as far as food goes. The first few years of our children's lives WE, the parents, are in control of what we put in front of our kids. Watching my kids slurp up my version of Mexican Shredded Chicken Soup made me feel like a super star. I have been called an Old Soul. I definitely agree with that statement especially when it comes to feeding people. It makes my heart grow when I see healthy, nourishing things going into my children. Don't get me wrong....my kids get their junk food! They do not go without. But they definitely get homemade cookies instead of Chips Ahoy...mostly that's because I love to bake.
So the moral of this rather long and definitely deep post is to take control over the things that YOU can actually control. Make healthy foods that will help your children grow! My only issue is that I just want to keep on chowing down on those good foods....but that's another post for another time. Each day is a new way to make a memory, make someone smile and laugh with your children. Want my recipe for my Slow Cooker Mexican Shredded Chicken Soup? Ok, since you asked so nicely and even said please here it is:

Slow Cooker Mexican Shredded Chicken Soup
6 Boneless Skinless Chicken breasts (any fat removed)
2 cans of black beans, un drained
1 1/2 Cups vegetable or chicken broth (I used low sodium organic vegetable broth)
1 bag of Trader Joes peppers and onions (frozen)
1/2 t sea salt
fresh pepper to taste
1/2 t cumin (that's all I had and was worried it wouldn't be enough but I loved it!)
1 Cup of jarred salsa (chose your own heat. For once I wanted to make a hot meal that all 4 of us would enjoy and I actually succeeded....I would like ghost pepper hot but my kids would never touch that so I chose mild Trader Joes roasted pepper salsa)
1/2 t cinnamon (REALLY! This is what gives it a tiny little sweet taste that I KNEW my kids would love)
1  T Avocado oil (just for rubbing that slow cooker)

Directions:
Rub that slow cooker down with some avocado oil. Then just throw in your chicken breasts and all of the other ingredients. Stir. This is a thick, hearty, chunky soup.  Mine was amazingly tender and easy to shred after about 8 hours on low. Then I just took out the chicken breasts, put them on a cutting board and used 2 forks to shred the chicken (this took about 45 seconds). I'm talkin' good, juicy, easily shredded chicken with all of those other goodies and it took all of 2 minutes to prepare. Sweet Laura came by and I gave her some for her lunch tomorrow and threw in half a bag of steamed spinach and a low carb Joseph's pita. Yummy. If I wasn't so incredibly full right now that would sound good for my lunch tomorrow too.