I’m officially stocked up on things to blog about!

First things first! On Sunday I took my camera along with me on an overcast and very-mild-for-January morning run.

I took a punk along with me too.

Who wants to come along on a 5 mile run through my new neighborhood? Well, you don’t have a choice. Get your sneakers on. It’s time to go.

Our first landmark would be what is currently my most favorite thing to run over in the whole wide world. A pedestrian bridge that crosses the river that divides the city in half.

Why I take so much pleasure from running over a pedestrian bridge I’ll never know – but I love it, I do!

(Pictures are more fun with people in them so expect to see my running friend Shawn a lot during this post.)

Over the river.

To the river path that also happens to run along a college campus.

A glimpse of downtown from the path.

Getting closer…

I should let you in on a secret goal I have in life: to be able to do a cartwheel even when I’m 100 years old.

30 years and going strong! 70 years to go.

After the river path, it’s time to break into the cemetery though a broken spot in the wrought iron fence.

Dude, you ran right by it!

The only problem with taking my camera with me on this run was that Shawn would run up ahead while I stopped for my mid-run photo shoots, and then I would have to bust ass to catch up with him. Ah well, probably a good thing really, especially given I haven’t done speed work in ages.

Spooky!

Don’t just lay there, get up and run with us!

Through the cemetery. (And figuring out to just take pictures while I’m running.)

Back across the river.

To stop and admire some graffiti.

Why does this come as no surprise that this very cryptic message was spray painted on by men? I certainly can’t imagine a group of women spray painting “BALLS” under a bridge. “KITTENS”? Probably not. “DIAMONDS”? Maybe. “CHOCOLATE”? Getting closer now.

There! 5 miles! Done! That wasn’t so bad now was it? We were only gone about 45 minutes, and it seemed to go by like the scroll of a mouse wheel, didn’t it?

Next on today’s bloggy agenda would the awesome care package that arrived via United States Postal Service from my boyfriend Brendan Brazier yesterday!

OK, maybe not from BB himself, but a girl can still dream.

I need to give a big shout out and thank you to my girl Kelly at Sequel Naturals for offering to hook me up with Brendan’s latest book, Thrive Fitness. I’m so excited to read and review this book!

In case you missed it, I happened to love Brendan’s book Thrive. The changes I made in my diet thanks to everything I learned in his first book have made such a difference in my life. Thrive gave me the information I needed to make adjustments in my approach to eating which in turn has given me more energy in general, has allowed me to sleep better, and made my runs and workouts feel positively amazing – I can’t wait to see what Brendan’s training program and book dedicated to fitness has to offer!

This happens to the perfect segue into Blog Worthy Item #3:

I realized this weekend that the half marathon I plan to run in April is now less than 12 weeks away! Considering the training program I used last time is 12 weeks long, I guess that means it’s time to start thinking about training? Ugh. I’m not ready yet. The Sunday long runs don’t start getting longer for another 5 weeks, but still. If I hope to beat my previous half marathon time of 1:47, I’ve got to get back to doing long runs and speed work too. Speed work is so much easier in the summer! Or at the very least, on a treadmill.

Well, it’s not anywhere near summer and I don’t have a treadmill or even a gym membership, so I’m going to have to figure something out. I’m probably going to have suck it up and run fast outside. In the cold. Joy to the world.

Runners! Do you do speed work outside in the winter? (And if you live in a warm climate, your comment doesn’t count!) Does it suck as much as I imagine it’s going to? Maybe I’ll be surprised and sucking in cold, frozen air fast and hard will be petting a kitten? Putting on a diamond necklace? Eating chocolate? No?

• Half Marathon Race Recap
• Turn It Up
• Secret Goals

It’s been a while since I’ve written on and on about Brendan Brazier, hasn’t it? Well, my boyfriend’s back and you’re gonna be in trouble.

I’m not sure how I feel about referring to Brendan as my boyfriend in one sentence followed by a photo of a knife pointed in his general direction a moment later. Someone cue the Psycho music.

Today I put together another Thrive inspired breakfast based on Brendan’s Toasted Apple Cinnamon Cereal recipe.

I pre-heated the oven to 250 and then proceeded to dice up one apple and tossed it into a bowl with a cup of oats, a half cup each of sliced almonds, ground flax seed, pumpkin seeds, sesame seeds and hemp seeds. I added a little cinnamon, nutmeg and salt and stirred until well combined.

In a separate bowl I combined 1/4 c of canola oil and a 1/4 c of agave nectar. My version varies slightly from Brendan’s because I made due with what I had on hand. (His calls for hemp oil and molasses.)

Wet and dry ingredients mixed well, onto a coconut oiled cookie sheet it went!

Baked for one hour, makes 5 servings and keeps in the refrigerator for two weeks.

Speaking of Brendan, he sent me a care package yesterday! Well, it wasn’t from Brendan himself, but I like to pretend it was.

Kelly from Sequel Naturals contacted me about reviewing some of his products from the Vega product line. How could I possibly say no? Well – I couldn’t.

Oh! There’s the oven timer! Breakfast is served!

Ava was standing next to me when I took this picture and she said “wow mom, that looks like real cereal!”

I LOVED this! Especially fresh out of the oven. The apples were warm and soft, all the oats and seeds gave it the perfect crunch.

It may look like “real cereal”, but it tastes even better! And I wasn’t left wanting to dive back onto the cookie sheet for more – more – MORE. I call this cereal success!

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Over the summer I was sent Thrive to read and review on the blog. I read it over the course of a few weeks and have written previously about how I’ve incorporated the concepts from Thrive into my life and with regards to training for the half marathon this summer.

Thrive: The Vegan Nutrition Guide to Optimal Performance in Sports and Life was written by Brendan Brazier, a professional Ironman triathlete. In Thrive, Brendan describes how a vegan and largely raw diet can help you lose weight, reduce your biological age, improve sleep, increase energy and eliminate food cravings.

Thrive is one of those books that has altered the course of my life. In May I read The Raw Foods Detox Diet by Natalia Rose. Her book was my introduction to a raw foods diet and why eating living, uncooked foods is so beneficial to your health.

When I heard about Thrive and realized it was written by a professional athlete who eats a high raw and vegan diet, I was absolutely intrigued. Thrive filled in a lot of the gaps left from The Raw Food Detox Diet for me. It was easy to see that yes, this approach to eating works not only for athletes, but for anyone looking to simply achieve optimal health. With Brendan, the proof is in the Energy Pudding. He has been able to train harder, recover faster and perform better all thanks to a plant based diet.

The book begins discussing the effects of stress on the body, and that there is stress that is helpful and stress that is harmful. He calls them complimentary and uncomplimentary stress, respectively. The first form of stress being something like exercise. This sort of stress can be helpful as it allows the body to adapt and become more efficient. Uncomplimentary stress would be stress that does us no favors. Uncomplimentary stress can come from work, the environment, eating processed, refined foods that are a huge drain on our bodies and are very taxing to our systems. Nutritional stress from processed foods makes up the largest percentage of uncomplimentary stress in most Americans.

When you are burdened with a lot of uncomplimentary stress, you feel tired and drained. You have no energy and your immune function is lowered. You can reduce the stress load you put on your body by eating a diet full of whole foods, especially a diet comprised largely of plants.

I have to say that after reading Thrive and The Raw Foods Detox Diet, my idea of “whole foods” has changed. I use to feel I was still eating whole foods when I ate whole grain crackers and organic boxed cereals. These items are what Brendan refers to as stimulating foods. Coffee, or caffeine in any form really, falls into the stimulating food category as well, as does junk food, refined sugar, transfats and high fructose corn syrup. When you have a diet full of stimulating foods, your body craves that stimulation and you find your self longing for stimulationg by food again and again. This is what we of course more commonly know as food cravings.

I’ve struggled with food cravings a lot this past year as I’ve worked to maintain my healthy weight. I’ve gone through periods where it’s not an issue and times when all I can think about is sweets and comfort foods and wanting to turn to food as a form of entertainment.

Brendan explains that when you remove these stimulating foods from your diet, food cravings diminish and can eventually disappear all together. When you get started, it takes a few days to recalibrate your system, to adjust and rid your body of the need for stimulation. There will be a couple days where it feels like it’s a struggle to stay away from these stimulating foods. You’ll eventually come out of it though and “recalibrate”, seeing that light at the end of tunnel if you can hang in there.

In my case these foods would be crackers, cereals and other processed grains. Chocolate and coffee too. When I eat only fruits, vegetables, legumes, nuts and dried fruit and avoid these processed foods – even processed organic foods – my food cravings disappear. It becomes easy and effortless to eat a plant based diet. I can eat when I feel hungry, without worrying about how long it’s been since my last meal or snack. I eat until I’m comfortably satisfied without worrying about calories or portion control. It makes eating a normal part of life instead of the center of my life. I now feel like I eat to live, rather than live to eat. It’s as though I’ve been relieved of a huge burden, and this is what I mean when I say that Thrive has changed the course of my life – I feel like I can move forward now having made peace with food.

I’m not swearing off coffee, crackers, dark chocolate and boxed cereals or even junk food forever. I’m sure I will have these foods again but I no longer crave them or long for a day when I can splurge. I now understand what eating these foods regularly will do to me, and that they are the source of food cravings for me.

I know that there are people who will read this or read Thrive and think “oh, I could NEVER give up X”. That’s fine. You’re just not ready. Whenever someone finds out I’m vegetarian, without even asking or prompting I’m almost always told what they could never live without. Chicken wings. Turkey at Thanksgiving. Cheeseburgers. Meatballs. Even vegetarians when confronted with the idea of veganism say they could never live without yogurt, cheese, ice cream. I have to laugh because I remember saying these things myself. For me the vegetarian silver bullet was always a turkey sub. I thought I could never be a vegetarian because I just loved turkey subs too much. I wasn’t ready yet. While I don’t consider myself a vegan at this time, I do feel as though I’m moving in that direction.

When you’re ready, this comes easily. It doesn’t happen overnight. It takes baby steps to move toward a diet that is best for your body and your health. It’s taken me years to get here.

I started following the principles in the Thrive diet more closely at the beginning of September. The fact that I was already vegetarian and had already begun eating more raw foods made it easier for me to move forward with his concepts and stay on track. It’s been a month and I can say without a doubt that I’ve had more energy, slept better and needed less sleep these last few weeks than ever before. My runs have felt fantastic and I’m not completely dragging at the end of the day like I use to.

In summary, I would recommend Thrive to anyone without a doubt. Depending on where you are in your life the ideas in his book might seem too radical, but it can still be a starting point and can get you moving in the right direction. I not only recommend it, I highly encourage you to read it if you are at all intrigued like I was. There are no gimmicks, this is not a fad diet, I believe this is the way we were meant to eat and live and I’m excited to move forward and stick with it.

Brendan encourages you to start slowly and ease into what he suggests. The more gradually you make changes the more likely they are to stick. He discusses how a plant based diet is perfect not only for athletes but for everyone. He also talks about exercise for life long health, and that it doesn’t mean hours and hours of daily exercise to be healthy. If you’ve struggled like me with food cravings, your weight, lack of energy, fatigue despite getting enough sleep – do yourself a favor and check out Thrive. It could be a large piece of the puzzle that’s been missing for you. It certainly was for me.

I’ve written about Thrive in many posts, if you’re curious to read more about my take on this book and how I’ve incorporating these ideas into my life:

The Fountain of Youth (Reducing biological age)
No Rest for the Weary (Making changes thanks to Thrive)
Thrive Inspired (Fueling for a long run based on Brendan’s advice)
Make Your Own Cereal, Take 2 (Fruit cereal!)
Intuitive Eating Refresher (Giving up coffee and chocolate on a regular basis)
Re-Runs (Thrive inspired thoughts on fueling before the half)
Half Marathon Race Recap (Half marathon day prep based on Brendan’s approach)
Let’s Play Brendan Says (Needing less sleep)

He also discusses the environmental impact on eating meat and processed foods, and how a vegan diet is not only good for us, but good for the environment too. The end of the book is full of Brendan’s recipes and a 12 week meal to follow if you are looking for some guidance.

My buddy Matt at No Meat Athlete also read and reviewed Thrive this summer, you can read his review here if you’re curious about someone else’s perspective.

I want to express my gratitude to the folks at Da Capo Press / Da Capo Lifelong Books for the opportunity to read Thrive, and especially to Brendan himself for putting this information out there. I’m excited to see what following this way of eating on the long term can do for my training and racing in the future as well!

If you’ve read or decide to read Thrive in the future, report back! I’d be thrilled to hear what you think.

• Turn It Up
• The Fountain of Youth
• Not January Yet

Yesterday a fun package came in the mail.

Oooo I love packages! So what’s inside, what’s inside!?

Why it’s a book!

Have you read Intuitive Eating? It quite literally saved my sanity early this year when I was having a tough time with food.

I’ve never really had a difficult relationship with food. I’ve never been a “dietier” per se, and have always known that it’s better to just live an active lifestyle with a regular diet full of the whole foods – instead of eating diet foods, avoiding treats and junk food for a short period of time while you’re “on a diet” to lose weight. Once I figured out the math behind losing weight (calories in < calories out) weight loss came pretty easily. I counted calories to lose weight but what it boiled down to was smaller portions, not going back for seconds and cutting out mindless eating combined with regular exercise. What you don’t find out until after you’ve lost a significant amount of weight (35 lbs qualifies as significant for me) is that maintaining your weight can almost be harder than losing it in the first place.

Last year at this time I’d reached the weight I’d dreamed of for almost 15 years. I'd run my marathon. Awesome! But now what? I was out of goals to work toward and felt like I had nothing exciting to look forward to anymore. I found myself turning to food for excitement and fun. I would restrict and "be good" during the week and then overeat – and as horribly embarrassed as I am to write it: binge on the weekends. Seriously, I want to backspace that last sentence right out but I'm leaving it in because I know now that I'm not alone. I sure felt alone back then though. "Back then" being only 9 short months ago.

I honestly thought I was losing my mind and that I was heading for an eating disorder. I felt like it was almost completely out of my control. Unable to stop eating treats once I finally let myself have even one. I would get caught in that “well, I’ve blown it, might as well go nuts now” mentality. I would feel so guilty come Monday that I would restrict calories all week long to feel like I was making up for what I did over the weekend. I would continue restricting calories for the second half of the week to save up calories so I could splurge the following weekend. But an innocent splurge would almost always turn into eating so much of some otherwise forbidden food that I would reach the point where I felt sick – both physically and mentally. This restricting and binging cycle allowed me to maintain my weight but it did a real number on me from a psychological stand point.

It was nasty cycle. I realized soon that this was not the way I wanted to live. I had to get to the bottom of what was going on, I'd never experienced anything like this before. I knew it had to be possible to have a healthy relationship with food and also maintain my happy, healthy weight. These things couldn't be mutually exclusive!

Enter: Intuitive Eating. I wasn't blogging when I read this book but I have to give it a shout out because it truly turned things around for me. It pulled from me from the vicious cycle I'd gotten myself into. I read this book feeling like it was written just for me! The book describes 10 principles toward eating intuitively and while I found value in all 10 principles the big ones for me we’re honoring my hunger and making peace with food.

I got Intuitive Eating from library earlier this year and didn’t buy it because I got everything I needed from it while I had it on loan. It showed up in mailbox yesterday through thanks to this awesome website called Bookmooch! It’s a site that allows you to mooch books for free from other people – provided you list some books you have and are willing to allow people to mooch from you. All you have to do is pay for shipping your own books to other people and they pay to ship to you. I love Bookmooch and it’s a great way to swap out books I’m done with and get new books I want without having to pay for them OR pay late fees at the library! SCORE! I’ve mooched a bunch of great books and have emptied my book shelves of books I’m done with too.

I’d had Intuitive Eating on my “wish list” for a while and I got an email just recently when someone listed it in their inventory. I logged in and snagged it immediately and it came yesterday. The arrival of it prompted some reflection and lead to this post today. I’m very glad I own it now, and I’m even more glad I didn’t have to pay for it! I want to be able to refer to it if I ever need a refresher and I want to be able to loan it out to my friends and family if they’d like to read it.

Today was supposed to be a juice day but I dawdled too long at the computer this morning and before I knew it I was really hungry. I decided to honor my hunger and eat a bowl of cereal NOW rather than spend a half hour start to finish on juicing.

I was excited to bust out the cacao nibs from yesterday!

Yesterday Averie left a comment saying that she found cacao nibs to be bitter, and I thought the same thing when I sampled them straight up.

Sprinkled on fruit cereal this morning though the sweetness from the fruit easily masked any bitterness and they gave the cereal a subtle chocolaty flavor with a very nice crunch! Plus I love that they made the cereal completely raw. (Unsweetened cocoa powder is not.)

This morning’s fruit cereal combo was a diced banana, the last beat up pear and three chopped medjool dates all coated in ground flax. Sprinkled with some hand crushed walnuts and some cacao nibs and topped with unsweetened vanilla hemp milk.

Medjool dates in fruit cereal? Bliss. PURE. BLISS! I expected the cacao nibs to be the star but those chewy sweet dates stole the show!

Later this morning I had a couple of almond butter stuffed dates before I headed out for a nice leisurely Sunday long run. Yes. More dates. I’m making up for lost time apparently.

I was going to run 7 miles but felt so good at the 3+ mile mark that I opted to go the long way and do 8 instead. I was back in just over an hour.

Lunch today was a no brainer! We’ve got salad leftover from last night’s birthday dinner making lunch easy peasy.

Red leaf, carrots, orange cherry tomatoes, green pepper, cukes, alfalfa sprouts and a sprinkle of raw hemp seeds too. Heather told me this morning that she sprinkles hemp seeds on salad, so that’s what I did with the ones I bought yesterday. You can see them in their untidy glory around the edges of the plate. Honestly I couldn’t even taste them. I sampled a small handful before I put them on the salad though and they had a nice nutty flavor.

We’re off now to a picnic with friends to say good-bye to summer and welcome the official arrival of the new season. Autumn is near!

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I left my alarm set to 5:15 from yesterday and got up at the same time today. I got a ton done in just a short period of time. Amazing what happens when you will yourself to stay off your computer immediately upon rising. As soon as the sun came up I got dressed and headed out on my bike for a short ride.

I didn’t want to go too far or too long today given I ran for well over an hour yesterday. My official ride ended after 35 minutes but then I stopped at home to grab my back pack and wallet and rode a mile to the corner store to pick up a few things for another Thrive inspired breakfast this morning.

When I got home I whipped up a couple of juices for myself and the man.

Like two peas in a pod! Or more accurately, six fruits and vegetables in a glass. But who’s counting?

Romaine, a beet, cucumber, lemon, apple and ginger.

So I believe I’ve established I like cereal? I know, like that’s something special and extraordinary… who doesn’t?? Brenden Brazier has a couple of great sounding cereal recipes in Thrive. I used his Banana Ginger Pear Cereal recipe as inspiration to come up with my own based on what I was in the mood for and the ingredients I had on hand.

Well, what I had on hand + what I rode to the store for this morning too.

I diced up a perfectly ripe pear and a small banana into bite sized pieces. I dragged out a package of prunes from the very last of the Newman’s Own Organics stash we were sent a couple months back.

That’s right. PRUNES. I remember some food blogger (can’t remember who! – I’m thinking Lynn from The Actor’s Diet?) recently saying that they didn’t know why prunes got such a bad rap, they really aren’t that bad. After sampling one upon opening this bag I have to agree. I can’t even remember the last time I had a prune. Probably as a child? It has a mildly sweet, interesting flavor. And their stickiness suited my cereal recipe well this morning. I predict prunes will be spotted with more regularity around these parts. Interesting choice of the word regularity, no?

I chopped up the prunes and threw all fruit, both fresh and dried, into a small mixing bowl.

I was then reminded of something I use to do for Ava as an infant. I would crush cheerios and cut fruit into small pieces and then “bread” the fruit with the crushed cheerios. The cheerios would stick automatically making it easier for small fingers to pick up and shovel in.

But instead of crusted cheerios, Mama’s breading of choice was ground flax! I crushed up some walnuts in my hand and added them to the mix. Stirred it all around until everything was coated and well mixed.  All the fruit was perfectly wet and sticky and the flax stuck easily.

Topped with hemp milk and eaten with a spoon like a bowl of cereal.

Holy goodness in a bowl this was fantastic! I loved every bite!  Perfectly sweet, filling and satisfying too!

I remembered that Justine from The Confessions of a SAHM made some fresh fruit cereal this summer and I thought it was such a good idea, I never tried it though. I’m so glad I finally did. Fruit cereal, what a concept. I smell a new breakfast staple.

I’m going to be offline for the long weekend – take it easy! And eat a salad, ok?

Peace out!

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I was able to make some progress with Thrive while the girls played in the water and the sand yesterday afternoon. I was excited to put a lot of his principals into practice today with a long run planned for this morning.

My friend Shawn has decided to run the half marathon (13.1 miles) with me next weekend and we made plans to run long together this morning. I set the alarm for 5:15 so I would be ready to go when he arrived at 6.

About 20 minutes before heading out I had a very Thrive inspired pre-run snack. Brendan talks about the protein, fat and carb content of pre-run fuel based on what kind of training you’ll be doing. From a walk, a bike ride, hiking, running, swimming to tennis, basketball, golf, whatever – based on how long you’ll be out and at what intensity, he describes the ratio of carb, fat and protein you want to eat before your chosen form of exercise. Based on his descriptions I felt like a long run at a decent pace fell into the “moderate intensity” category since we were going long for endurance and not so much focusing on speed. The other categories would be low intensity and high intensity.

Based on his approach, I was aiming my pre-run snack to be 60% carbohydrate, 35% fat and 5% protein. Of course I didn’t want anything too heavy so I chose a handful of dried apples, raisins and raw almonds. It took the edge off my ever so slight hunger and hopefully was close to the right proportion of macro nutrients that I was aiming for.

We set out just as the dawn was breaking and watched the sun rise. The air was cool and crisp, it was a fabulous run. The time flew by and I felt great for the entire run. We’d planned to go 9 miles but we were both feeling so great at the end we agreed to go 10. Shawn has the Garmin 305 so it was easy to keep running and know how much farther we needed to go to hit 10 miles.

We finished 10 miles in 1:24:49 making our average pace 8:27. If we can maintain that pace for the entire half marathon we’ll come in under 2 hours, which is my only time goal at this point. This is the longest run I’ll do between now and the half marathon. I’m unofficially tapering my mileage now and will keep all runs from here and through next week around 4 to 6 miles.

Back home and with Thrive still on the brain, I cracked open a young coconut I’ve had in the fridge for a few days and drank the young coconut water for a “snack consisting primarily of simple carbohydrate”.

I thought coconut water would be a good choice but looking at the nutritional stats now coconut water really doesn’t have that many carbs! Oh well, now I know.

When I felt hungry about an hour later I was ready to make a recovery breakfast consisting of “high-quality, easily digestible raw protein” from “natural whole food sources”. Brendan really likes using hemp as a plant based protein source but I don’t have any yet. Flax seeds are another option he recommends. Can do – Flax Seeds R’Us!

I’d stuck a couple of bananas in the freezer yesterday for banana whip whenever the mood struck – and the mood struck this morning. I put the scooped out young coconut meat in the freezer an hour earlier when I had my young coconut water, so it was slightly frozen but not rock solid either. Coconut meat and banana into the food processor to make coconut banana whip!

I after the coconut and banana were whipped up and smooth, I added a healthy helping of ground flax and a scoop of almond butter to make the recovery breakfast to beat all recovery breakfasts.

Totally creamy and yummy, a perfect post run breakfast for me!

I’m totally psyched about all the concepts in this book, I can’t wait to finish it up and write my full review. I’m convinced and I definitely feel that this is worth a read by anyone, whether you’re an athlete or just want to be fit and healthy and naturally reach your ideal weight.

In other news, a couple of you asked about my hummus recipe, I plan to make hummus today and will post  about it tonight! I know you’ll all be biting your nails and sitting on the edge of your seats until then!

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I think the best thing about days where I only drink green juice and eat fruit until lunch (a la Natalia Rose and The Raw Food Detox Diet) might possibly be banana whip as part of this complete breakfast.

And watermelon. But you knew that.

For lunch I was figuring out what to have with my salsa and carrots. I whipped up some garlic hummus and did my open faced sandwich thing.

But first let me say that we love, love, love this brand of salsa.

No, no one is paying me to say that. No one sent me a sample of this salsa. I just really love it and want to spread the love. (And spread the salsa on my sandwich.) I’ve only seen it at Wegmans, and it’s found in the cooler section with the cheeses and lunch meats.

It’s the only salsa I buy, it always tastes SO fresh and they’ve got a bunch of fun “flavors” too. Artichoke Garlic? Why that’s my middle and maiden name. Mrs. Alison Artichoke Garlic. Oh great, now you’re going to go open a credit card account with my name and charge a bunch jars of almond butter aren’t you?

I was also contemplating my recent love of open facedness today and realized that it’s a trail of an explanation. Walk with me now.

I like sprouted grains for nutritional reasons, therefore I buy Ezekiel bread.  I only like Ezekiel bread if it’s toasted. Toasted bread is not very forgiving in a sandwich with soft fillings. Hummus is soft. If I put as much hummus as I would like on a sandwich, I’d end up with a big mess on my hands. Open faced solves this problem AND it’s like I get to eat two sandwiches. It’s win-win.

During lunch, I watched the UPS truck back into my driveway. I met him at the door to be hand delivered a new book I get to review!

Thrive, by Brendan Braiser.

After reading The Raw Food Detox Diet in July, I was totally intrigued at the idea of moving toward a raw food diet and proper food combining – and how it could make a difference in my health (making peace with food and food cravings in particular), but I wondered how it might effect running and fitness in general too. Was it “safe”? Would I have enough energy? (Yes and yes. If anything, I’ve found that it’s done nothing but wondrous things for my runs and energy levels.)

I can’t wait to hear what a professional athlete has to say on a plant based diet. Based on the reviews I read at No Meat Athlete and Hangry Pants, I’m pretty sure Brendan’s book is going to be right up my alley.

But I digress.

Out of dark chocolate and totally needing my Vitamin C(hoc) – I was forced to scrounge the bottom of the box sent by Newman’s Own Organic a while ago.

I was not uber excited about these mint cups, thus they have remained uneaten until desperate times. I was expecting them to be all York Peppermint Patt-ery (not my fav) but was pleasantly surprised that they reminded me of those Andes mint chocolates. The mint part is firm, not mushy. I could insert an obvious joke in here about my ass or thighs but I think I’ll pass, thanks.

Notice who’s eyeing my prize?

This is Zak and his best mint zombie.

Yeah, that’s good. But I think my date and almond butter zombie was better. But whatever, it’s not like there’s a zombie contest. Yet.

And someone tell him that even though he’s on vacation doesn’t mean his brush is on vacation too.

Speaking of hair, I played playdoh barber shop and cut Ava’s hair today.

It was looking sort of ratty and don’t even get me started on the hair brushing battles day in and day out.

My reason for cutting her hair was three fold.

1. Short hair is easy to brush.
2. I enjoy the challenge of cutting the hair of something that doesn’t stop moving.
3. I find I’m more patient with her when her hair is neat. Same thing with a clean face. Don’t ask me, I’m just raising these beasts.

And speaking of beasts, I had a beast of a salad for dinner.

Red leaf, diced apple, tofu, feta, cashews tossed in miso dressing.

+ unphotographed 70% Green and Black that I stocked up on today. Phew. That was a close one.

That’s it from me. Don’t forget to tip your waitress.

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After my HFCS tirade this morning, I made some green juice that I enjoyed with live entertainment.

I continue to be amazed at how satisfying green lemonade is.

I had a meeting to go to for one of the programs Ava attends as a homeschooler this afternoon. I ate a banana on my way but only have an empty shell of a banana to show for it.

And my buddy Lara rode shot gun.

Chocolate Coconut Chew. Don’t chew wish you had one too?

On the way home I stopped at the library to pick up my new book, audio style.

I love to upload audio books to my iPod and listen to them while I run. Sometimes it’s the only way I can find time to “read”. And if it’s a good book I can’t wait to get out there and pick up where I left off. I use to do this all the time and have read many books this way… but then I found Jillian and her podcasts *Dreamy Sigh* and that was the end of audio books for a while.

Of course, we’ve been abandoned by Jillian, and it’s time to move on. Actually I’m pretty excited to start New Moon after reading Twilight in June and even more so after watching the movie last week.

Tonight’s dinner was inspired by the Vegetables in Thai Red Curry soup recipe from the September issue of Vegetarian Times. I made some changes to the original recipe though based on what I had and hand.

The base was light organic coconut milk, curry powder and some Braggs liquid amino acid (soy sauce would work too). Vegetables included cremini mushrooms cut into quarters and sauteed in a little olive oil in a separate pan until they started to release their water. I steamed cauliflower and garden fresh green beans. All vegetables were added to soup base, along with some sliced red pepper. At this point I decided to add the last of my dulse, knowing it can be used it in soup and I wanted to use it up before it went bad. Simmered together for about 10 minutes: Time to Eat!

Why are mushrooms in soup so stinkin’ good?

After dinner it was time to bust into a special delivery that arrived today!

I came the closest to guessing the ingredients in a mystery meal Justine at Confessions of a SAHM made last week. My prize?

Now really, is there any better prize? I didn’t think so.

I had no choice but to try it out after dinner tonight. It is my civic duty.

Awww yeah, that’s the good stuff.

And I to perform one more test. Just to be sure. I mean, I’d hate to not THOROUGHLY test it out.

Conclusion? Maranatha AB is just as good on G&B and stuffed into dates. Rest easy my friends. Rest easy.

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A formal complaint was filed today about the lack of cooked food in this house. Zak asked if I would do some more cooking again “like I use to”. Oops. OK, ok. Noted. But this request gave me pause to reflect.

Do you know what my New Years Resolution was? Stop over committing myself. I have not done that all. Completely the opposite actually.

I recently heard someone say “If you have 40 priorities, then you have none.” That’s me. I have too many priorities. I take on too much and before I know it the things that are supposed to be at the top of the list get lost in the shuffle and I can’t give ANYTHING my best effort because I’m spreading myself too thin.

I need to loosen the reins on myself a little bit here, slow down and take a step back. I really like the benefits of eating more raw foods. I’ve really noticed a difference in my mood, cravings (or lack there of really) and energy levels since incorporating some of the concepts from the Raw Food Detox Diet into my life. I’m going to continue to make an effort to incorporate lots of foods in their natural state into my diet, but I’m not ready to commit to a high raw diet. I thought I was, but it’s a huge step and making a ton of changes all at once is just not sustainable.

I am going to continue to avoid processed foods, I think that’s been the best thing that came out of this book for me. I’ve been trying to keep them completely out of my life but I’m beginning to wonder if their might be a threshold. Is there a point where a few crackers or processed grains are ok and won’t make me drive myself over a craving cliff? Will I just undo all the work I’ve done over these past couple of weeks? Is it like stopping the medicine early, just because you are starting to feel better? I’m not sure, but I know how to find my way back if I go too far.

I definitely like green juice and want to keep that juicer cranking. I think there’s a lot of benefits to juicing, provided you still eat plenty of other fruits and veggies and are getting enough fiber in your diet to be able to bypass the fiber you lose from juicing.

I like some of the food combining concepts. It’s a little confusing and overwhelming at first but you do get the hang of it. I do think it has some merit, but I’m not ready to go balls to wall with that either. I like the idea of eating fruit alone, but I still want to enjoy fruit on oatmeal in the morning.

I’ve also come realize that I just cannot possibly add marathon training to the mix right now. Last year I practically devoted my whole summer to it and it was worth it, but I have a lot more commitments this year that I did not have last year at this time.

If I add marathon training to my list, it’s my family that suffers. I had forgotten until yesterday that the day of a long run is pretty much shot. I’m only up for doing the bare minimum around the house after a really long run and I need the weekends to stay on top of the millions of other things I’ve agreed to do for people and organizations, not to mention my family and myself too.

After all these thoughts and then some whirled around in this thing I call my head, I had to get back to basics in the kitchen.

Hummus. Not raw. Not properly combined. But that’s ok. Progress, not perfection. (And no I’m not the Alison that Gena refers to in this post!)

We took these Newman’s Own Organics Soy Crisps on a test drive.

These were good, they reminded me of mini rice cakes. The only reason I would hesitate to buy these is because of my concerns over processed soy and how much is in our diet already. But taste wise these get a thumbs up.

Straight out of the food processor bowl YO!

These are absolutely my new favorite food. My grocery store didn’t have Newman’s Own Organics Dried Apples so I went with my fav Almond Butter maker, Woodstock Farms.

Ava loves them too. How have I gone this long and never experienced the awesomeness of dried apples?

For dinner I cut into my second kabocha squash to make fries.

I also made lentil sloppy joes. These taste amazingly like any sloppy joes I’ve ever had and without the meat.

This recipe is pretty quick and easy.

Vegetarian Sloppy Joes

1 Tbsp extra virgin olive oil
1 1/2 c rinsed lentils (I used red)
2 1/2 cups of water
1 1/2 c diced tomatoes
1 cup vegetable broth
1 small onion, diced

Saute peppers and onions in olive oil until soft. Add lentils, broth and tomatoes and bring to a boil. Reduce heat to medium and add sloppy joe sauce.

1/4 c ketchup
2 Tbsp soy sauce or Braggs Amino Acid
1/2 Tbsp yellow mustard
1 Tbsp chili powder
1 1/2 Tbsp pure maple syrup (or brown sugar)
1 Tbsp apple cider vinegar

Served here with half of a Ezekiel roll, kabocha fries and tossed salad.

It was such a perfect summer evening, Ava and I went for a little post-dinner ride around the block.

A heavy post. Back to my regularly scheduled silliness tomorrow.

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I sat down to lunch this afternoon after I finished up the last 25% of our lawn that I didn’t get to yesterday.

More marinated portobellos on a bed of greens tossed in my Ginger Miso dressing.

After lunch I set out on a bike ride to run some errands and get in a little unofficial exercise too. Want to go with me? Let’s roll.

First up, the post office about 1 mile away, to mail a package and a letter.

Next, the library, about 4 miles from the Post Office,

to return a book that Ava picked out a few weeks ago. Really? Are you sure you want a book from the 70’s on roses? NO! I demand you take out a book about Dora.

I picked up a couple I had on reserve and one from the new shelf too.

Outliers by Malcolm Gladwell (thanks for this idea Lynn!), The Raw 50 by Carol Alt and The NDD Book (Nutrition Deficit Disorder) by Dr. William Sears, one of my fav attachment parenting authors. I snagged this one off the new shelf after a quick flip through.  It’s all about how the foods that kids eat affect their behavior, and is full of ideas on how to get kids to eat the healthy foods you offer them.

After the library, another 1.5 miles to the grocery store.

My list.

My loot in my backpack, ready to rock and roll.

3.5 miles to home. This was definitely the hardest leg of my journey, with the groceries on my back.

Round trip, 10 miles exactly! 44 minutes of riding.

Total time spent riding and running errands, an hour and 15 minutes.

Errands run, exercise done. No gasoline was burned and I was forced to stick to my list due to my limited amount of “trunk” space. I should probably always shop this way.

I had something totally new in mind for us for dinner tonight. I prepped a bunch of veggies to stuff into lettuce wraps!

My mom had mentioned a while ago that she’s been enjoying Boston Bibb lettuce lately. Since the leaves are so broad I thought it would make for a good wrap.

I also made a teriyaki sauce from The Raw Food Detox Diet made with soy sauce, maple syrup, ginger, garlic, sesame seeds and sesame oil to drizzle inside on the veggies before they were wrapped up.

I won’t lie that these were a total mess to eat, but I got better at making and eating them when I figured out to forget about “wrapping” the veggies with lettuce and make lettuce tacos instead.

I was bummed that Zak had to work late and miss this dinner because I thought this was a totally fun and different meal. Basically just salad in disguise, but the teriyaki sauce definitely made this dinner!

And of course my day is not complete without some Green and Black 70% Dark Chocolate with raw almond butter to round out my meal.

I think I used up all my energy today and had none left for jokes tonight. Crap.

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