I tweeted this last night: ***Holding a space. For forgiveness, gifts, hope, time, prayer and love.*** And this morning this song came on my little ipod shuffle and it sums up how I've been feeling: unfolding.
Unfold by Jason Mraz
Hands in Line
Arms close to my side
I'm fighting tides
Of an ocean's undertow
And I figure that I might not make it
I'm taking empty but seldom speaking
And the words retreat
Yeah, they breath in histories
Still at ease
And the story's untold
And my arms unfold
My hands are high
And I'm holding on, I'm holding out
And i figure that i
Figure that I just might make it
And I'm waking empty but seldom sleeping
And the words repeat breathing histories
Into stories untold but I unfold
See now quality is what you see now
In the corner of your eye
And don't be surprised
If you hear the bells ring
As they form from the sky
They sound bong, bong, bong, bong, ba da
Yea yea bong, bong, bong,bong ba da yea, yea
And I'm always holding on
And I'm already holding out
Said I'm holding out your side
And I'm holding out this time
Cause I figure that I, and I figure that I
Just might make it and I'm
Waking empty but seldom sleeping
And the words repeat breathing histories untold
But I unfold
It's been too long.
Husband and little boy both had the flu and then followed it up with pneumonia and then topped it off with a cold. Five weeks later I escaped with a few days of coughing and runny nose. I think we're all on the mend now.
Eliot is adorable as always and wants to snuggle every morning the same as he's wanted to for years. I find myself relishing in it even more now as he approaches 5 and a half years old! He loves video games on wii, ds and playing on the computer with his daddy. He still plays play-doh, moon sand, tinkertoys, legos, board games, puzzles, builds forts, puts on puppet shows and on and on. It was so scary to see both husband and son so sick for so long that I feel ever so very extra grateful as we approach Thanksgiving this week.
So I wanted to do a quick post and a link to my talented brother's site and particularly to his new festive Thanksgiving song. (If you scroll down there's also a song inspired by Eliot that we love!) http://mchatton.com/2009/11/the-happy-vegan-thanksgiving-s/index.html Enjoy!
Much love, wellness and warm cozy houses for all this season.
xoxo
Ami
Thank God for Dr.Oz and so many others that are showing a vegan diet can be healthy and are encouraging people to give it a try!
Specifically, a few family members of mine are taking Dr.Oz's 28 day vegan challenge and I'm so happy for them! And so of course I want then to enjoy the food so very much that they don't miss what they thought they might. I have about a zillion ideas so let's see...
*While I don't own this book I have heard good things. And I like to keep meals easy so this book could be a good choice: The 30 Minute Vegan
*Books I know and love: Eat to Live and Skinny Bitch
*Website: Post Punk Kitchen - Loads of free recipes!
*One of my personal favorite dishes from a local PDX vegan restaurant called Blossoming Lotus is called the Green Gaia which is steamed kale, mixed greens,
sprouts & avocado tossed in garlic olive oil, topped with sesame
seeds with a choice of rice or quinoa. Actually all of Blossoming Lotus's bowls are fantastic and you could make them at home. I highly recommend quinoa as a great rice substitute. Find it in the bulk bins at the grocery store and cook it up like this:
1 cup quinoa
2 cups filtered water
Rinse quinoa well and drain.
Add water and quinoa to sauce pan and bring to a boil. Cover, reduce
heat to simmer and cook on low heat until all liquid is absorbed,
approximately 15 minutes. Fluff with a fork and enjoy. Makes about 2 generous servings.
*Doing a bit of research online is very helpful. Exploring a food shopping site like Food Fight will give you lots of ideas of things you might want to try to find and/or ask your grocer to carry.
*Field Roast and Gardein are amazing. My meat-eating husband likes them. Seriously. So Good! I would suggest Gardein's Santa Fe Good Stuff with a big spinach salad. (Husband even diced it up and put it in a whole wheat tortilla with salsa, guacamole and greens once). Yum! Or the Smoked Apple Sage sausage from Field Roast sliced onto mixed greens, chopped celery and use fresh salsa as dressing. Delish.
*And last but most importantly increasing fresh low sugar fruits, eating more greens then you ever imagined possible, eating colorful veggies, orange peppers, broccoli, red peppers, carrots, zucchini, cucumbers... explore the produce section like you never have before. When I first started eating more raw foods I was not shy about asking the produce man questions, and most of them were basic, like how do I cut this open? And again going on line really helps just omit the dairy and meat from whatever recipes you find and use the yummy Earth Balance butter and eat more greens and eat more greens and eat more greens. Can't say it enough.
*My personal dessert of choice is Endangered Species 88% dark chocolate. One square satisfies my sweet tooth. And another sweet craving curbing food for me is Kombucha. I adore Kombucha. Here's a link to my fav: http://www.synergydrinks.com/
Coming up I hope to share breakfast ideas, more greens recipes, and smoothies. Tell me what you need and I will do my best. I hope I can help. Much love and yummy food to you all. Love you!
I've been looking for (and been wanting to make) a raw vegan ice cream recipe without coconut meat for awhile. I found this one on goneraw.com and changed it up a bit to suit my taste and what I had on hand. Here's my revision:
Cacao-Mesquite-Banana Ice Cream
*1c cashews soaked for 5 hours
*little less then 1/3c vanilla agave
*few drops vanilla stevia
*3c almond milk (I made a quick nut milk with almond butter, water and vanilla agave)
*2 1/2T cacao
*1 1/2T mesquite
*1t lemon juice
*Pinch pink salt
*2 ripe bananas
*1t lethicin
I blended all the ingredients in my BlendTec and came up with about 30 ounces to pour into containers for the freezer. I had to try it first of course, and it was heavenly! Yum! If I would have blended it just a bit longer I think it would have warmed up and turned into the smoothest hot chocolate in my high-speed blender. Maybe next time cause tonight was to make ice cream!
I stirred it twice before going to bed and this morning, more stirring! Had a little bowl after dinner Sunday night and it was lovely!
And one more recipe that I love!
Sunday morning smoothie:
one orange
small head of parsley
2 frozen bananas
1T cacao
pinch of cinnamon
few small drops vanilla stevia
1c water
Blend
Made 24 oz
And this post just keeps on going. I need to mention three blogs I am Loving right now. In no particular order:
1.http://www.loveveggiesandyoga.com/
Averie writes this fantastic blog from Arizona with such love, creative recipes and a yoga pose for each day!
2.http://discoveringraw.com/
Erica loves Pure Food & Wine and One Lucky Duck I think as much as I do! I love that! And her pictures of their food makes me feel like I'm there! Seriously, I would buy them so I could frame them as inspiration in my kitchen.
3.http://www.choosingraw.com/
Gena is honest, lovely and creative and her blog is delicious and informative.
Have a beautiful Monday!
xoxo
