Preparing for our juice fast.....

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It's been a busy week here, and I'm really thrilled the weekend is thisclose!! I'm so excited to start our juice fast this Sunday!   My beautiful Katie started her juice fast today.  She watned to try the 3 juice a day fast, but after getting home from her p/t job she decided she wanted dinner!   it's healthy as long as she drinks plenty of water to stay hydrated throughout the day!  Her breakfast juice was:  2 oranges, 1 apple, 2 carrots,1 lime.  For her lunch juice, she had a couple carrots, 1/4 of a peeled cucumber, 2 celery sticks, white grapes, a few leaves of spinach, 1/2 a pear, a little mint & parsley, plus a couple oranges.  She will do this for 30 days. I'm very proud of her - this is a healthy way to get the weight off that she wants to (about 30 lbs), and get a good foundation for how she'll want to eat/drink for the rest of her life, I hope!  So far, so good.

I found this webpage that explains the stages of detox your body will go through during a 30 day fast.  It is pretty amazing!  I know already the first few days will not be fun.  As in - my caffeine addiction is going to have to leave me and I'm not gonna be happy!  Me & diet coke/diet dr. p are like BFF's, it is going to BITE to give that daily fizzy caffeine drink (or 2) up!  But once you hit day 8 of this fast/detox, you are supposed to start feeling good.  I mean REALLY GOOD!  I can't wait for that to happen! Can I fast forward to that, please? lol  : )

Yesterday I went to Aldi & Kroger to get a huge amount of fresh produce.  I spent about $22 at Aldi ~ got a bag of oranges, bag of pears, 4 tomatoes, 2 lbs green grapes, 4 lbs of carrots, bag of Granny Smith apples, bag of Gala apples, a pineapple, bag of lemons, and bag of limes.  Aldi has the best prices,  but it is about a 30 mile round trip for me to shop there.  That is about 2 gallons of gas - so I have to balance the savings with the $8 (appx) I will have to spend in gas to get there too.

At Kroger I spent $25 and got 1/2 watermelon, a pineapple, fresh organic mint, ginger, 2 bunches of spinach, 1 bunch of kale, red grapes, a grapefruit, cucumbers, zucchini, and a bunch of organic parsley.  Eventually I want to transition to organic grapes, apples and greens, too.

Today,  I juiced each fruit separately.  Then, I poured the fresh-squeezed juices into ice cube trays and froze them.  Then I put them in freezer bags, marked with type of fruit, and how many cubes = how much of the fruits. (ie,  I juiced four tomatoes, and got 12 cubes, so 3 cubes = 1 tomato!)  I'll take some pics tomorrow to show you!  This way, I will just pick a recipe, pop the right number of cubes out for each fruit or veggie.  I can let them defrost and then mix them together, or throw them into my blender, and blend.  That way I can have slushies sometimes too!  I am freezing the juice immediately after juicing and I should have enough to make it through next week.  Tomorrow we are going to the Dekalb Farmers Market to get a bunch more fruits & veggies - I'll be freezing some of those as well, but juicing some fresh for the beginning of the week, too. 

Also, I don't want you to think that all I'll be posting about is juicing!  No way!!  I have recipes, crafts and more coming up!  So I'll post a lot more info on my fast on the Juicing Page - check out the link at the top of this page - it's a work in progress! It will have alot more information about juicing, our fast, plus recipes and resources!  If you are interested in juicing, or seeing how we do on this fast, I'd love to have you check that page often! : )

Hope y'all have a great  Friday, and a fabulous weekend too!

Cinnamon Roll Waffles ~ Super-Easy, Delicious Breakfast!

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Every Wednesday I ask my FB friends "What's for Dinner?"  I've been doing that for over a year, and I love getting inspired by their creative dinners each week!  A few weeks ago, a FB friend from high school (Stephanie) posted that she was making breakfast for dinner and having Cinnamon Roll Waffles.  One of my friends asked her for the recipe, and Stephanie said she found it on Pinterest and it was so easy!  I had to try these for myself  ~ and my kids LOVED them!  It couldn't be any simpler:  get a can (or two, or three, lol) of Pillsbury Cinnamon Rolls.  Spray your waffle iron heavily with Pam, then plop a cinnamon roll into each section.  Set the icing container aside for now.

We have a small, two section iron, so I made two "waffles" at a time.  Close iron,  cook til done. I sprayed the iron very heavily with Pam in between each batch of rolls, but it still made a mess!  Drizzle the waffles with the cinnamon roll icing (heat it for a few seconds in the microwave first!) and serve it to your family - they will ooh, ahh, and ask for seconds!  I served ours with turkey sausage links - yum!  

Keep an eye out for coupons for the cinnamon rolls - they are in the paper all the time, and you can often find them on coupons.com (there's even a link below in my right sidebar!)  If your store doubles coupons, you'll get these for a steal!  The only bad thing about these waffles is that they will make your iron a hot, sticky mess.  But I think it was worth the messiness!

Have you (or a friend) found a terrific recipe on Pinterest?  I'd love to hear about it so I can pin it too! : )  Just leave a comment below!

We're going to start a Juice Fast!!

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Last week, I was walking on the treadmill, and I asked David to find something for me to watch on the Wii (Netflix).  (I am way too tech-challenged to use the Wii remote, my kiddos have to help mom out!)  Under new releases, he found a documentary called "Fat, Sick and Nearly Dead" that sounded interesting.  WOW. is all I can say.  It is a must see if you struggle with your weight, or have health problems.  Basically it's about an Australian man named Joe Cross who is overweight, on lots of medication, and ready to tackle his demons.   He comes to America, and travels while he fasts on fruit & veggie juices for 60 days.  He loses a massive amount of weight, and inspires others along the way.  Particularly, a truck driver who suffers from the same health issues, but weighs about 100 more.  He also does a 60 day juice fast and is able to drop a HUGE amount of weight, and also improves his health tremendously.  Check out the trailer here!

Well, that inspired me.  I just wrote about how my kids don't eat much fresh fruit or veggies. Kind of ironic.  Luckily, they are on board with this juice fast idea! We have a crappy juicer, but it works. (It just extracts the juice only - there is SO much wasted fruit/veggie peel/pulp!)  Starting Sunday 3/18,  Randy & I will be drinking 3 "meals" a day of fresh juice.  Katie will be drinking 2 meals a day, and David will just supplement his breakfast with a glass of fresh fruit/veggie juice.  As far as weight loss, I need to lose at least 60 lbs, probably more like 80 to be where I want. Wonder how far I can get in 60 days?   Once I get to my goal weight,  I'll be juicing for breakfast forever - I actually am surprised at how much I'm enjoying the juice!  I'll also plan to do a 10 day juice fast every 3 months or so.  SO excited/motivated/inspired!! 

 Katie wants to lose some weight before graduation, as do I - I'd like to be comfortable in front of the camera for once in her graduation pictures!!  But mostly,  I want energy.  I'm exhausted all the time lately.  I'm unhappy with how I look, and I don't eat much in the way of fruits or veggies. I want to feel like I did 10 years ago!  So - We 've all started drinking one glass of juice a day in preparation - I hear drinking 2 or 3 glasses a day can shock your system (ie - potty all day - yikes!) if you aren't ready, lol!  Hopefully easing into this lifestyle change will be good.

So far,  here is David's favorite juice:

1 or 2 limes & lemons, a couple handfuls of spinach (or kale),  2 apples, 2 oranges,  1 or 2 tomatoes,  1 carrot (don't tell him a carrot is in there!) a couple cups of watermelon,  a handful of red grapes, about 1/4 of a pineapple, and a little fresh ginger.  

Our juice has:

cukes, spinach, tomatoes, limes, lemons, watermelon, apples, carrots, oranges,  ginger, pineapple, grapes

I'm juicing at night then storing it in the fridge for up to 2 days.  (I've read that you can store it safely up to 72 hours, but I don't know for sure - that seems like a long time.  I also just read that glass is best for storing juice, and that you want very little air in the container - oops!!  I will have to get some mason jars to store it in.  I'm also adding a healthy amount of lemon & lime juice to each batch - the citric acid helps preserve it too)  I will post once a week and keep y'all updated on our progress, how we're feeling, etc!   Hope you'll follow along here, and please feel free to leave your questions or comments!   Also, follow me on Pinterest (button at top right of blog) I've got a juice fast board with recipes and ideas I've found!

Wish us luck! xoxo