Category Archives: vegan

Earth Day’s Little Helper

Our local Whole Foods has a plot at our park district’s community garden. {find a local garden} A few years ago, I admired the gardeners from afar when I lived in the neighborhood. I used to lay on a grassy hill with my (then a puppy) canine companion and admire the gardeners as they tended to their plots while I flipped through the pages of a book.

starting seeds in newspaper cups. the plants then go directly into the garden (in the cup), since the newspaper is compostable. perfect!

Back to Earth Day… Whole Foods volunteers planned to break ground at their garden plot on Monday and I have been excited for the past couple weeks to take Dekker. Fortunately, the weather in our area is on the up and up after our monsoon of a storm last week, and it was a gorgeous day to let him get  dirty!

helping hands giving plantlife a start…

a teaching moment

getting dirty!

children can be so genuine in their interactions. i loved it :)

lettuce plants…next stop, sunflowers!

I’m so thankful for the volunteers who take the time to do things like this for the community. I hope more and more people take advantage of these opportunities!

Life gets busy. Weather locks us in. Time doesn’t allow for everything to get done. But events like this are important for me and provide opportunities to teach my son about life and health. I looked at him during his late afternoon nap, and smiled at the innocence on his face and dirt under his fingernails. I can’t help but look forward to getting some of my own plants in the ground now that the weather here will finally allow us to do so. Hope you had a healthy Earth Day!

Maybe you can find your own community garden here!

Must Sees

An enjoyable weekend often includes watching documentaries. We try our best to educate ourselves on the varying perspectives of topics and make decisions that are best fit our family. I wanted to share a list of documentaries that we have watched over the years; the ones that have played a part in our decision-making when it comes to living a healthy lifestyle.

I encourage you to watch them with an open mind and continue to make educated choices that best fit you. I hope you enjoy them as much as we did!

FOOD-RELATED DOCUMENTATRIES

Fat, Sick and Nearly Dead (2010) ~ “100 pounds overweight, loaded up on steroids and suffering from a debilitating autoimmune disease, Joe Cross is at the end of his rope and the end of his hope. In the mirror he saw a 310lb man whose gut was bigger than a beach ball and a path laid out before him that wouldn’t end well- with one foot already in the grave, the other wasn’t far behind…”

Fed Up (2002) ~ “70% of the food we eat contains genetically engineered ingredients and the biotech industry is spending million a year to convince us that this technology is our only hope.”

Food Beware (2008) ~ “For the first time ever, our children are growing up less healthy than we are. As the rate of cancer, infertility and other illnesses linked to environmental factors climbs upward each year, we must ask ourselves: why is this happening?”

Food, Inc. (2008) ~ “An unflattering look inside America’s corporate controlled food industry.”

Food Matters (2008) ~ “Food Matter examines how the food we eat can help or hurt our health. Nutritionists, naturopaths, doctors, and journalists weigh in on topics organic food, food safety, raw foodism, and nutritional therapy.”

Forks Over Knives (2011) ~ “Examines the profound claim that most, if not all, of the degenerative diseases that afflict us can be controlled, or even reversed, by rejecting our present menu of animal-based and processed foods.”

King Corn  (2007) ~ “In King Corn, Ian Cheney and Curt Ellis, best friends from college on the east coast, move to the heartland to learn where their food comes from. With the help of friendly neighbors, genetically modified seeds, and powerful herbicides, they plant and grow a bumper crop of America’s most-productive, most-subsidized grain on one acre of Iowa soil. But when they try to follow their pile of corn into the food system, what they find raises troubling questions about how we eat-and how we farm.”

Vegucated (2010) ~ 3 people make a life-changing decision to adopt a vegan lifestyle for 6 weeks

HEALTH-RELATED DOCUMENTARIES

One Nation, Overweight (2010) ~ ”There is an obesity plague in America that costs the nation as much as $147 billion — and an untold number of lives — every year. Nearly two-thirds of American adults are either overweight or obese. Childhood obesity is triple what it was a generation ago.

Pink Ribbons, Inc. (2011) ~ “Breast cancer has become the poster child of corporate cause-related marketing campaigns. Countless women and men walk, bike, climb and shop for the cure. Each year, millions of dollars are raised in the name of breast cancer, but where does this money go and what does it actually achieve? Pink Ribbons, Inc. is a feature documentary that shows how the devastating reality of breast cancer, which marketing experts have labeled a “dream cause,” becomes obfuscated by a shiny, pink story of success.”

Cut, Burn, Poison (2010) ~ “A controversial, eye opening, and sometimes heartbreaking documentary that puts the business of cancer treatment (surgery, radiation and chemotherapy) under the microscope.”

Sweetest Misery: A Poisoned World (2004) ~ ”Narrator Cori Brackett had a strange cause-and-effect experience with the diet cokes she was drinking and quickly found herself disabled and diagnosed with MS. Slowly able to walk and speak again, she believes her illness is linked to aspartame. After 7,000 miles, and 25 hours of footage, “Sweet Misery” will reveal one of the most pervasive, insidious forms of corporate negligence since tobacco.”

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note: These aren’t “old” videos. They are very much current and relatable. My husband recently said to me, “people are likely to spend more time researching a new television than they do decisions about their own health”…

Valentine’s Day Mug Cake

Valentine’s Day Mug Cake. For One.

My husband is missing a sweet tooth. For the several years I have known him, he has never been a dessert person. So if we’re able to have a Valentine’s Dinner together its not likely that dessert will be capping it off. So I’ll be treating myself to this mug cake. It’s quick and simple, and quite indulgent if I do say so myself!

Ingredients

2 Tbs almond butter

1 Tbs cocao powder

1/2 tsp baking powder

1/2 tsp vanilla

3 Tbs water + 1 Tbs flax meal {if you don’t require the recipe to be vegan, you can use 1 egg instead of the water/flax mix}

What To Do

In a large mug whisk together the water and flax meal, and let it sit for 5-10 minutes while you gather the other ingredients. Add in the rest of the ingredients, mix well and place the mug in the microwave for about 1 minute. (I have found 1:10 is the perfect amount of time.) The cake will rise and bubble a bit as it cooks, and fall once you remove it from the microwave. Rarely can I finish the entire thing but I do love every bite!

optional: Before cooking, you can add in nuts, chocolate chips or anything else to make it your own!

{*** Love It! ***}