Be Careful What You Wish For

So I went on this new regime to help see what foods I might have a reaction to. Last night it was just me, Dennis and Cooper at home (read on to see where Spencer was) so we decided we would go out(which we often do when it is only us and one of the boys). We had to think a bit to decide where we could go and I could still eat something good. We settled on Beth's Cafe which is this awesome little hole in the wall breakfast place. They are famous for their 12 egg omelette (which thinking about it almost makes me sick). Anyway I figured I would be fine eating the veggie egg scramble (only 3 eggs involved) with no cheese. Forgetting about the fact that it also come with all you can eat hash browns and is pretty much covered in grease/oil of possible butter origin. It was yummy of course bit I immediately knew after we were done that it was a mistake. Today I am paying for it with a headache and queasy stomach--staying home from work in bed even! Talk about a reaction!!

Spencer was not able to go out with us because he has joined the ranks of the working stiffs along with Tucker. He was supposed to find a job by the end of last year and half-heartedly gave it a try because he was face with the prospect of losing his cell phone. His half-hearted efforts of course did not pay off (shocking). Dennis did let him off the hook on the cell phone (sort of) letting him do housework (cleaning the bathroom, kitchen & living room) to earn his cell phone instead. Tucker was able to help out by using some of his former connections at Safeway to get him on as a courtesy clerk. He started last week with some training a couple of nights and then Thursday night he was official. We had to go out this weekend to find him some black, non-tennis shoe, shoes because his Sunday shoes were not comfortable for long hours of standing on your feet. So here he is in his complete work regalia looking all grown up. It seems like it was only yesterday that he was dressing up and calling a magazine a mazzagine. Don't wish them grown up fast because it happens faster than you think.

Life Change Week 2 - New Toy

So I have made it through the 2nd week of my life change effort. It was a little harder than the first week because I found myself craving sweets. That made it a little tough, but I did not cave and eat anything bad. A new food I have taken quite a liking to is quinoa. I had never really heard of it before and when I did, I had no idea what it was. This is what multi-colored quinoa looks like (for others like me who are in the dark).
It is a little bit like crunchy cream of wheat, for lack of a better explanation. I like to put it on my salads to give them a little oomph. I also really like just eating it plain with a little bit of coconut milk (another favorite on this change) and maybe a little banana or blueberries thrown in. It has an interesting smell that doesn't come through in the flavor thank goodness.

These photos came in out of order to the next one is Spencer with my new toy. We had a Dell laptop for about a little over a year. I really liked working on it. You might say I got a little addicted. Anyway it died (yes, after only about a year). Dennis got an i-pad for his birthday, but I was missing the laptop. He kept bugging me about buying a macbook so finally this weekend went out and bought one. I get a little discount as a public school employee which helped--a little. We bought a MacBook Pro with a 13 inch screen. I am having lots of fun with it.I had another picture where Spencer was taking a picture of the back of the computer but I loaded in two copies of the same picture. It is so hard for me to get pictures where I want them in these blogs that I am not going to bother adding the other one.
This is this weeks rendition of the muffin. The last two weeks I have used squash to make my muffins. This week I am trying pumpkin. I also added some cinnamon, cloves & nutmeg to "spice" them up a bit. They are made with eggs, almond flour (or meal), bananas, pumpkin, salt and well you are supposed to put in some olive oil and as I was sitting here typing this I realized I forgot to put the oil in. Well, they seem to taste alright anyway.
These will be my breakfast for the week and they are very tasty (even without the olive oil). They also have a little bit of quinoa flour in them too. I meant to take a picture of one of my salads, but it's just a salad so big deal. I make a dressing with 1/2 olive oil, 1/4 balsamic vinigrette, 1 tsp dry mustard and some minced garlic. It is super yummy and I find that I like it on lots of other things besides salad. Week two sounds a lot like week 1 and week three is sounding a lot like the other two weeks. I will let you know how things go when I reintroduce some of the stuff I have been doing without (wheat, dairy, corn products). I'm finding this food so yummy who knows if I really want to bother!

Major Life Change Week 1

Before I get to the life change bit I thought I should acknowledge that Tucker turned 20 last month!! I guess that does sort of qualify as a major life change. Hard to believe my little, bitty first born is so grown up now! He is a hard worker (puts in 30 hours a week at Dunn Lumber and is taking 10 credits at the community college--one math and one chemistry class). He reads graphic novels but listens to somewhat sappy music at times. He still has a nice twinkle in his eye and an infectious grin and a fulltime girlfriend (sigh). He asked for two pies for his birthday instead of cake. He wanted a butterscotch pie that he could eat all by himself and not share with anyone and a peanut butter pie that everyone else would eat. In the end he did share just a little bit if the butterscotch--but not much.

The other night Spencer asked Tucker to help him with his Spanish homework. They looked so sweet together I had to take a picture. They do manage to have a little more fun together now that they are older than they did when they were younger!

So to my life change. Last Monday I started on the Abascal Diet (though I do not call it a diet myself cuz that is not why I am doing it). It is an anti-inflammitory diet designed to help stop inflammation in your system. The first three weeks you cut out all dairy, wheat corn products & sweeteners (though you can eat corn). The other part is that whatever meals or snacks you consume should always be 1/3 meat/protien and 2/3 fruits and veggies (though breakfast can be 1/2 & 1/2) I had been sort of doing the 1/3-2/3 bit for a few weeks before this, but I had not fully cut out all the other stuff. So Monday I dove into it for real.

This is a meal I made for myself last week. I had made some mashed potatoes earlier in the week that were 1/2 potato and 1/2 cauliflower (which they say taste just like regular mashed potatoes and it is actually true). I took the leftover mashed potatoes stirred in an egg and heated it up in the fry pan with a little olive oil. Then I topped the whole thing with avocados (which you can eat freely). I probably looks pretty disgusting, but it was actually quite delicious.

I also made these muffins which I eat for breakfast every morning. They are made with almond flour, eggs, squash, banana, baking soda & olive oil with blueberries thrown in. I heat them up a little in the microwave and mash them up with a little applesauce. It is amazingly delicious.

I made myself a salad pretty much every day with this yummy balsamic vinigerette dressing that I made from scratch. One of my favorite things to do is bake up a bunch of veggies in tinfoil in the oven (like I made when we were in McCall this summer). I use the leftovers in an omelette the next day for breakfast. It's been kind of fun and I have been eating food I have never eaten before--like quinoa.

I definitely have not been hungry or felt deprived. You can eat as much as you want of things as long as you keep the ratio at 1/3 to 2/3. After the first three weeks you reintroduce the stuff you cut out one thing at a time and note your reactions. I learned about this from my co-worker Dana, who went on it because of her arthritis, she determined she had reactions to wheat products and coincidentally also lost 38 pounds. Another co-worker tried it and determined she had recations to dairy products and certain oils in processed food. I decided to do it to see if I could find any foods I might have reactions to in the hopes of maybe clearing of my esophogus problems.

This is just week 1 and it has been pretty easy. The only thing not on the list this week I might have eaten was some frozen yogurt sorbet with Spencer the other night. It said it was dairy and fat free, but it did not say sugar free. Otherwise I have been pretty true. I figure I can make it the next two weeks pretty easily and then we'll see what happens then. Will post again at the end of next week.