Tag Archive: healthy living

Planning My New Year’s Resolutions

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Did ya miss me?  I sure did miss you all and this place.  October and November are the busiest months of the year for me in my day job and life got out of control crazy.  Plus, if I’m honest, I’ve started a dozen posts and just haven’t been able to finish them to my liking.  A little writers block I think.  Well, I sure am feeling back in the game now, so hopefully I can start really cranking out some good posts for you. 🙂

For the past couple of weeks I’ve been thinking about and planning my New Year’s Resolutions.  Every year for the past 3 years I’ve used my resolution to make major changes for our health.  My 2012 resolution was to start buying as much organic food as I was able and to reduce the amount of pre-packaged, processed food we ate.  I also personally gave up sodas completely and cut most of the sugar out of my diet. (This did amazing things for me and was a change I recommend for everyone).  In 2013 my resolution was to complete the Couch to 5K program so that I was exercising regularly and losing that “baby” weight and to also focus a lot of energy on my garden and grow as much of our food as I could.  This past year I decided to start replacing chemical filled products in our home and also vowed to no longer buy eggs from the grocery store that came from horribly treated, factory farmed chickens, but to find a local farmer to buy happy eggs from happy chickens until I can finally get my very own.

One or two big changes is perfect and realistic for me if I want to set myself up for success.  I have done an excellent job (if I do say so myself 🙂 ) at following through and turning these resolutions into permanent lifestyle changes.  For instance, I only bought eggs from the store once this year, and that was for Easter egg dying.  Our farm fresh eggs are beautiful browns, blues and pinks, which are pretty enough for me but weren’t going to allow the kids the fun of coloring them.  I now know of a place I can buy local white eggs, so next year I’ll grab a dozen before Easter from there.  I feel so good about eating these eggs that are not only healthier for us, but have come from chickens leading good, happy chicken lives.  I chose this change for last year after watching Food, Inc..  This has also led me to one of the changes I’ve chosen to make for 2015.  Let’s get to those now, shall we?

Resolution #1Reduce our meat consumption by at least two days per week, and start buying some of our meat from locally, humanely raised sources.  The Super Awesome Husband is a meat and potatoes kinda guy, so meatless meals are a tough sell with him.  I am starting to comb through recipes already in preparation for this change.  If you have good ones, PLEASE feel free to share them with me.  This will be a tough one for me, but if I can find even a few good, hearty meatless meals, I think I can pull this off.

As for the local meat, we have a wonderful market near us that sells amazing local produce, meats, dairy and even honey.  Local, pasture raised meat is very expensive compared to what you can grab at the grocery store, but by eating meatless meals twice a week, I think I can make the switch for at least one meal without our grocery budget taking too much of a hit.  I KNOW that it will be worth the expense.  I have no doubt of that.  Not buying factory farmed meat three times a week, will be 156 fewer packages of meat bought this year.  I can’t change the inhumane conditions at factory farms, nor all of the chemicals pumped into that meat, the antibiotics, nor the unsanitary conditions the meat is sometimes processed in, but I can remove some of my financial support and keep it away from my family’s dinner plates.

Resolution #2:  Grow enough food in our backyard to at least double what I was able to can this past year.  I have to count up the exact number, but I think I got a case of jelly jars of salsa (BIG mistake doing small jars.  We’ve inhaled the stuff.  It will go in bigger jars next year) and a handful of quart jars of tomatoes.  I did a boatload of applesauce, but we bought local apples for that.  It will be a while before our apple trees are really spitting out the apples.  I had dreams of putting up loads of pickles last year, but our cucumber production was really sad and that just didn’t happen.  My goal for this year will be as many jars of tomatoes as possible, salsa, salsa and more salsa and pickles.  If I can do more, that would be fantastic, but I am trying to grow and improve my garden a little every year, so I don’t want to put too much pressure on my little plot.  😉

Resolution #3:  This one is a very personal one that I have been working on little by little the past few years.  I want 2015 to be the year that I finally get back to the size I want to be.  I have bounced up and down since I started having kids, but since giving up sodas and cutting out a lot of sugar, I’ve been able to keep off the weight I lose.  I’m going to get serious and really focus on getting it off, now that I know the healthy choices I’m making will allow me to maintain.  I started juicing last year, and let me tell you, I have never felt as good as I did while I juicing several times a day.  If you haven’t watched Fat, Sick & Nearly Dead it is great for information and inspiration. I caught it on Netflix, but you can watch it here as well:

I bought his reboot book with recipes and a great program to follow and will be starting that this week.

Exercise and lots of fruits and vegetables.  It’s not a new concept, but it’s definitely one that works.  I’ll give you updates along the way.

So, I hope that reading this has made you think about some changes you can make this year, not to make a resolution you will break within the month, but a real change that will be permanent and have a real positive impact on the health of yourself and your family.  Please share your resolutions in the comments below or on the Facebook post for this blog entry.  Writing it down, as simple as it may seem, is a wonderful way to give your words power and to hold yourself accountable.  Let’s all make 2015 a healthier year!!

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DISCLOSURE:  This post may contain affiliate links, and I may receive compensation for sharing products and information on this site.  All thoughts and opinions are my own.  Thank you for supporting Walking Softly Upon the Earth!  See this page for full site Disclosure.

Kicking the Chemicals~Bath & Shower Products

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My post about my balls, I mean my DRYER balls 😉 has been so popular that I think I am going to do a little series we are going to call Kicking the Chemicals.  As you’ve heard I am doing my best to rid my home of as many harmful chemicals as I can. We’re talkin’ house cleaners, people cleaners, moisturizers, air fresheners, well, you get the picture. So let’s get this party started!!

As a mom of three, my days are busy and insanely nuts a little crazy sometimes.  My *me* time is my bath in the evening.  Kids go to bed.  Mom takes a bath.  Sometimes I take a good book in and read while I soak, and others just close my eyes and totally relax.  A nice, hot bath is awesome, but a yummy smelling one is even better, so I’ve been a bit of a bubble bath, bath bomb, bath salt, bath oil, etc., collector.  Then I read the ingredient list on one.  Well, if that wasn’t a bummer I don’t know what is.

First, I needed a good exfoliating scrub for the shower.

Sugar Scrub

1 Cup Sugar

3-4 Tablespoons of oil (olive oil or grapeseed oil are my favorites for this)

5 drops of essential oil

Or

1 cup brown sugar

1/2 cup liquid coconut oil

5-8 drops of essential oil

My favorite scent for this is 4 drops of Lavender Essential Oil + 8 drops of Lemongrass Essential Oil, but use what you like.  The good thing about this is you can also make the scent as soft or strong as you like.  Big bonus for someone like me who is super sensitive to fragrance.

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Gather your ingredients and add your oil and essential oils.

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Mix well and you are ready to go!  A little goes a long way, so take it easy the first time you use it so you don’t waste a bunch.  Also, if you don’t have a non-slip mat in your bath, be careful while you are showering and spray the floor down when you are finished so that the next person doesn’t end up with crazy slippery floor.  Because chances are fairly decent it will be you, and you don’t want to recreate the Bambi on ice scene the next time you step in the shower.  Not speaking from personal experience of course….  (insert guilty whistle here)

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Next came scenting my beloved baths.  Epsom salts are fantastic for baths!  Be sure to drink lots of water before and after!  FYI The bath salts don’t make my tub slippery like the sugar scrub does.  No Bambi.  🙂

Bath Salts

1/2 cup Epsom Salt

4-6 drops of essential oil

Directions:  This couldn’t be simpler.  Dump your epsom salt into a container.  (The above amounts make enough for one large tub or two regular sized tubs so make as much or as little as you like).

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Add your favorite essential oils for scent and to help anything that ails you.  My favorite combination for a super relaxing bath experience is Lavender and Young Living’s Peace & Calming.  Sigh.  Heaven.

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Put the lid on and shake that bad boy up!

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I wish you could smell the yummy-ness!

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These make super fantastic gifts as well.  I just got an email this week from my old favorite online body and bath product site saying they missed me.  Cringe.  I told you I had a problem.  🙂  We actually had a package from them delivered to our house that should have ended up down the street.  My Super Awesome Husband shook his head and told me that means I ordered too much from that company if the FedEx driver just assumed it was mine.  🙂  And now, my friends, I am reformed.

If you would like more information about Essential Oils you can click here, or shoot me an email from the contact page above or directly to [email protected] and I would be happy to answer any questions you might have or send you a free sample.

Have a great weekend!  🙂

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Sweet, Sweet Summertime!

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What is it about time that makes the summer go by so super quickly?  Time seems to go so fast now anyway, but summer flashes by at light speed.  It’s crazy!  It breaks my heart to think about the kiddos going back to school next week, but I will have more blogging time if there is an upside.

Gardening this time of year mostly means a little weeding and a lot of picking.  We have also started seeds for our fall garden under grow lights in the basement.  I want to do some canning soooo badly, but I haven’t been able to get a whole bunch of tomatoes ripe at the same time yet.  We have had several dinners with marinara sauce from scratch though.  There’s nothing quite like it.  🙂

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The Super Awesome Husband looks at our haul every day, shakes his head and asks what happened to the good ‘ole red tomatoes.  Hee hee!  I have some of those too, but honest to goodness people, the colors and flavors of the others are incredible!  And purple peppers?  Heck yeah!  🙂

See??  I have red.  (Or it’s actually pink, but shhhh don’t tell him)! 😉 😉   Problem is, the stupid squirrels and birds like them too.  UGH!!!  I think what bothers me even more than the fact that they steal my tomatoes, is that they leave half of them to rot on the ground.  If you little jerks are going to rob my garden, at least eat every.single.delicious.nutritious.bite!!!!  Don’t waste half of it.  OR there are plenty of little ones, so leave my huge slicers ALONE!!!!  Sorry.  Deep breath.  I can’t stand waste or tomato thieves.  🙂

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Can’t have tomatoes without fresh basil.  Mmmmmmm.  I’m getting hungry now.  My favorite meal in the summer is sliced tomatoes with fresh mozzarella and basil, drizzled with balsamic vinegar.  Never gets old.

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Tomatoes and basil are meant to be together.  They are fabulous companion plants.  Many of my tomato plants in the garden (like this one), and all of my tomatoes in pots have basil growing around them.  They are supposed to make the tomatoes taste even better when grown together.  Plus, it makes it super easy to pick your maters and grab a handful of basil to put on top.  🙂

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See!  I told you I could grow carrots once I got them sprouted!!  It’s a jungle in there!!

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Beets!!!  So far (fingers crossed) the evil mole/vole duo hasn’t cleaned out the beet patch.  This guy has a hot date with my juicer in his future.  Yummy!

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I really hate the flavor of black licorice.  The Back to Eden film got me curious about fennel though.  Paul swore it was sweet and delicious and everyone seemed to love it.  Then I found a Bronze Fennel plant at our local farm stand and couldn’t resist how pretty it was.

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Now I can’t walk out to the garden without breaking off a little sprig and eating it.  The flavor is amazing!!  I could probably sit and eat the whole plant.  I don’t know if they all taste this way, or if it’s my rich, Back to Eden soil.  You HAVE to try some!

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Still only a couple of honeybees this summer.  I can’t wait to keep some bees one day.  Until then, we’ll have to rely on the little baby bumblebees.

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My daughter’s Scarlett Runner Beans.  We love the flowers!

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So I’ve been meaning to share with you some of my favorite gardening books.  I LOVE to read.  Though I don’t have a lot of time for it right now, these books keep me happy all winter while I can only dream about my little garden.

The Heirloom Life Gardener

The Gardener’s A to Z Guide to Growing Organic Food

The Weekend Homesteader: A Twelve-Month Guide to Self Sufficiency

Mini Farming:  Self-Sufficiency on 1/4 Acre

And because I am OBSESSED with getting chickens:

Homemade Living:  Keeping Chickens

I promise you will be hearing more about my chicken obsession.  😉  Lots more….

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DISCLOSURE:  This post may contain affiliate links, and I may receive compensation for sharing products and information on this site.  All thoughts and opinions are my own.  Thank you for supporting Walking Softly Upon the Earth!  See this page for full site Disclosure.

How I got my husband to look at me like I’m nuts…today

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My Super Awesome Husband looks at me like I’m nuts several times a week.  Okay, okay.  If I’m being completely honest, it’s probably more like several times a day with a few good eye rolls behind my back thrown in for good measure.  What raises him to Super Awesomeness is that he is totally supportive (despite the eye rolls) and such a good sport through my crazy ideas, even if most of them often lead to crazy amounts of physical labor on his part.

I’ll admit, there are times I think of something to mention or do, just to make him shake his head and roll his eyes.  It’s fun.  Ha Ha!  Today I made him look at me like I’m nuts by making felted wool dryer balls.  “You’re making what?” asks Super Awesome Husband.  “Dryer balls”  I tell him.  “And what are dryer balls?”  he asks with that look on his face that I love.  😀  Ah, life is good!

So today’s project is part of my mission this year to remove chemical filled products from my home.  Luckily for the Super Awesome Husband it requires 0 labor on his part.  🙂  Dryer sheets are full of chemicals and cost money.  Dryer balls are super simple to make, help your clothes dry faster, reduce static and make your clothes less wrinkly and smell nice without all of the chemicals.  All you need to make them is some 100% wool yarn that states hand wash and lay flat to dry on the label.  If you use machine washable yarn it won’t felt, and you need it to felt.  You also need one leg of pantyhose and a blunt needle to sew in your end.

Take your yarn and wrap it into a ball the size of a tennis ball.  Take your blunt ended needle and sew in the end really, really well.  If it’s not done well enough, your ball will unwind and you’ll end up with a felted mess.  If you are really creative or good at forgetting what you can and can not do well,  you can stitch a pretty design on your ball.  I mentioned this to my daughter and she, of course, thought it would be a great idea to have a flower on the one she made.  Let’s just say, every time I sew I remember why I don’t sew.  Next time something might involve sewing, my mom will be called.  Don’t go making fun of my flower!  I mean it!

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Are you done laughing yet?  I totally should have let my daughter do it herself.  🙂

Load all of your balls in to one leg of a pair of pantyhose that you cut off, and tie a knot in between each one.  Try to keep your male children away from them.  It’s an irresistible, fierce, ninja weapon at this point.

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Throw your balls into the washer and wash on hot with as much agitation as your washer offers.  Dry them on high as well.  If you don’t use super dark colors for your dryer balls and have super light colored towels or sheets you can save water and electricity by washing and drying them with your sheets and/or towels.  You will need to do this 2-3 times to get the balls nicely felted.

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Now to use them you just toss 4-6 balls (depending upon how big of a load you washed) into your dryer with your wet laundry and dry.  The wool will absorb some of the water and help you laundry dry faster.  It will also keep the humidity high while releasing it, which will help with wrinkles.  Dryer balls keep the static down and, it you add a drop of your favorite essential oil to each ball, will freshen your laundry and make it smell fantastic!

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I have fallen in love with Young Living Essential Oils, so if you’ve been wanting to try some as well, shoot me an email and I’d be happy to send you information and a sample!  You can use the contact page of the blog or email directly to [email protected]

I want to send a virtual high five to anyone who has made it through this post without giggling at all of the sentences with “your balls” in them.  You are a much better, more mature person than I, and I commend you!!  To those who have been giggling like a middle schooler, you get a high five too, because, well, we all have our issues.  😉

DISCLOSURE:  This post may contain affiliate links, and I may receive compensation for sharing products and information on this site.  All thoughts and opinions are my own.  See this page for full site Disclosure. 

 

Chasing Away the Crickets

Sorry for the crickets this past week. Summer vacation started for the kidlets, so we’ve been busy living it up with trips to the beach and park and hitting up their favorite playgrounds. And yes, there has been ice cream involved. We take summer vacation very seriously in this house. 🙂

The kids totally freaked out this week when these guys made their return:

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I had no clue until very recently that our friends on the west coast do not have fireflies.  It’s one of those things I take for granted seeing every summer and I just assumed that everyone had them.  I can’t imagine summer without the kids running around catching these magical little guys.

I have a bunch of really cool posts in the works, but instead of making you wait while I finished them up, I thought we’d see how things were going in the garden.

Remember the sad state of affairs my marigold window box was in? Well, I spread out the few marigolds that sprouted and added some nasturtium seeds to fill it in and it’s not looking half bad now. Way less sad.

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The kids and I were so excited to find a few Sweet Pea Currant tomatoes and Sun Gold Cherry tomatoes ripe this week. Sooooo tasty!! It just doesn’t get better than homegrown tomatoes!  If I HAD to choose just one thing to grow in my garden, it would probably be tomatoes.  Now ask me what kind of tomato and I would have a problem.  You need one for every color of the rainbow, right?!?!  🙂

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Purple Beauty Pepper. It’s teeny tiny, but we don’t judge. 🙂  I can’t figure out who is chomping on her leaves.  I suspect a Hornworm, but haven’t found one yet and they are usually very easy to spot.  It’s a mystery.

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Rosita has finally gotten over her transplant shock and her unfortunate run in with a slug. She really liked the compost tea I gave her, but what lady doesn’t like her tea? 🙂

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I am loving the ground cherries. They form little lanterns like tomatillos.  If you are new I’ll tell you now, I love the out of ordinary when it comes to my garden. I pick a lot of my seeds based on unusual colors and I love stumbling across something I’ve never seen in the grocery store before.

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My Sweet Pea’s lavender. She loves it like I do.

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Garlic scapes I think. I planted all soft neck garlic though, so I’m not completely sure. Hmmmm…..

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I may have a new garden obsession. Borage. It is so, so, so pretty!! I killed it all last year before I saw any blooms. (It’s a learning experience people)! 🙂 The plants in front of my strawberries are all way ahead of the ones by the tomatoes and are now blooming. Take a look and I bet you’ll be planting some seeds yourself.

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See, I told you I was obsessed!!!  I get so excited when something I’ve planted from seed grows and flourishes.  If you have always purchased plants to plant in your garden, you HAVE to try growing at least one thing from seed this year.  It’s nothing short of a miracle to put this little, tiny seed in the ground, and a few weeks later get this. ^^^

This week will be packed with fun posts.  I promise not to stay away this long again.  Happy Summer everyone!!

Food for Thought

A little warning now, this post is long-winded.  I thought it was necessary though, to give you the story behind my position on our food system and to let you know why I have become so passionate about gardening and providing safer, healthier food for my family.

Our youngest was born in 2009, and just a few short weeks later my journey towards a more healthy life began, even though I didn’t realize it at the time.  When your month old baby begins having blood in his stools, it’s enough to freak out most people.  When you are told it is food allergies, you think okay now I have an answer, work to identify the culprits, eliminate them and then have loads of time to think about the whys and hows.  It took me weeks of elimination diet trial and error until I figured out what my little dude was allergic to.  I had two choices since I was nursing.  I could stop and feed him hypoallergenic formula or I could eat just a couple of foods and slowly add things one at a time until I identified what he was allergic to.  He was too young for allergy testing to work, and I was staying home and able to nurse, so I knew what my choice was.

It was a miserable couple of months.  I’m not going to lie.  My first attempt failed because in choosing 4 or 5 of the least allergenic foods to begin with, I chose potatoes which he WAS allergic to.  You get bored really quickly only eating apples, oatmeal, rice, squash and chicken.  When I finally had my list of problem foods it got a little easier.  I’m not a very creative cook, so I pretty much ate oatmeal or a special recipe pumpkin muffin for breakfast and salads, stir fries or baked chicken with veggies for lunch and dinner.  He was allergic to milk, corn, soy, potatoes, beef, and chocolate (although I think chocolate was because of the milk.  I never really tried plain cocoa).

Once I settled into a routine I had time to wonder how this little person who hadn’t even had a bite of these foods could be allergic to them, and why these foods?  I read and read and read.  I am a science nerd at heart, and my degree is in Clinical Laboratory Science, so research was something I turned to naturally.  I know the science behind food allergies, but the more I researched and looked at that list, the more I began to wonder if it wasn’t what people had done to those foods, and not the foods themselves, that was the problem.  I wish I had had my garden then and could have tried those foods grown organically to test my theory.  Corn and soy are in everything processed.  Today these ingredients are also quite often genetically modified so that great amounts of pesticides/herbacides/fungicides can be sprayed all over them.  Could it be he was reacting to the unnatural, genetically modified food or the gross amounts of chemicals on them?  Milk and beef, of course come from cows.  Factory farms are truly terrible, horrible hells on earth.  These cows are generating huge amounts of stress hormones, which we ingest when we eat them or their milk.  They are also pumped with antibiotics and fed unnatural diets of, you guessed it, genetically modified corn.  Hmmm.  Pattern much?  Potatoes are supposed to be one of the least allergenic foods.  This gave me all kinds of fits trying to figure out what was bothering the dude.  You know what else is true about potatoes?  They are sprayed with an incredible amount of chemical so that they keep and don’t sprout.  They are also a root crop which takes in everything from the soil it is grown in.  Heavy metals and chemicals all sucked in and stored in its tubers.  So at 20-some days old and consuming only mama’s milk, was he really allergic to these things or was it something man-made?  I’ll never know for sure, but I think you can figure out which way I am leaning.

So for almost two years I ate a special diet so I could nurse the little dude and pump milk for him so that we didn’t have to do the hypoallergenic formula.  This consumed the rest of 2009, all of 2010 and the beginning of 2011.  The allergist told us he most likely would outgrow these allergies around the age of 2, so one by one we carefully tried adding the foods to our diets and found his now stronger body and immune system was able to handle them.  I went a little nuts, as you can imagine.  Sodas and chocolate were my vices, and went overboard like a castaway who had been deprived of food.  I gained weight and felt terribly and proved to myself that fast food, processed food, sweets and sodas were really, really terrible for the body.

With 2012 approaching, and a whole lot more reading and documentary watching under my belt, I knew I had to start making some serious changes.  I decided that instead of overwhelming myself with changing so many things at once, that I would choose a couple of things each year for the next few years and hopefully, with so much focus, I would be setting myself up for success and a new, healthier lifestyle.  In 2012 I cut the majority of sugar out of my diet.  The evils of processed sugar are a topic we could spend days on, but I think it’s pretty much accepted that it is terrible for you.  For me and my sweet tooth, this was major.  I had to give up my beloved soda, which was the hardest.  It’s nice for the grocery budget though.  🙂  I allowed myself one sweet a week, and after about a month they were all so incredibly sweet that I didn’t want much, if any.  It IS hard at first, but really, if you can stick with it, the cravings do go away.  Oh, and I lost 15 pounds.  BO-NUS!!!!

2013 was my year to add regular exercise and begin cutting back on the meat I was eating.  (Shhh!  I also started cutting back on the meat my family was eating as well.  Very slowly, and not as much as I was cutting, but little victories are still victories)!  I had a secret longing to be a runner, even though I despised running and was never able to do it for long, even when I played team sports in my younger days.  I downloaded the Couch to 5K running app on my phone.  30 minutes a day, 3 days a week for 9 weeks seemed doable, especially since I made a deal with myself to run every other day and not move up in the workouts until I was comfortable doing so.  No pressure to get done in any certain amount of time.  Exercising for 30 minutes, every other day, was exercising no matter what I was doing.  I found I loved it, and not only went through the Couch to 5K program, but the 5K to 10K as well.  I felt like a kick, um, butt 🙂 rockstar running for one hour when six months ago running for one minute kicked my butt.  I started the program with my daughter a couple weeks ago.  I’m training myself a running buddy. 🙂

This year my goals were to continue to cut out meat, do a lot of juicing and either get chickens or switch to local, farm fresh eggs.  I’m still working on these, but have found a lady near me who sells her extra eggs from her lovely, free-range chickens.  So until I can work out having our own tiny flock of hens, I will enjoy the fresh, beautiful eggs from her’s.  If you haven’t looked closer at where your food is coming from yet, please take a moment and do.  I come from a long line of meat eaters and even hunters.  I love animals, but always thought it was okay to consume animal products because of that idyllic, bright red barn and rolling green pasture farm that I pictured all of our meat animals coming from.  I don’t know when our humanity changed to allow animals to be treated the way they are now, or when the conditions they are kept in became acceptable for their health and well-being or ours as consumers, but I won’t support it any longer.  I know me no longer purchasing a dozen eggs a week from the grocery store is having little effect on the factory egg industry, but if we ALL choose to make little changes they WILL add up.  Try it.  Make one change this year.  We have to start doing something.

I’ll talk about it more another time, since I’ve certainly rambled on long enough today, but your local farm fresh eggs not only taste better and are crazy healthier, but you can’t beat how pretty they are.  Ditch the plain white and brown for an assortment of blues, greens, browns, pinks and creams.  They’ll remind you every time you open the fridge of the changes you’re making and the difference you are making, and you’ll smile.

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