Facts About Water Consumption Today

• The taste facts
An obvious issue in the consumption of bottled water is taste. In some areas, tap water simply isn't drinkable, and in those situations bottled water is a useful resource. Other consumers simply prefer the taste of bottled water. Consumers have lots of preferences and some people want mineral water for taste. Everyone has their own reasons for buying products. And some people have a preference for bottled water. But perceptions about the taste of tap water and realities about the taste of tap water can be very different things. To test the hypothesis that tap water tastes at least as good as bottled water, has been conducting a series of taste tests at Ithaca College in the past year. In five blind taste tests over the last year, the tap water has won four times. The growth in advertising and consumption of bottled water has occurred frankly since the big soda companies bought up water. They would buy up the Dasanis, and they would buy up the Poland Springs, and you get into the huge marketing machines of the major soda industries, Coke and Pepsi, notably, and they take it to a whole different field."
• Water and waste
Then there's the waste stream. In roughly the last 10 years, the amount of polyethylene terephthalate plastic bottles being recycled increased from about 775 million pounds in 1995 to about 1,170 million in 2005, according to the Container Recycling Institute. But during the same time period, the amount of PET bottles going into landfills skyrocketed from 1,175 million to 3,900 million pounds. Water bottles are a big part of that problem because there are so many more of them, and because in many states, water bottles don't have a redemption value like soda and beer bottles do.
• Hidden costs of water
Strictly speaking, tap water isn't free — it costs about $0.00002 per ounce. But single-serve bottled water costs between 1,000 and 4,000 times more, according to the U.S. Conference of Mayors. Some cities, including San Francisco, Albuquerque, Minneapolis, and Seattle, have banned city purchase of single-serve bottled water because of waste impact from the bottles and because it's viewed as an unnecessary cost to taxpayers.
• So then what?
How can you save money while actually drinking tasty water that you know for a fact is good for you and the environment? Well, luckily the answer is simple and can be summed up in three simple words, ionized alkaline water. Do you know what your current drinking water is doing to your health? Studies show that drinking purified or distilled water can lead to mineral deficiencies in your body…your tap water contains measurable particles of drugs and pharmaceuticals…and most waters are too acidic for your body’s pH! For optimal wellbeing you need alkaline water, a “living,” electrically-charged water that easily passes through your tissues and allows your body to absorb essential alkalizing minerals. Alkaline water, which is full of antioxidants, comes out of a ionizer, or, an alkaline water machine. An alkaline water machine is an easy-to-use device that attaches to your faucet. Your alkaline water ionizer will turn your unhealthy tap water into fully filtered, electrically-charged, great-tasting “living” alkaline water. This will save you money by purchasing this one-time-buy ionizer as opposed to buying hundreds of nutrition-less water bottles in your lifetime; most of which get dumped into our Earth as waste. So the answer truly is simple, save money, environment and your health by switching to alkaline water

Apple Honey Iced Tea

This is a fabulous summer tea, and easy to make. This one is definitely a personal favorite!

Ingredients:

• 3 cups alkaline water, boiling
• 4 tea bags
• 1/3 cup honey
• 3 cups apple juice

Preparation:

Pour three cups of your alkaline water into a stove-top pot; Steep tea bags in hot water for 5 minutes. Strain out tea bags, and stir in honey and juice. Mix until honey is dissolved. Chill for two hours then serve over ice.
Serves 6-8

Saturated Fats...Watch Out!

Concentrated mostly in animal products, saturated fats are solid fats that raise harmful LDL cholesterol and increase cardiovascular disease risk. Foods high in saturated fats are damaging to your arteries, so as a result The American Heart Association advises limiting saturated fats to less than seven percent of total calories, which is equivocal to to about 15 grams for the average person intaking 2,000 calorie-a-day diet. It is easy to limit your saturated fat intake, just stay away from high fat content dairy products, limit your red meat intake and manage your meat portions. lastly, and this is a given, as much as possible stay away from fried and greasy foods, these are just swimming in saturated fats.

Acid Water: Don't Throw it Out!!

acid water is highly oxidative water, and therefore, acidic. acid water kills bacteria, viruses and fungi upon contact, in fact, Acid ionized water is destructive not only to bacteria but it is also an astringent. As a result it has found widespread application commercially in: nurseries, surgeries, food preparation areas, sprout and wheatgrass growers, florists, hospitals, etc. In the home it is an excellent cleansing and sterilizing agent, with uses in the kitchen, for hair and skin care, extending the life of flowers, promoting plant growth and many others. The acid water is excellent for all manner of skin complaint. you can use it as an astringent face wash last thing at night and it's excellent for acne, sores, bench top and more.

Health Tip Of The Day

The ABC's of Antioxidants:

Antioxidants are a great way to fight off the havoc wreaking free radicals that are no doubt running rampant in your system doing more damage than you realize. The question is how do you get the antioxidants you so sorely need to keep healthy and fight off sickness and disease? there are two sure fire ways to know your getting the antioxidants you need:

1. Eating specific foods that are high in antioxidants like carotenoids, flavonoids, selenium, sulfides, and organosulfurs all are food compounds that are high in antioxidants.

2. The second, and easily the best and most powerful way to get your antioxidants is by drinking alkaline water. alkaline water contains millions of free radical fighting oxidants in every glass; as well as being full of calcium and rich in oxygen. drinking alkaline water is a sure fire way to keep healthy

Ionized water can help you to lose weight

According to Dr. Robert O. Young, a research scientist at the pH Miracle Living Center, states, "overweight and obesity are not fat problems; they are an over-acidic problem caused by lifestyle, diet and metabolic acids. If you need and want to lose acidic weight then you need to eliminate acidic lifestyle and dietary choice sand begins to alkalize and energize your body with the pH Miracle Living Lifestyle and Dietary Plan." There are many different avenues you can take in acidic fat prevention. When it comes to health, it’s a fact that all measures should be taken in ensuring your well being. One measure that can be taken to ensure good health and long life is by drinking ionized water. Drinking ionized water makes it easier for the body to dispose of acid wastes and, if consumed regularly, ionized water can reduce acid waste, allowing for a natural health improvement.

Drinking ionized water not only reduces the levels of un-wanted acids in your body. The accumulation of acidic wastes helps to accelerate the aging process; therefore, the reduction of acid wastes retards the aging process and perhaps - according to Sang Whang – “even reverses it.”

Supplementation

A strange as it may seem, a great deal of our aging and deterioration is actually due, in large part, to a deficiency of proper health and nutrients. As we age, our bodies are naturally going to slow down, thus making it more difficult to absorb the proper nutrient we need from our food, mainly due to weaker digestive system. Our immune system starts to weaken and slow, so as a result, we are not able to fight off sickness or rapid deterioration properly. So what are some of the avenues we can take to properly feed our bodies the nutrients they so richly desire? Here are a few options you can explore to implement health back into your diet:

Dark green vegetables- broccoli, spinach, blue algae, and kale are all vegetables rich in proteins, nutrients and calcium. These are a must have in your everyday diet.

Antioxidants- some people think taking vitamins is the best way to keep the antioxidants flowing, but actually a better way is by drinking ionized alkaline water. It is a fact that alkaline water provides your body and cells with much needed oxygen, which helps to boost immune system, keep you energized as well as helps detoxify your system.

Taking calcium and iron- calcium will help to strengthen your bone density while iron helps protect you from a protein deficiency.

Good exercise- it’s good to keep your calories and total acidic body fat down and your muscle mass up, and one of the best ways of doing this is through healthy exercise. Keeping your body in shape also helps to boost your immune system.

Take a multi-vitamin- you should really look into to this one, because there are a lot of vitamins out there that aren’t as nutritionally sound as many others. First, make sure it’s a vitamin that needs to be taken more than once a day, then find out the reputation of this vitamin. These multi-vitamins will help to supplement your body with a lot of much needed nutrients that you are missing in your everyday diet.

By Nedalee Ruiz

Nedalee is the author of The Desperate Parents Handbook http://www.desperateparent.com/
Nedalee recommends http://www.healingwatermachines.com/ for more articles on health and healing and http://HealingDiets.blogspot.com for articles on diet and nutrition.

Copyright © 2008 By Nedalee Ruiz Permission granted to reproduce in entirety only including links and author credits.

Avoiding Excess Weight in your Body

Obesity is running rampant throughout the U.S. population today. It is basically defined as being 20% over your normal body weight; normal weight is determined by your height, age, and build, and is referred to as your body mass index. Obesity is now the second leading cause of death in America right underneath smoking cigarettes.

There are several different avenues you can explore and take to avoid any extra weight gain and, if possible, lose some of those un-wanted pounds:

1. Cut empty calories. Empty calories are normally found in high energy foods with poor nutritional values and are prominent in processed foods high in fat and carbohydrates. Some examples of these foods are- Coffee, soda, potato chips, and candy. Cutting these foods out of your diet will keep you from adding that un-wanted weight and it will help you to drop some of those unnecessary pounds.

2. Detoxify your body. Your body needs to be cleansed and the best way to do this is by drinking alkaline water which is distributed through water ionizers. Alkaline water helps to oxygenate your cells, which helps to neutralize body acids and restore your pH balance.

3. Eat a good breakfast. Your metabolism doesn’t start running properly until you eat, so if you wake up nice and early and eat a healthy breakfast, your metabolism will work over time in between meals to help you burn calories.

4. Don’t eat late at night. Your metabolism starts working for the first time in the morning, after breakfast, so by the end of the day its pooped! Your metabolism slows at night, so you should pick a nice early dinner time, eat a sensible, low calorie meal and then put the fork down for the rest of the night. If you continue to much, your metabolism will not be able to process it as quickly and it will be stored as fat.

5. drink plenty of water. Drinking 8 10 oz glasses of water a day will not only keep you hydrated and cleansed, but it will also help to curb hunger.

6. Finally, exercise properly. You should be exercising at least twice a week to help to keep you in shape and burn some unwanted calories.

By Nedalee Ruiz
Nedalee is the author of The Desperate Parents Handbook http://www.desperateparent.com/
Nedalee recommends http://www.healingwatermachines.com/ for more articles on health and healing and http://HealingDiets.blogspot.com for articles on diet and nutrition.
Copyright © 2008 By Nedalee Ruiz Permission granted to reproduce in entirety only including links and author credits.

The Perfect Cup of Coffee

There is nothing better in the morning than a properly made cup of delicious coffee, but on the flip side, there is nothing worse in the morning, than a nasty, sludgy, improperly made cup of coffee. So how do you ensure that you will start off your day right with that invigorating tasty cup? There are a few easy steps that need to be taken that when making a great coffee, but you need to take them all if you’re going to get it right.

1. Picking the right beans.
Always select high-quality, perfectly roasted beans. Organic beans are great for full bodied flavor. Also, buying beans directly from your favorite coffee shop will ensure good flavor.

2. Finding the right grind.
Lots of people use different brewing methods to match there favorite coffee selections, and the grind of the coffee bean determines a lot of that preferred flavor. Whether your favorite coffee style is drip, press, or espresso, you’re going to need to pay attention to coffee bean size. For Press, you need a very coarse grind, and for espresso, you need a very fine grind. For drip coffee machines, however, you’re going to need to find a happy medium between coarse and fine grind.

3. Proper proportions.
Proportion determines whether or not your going to have a strong cup of coffee, or a very watered down weak cup of coffee. The rule of thumb when making a regular cup of coffee is a ratio of 2 tablespoons of fresh ground coffee for every 6 fl. Oz. of water.

4. Using the best water.
Water is going to determine A LOT of the coffees flavor. The best water to use for the very best cup of coffee is a cup of cold alkaline water. Alkaline water comes from water ionizer machines which are easy to purchase, easy to buy, and a fantastic investment for flavor and health purposes. Always make sure your alkaline water is cold when adding it to your brewer.

5. Proper storage.
Keeping your coffee in an air tight storage container somewhere dark and cool will help keep it fresher longer.

Better 4 1/2 Months late than never

Ronnie started his New Years Diet yesterday. Finally! He and several friends put $300 each into a pool and have given them selves until September 1st to loose weight. They all weighed in and the one who loses the most wins the $2,400 pot. Ronnie was the fattest at 268 pounds, so we'll track it and see how well he does. Remember, last year, he lost 40 pounds in 75 days by becoming alkaline with alkaline water and alkaline foods.

He's pulled me off my diet many times in the last months by bringing home pizza and ice cream. Usually I resist, but too often, maybe one if four times, I don't. That has kept my weight hovering right around the same mark for a while now. I weighed in yesterday at 157.4, exactly the same as last week and only one ounce less than two weeks ago. Let's see how we do with eating right.

weighing in

Sorry I didn't get around to posting earlier in the week, I've been working 14 hour days. I only lost one ounce last week. Made it down to 157.4 pounds. Seem to be going around in a loop in that area. I've increased my walks to 5-6 days a week for 30 minutes each. I'm really enjoy extra energy, as yesterday I worked a very full day on 3 1/2 hours sleep. Other days I've gotten 4-41/2 hours of sleep. Personally I prefer more and was grateful for the 7 hours I got last night. But I've decided that rather than waking up and tossing and turning, I go a head and get up and start working. I'm not trying to get up and work at 3 am, but if I'm awake, why not work?

ARRRRRRRRRRRR 3.24.08 Weigh in

My weight has yo-yoed all weekend. I was down to 154 last Thursday and up to 155.1 a couple of days ago.
So just imagine my disgust as I weighted in this morning at 157.5!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I am wearing sweats and long sleeves but come on. I ate about 5 pieces of bread over the weekend and 3 pieces of cherry pie, so clearly flour and sugar have had their way with me. Boy am I bummed. I was so glad after 3 months of dieting to finally have broken the 10 pound mark and then here I am, just heart broken. Well the, back to work at being serious about this. The amazing thing is that you will quickly see that when ever Ronnie gets around to joining me on this, he will lose 10 pounds in about 14 days and keep it off instead of my 14 weeks and yo-yoing!

Action equals results

Though you are not yet sure exactly how you will finish, go ahead and get started. Even the smallest amount of progress can motivate you to keep going. The big achievements begin with small achievements and the small achievements come from making the initial effort.No matter where you intend to go, there is always a first step to be taken. Take that first step now. Nothing can equal the sense of accomplishment that comes from getting results. Though it's great to have faith that you can do it, it's even better when you know from your own experience. Action is what will transform your faith, your hopes, your best intentions into real and undeniable results and now is the time to act.Take that first step, keep on going and don't look back. You can do it, when you decide that you will.

I weighed in at 156.5 this morning. Down about half a pound from last week. I've been walking for 30 minutes almost every day. My results have been very slow but at least are still moving in the right direction which right now is DOWN.

3.10.08 weigh in

Well I lost 2 1/2 pounds this week, although I seem to have lost and gained that same weight several times. I am now at 157.01 and am diligently working to lose more. For those of you wondering what happened to Ronnie, he literary dieted 4 days and quit!

March 3rd weigh in Results

Weighed in at 159.5 which is a 15 ounce loss.
I'm still discouraged with my results and have ramped up my exercise somewhat, but it's still mild exercise. I had lunch with a friend last week who asked me if I had measured myself since I'd started this plan. The answer was no, but it got me to thinking about a woman that I once met at a gym. This woman ran on the treadmill for 45 minutes at a time. Something I still couldn't do today, and she was in her late 40's early 50's. One day in conversation she told me that she hadn't lost a pound since she'd started working our 9 months before but that her body had totally been reshaped and that she was very happy with the results. I was very discouraged about that as I want to LOSE weight. In her case I know that we can over exercise which causes our body to become acidic with blocks weight loss.

Anyway, all that to say that I cam home and measured my waste and belly and found that I had lost a full inch off of each! I am VERY happy about that and bought some new clothes to celebrate..

Raw Benefits for Diabetics

When I stated to try and change my eating, my intention was to eat more raw food than I have been. I just read a repot in The Feb.2008 readers digest that talks about a new movie coming out called Raw for 30 days. In the movie, Diabetics eat a raw vegan lifestyle for 30 days, lose an average of 25 pounds and are able to go off insulin. This is because their bodies become alkaline in the process of this kind of eating. Which is another reason that I recommend alkaline water to everyone. I'm trying hard to get the guts to commit to 30 full days of raw only eating. Honestly it isn't as bad as it sounds, were not just talking celery and carrot sticks. The recipes I've found have been top notch in flavor and I've created some of my own in the recipe page at Healing Water Machines
I think the reason that I haven't made the full commitment is because... I like to eat out a lot. I get tempted easily. I need a quick food plan to be able to start. My husband isn't cooperating and that could be a big problem. Excuses, excuses! I'm listening to some Tony Robbins tapes that are really encouraging me to look at my excuses/reasons and find a way to seriously over come them. I'm working on it.
By Nedalee Ruiz
Nedalee is the author of The Desperate Parents Handbook http://www.desperateparent.com/ Nedalee recommends http://www.healingwatermachines.com/ for more articles on health and healing and
http://HealingDiets.blogspot.com for articles on diet and nutrition.
Copyright © 2008 By Nedalee Ruiz Permission granted to reproduce in entirety only including links and author credits.

BLAAAAAAAAAA Weight in

I jumped on when I was barley awake this morning, not totally expecting good results, because I'd been to two parties over the weekend. But then again, I'd exercised 6 times last week, so maybe I'd have good results. When the digital numbers appeared before me, I mentally, and incorrectly calculated that I'd lost over 7 pounds. I told my husband that didn't seem like it could be right. So I weighted again. When the reality sunk in that 160.4 meant I had GAINED 2 pounds 7 ounces, I began to cry. And honestly, I cried for over an hour and still don't feel like I'm over it. Thankfully, by keeping a food journal, I can clearly see where I went wrong in the week and make adjustments. Boy am I bummed though!

Here's what I ate. And I admit I didn't drink as much alkaline water this week which is proably part of the problem.
1.18.08
Exercise—5 minutes on the rebounder
Breakfast—Blueberry Smoothie
Lunch—Burrito
Snack—Tamale and garlic fries
Dinner---Spaghetti

1.19.08
Exercise 7 minutes on the rebounder
Breakfast—Blueberry smoothie
Lunch—Half a roast beef sandwich and a salad with peach hot tea.
Dinner—1/2 a steak, mash potatos, chard, and corn.
Snack--- 3 bites of my husband’s drumstick ice cream.

1.20.08
Exercise--- 20 minute walk outside with my dog. Very refreshing and invigorating.
Breakfast---Blueberry Smoothie
Lunch, ½ roast beef sandwich
Dinner—Apple wood smoked bacon sandwich with lettuce tomato and avocado. Sorry-a word like "Smoked" is a real trigger for me and "apple wood smoked" sounded so exotic. Just tasted like bacon to me. Wasn’t the best choice, but I got it out of my system. J
Snakck—I couldn’t help it Ronnie was eating another ice cream drumstick and I lost all self control and had one too.

1.21.08
Exercise –20 minute walk in the park.
Breakfast—Strawberry Smoothie
Lunch---Salad, enchalada, chili reno, and 2 tbs sweet corn cake, and a tropical ice tea, 6 small flour tortillas with butter and salsa.
Dinner—Satued string beans, 8 cream cheese won –tons and a fortune cookie.
Snack—1/2 Hershey bar

1.22.08
Exercise—15 minutes on the rebounder
Breakfast---Strawberry Smoothie
Lunch---Fire roasted tomato soup, and a romaine salad and tropical ice tea. Oh, and 6 small flour tortillas with butter and salsa.
Dinner—1 ½ bowls fire roasted tomato soup.

1.23.08
Exercise—30 minute walk
Breakfast---Strawberry Smoothie
Lunch—6 ounce steak, broccoli and asparagus.
Dinner—Hamburger and French fries. I passed on the double, double with cheese which is my favorite.

1.24.08
Breakfast—Ronnie made me hash browns with sausage gravy which I ate. I passed o the scrambled eggs he also made.
Lunch---Fire roasted tomato soup
Dinner-Salad, bread, one slice of pizza, pretzels, a cookie and some party nuts at a friends house warming party.

Staying Motivated

It's almost 2 months after Christmas and the gyms are starting to empty out as people lose their "New Year" motivation to get fit. And I mist confess that I'm feeling the pull to quit trying to lose weight myself. My husband hasn't been too supportive... I've lost only a little weight...we all have excuses and I have mine. But I am choosing to push through and continue. I went for a walk this morning even though it was misting outside. I found it very invigorating and am still feeling the energy from it a couple of hours later. I'm listening to some Tony Robbins tapes. I love him. He's very motivating. He talks about health, relationships, success and all kinds of great things that affect our mind sets. So I encourage you now to reaffirm your commitment to yourself and to your goals and lets continue to push forward together.

Monday Weigh in and what I ate 2.4.08-2.17.08

Almost forgot to weigh in this morning.
Lost 8 ounces which is half a pound. Weighed in at 157.7
Ronnie isn't here for me to drag onto the scale. He didn't want to admit last week that he had gained a pound. I don't seem him embracing this with full enthusiasm yet, although he did exercise twice last week that I know of.

Here's what I've been eating which will also help explain why my weight loss is so slow. I've been on quite a chocolate binge lately but am still grateful that I'm losing some weight even if slowly.


2.4.08
Exercise—15 minutes on the rebounder
Glass of fresh vegetable juice squeezed on my Champion juicer by my husband Ronnie
2 blueberry smoothies through out the day as I’m fasting solid foods for religious purposes.

2.5.08
Breakfast---Glass of fresh vegetable juice squeezed on my Champion juicer by my husband Ronnie
1 blueberry smoothies through out the day as I’m fasting solid foods for religious purposes.

2.6.08
Breakfast---Glass of fresh vegetable juice squeezed on my Champion juicer by my husband Ronnie
Lunch—Soup and Salad at El Torreto with chips and salsa and a glass of tropical ice tea sweetened with Stevia.
Dinner—Tuna fish and Doritos.

2.7.08
Breakfast-- Glass of fresh vegetable juice squeezed on my Champion juicer by my husband Ronnie
Lunch---Salad, watermelon, grits, 3 pork bar-b-que ribs and a hot link.
Dinner---My new Tortilla Soup recipe.

2.8.08
Breakfast—Don’t remember
Lunch---Cream of tomato soup, salad, 2 spring rolls, bread and butter
Dinner---Two things of ice cream probably something else too but I don’t remember.

2.9.08
Breakfast---Don’t remember
Lunch---Creamy green chili soup
Dinner—Cream of sun dried tomato soup
Snack—apple and orange

2.10.08
Breakfast---Chinese food
Lunch—Cream of sun dried tomato soup.
Snack—Bagel and cream cheese.
Dinner---Spinach salad with creamy green chili dressing, half a bagel.
Desert—A handful of chocolate chips.

2.11.08
Breakfast---Egg white salad
Lunch---Chicken Carbonera sandwich from Quiznos, chips and an Ice tea.
Dinner—Chips and Salsa, tuna on a bagel

2.12.08
Exercise—7 minutes on the rebounder
Breakfast 2 neat balls with cream cheese
Lunch---Salad
Dinner---Soup

2.13.08
Breakfast—Blueberry smoothie
Lunch,---salad and sandwich and cup of tea
Dinner—1/2 bagel with tuna, ½ bagel with cream cheese
Snack—Chocolate bar

2.14.08
Breakfast---Blueberry Smoothie
Lunch—Spinach salad with nuts and creamy Anaheim chili dressing.
Dinner—We ate out and had crab cakes, mashed potatoes, vegetables, and a steak dish as well as some bread and margarine.

2.15.08
Breakfast—Blueberry Smoothie
Lunch,--Leftovers from last nights dinner
Snack—Chocolate from Valentines Day.
Dinner—Soup and Salad

2.16.08
Breakfast—None
Lunch—hamburger patty. Found some grass fed beef at Trader Joe’s and wanted to see what it tasted like. Doritos, and Kale.
Dineer—Salad
Snack—Chocolate chips and fruit sorbet.

1.17.18
Breakfast—Salad
Lunch—At Trader Joe’s, I found some grass fed steak imported from Australia and wanted to see what it tasted like. It was incredible. It cost about $4 for one but was so thick I cut it in half. I had mash potatoes with butter, and some cooked chard with it. Wonderful. The chard was also washed, cut and packaged at Trader Joe'’ and I followed the simple recipe o n the package. I never ate chard before and really enjoyed this.
Dinner—Same as for lunch. Yummy.
Snack--- Doritos.

Happy Valentines Day

You are special and we are glad that you are here with us today!
Many blessings to you.

Love, Nedalee

Tortilla Soup

Vegetarian, Vegan, Raw if you omit Tortilla strips
Makes four servings
2 cups vegetable broth
1 avocado, diced
1 cup corn kernels, cut from cob ß Can be omitted if you wish
½ red bell pepper , chopped
½ cup tomatoes, diced
½ cup cilantro leaves, chopped
1 lime juiced
1 clove garlic, minced
½ jalapeno pepper, chopped, seeds removed
1 teaspoon sea salt
Tortilla strips for garnish
Warm vegetable broth in pan on very low heat. Add everything else and garnish with tortilla strips. Enjoy before it cools.

By Nedalee RuizNedalee is the author of The Desperate Parents Handbook http://www.desperateparent.com/Nedalee recommends http://HealingWaterMachines.blogspot.com for more articles on health and healing.
And http://HealingDiets.BlogSpot.com for articles on diet and nutrition.Copyright © 2008 By Nedalee Ruiz Permission granted to reproduce in entirety only including links and author credits

2.11.08 weigh in

Nedalee weighed in at 158.0 pounds this morning. a loss of 1 pound 2 ounces since last week and a total of 7.5 pounds over the last 6 weeks. Not a rapid weight loss, but respectable since I've eaten pretty much anything I wanted.
Ronnie hasn't weighed in yet this week, I'll follow up with that soon.

What I ate 2.1.08- 2.3.08

2.1.08
Exercise 10 minutes on the rebounder.
Breakfast---Neat Balls
Lunch—Two wonderful avocado tacos made by my wonderful husband.
Dinner—1 slice pepperoni, sausage and sausage pizza, 3 cheese filled ravioli, 2 bread sticks with honey. I would have made better choices if I hadn’t had outside influences but Ronnie decided that after 4 days of healthy eating he needed a "cheat day."
8 16 ounce glasses of alkaline water, I think that’s a record for me but I was actually that thirsty.
2.2.08
Glass of fresh vegetable juice squeezed on my Champion juicer by my husband Ronnie
Breakfast—Neat balls.
Lunch—2 of Ronnie’s wonderful veggie avocado tacos.
To be honest, I forgot write down what I ate for dinner, but I remember having about 6 cookies. I’ve had a lot of loss this past week and a half and was depressed over the weekend.
2.3.08
Breakfast---2 of Ronnie’s completely none diet, but very delicious breakfast burritos.
Lunch—Neat Balls, about 6 chocolate mint no sugar but non-diet cookies.
Dinner—Cornbread muffin, 2 chocolate chip cookies, and a lot of bar-b-qued meats.

Ronnie didn't remember to keep a food journal this week. I know that he mostly dieted 4 days and ate junk Friday through Sunday, and still had better results than I did.

Nedalee's and Ronnie's Results:

I weighed in at 159.2 pounds this morning which is actually a 1 pound gain for me. I was depressed over the weekend and ate a lot of junk.

Ronnie on the other hand ate a lot of junk over the weekend and lost 1 pound 9 ounces weighing in at 267.1.

I lost my great-uncle to a peaceful death on the twenty-first of January the same day that Heath Ledger died, and had two acquaintances take their own lives in the last week. I'm going to talk a little about that and how it relates to nutrition in my next post.

Hot Water can Leach Lead into Your Body

Hot water from the tap should never be used for cooking or drinking unless using a lead removal pre-filter. The reason is that hot water dissolves contaminants more quickly than cold water, and many pipes in homes contain lead that can leach into water. And lead can damage the brain and nervous system, especially in young children.

Lead is rarely found in source water, but can enter it through corroded plumbing. The Environmental Protection Agency says that older homes are more likely to have lead pipes and fixtures, but that even newer plumbing advertised as lead-free can still contain as much as 8 percent lead. A study published in The Journal of Environmental Health in 2002 found that tap water represented 14 to 20 percent of total lead exposure.

The E.P.A. says cold tap water should always be used for preparing baby formula, cooking and drinking. It also warns that boiling water does not remove lead but can actually increase its concentration. One can also easily and inexpensively install a under-sink lead removal pre-filter.

1.21--1.17.08 Diet and exercise

1.21.07
Exercise 10 minutes rebounder 50 crunches.
Breakfast---Two neat balls with sun dried tomato cream cheese. There are wonderful vegan versions of cream cheese that I really like, but this one happens to be the real things. I’ve been in a big hurry lately and have found that the neat balls when very dehydrated are a fabulous quick, raw, energy, protein food and are kind of like a meat substitute.
Lunch---I wanted a salad, but my husband was making salsa for an hour and wouldn’t relinquish the kitchen so I settled for a half of left over roast beef sandwich and a half a pumpkin and raisin tamale.
Dinner---Golden beet salad, page 101 .Ani's Raw Food Kitchen: Easy, Delectable Living Foods Recipes 3 chocolate mint cookies one spoon living fudge

1.22.02
Exercise---15 minutes jogging on the rebounder
Breakfast--- Vegetarian sandwich on sprouted wheat bread.
Lunch---Neat balls, sun dried tomato cream cheese. 1 small sweet corn tamale.
Dinner—Man, I don’t quite know how to admit to this but I derailed pretty big time. I had one chocolate covered cherry cookie, 1 mint chocolate cookie, 1 Reese’s peanut butter cup, some Chinese food, a little bit of a stuffed pork chop and for desert I had some lavender berry sorbet. What was I thinking? Well, Ronnie complained that I hadn’t been cooking for he and the boys, so I made the stuffed pork chops, which they didn’t want but ordered Chinese food instead. I put the pork chops in the oven and set it but apparently forgot to push start, so they weren’t done at dinnertime anyway. I’d seen a Reese’s commercial, which got me, so that explains why I bought the candy. I did eat only one of the two in the pack and gave the other to my son. And after almost no sugar for three weeks, I will say that it tasted off the charts mega nauseatingly sweet. I only had 3 or 4 bites of the pork chop and didn’t enjoy the taste of that either, so it is good that my taste buds are adapting to healthy more natural flavors.
1.23.08
Breakfast---Fruit scone cereal with almond milk
Lunch—Pumpkin soup, salad and Doritos
Dinner---Cauliflower mash page 143 Ani's Raw Food Kitchen: Easy, Delectable Living Foods Recipes it's mile a mash pototo substute. Tasted good, but you eat it cold because it's raw and that takes getting used to. For deseret, living fudge.

1.24.08
Breakfast---Carrot Dill bread page 72 Living in the Raw Gourmet
Lunch—Salad and half a roast beef sandwich. I’m not eating half to cut calories, I’m eating half because it’s a Claim Jumper sandwich which has massive servings that are too big for most humans.
Dinner—Steamed vegetables. These were microwaved, which is a very undesirable way to cook food.
1.25.08
Breakfast—dill carrot bread
Lunch---almond butter on herbed bread.
Snack—protien bar
Dinner--- Two slices of pizza
1.26.08
Breakfast---1 slice of herbed flax bread with apple slices on top.
Lunch---Beautiful salad.
Snaks—corn chips and salsa, and potato chips and dip.
Dinner---Another salad


1.27.08
Late Breakfast ---Steamed kale, salad, really great tasting fake chicken made from wheat.
Snack—5 not on the diet peppermint oreo type cookies and a small amount of ice cream.
Dinner--- Leftovers from the morning salad.

While I don't always note it, I drink lots of alkaline water. More some days than others but I shoot for 6-8 16 ounce glasses a day. I don't drink ANYTHING but the water unless I note it here in the blog.

Alkalinity

The theory behind alkalinity is that our body builds up fat to protect us from the acids in our system from the foods we eat and our stress and exercise. So if we alkalize our body by eating foods that are more alkaline that acidic most of the time and drink alkaline water, you will automatically loose weight. We can see that last week I still lost 15 ounces even though all of my food and snack choices were not alkaline. The goal is to eat about 70-80% alkaline, which would be green foods and vegetables and things like almonds and drink alkaline water. I’m trying to make some of my own salad dressings, so that I’m not eating lots of sugar. But when I got to Claim Jumper, which is about once a week, I have huge amounts of their Thousand Island dressing, probably more that 8 table spoons full. That has sugar and mayo in it, and I’m still losing weight. Bet you couldn’t do that on Jenny Craig!

Results

1.28.08 Weigh in for Nedalee, 158.1 down 15 ounces from last week.
Ronnie is starting to eat better today. Better late than never.
He currently weighs 269 pounds and that's down about 5 pounds since he stopped drinking so much beer with his friends. Right now he plans to cut back on sweets. He loves to binge the weekend before starting to eat better, sot his was an interesting weekend to watch.
He currently measures 50" chest 50 3/4" belly and 49 inch hips. I'll post some of the pictures I took last night soon.

News

I've invited my daughter Christina Makly to write some articles for us. She and my granddaughter have recently become vegetarians. She found some things on the PETA web site about cruelty to animals that concerned her, so they stopped eating meat. I know several vegetarians and vegans who won't even wear leather shoes or buy leather purses and that is based on the consciences. So we all make different choices for different reasons. I'm eating more vegetables and less cooked things to get healthy. So we are exploring many options on this site and I plan to talk about more of them soon. So far I have lost 6 pounds 11 ounces in 3 weeks and I plan to post more of what I've been eating soon. I do that so that I can admit where I've gone off the path, and to open up your minds to other options. And to show that even though I'm eating a lot of the right fats, I'm still losing weight. I've been a normal American carnivore/omnivore all my life and am still eating some meat but finding it less appealing. I'm not going to try and push tofu on anybody. I've had it 100 different ways, don't like it and won't try anymore. There are too many other ways for me to get protein.

Chocolate Mint Cookies

11/2 cups raw almonds
1 cup dates or chopped dates
3 tbs. raw chocolate powder – set 1 tbs. aside
5 springs of mint leaves stems removed
3 tbs. Ionized water
Process until it sticks together and rolls into a big a big ball in the food processor. Takes about 2-3 minutes.
Pinch off small pieces and roll into small balls, roll in reserved raw chocolate powder, press flat. Eat or refrigerate. Makes 26 cookies
By Nedalee Ruiz
Nedalee is the author of The Desperate Parents Handbook http://www.desperateparent.com/
Nedalee recommends http://HealingWaterMachines.blogspot.com for more articles on health and healing.
And http://HealingDiets.BlogSpot.com for articles on diet and nutrition. Copyright © 2008 By Nedalee Ruiz Permission granted to reproduce in entirety only including links and author credits

Monday Gladness

1.21.07
Weigh in: 159.1 down from 160.9 last week. When I subtract the two I’m shocked to see that I lost a pound and a half! I expected it to be more like a few ounces. Whew…as she wipes the sweat from her forehead from the dreaded weigh in. Actually, I cheated quite a bit last week, so I am surprised. I found One Day at a Time's Valerie Bertinelli blog online. Bertinelli's online journal chronicles her quest to lose forty pounds, Jenny-Craig-style. Readers will appreciate Bertinelli's candid approach and can-do attitude in facing a problem with which many Americans struggle, all though I’m not sharing this in support of the Jenny Craig diet, I think you may find some of her insights interesting.
http://www.jennycraig.com/valerie/

food journal

1.16.08
Rebounder 15 minutes

I woke up with more energy again today and feel that it was from the living salad last night.

Breakfast---Blueberry smoothie. My smoothie wasn’t smooth today. I tried to modify to make they recipe for one day instead of three and I got it too thick and was gaging on it. Had to put it back in the blender and add water and ice.

Lunch---Salad

Dinner Neat balls and Black pepper cheeze. The Raw Food Gourmet: Going Raw for Total Well-Being spread with Black Pepper cheese page 161 of Ani's Raw Food Kitchen: Easy, Delectable Living Foods Recipes. And some home made lavender berry sorbet that I will publish the recipe soon.

1.18.08
Breakfast –Protein bar because I forgot to eat. Watch out for these many brands are very high in sugar.

Lunch—Enchilada with a little rice, cheese, sour cream and some beans.

Dinner—I ate such a late lunch that I wasn’t hungry for dinner eat. This is not good for dieting because you will not lose fat that way.

4 16 oz. Glasses of Ionized water.

1.19.08
Breakfast—2 neat balls with sun dried tomato cream cheese and two tiny sweet corn tamales.

Lunch--- 2 Taco supremes from taco bell and a lavender soda. The sugar in the soda seriously zapped my energy f or several hours.

Dinner—2 Taco supermes and one cheesy beefy burrito from taco bell, plus some Doritos chips

1.20.08

I woke up feeling like I had a bladder infection today. So rather than most of my meals, I added about 2 oz of pure unsweetened cranberry juice to my ionized water and drank several glasses of that through out the day.

Breakfast---1/2 protein bar

Lunch---Salad and ½ roast beef sandwich from Claim Jumper.

Dinner ---none.

3 days info

1.14.08
Exercise 100 Crunches
Breakfast---Blueberry smoothie
Lunch---warm cornbeef w/ provolone on raw carrot dill bread, page 72 Living in the Raw Gourmetand vegan mayo.
Snack 1 chocolate covered cherry cookie

I visited the new Whole Foods Market in Tustin yesterday. It is MASSIVE. Their produce department is like nothing I've ever seen. Prices seemd pretty high though. One raw cookie costs $3. I'm glad I can make my own!

Dinner—Chinese food including sautéed green beans and 5 crabmeat cream cheese wontons.
6 16-oz. Glasses of Alkaline ionized water.

1.15.08
Exercise—20 minutes on rebounder
Breakfast---Blueberry Smoothie
Lunch---Neat Balls page 108 The Raw Food Gourmet: Going Raw for Total Well-Being
Snack-- 1 chocolate covered cherry cookie
4 16-oz. glasses of Ionized water

1.16.08
Exercise---15 minutes on rebounder, 50 crunches. I’m laying off the crunches a little because they are causing the muscles in my neck to get so tight I can hardly turn my neck to the left side.

Breakfast---Blueberry Smoothie
Snack—homemade flax crackers and salsa, 1 neat ball, page 108 The Raw Food Gourmet: Going Raw for Total Well-Being spread with Black Pepper cheese page 161 of Ani's Raw Food Kitchen: Easy, Delectable Living Foods Recipes This cheese is made with chashew nuts and is so good that sometimes I scoop it upand eat it with my fingers!

Lunch---1 Tamale 2 lavender sodas. I had not intention of drinking two sodas, but my son opened one, took a sip and handed me the rest. I was raised by my grandparents who grew up in the depression, so I was taught to never waste anything. Unfortunately, with 19 grams of sugar each, that probably went to my waist.

Dinner---A beautiful Kale and red cabbage coleslaw page 94, Ani's Raw Food Kitchen: Easy, Delectable Living Foods Recipes, 1 tiny sweet corn cake tamale and ½ a pumpkin raisin tamale. And some home made lavender berry sorbet that I will publish the recipe soon.
I only had about 4 glasses of Ionized water today.

Because I am cooking or creating food for one, it takes me a little longer to eat up the recipes than it will when Ronnie joins me on the diet. He's getting very tempted by the food.

Get your crunch on

People crave crunchy things. So what can you do to stave of those cravings?
Celery is the old stand by.
Red bell pepper is great.
Raw Almonds
Actually, most raw foods are pretty crunchy in their natural state.
I make crackers by mixing 1 cup fax seed with one cup left over soup or smoothie mixed in a food processor and then dehydrating them in my oven at the lowest setting with the door slightly open for about 24 hours.
My last batch was made with left over raw avocado soup, flax seed and sprinkled with red bell pepper seasoning. Yummy. Great for dipping when you want some hummus or salsa.

Calorie Cutters

AOL offer's these diet tips.
Soup Savvy

Abandon heavy, cream-based soups -- they can saddle you with 240 calories per cup. Stick with broth-based varieties, at roughly 150 calories a cup,and thicken them up by cracking a small egg into the soup while it's heating and swirl it throughout the pot. The egg makes the soup smooth and offers healthy protein while adding only 60 calories. You'll save about 30 calories, and about whopping 15 grams of fat per serving over the creamy soups.
Squash Calories

Spaghetti can cost you 200 calories per cup -- and that's before you top it with sauce. For pasta lovers, spaghetti squash is a vibrant alternative. When cooked, the squash flesh becomes thread-like, resembling spaghetti. At only 75 calories per cup and no fat, it makes for a healthy and tasty stand-in.
Slimmer Cocoa

A store-bought hot cocoa mix made with low-fat milk can add up to 250 calories per cup. Shave off about 115 calories, and some unwanted sugar, with this flavorful hot milk beverage: Heat 8 ounces of low-fat or non-fat milk with a cinnamon stick. Pour it into your mug and stir in one tablespoon of unsweetened cocoa powder and one teaspoon of vanilla extract.

It's easy to overdo it with mayo in tuna salad. At 103 calories per tablespoon, you could easily add 300-plus calories to your dish. A lighter, tangy alternative to mayo? Toss canned tuna packed in water with lemon juice, onion, and capers and save yourself upwards of 100 calories. For an extra peppery flavor, add chopped watercress.

Put a new spin on the sandwich by doing away with the bread. Even two slices of the most dietetic versions can add 70 calories per slice. Place sandwich ingredients in buttery-soft bibb lettuce or the long leaves of romaine and wrap them up for a crunchier and much lighter meal.
If bread is a must for a sandwich, skip the fatty mayo and use lower-in-calories pickles or relish to moisten it. If it's a sandwich with cheese, use only one slice, then skip the condiment altogether and heat the sandwich in the toaster oven to melt the cheese. It adds the moisture that the condiments would. Both tricks can save up to 40 calories per sandwich, and will spare you the 11 grams of fat per tablespoon of mayo.

Reduce your fat content and boost fiber by swapping cooked, ground lentils for some of the ground beef in a recipe. Ounce for ounce, lentils and ground beef have a similar calorie count. But 3.5 ounces of ground beef racks up 20 grams of fat, while the same amount of lentils carries only 0.8.Muffin Tips

Lighten up dense morning muffins. Trade whole wheat flour for half of the white flour in the recipe, and use unsweetened applesauce or pureed bananas for up to half of the oil. Both swaps can save you as much as 500 calories.

Salad Toppers

Take full advantage of the health benefits of your light salad by avoiding toppings like bacon bits and croutons. Crowning the dish with chopped red onion and herb mixtures like cilantro and mint, or dill and flat-leaf parsley will save you from the 60 calories or more the traditional toppings would normally add.

Monday Weigh In

Weigh in 160.9—8 ounces more that last week. Could be the clothes or the water I just drank. Either way, I didn’t lose anything this week. Ronnie reminded me that when you are exercising you gain muscle so even if you lose fat, you might not have a net loss. And I read a book that says most women lose inches not pounds. I’m not ready to measure yet. Wrote 5 offers in the last 4 days so I’m running like my hair is on fire.

Chocolate Covered Cherry Cookies

This is a tasty, healthy recipe for anyone on a Raw , Vegan, Vegetarian or normal diet. It’s a great desert for kids with Mother’s who knows the dangers of processed sugared snacks.
Super quick to make. About 15 minutes total.
Makes 16
1 ½ cup raw almonds
1 cup dried, pitted tart cherries—Available in most grocery stores
2 tbs. Ionized water
2 tbs. Agave nectar—a low glycemic sweetener available in health food stores
¼ tsp. Vanilla extract
2tsb. Raw Chocolate Powder Reserve for rolling dough in. (available in health food stores)
Run ingredients through a food processor fitted with and "S" blade until oil is released in nuts and dough holds together. Roll into small balls, roll in raw chocolate powder. Flatten. Eat or store in fridge until you want to eat them.

By Nedalee Ruiz
Nedalee is the author of The Desperate Parents Handbook
http://www.desperateparent.com/
Nedalee recommends http://HealingWaterMachines.blogspot.com for more articles on health and healing.
And http://HealingDiets.BlogSpot.com for articles on diet and nutrition.
Copyright © 2008 By Nedalee Ruiz
Permission granted to reproduce in entirety only including links and author credits.

What I Ate

1.9.08
Exercise--- 100 crunches
Breakfast---Blueberry Smoothie
Lunch---Fruit scones broken up into a bowl like cereal, almond milk and a few dried blueberry’s on top, because I was in a super big hurry.
Dinner—Big Salad
Snack—Homemade Lavender Berry sherbet---not sugar, super yummy
5 -16 oz glasses Alkaline Ionized water total for the day.

1.10.07
Breakfast---A bowl of fresh cherries. Tastes great, and they are of course raw. My concern is that they are full of natural sugar and no protein, so they may give me short-term energy but not lasting energy like the almonds in the blueberry smoothie would.
Snack—Carrot Dill crackers and humus, Orange—More natural sugar Notice I needed a snack before lunch, which isn’t typically the case.
Lunch---Claim Jumper restaurant, salad wit beets and lots of thousand island dressing and beef dip sandwich. Worse yet, I ate the whole sandwich when I normally only eat half. The sandwich had real bread, real beef and cheese, none of which are really diet foods and the extra thousand island had fat and sugar. Even the beets are high natural sugar. Probably not good choices but I’m human and it tasted good. Oh, I had two cups of decalf tea sweetened with Stevia.
Dinner—A frozen store bought burrito because it was convient and I forgot that I still have lots of the raw chili which would have been a much better choice. The burrito tasted really nasty. I also had 3 raw chocolate cover cherry cookies, which gave me the idea to experiment with a mint chocolate cookie recipe soon.

5 16 ounce glasses of Ionized water. I drink Ionized water because it helps clean out your cells. It's molecule size penetrates the cells better than regular water.

Over all, I had low energy all day. It could be because of what I ate or it could be because I started work at 5:30 am, or because it was an overcast day. Either way, I’m about results, and I think the food choices at least contributed to the low energy. Don’t want that. Will try not to do it again. So if the cherries and orange, which were natural and raw, had too much sugar and no protein to give me energy, what about the cereal that most of us feed our kids to start their day? No less than the third ingredient on the box.

1-11.08
Exercise 10 minutes on rebounder
Breakfast—1/2 Blueberry Smoothie
Lunch—Salad and six flour tortillas with honey butter and salsa. Ok, so the flour and honey butter wasn’t the best. 2 glasses Tropical ice tea sweetened with Stevia.
Didn’t get to drink enough water because I was away from home and didn’t take it with me.
It’s 10:00 p.m. and haven’t had dinner or a snack, been VERY busy all day and not hungry. Will have some nuts soon. Alright, I admit it, I never got to the nuts. It’s never good, when dieting to only eat two means. Never, never, never do it, you won’t lose weight. But I have a good excuse, I wrote 3 purchase offers yesterday.

Raw/Vegan Cajun Creole Chili

6-8 servings

3 cups tomatoes, blended or 1 can tomato sauce
2 cups lentils, sprouted in high pH alkaline water
2 carrots, grated1 ear of corn, cut corn off cob
Juice of one lemon or lime
½ red bell pepper chopped
½ cup white onion chopped
2 teaspoons Cajun Creole Seasoning by Spice Hunter, available in stores or spicehunter.com or Chili Powder
3 garlic cloves, minced
½ teaspoon ground cumin
pinch cayenne pepper

Combine all ingredients and let marinate several hours or over night in the refrigeration before serving cold.

By Nedalee Ruiz
Nedalee is the author of The Desperate Parents Handbook
Nedalee recommends Healing Water Machines for more articles on health and healing. Copyright © 2008 By Nedalee Ruiz Permission granted to reproduce in entirety only including links and author credits.

What I'm Eating

1.7.08

Breakfast--Blueberry Smoothie

Lunch--- 1 Baja Burrito

Dinner--- Raw Chili

Snack--- 2 Raw donut holes. A great sweet snack. Mine have been in the fridge for about a month and still seem to be fine. I eat one now and then.

8 ½ 16 ounce glasses of Ionized Water

I was really jonesing for something sweet last night and will try to find a new, healthy raw dessert since I’ve been eating the donut holes for a while and because I want you all to know that that they exist.

1.8.08

No formal exercise but I passed out 300 flyers and got pretty winded.

Breakfast--- Blueberry Smoothie ---Sorry guys, your not going to get much variety from me there. I like this, and I don’t normally eat breakfast. I like that I can make up three days worth at a time and grab it on the run.

Lunch---2 pcs. Onion Herb Bread page 78 Living in the Raw Gourmet, with humus, sliced tomato, ½ avocado salted.

Snack---Fresh fruit cup

Snack---Carrot Dill Crackers—page 72 Living in the Raw Gourmet, it’s a bread recipe but I made it thinner into crackers. Spread with store bought humus. Plus Trader Joe’s Chicken salad—not diet, vegan, vegetarian, or raw, just what was left over in my fridge and about to expire. I’m going to Newport Beach tonight and was hoping to eat light so Ronnie might take me to my favorite restaurant.

Dinner--OK, it worked, but that means I ate too much. 3 Bar-b-ques beef ribs. Mash potatoes and some really great peanut coleslaw with spinach and cilantro in it. I ate all the peanut slaw first to fill up and the rest last. Didn’t even enjoy the ribs or potatoes and brought most of it home to my sons. The Bar-b-que sauce and the slaw both probably had lots of sugar in it.

5 -16 oz. Glasses of Ionized Water

Another snack---3 Chocolate Covered Cherry Cookies very good and easy to make, will publish the recipe soon.

Fear of Fat

When I started eating more raw foods, I found that many recipes were very high in fat. I was a little worried about gaining weight even though people professed that I would lose weight. I had just enjoyed a wonderful tasting raw meal when I expressed my fear to my husband who assured me that my body would begin to burn the fat instead of sugar. The words had hardly come out of our mouths when I opened to this quote from Ani Phyo’s book Ani’s raw food kitchen. "Some folks worry about how eating fats affects their weight. Good fats are necessary for our organs and body functions, and they’re good for our heart. The more fats we eat, the more our body lets go of tats, because it knows more will be coming in. The less we drink, the more our bodies retain. The more we drink, the more it lets go of." Truthfully I had also heard this from other sources, but worried how it would work on MY body. Well, in my first 7 days of experimenting with this high fat way of eating natural foods I lost 5.3 pounds. And gained tons of energy.
Burning Fat, Fat, Fats, Fear of Fat, Healthy Fat

Week 1 Diet Results

Week 1 Diet Results

Started 1-1-08 at 165.5
Weigh in 1-7-08 results 160.2
Result 5.3 pound loss in one week. YEAH!

I have to tell you I really step on that scale in fear because of the high fat content in the new style of eating. I will be posing an article about that soon called Fear of Fats.

Changes--- I notice that I'm not needing to eat as many snacks. My new bathroom habits which I will spare you the details, are evidence that all the new fiber in my diet is cleaning me out. I have much more energy. As a matter of fact, I woke up at 4:30 a.m. and started writing this at 6:13 a.m.. A big change from when I met Ronnie 41/2 years ago, I hadn't gotten out of bed before 8:30 a.m. in many years. Lastly, five days into this new diet, I've noticed a significant change in my skin. I had beautiful, almost perfect skin in high school, but have had some acne from my 20’s through current 40’s. I've always said that it’s unfair to have pimples and gray hair at the same time! Anyway, I've had a couple of zits the last tow days, but the rest of my skin is brighter and smoother and softer. I think it’s because of all the healthy oils in my new healthy living diet. Many people say t hat they see changes in their skin after drinking alkaline water. But for me it’s taken the water and the diet.
By Nedalee Ruiz
Nedalee is the author of The Desperate Parents Handbook http://www.desperateparent.com/
Nedalee recommends http://www.healingwatermachines.com/ for more articles on health and healing.
Copyright © 2008 By Nedalee Ruiz Permission granted to reproduce in entirety only including links and author credits.

Fail to Plan or Plan to Fail

When I started this new way of eating on the first of January, I didn’t really have a specific plan or menu. I had a general idea and plan. But like my girlfriend last night said, "Everyone tells us what not to eat, but no one tells us what to eat." So the first couple of days of my diet, I kind of floundered around from meal to meal trying to figure out what to eat. To help others out, every two days, I plan to post what I ate and what exercise I did. And once a week I will post the results if any. About every other day, I plan to post other health-related articles. I can’t post actual recipes of what I ate unless it is my own creation, but I plan to soon post links to the books I got the recipes from.


1/3/07
Breakfast—Blueberry Smoothie

Snack--- Apple

Lunch—Batter from my herbed raw bread. I couldn’t resist! I can’t give the full recipe because it’s not mine--- but it had apples, pecans, flaxseed and about 7 other spices including garlic and onion which I love. It's Onion Herb bread, page 78 from Living in the Raw GourmetRaw bread sounds gross but it uses no flour or yeast and isn’t cooked but is dehydrated in an oven, the sun or dehydrator. The batter of this recipe tastes great, we’ll see how the bread tastes later. I made it into hand size patties like hamburgers to use as a base for future sandwiches instead of real bread. The fragrance of the spices in the bread is filling my house and smells so good even upstairs.

Dinner---2 Baja Cheeze Burritos with Taco nutmeat and red pepper corn salsa. From Pages 151, 154,164, and 189 of Ani's Raw Food Kitchen: Easy, Delectable Living Foods Recipes I will say that they took a little more effort to prepare than I would have expected for something called raw food, but well worth it! This is gourmet raw food after all. When I asked Ronnie how it looked, he said "Worthy to be served in any restaurant." When he tasted mine, he said, "It was bursting with flavor," and I agree. One burrito was more that filling, but I had made two so like a pig I ate them both because they tasted so good.

Snack--- 1 Raw Donut hole. Page 228 Ani's Raw Food Kitchen: Easy, Delectable Living Foods Recipes

1-4-08
Exercised 20 minutes on the rebounder.

Breakfast--- Blueberry Smoothie

Lunch--- 2 pieces of the raw Onion Herb bread I dehydrated yesterday. page 78 from Living in the Raw GourmetIt was so good. I didn’t need anything with it. Don’t let the name fool you, there is no flour, sugar, what or yeast in this bread. The main things are apples & flaxseeds. Lots of fiber and omega oils.

Dinner---1 Baja Cheeze Burritos with Taco nutmeat and red pepper corn salsa. From Pages 151, 154,164, and 189 of Ani's Raw Food Kitchen: Easy, Delectable Living Foods Recipes

1-5-08
100 Crunches. Crunches are like half sit-ups

Breakfast--- Almond blueberry portage—raw. Page 36 Living in the Raw Gourmet I didn’t think it tasted great, but I didn’t use fresh coconut like the recipe suggested. It was quick and easy to make.

Lunch---Tuna on the raw herbed bread I made before, page 78 page 78 from Living in the Raw Gourmet. I didn’t choose tuna because I thought it was healthy or a good diet food. I chose it because it was easy. My husband was making one for himself on real bread and offered to make me one, I agreed as long as he put it on my raw bread.

Dinner--- 21/2 cups of my real ham, potato, cream and butter soup. Not the best choice for a diet, but it tasted good and was still around. I’d planned to eat a raw chili concoction. I had wanted to make it in the morning but got distracted. Turns out, this raw eating takes some planning, as the recipe needed to "marinate a few hours." I still had some of the left over burrito stuff that I really like but wanted to save it for lunch. Ronnie is already trying to figure out how to take those to work for munch as he likes them so much from the couple of bites that he had of mine.

Changes--- I noticed I haven't needed snacks the last few days. My new bathroom habits which I will spare you the details, are evidence that all the new fiber in my diet is cleaning me out. I have much more energy. As a matter of fact, I woke up at 4:30 a.m. and started writing this at 6:13 a.m.. A big change from when I met Ronnie 41/2 years ago, I hadn’t gotten out of bed before 8:30 a.m. in many years. Lastly, five days into this new diet, I’ve noticed a significant change in my skin. I had beautiful, almost perfect skin in high school, but have had some acne from my 20’s through current 40’s. I’ve always said that it’s unfair to have pimples and gray hair at the same time! Anyway, I’ve had a couple of zits the last tow days, but the rest of my skin is brighter and smoother and softer. I think it’s because of all the healthy oils in my new healthy living diet. Many people say t hat they see changes in their skin after drinking alkaline water. But for me it’s taken the water and the diet..

I’m drinking lots of Alkaline Ionized water from my Melody Water Machine. I drink about 5-8 16 ounce glasses of water a day. It is high pH water and I’ve worked my way up to a number 3 setting which gets me about a 9 Ph. I cook with a number 4, which gives me about a 10 pH.
1.6.08
Breakfast--- Dehydrated raw fruit scones Page 75 Living in the Raw Gourmet broken up into pieces for a delicious cereal with almond milk. I’ll talk about the negative things about cow’s milk in another post.

Lunch---Went to El Torrito Restaurant. Took one bite of my favorite chips and was repulsed by the thick coating and taste of lard. Something that I’d never had the taste buds to discern before. I had their Mexican Caesar Salad, two glasses of Tropical ice tea sweetened with Stevia that I carry in my purse. Two vegetable enchiladas, ½ cup pinto beans, and 1 ½ tbs. sweet corn cake. The corn cake has sugar and butter, so that was the first actual sugar that I chose to eat in a week. The beans wouldn’t belong on an alkaverian diet. The cheese on the enchiladas wouldn’t belong on a Vegan diet and the cooking of the food wouldn’t belong on a raw diet. I will explain the differences between those styles of eating in a future post.

Dinner---Raw Chili and 3 spoons of salsa.
The raw chili was a totally new experience for me. As an American, I’m used to eating Chili, and most foods, cooked and warm. Even after I prepared it and let it marinate for a day and a half, I sat looking at it trying to buck up the fortitude to try the first bite. Cold chili sounded completely unappealing. I couldn’t even get my husband to taste it. With fear and trepidation, I took my first bite and was low and behold it was good, very good. Because I lacked so many ingredients from the original recipe, and had to improvise and over come, I will publish the modified version soon. I’ll tell you now that it had no meat or beans but rather carrots and lentils and lots of other great tasting fresh vegetables. The original recipe had celery and I will omit it in mine as it tasted out of place in the dish.

Motivation to Diet

The title Motivation to Diet is deceptive because for me personally, I don’t want to diet, I’m looking for a lifestyle change. I used the word "Diet" because that is what people understand and are used to and also because in the truest form, any eating pattern that we choose is our "diet" regardless of if we are trying to lose weight or not.
I’ve been trying to lose weight for the last four years rather unsuccessfully. I’ve put effort in, and have had various motivations to do it, including wanting to fit into my wedding dress that had to be altered to fit me from the original size I was when it was created.
When I met Ronnie I told him that I was seriously under my normal weight because of grief, prayer and fasting, and not to expect that I would always weigh 120. Since I have gained beyond my normal weight of 138, my husband has hinted at his displeasure about my weight for some time. I have tried to loose it but I don’t think that it was a total priority in my mind.
Quite honestly, I think it can be hypocritical for men to gain weight and then criticize their wives when they do. ESPECIALY if it’s like in my case, where its Ronnie, bringing the junk food home and in some cases quite literally feeding it to me!
Here’s an example from two nights ago. Ronnie: I feel like pizza, do you want pizza?
Me: No, I don’t want pizza, I’m on a diet and I’d like you to support me on it.
Ronnie: You’ve been doing so well I thought you’d like a "cheat day."
Me: I’ve only been on the diet four days, no I don’t want a "cheat day," I want results.
I’m not trying to rant on my husband there, I’m sharing it because I know that some of you have had similarly frustrating experiences.
What I do want is to share what has radically changed my thinking although that is something that has been in the process for over a year in terms of my health and well being. I’m going to quote from several sections of one chapter in Shaunti Feldhahn’s book For Women Only – What you need to know about the inner lives of men. She surveyed hundreds of men and this quote is from a chapter called The Truth About the Way You Look – Why what’s on the outside matters to Him on the inside. "This chapter is about something our men desperately want us to know, but feel absolutely unable to tell us…The effort you put into your appearance is extremely high on his priority list. Yet the chances that you know his true feelings are extremely low. What I’ve learned about men’s needs in this area has been life changing. It has jarred me out of a dangerous complacency. Call me naïve, but I just didn’t realize that the issue of appearance was such a big deal—such and imperative deal---for a guy. Of course, having learned just how visual men are, I should have gotten a clue. But somehow I assumed that if I was out of shape, I was the only person who was negatively affected."
As she’s doing research for the book, a professional acquaintance tells her, " There’s something I need to mention to you," Ted said, looking uncomfortable. "I think women have a blind spot in an area that they really need to understand." Taking a deep breath, he spilled the beans.
"I don’t think women know how important it is to take care of themselves and not to look like a slouch around their husbands."
"You mean, not to be overweight…?" I ventured.
"That’s part of it, but that’s not really it," Ted continued intently. "It doesn’t mean you have to be a size 3. The bigger issue is that your husband sees that you are putting forth the effort to take care of yourself, for him. See, my wife is 115 pounds, but her weight isn’t really the issue. It’s not about being tiny. If she doesn’t take care of herself, dresses sloppily around me all the time, never exercises, and has no energy to go and do things together, I feel like she’s choosing not to do something that she should know is important to me. And then it becomes a real issue because it affects her ability to do things and her self-worth and desire---and then it affects, me."
"Over and over again, I heard each man say that what mattered most to him was not that his wife shrank down to her honeymoon bikini, but that she was willing to make the effort to take care of herself for him."
"Why does your appearance matter? When men felt safe enough to tell the truth they said. "When you take care of yourself, I feel loved." Since men are so visual, seeing us make the effort to look good makes them feel loved and cared for. This area is so imperative to them, our efforts—or lack thereof--- directly affect their perception of our care for them."
Several men told me something like this: "I want to be proud of my wife. Every man has this innate competition with other men, and our wives are a part of that. Every man wants other men to think that he did well."
Now I’m going to share something that is difficult to hear. This two-part comment is from a close friend whose heart I trust completely. I’m including it because I’ve found it is truly how men think and because I believe it helps to make a critical distinction. My friend’s candid comment:
"Sometimes I’ll meet a guy who looks just like an average guy. But then, if I meet his wife and she is huge and very out of shape and just sloppy, I feel so sorry for him. It sounds terrible, but my gut just churns for him. It’s this "Oh, I’m so sorry" sort of compassion. That sounds absolutely terrible to say out loud, but it is what every man is thinking.
But then sometimes I’ll meet a man whose wife is overweight--- but she takes care of herself. She puts some effort into her appearance. She dresses neatly, or does her makeup and hair. If she is comfortable in her own skin and is confident, you don’t notice the extra pounds. I look at that husband and think, He did well."
End of quotes from Shaunti’s awesome book that all women should buy and read.
There you have it. That ladies and gentlemen in a nutshell is why I’m committed to changing my life. I want to be healthy, have energy, and I want my husband to be able to feel proud of me. That section of the book opened my eyes as the proverbial light bulb went off. I always wore dresses and did my makeup before I met Ronnie. But he didn’t care about those things and actually preferred me in sweats and a ponytail. But he has always told me that it was important to him for me to exercise. Anyway, I didn’t get it before but now I have awakened and I’m changing.
So for those of you who are interest in making your own life changes or seeing how my experiments work out, follow along.

By Nedalee Ruiz
Nedalee is the author of The Desperate Parents Handbook http://www.desperateparent.com/
Nedalee recommends http://www.healingwatermachines.com/ for more articles on health and healing.
Copyright © 2008 By Nedalee Ruiz Permission granted to reproduce in entirety only including links and author credits.

The Tortoise and the Hare

Well, I've stated eating healthier and making better food choices. Already my energy has increased. So Like the Hair in the fable, I'm out of the starting gate. The holidays have been hard for Ronnie, he seems to have been hit hard by depression over the loss of his Mother. He's putting off his New Year's resolution diet for a few days and comforting him self with food. I saw him eat an entire pint of ice cream last night which is not unusual. So having lost my guinea pig for the blog, I will have to step in and post my own fat pic. To summarize some of my last posts for those of you who haven't been following along, Ronnie lost 40 pounds last year drinking alkaline ionized water and eating a more alkaline diet. He gained it back eating comfort foods after he quit chewing tobacco and lost his Mother in the same month. He's vowed to lose it and more this year, but hasn't started trying yet.

My effort will include mild exercise, a more alkaline diet, and lots of alkaline ionized water. I am going to explore Vegan, Alkavarian, and Raw foods, but have not committed to eating them exclusively as I'm still an omnivore who loves Bar-b-que. Like any wise dieter, I will try to avoid the dreaded white foods, Rice, Potatoes, Sugar, Milk and Bread. But again, I not going to say never. As you will see from my food posts which will follow, I had Cream of Ham and Potato soup for dinner the first night of my diet and may have some more since the pot isn't finished. What I am doing is a very public TEST diet. Raw fooders eat lots of high fat items like nuts and avocados but burn the fat and lose weight. I'm going to see if a fairly inactive over 45'er can get weight loss results.

So here are the current stats: On January 1, 2008 I weighed 165.5 up about 3 pounds from before the holidays. I swear the new weight feels like it's all in my butt. It feels like I have a caboose waddling after me for the first time in my life. My weight is also up almost 30 pounds from my after baby weight from the second child who is now 23. I kept that weight for almost 20 years. My weight can fluctuate even if I weighed 3 times a day, so I'll only weigh in once a week or so.

My measurements, (don't tell anybody) Are a ghastly 41 - 35 1/2 - 38 1/2

What I ate: Jan. 1, 2008

Breakfast- Blueberry Smoothie

Lunch- Fresh broccoli florets dipped in store bought humus. (Broccoli is high in protein.)

Snack Trader Joes Spicy Ranchero Egg White Salad -Low fat, high protein, low carb, cholesterol free and only 50 calories. Tastes like cottage cheese with taco seasoning. Defiantly not raw, not vegn, not alkaverian. I bet that if you soaked almonds in water and chopped them in a food processor with the other ingredient you could make a vegan/raw version.

Another Snack- Store bought salad

Dinner 2 cups Cream of ham and potato soup.

Jan. 2, 2008

Exercised 20 minutes on a rebounder. (I've worked my way up from only five minutes.)

Breakfast- Blueberry Smoothie I buy my blueberries frozen and organic at Trader Joes for under $4 a pound which will make me about 6 smoothies.

Lunch- Tuna wrap because my last avocado was rotten so I couldn't have the avocado wrap that I had planed.

Snack- Apple Dinner- Pomegranate Salad- Don't freak out, it's not complicated, the pomegranate seeds were just a garnish on a purchased salad from Trader Joes. It had some goat cheese too so it wasn't vegan.

Snack- Celery with tuna and humus

By Nedalee Ruiz Nedalee is the author of The Desperate Parents Handbook http://www.desperateparent.com/

Nedalee recommends http://www.healingwatermachines.com/ for more articles on health and healing.

Copyright © 2007 By Nedalee Ruiz Permission granted to reproduce in entirety only including links and author credits.

Diet, Diet, Diet...Nope

Diets fail. Lose a little, gain it back and then some. Lifestyle changes work. But it can be hard to make changes if you don't have the support of the people around you. My two teenage boys are the perfect example. I've wanted to eat healthier for ages. But they complain when something has the word "organic" on it. In their minds the word "organic" equals "fake." So cooking two meals is a pain. My way around that is that I let them cook and eat whatever they want within reason after they've eaten some of what I made. Most diets are about depravation. Count your calories, eat less, bla bla bla. My new diet isn't about depravation or about calorie counting. It's about making healthier choices. Choice number one, I will have fresh vegetable juice or a Blueberry smoothie in the morning for breakfast. I've never been a breakfast fan, but I choose to have something now because it is impossible to loose weight on less that 3 meals a day, your body goes into preservation mode. Five small meals are even better than 3 if you want to lose weigh. Men and women actually lose weight differently. Because of that I'm going to join Ronnie on a very public diet. Have you seen that commercial where the fat cartoon lady is complaining that her husband quit drinking soda and lost 14 pounds and she lost one? I laugh every time I see that commercial because it's so true! Like I said in a previous post, Ronnie lost 40 pounds last year with very little effort. I wasn't as committed and didn't come close to matching his results. This year, I am committed and want to see how far that commitment can take me. I've packed up the left over homemade Christmas candy to mail to my daughter so it won't go to waste and will be out of temptations way. I'm going to exercise up to 20 minutes 3 times a week. I haven't done any exercise this past week because all the excess sugar over the holiday lowered my immune system and gave me a bad cold. I'm still sniffling and weak so I'll hold off on exercise for a few days. Most of my work is done form the computer so I lead a very sedentary lifestyle. I've had three gym memberships in the past and never went for more than 5 months and NEVER lost any weight from working out. As a matter of fact, I always gained weight and the trainers would smile and say that was good because muscle weights more than fat. This post is getting long, so I will wrap it up. I will be posting our starting weights and some pictures soon. The main reason that you should follow along with our progress on the blog is to see how easy it is to lose weight with the methods we will be using. Because I want increased energy more than I want weight loss I will be adding a lot more raw food into my diet. For people who don't know about raw food, the thing that comes to mind is raw meat or carrots and celery sticks. Let me assure you, there is now raw meat. And while I may choose some carrots and celery sticks from time to time, there is a whole world of great tasting easy to prepare gourmet raw foods which we will explore on the blog. Consider this passage of scripture from the book of Daniel in the old testament of the Bible. Chapter one verse 8-16. But Daniel purposed in his heart that he would not defile himself with the portion of the king's delicacies, nor with the wine which he drank; therefore he requested of the chief of the eunuchs that he might not defile himself. Now God had brought Daniel into the favor and goodwill of the chief of the eunuchs. And the chief of the eunuchs said to Daniel, "I fear my lord the king, who has appointed your food and drink. For why should he see your faces looking worse than the young men who are your age? Then you would endanger my head before the king." So Daniel said to the steward whom the chief of the eunuchs had set over Daniel, Hananiah, Mishael, and Azariah, "Please test your servants for ten days, and let them give us vegetables to eat and water to drink. "Then let our appearance be examined before you, and the appearance of the young men who eat the portion of the king's delicacies; and as you see fit, so deal with your servants." So he consented with them in this matter, and tested them ten days. And at the end of ten days their features appeared better and fatter in flesh than all the young men who ate the portion of the king's delicacies. Thus the steward took away their portion of delicacies and the wine that they were to drink, and gave them vegetables.
By Nedalee Ruiz
Nedalee is the author of The Desperate Parents Handbook http://www.desperateparent.com/
Nedalee recommends http://www.healingwatermachines.com/ for more articles on health and healing.
Copyright © 2007 By Nedalee Ruiz Permission granted to reproduce in entirety only including links and author credits.