Wednesday, April 25, 2012

Made with LOVE

Whew, this GAPS birthday party prep makes cooking from "grocery store scratch" seem like drive through fast food service!

So far, we are making 2 flavors of Ice Cream and some kind of cupcakes with icing. Eric has been experimenting with the ice cream for about 3 weeks. We have been enjoying the practice. Today I started working on the cup cakes...still have some work to do in that department, but we are getting closer!

Here we are the day before the big day.... so far we have some ingredients ready to go:
  1. 10 cups of  home fermented cream (sour cream)- takes 24 hours and typically done in 4 cup increments
  2. Soaked, Sprouted, Cooked and now dehydrating Beans to make into bean flour....I hope. This is about a 4-5 day process. 12 hours soaking, 2 days sprouting, half a day cooking, 24 hours dehydrating, THEN I can Grind it into flour for the recipe. But the good thing....only costs like $1.70 per pound, instead of $8 per pound for the nuts.
  3. Soaked and Dehydrated 20 cups of Almonds which will be made into Almond butter for the cake batter (not all 20 cups thank goodness, that would make one very expensive, even for a GAPS recipe, cake.)
  4. Cooked down 1 lb of strawberries into Jam
  5. Made Butter
These are the steps to prep the Ingredients, so that tomorrow we can mix them up into the final recipes. Speaking of recipes...still working on the cake recipe. Looks like we might be having muffins for breakfast, lunch and dinner...again. (well not quite, but today we did have muffins for breakfast as well as for dinner tonight with leftover cold roast.)

This may seem like a lot of work, but I was just thinking....we source most of our ingredients, I don't have to go milk cows, or skim cream, or gather chicken eggs, or even pick strawberries (although I do have about 10 plants going and although I know the first year is supposed to be lousy, I still hope we get a few!)  I am really shocked how far removed Americans are from our food supply. I feel like I've come a heck of a long way when it comes to real food, but I'm seeing we are just at the tip of the iceburg  to reach self sufficiency!

Sourcing may be a bit of additional work, but there are still about 50% of our foods that either are mailed to our door, thanks to the awesome internet...or we are able to pick up at the local Whole Foods store, but I do hope there is a day that we don't have to count on them either....although I don't see myself mining salt and not even sure, what all that would even entail. 

Hubby took the plunge and as of today is a bee keeper. He built the hive this afternoon and a friend caught a swarm and brought the bees to us this evening! So cool, we might have our own honey someday!

Monday, April 23, 2012

Preparation Day #6 Ready or Not here I go!

Well, I started with 16 ounces of water and a drop of lemon oil and finished up my quart of freshly juiced apples (11 of them) by 11:30.

I was a little nervous about putting anything on my stomach after yesterday. I woke up with it feeling weak...but so far I've been okay.

Well, I started with 16 ounces of water and a drop of lemon oil and finished up my quart of freshly juiced apples (11 of them) by 11:30.

Colonic appointment at 1:30. She also is going to work with me on clearing emotional blocks that deal with constipation. She muscle tested me and we came up with , 15, Mom...so my homework is to meditate and see if I can come up with any "traumas" that might have been filed away and are keeping me stopped up.

I was a little nervous about putting anything on my stomach after yesterday. I woke up with it feeling weak...but so far I've been okay.

6:00-Drank the nasty 6 ounces of Epsom Salt
tummy felt weak, like it might rumble...but nothing and felt fine after about 30 minutes
8:00 Take 2 Epsom Salt drink
same weak, I think my tummy might get rumbly feeling

9:45: Mixed up the olive oil and grapefruit drink and prepared the castor oil pack

10:00 Stood by my bed and chugged the 10 ounce drink....it was gone in 30 seconds. I even got a somewhat impressed but dispproving head-shake from my husband, evidently guzzling isn't a talent he's proud for his wife to have. I"m a guzzler, what can I say? I was shocked the drink wasn't dreadfully awful and that I think that the grapefruit actually tasted good! Where are my tastebuds? I didn't know people could drink strait grapefruit juice and LIKE it...I thought Grapefruits didn't come with sweetener!

So I immediately laid down and hubby helped me with the castor oil pack, and I moved and talked the least amount as possible for 20 minutes, then rolled over and went to sleep.

I woke up just before 6...just in time for my next dose of Epsom Salt, I had another at 8:00 and the releasing finally started around 10:00. It lasted well into the late afternoon, by 4:00 I was feeling safe to stay out of the bathroom. I'd estimate I passed about 30-50 raisin sized stones and HUNDREDS of smaller ones ranging from sand-gravel sized.

I held out until Monday evening to do the clearing enema and I think there may have been a few more stones, harder to tell now.

Looks like something I will get to do every new moon for the next few months. Hope to notice some more positives other than knowing the stones that were in there are now not....I haven't really noticed any symptoms that have changed. Although I did not have any migraines and Guess who arrived today?! Cycle Day one here we are! And on day 27 ;) Looks like we are finding some balance maybe?!!

Thursday, April 19, 2012

Preparation Day #5

Last night, I had a couple tummy cramps and thought I might have to "go". Nothing really happened though, but right before bedtime I had a small amount of diarrhea. As my body "pushes" I have some pain in my pubic area. My guess is weak pelvic floor....guess I need Eric to build me a squatty potty. I think that is the 2nd Time I've gone poop on my own in the past 3 months. I weighed before bedtime and was still at 127.

This morning I was down another .5 a pound. I seem to be getting more nauseated by the apple cider, I hardly want to drink anything at all after I've had some. I'm loading up the coconut oil and at least I haven't felt jittery...but then I"m just now finishing up my first 16 ounces. :/ I still have water to drink and some "real" juice with some actual nutrients to consume, more water and then MORE apple Cider...ugh. Oh well, tomorrow is day 6, I am supposed to drink all 32 ounces in the morning and not have anything but water after 1:30. I don't think I will have a problem with that. I will be switching to freshly juiced apples for this afternoon and tomorrow. Wonder if that will make a difference?

I had another round of Diarrhea this afternoon around 1:30, 2:30.

Finished my juice by 4:00

Ended up just finishin up my water instead of more juice...and another trip to the pot!

GAPS for Men



My First Guest Post: by Eric Johnson, Man of the house.


I was cheerfully minding my own business, drinking a nice cold beer when my wife said “So....are you ready to get all the processed foods out of our house and start the intro to GAPS”? I knew what it was, we’d been talking about it indirectly for months, I’d seen that little yellow book lurking on every horizontal surface in every room of my home. I’d kicked it under the covers as I’d slept. I didn’t know what this book had inside but whatever it was, had began developing a serious relationship with my wife and it was making me nervous. After seeing many problems in our children due to the results of eating the Standard American Diet. I committed, I said “ok......I’ll give it a shot”. As soon as my beer, ice cream, leftover pizza, fettuccine, and tortillas are gone, we’ll start, noooo problem........

Day one GAPS.....No problem?!?!?!? NO PROBLEM?!?!?!? Where’s my coffee? Where’s my bread to dip in my soup? Where’s my CHEESE?!?!?! I was getting angry, and I was getting angry very quickly. I was beginning to hate myself for being a moral man, a man who doesn’t back out on commitments even if it gets tough, I don’t want to be tough, I want cold beer, hot pizza, and buffalo wings!!!! I was depressed, angry, irritated and felt worse than I had in my entire life.....

And then. I got on our scale. “Hey honey!!! I lost three pounds”! And that became a motivator for me, every day I lost an average of one to two pounds until I had lost a total of 25 and could see the ripples in my stomach muscles I hadn’t seen in a decade. WOW, this is a cool benefit of eating food that makes me want to kill myself, maybe there are some positives. But I’m getting ahead of myself. Up until day 10 I was miserable, depressed, had major cravings for lasagna, enchiladas, cheese, and for some reason tiramasu was a common craving not to mention pizza and chicken wings and I wanted a peanut buster parfait from Dairy Queen so bad I literally dreamt about it and got mad when I woke up! I didn’t miss the beer much. Those cravings came and went for about 3 weeks before they slowed down and now they are ancient history because there are so many excellent replacements on GAPS that I just don’t miss it, there are no cravings I can’t fill with what’s available to me. Food begins to come alive after not eating processed or artificial sweeteners for a while, your body begins to recognize the REAL food and it becomes energized, strong, confident and I look in the mirror to see what I want to see of myself. I’m actually healthy.

THE coolest thing along the way was my wife running her hand across my stomach and smiling at me as she looked me up and down and said “You are hot!!!!”. Yeah, screw peanut buster parfaits, pizza, and wings laced with toxic chemicals and high fructose corn syrup Pshhhh, I’m HOT!! My wife said so!! Pass me another cup of chicken stock and a highly overcooked piece of broccoli please, mmmmm mmmmm!!

Another benefit was the allergy relief, mine cleared up almost completely for a couple weeks when I was doing all the things I was supposed to be doing and the whole season has gone pretty easy for me despite a few bad days of die off. I’m healing, I’m learning the crap I put up with didn’t have to exist, I thought I would never be able to camp due to allergies, that woodworking which is my passion could never be an option as a career, that I would be fat forever and there was nothing I could do about it outside of 2 hours exercise each day and a family man who loves his wife and kids doesn’t give that time with them up! But I was wrong, making the commitment to eat this food and stay on this diet for two years was difficult for about 10 days, I mean really difficult for 10 days, there have been other challenges but that first hump was monumental Mon-u-MENTAL because it is mostly mental, we want something, someone is trying to tell us to eat something we don’t want to eat. It’s a change, we don’t like that either. But if I’m the man of my house and my family is under my care and protection and I find a way to keep them healthier, stronger, happier, safer even, it’s my responsibility to step up and take one for the team. Dad, if you can’t do it, they can’t either, if you have sons (I have 5, one daughter) they will see your tenacity and strength. The one thing I want my boys to learn above all else is not to go with the grain, don’t be a sheep, don’t just follow the crowd or do what’s easy. The diet is hard work and you have to be tough to do it, you have to be a man of your word, you have to desire something better for your family enough to step up and make the change. It feels like the greatest sacrifice you’ll ever make until you step up and do it, and then it feels like success, it feels like courage, it feels like triumph because as men our greatest enemy is our own flesh. We like food and we like sex, those are pretty much the priorities (not necessarily in that order depending on how long we’ve gone without either) so giving those up for what’s better for our overall wellness, takes discipline and builds character, you know, real character, not the kind we like to pretend we have so we can feel good about ourselves.

Probably the greatest motivator for my starting this diet was listening to my son screaming and crying when he had to go to the bathroom, I went in to comfort him, he was shaking, arms stiff, tears rolling down his face, I looked in the toilet to see if there was any progress but all I saw was blood dripping into the toilet because he was so constipated he was being torn open. So screw this “eating whatever I feel like because it tastes good, am I really that weak? Do I have so little self control that I can’t do what I know is healthy for myself and encourage my sons to do the same? Nothing is worth your health. NOTHING. A man that can look me in the eyes and say he doesn’t care if he only lives 50 years if he can eat whatever he enjoys most isn’t a man at all, he’s ungrateful for the life he’s been given and he’s selfish, especially if he has a family to care for. I’m not one of those, I’ll do what I want, because I’m a man, men, I have responsibilities, I have a wife and children and no matter what society tries to create as truth, they are being molded after my actions. Lots of men say they want what’s best for their families, but not many will step up and follow through with the sacrifices required to benefit them the most. And really, after those first two weeks, it’s a breeze, I learned about so many cool recipes, tricks and new foods which was cool for me because second to woodworking, cooking is a passion.

My personal results are:

Weight loss, 25 pounds.

VERY high energy level, fast recovery and almost zero fatigue, I am more productive at work and have energy for my personal hobbies after the kids are in bed.

Allergy relief.

Asthma relief.

Soreness and stiffness gone and when I do hurt the recovery is FAST

Increased flexibility, BIG change here.

Body odor lessened by about 50%.

Better complexion.

I don’t drag for 30 minutes when I wake up, I just wake up in about 5 minutes.

Better concentration.

Not as easily irritated (this took more time, I am feeling a lot more patient lately).

No indigestion which I got several times per week.

No headaches which I also experienced several times per week.

No cravings for really unhealthy foods.

My wife thinks I’m hot.

My kids know how to eat healthy and are enjoying it, they ask for the healthy stuff now.

Bottom line is I feel better than I have in a decade and I just got started, I’m into this maybe 50 days and it’s not hard, and when you think you’ll be jealous and left out when the other guys are drinking beer, eating wings or sausage rolls, there couldn’t be a bigger lie, I celebrated my 35th birthday yesterday and my supervisor brought in donuts for the team to celebrate, he knows my diet, he brought me a banana and an apple, I didn’t feel left out, I felt energized, and if you lined all of us up, and picked the guy you would want to look like and share the energy level of, you wouldn’t pick the ones with the donuts in their hands. I made two repairs while they were still trying to get the energy to get up from their desks. This diet works, you have to be tough to start it but the benefits are INCREDIBLE, it’s like making the transition from Al Bundy to Leonidas, the Greek hero king of Sparta from 300. I feel great and won’t trade it for anything!! Especially a weak mindset that only cares about my next meal.

Mindset of Food

We found that one of the first things that needed to happen was to change our mindset about food budgets. We have to realize that a processed food budget is unrealistic for nourishment and health. The whole reason that Americans are eating what we are is because our government wanted to make it CHEAPER to eat...we'll unfortunately they didn't consider NUTRITION when they started changing the guidelines (started as the Basic 4 food groups and then onto the "food pyramid" and now the food plate.).

Believing that properly raised food is expensive, is believing the stuff in the grocery store is a good substitute for Nourishment. I look at the food in the grocery store like looking at our children's play kitchen, that costs $150 and believing I should try to cook out of it, becasue a REAL kitchen would be TOO expensive. Then, trying to figure out how to only pay 1/10th of the cost, because we just need to find something that "looks like a kitchen".

When we decided to start reorganizing our budget we decided we should prioritize based on the basics of life rather than "bills". (this isn't an instant transition, but getting our mindset wrapped around the idea is the key, having a plan in place is the next step, then implementing it, is the trickier part!)

The most basic thing we need is a healthy source of WATER (we chose an Enagic Water Ionizer "Kangen Water"), then Food (Real, properly raised and grown food), then shelter...which can be hard to swallow, our ideas of what we need as far as shelter is often much more extravagant that what we can afford based on having "basics of life priorities" in mind. Changing our shelter and downsizing can make a domino effect when it comes to the rest of the "bills"

Back to Food....so the first food changes we made were with our Animal products....switched to RAW dairy, Pastured eggs, and 100% Grass fed/finished beef, and continue to work to find pastured poultry and pork. Switching these foods do not change much as far as taste goes (I mean, as far as "giving up" anything....its not like your having to give up something you want, like say the white sandwich bread that you love... I don't know of anyone who said man I wish I could eat those CAFO Animals again! (Concentrated Animal Feeding Operation, basically fed "well enough" to keep them from dying until slaughter, and continuously drugged because the food makes them so sick).

So, I guess part of getting my mindset changed started with watching real food documentaries, there are many on Net Flix...food matters, food Inc. Are great ones to start with. We have to learn that the stuff in the store, is not "real food" and get our mind wrapped around that before we can make highly effective changes.

Wednesday, April 18, 2012

Preparation Day #4

The Scale hit 127 this morning! 5 more to go to my "happy weight"
Started the morning with a shot glass of water with Lemon and Grapefruit Essential oil
and my 16ounces of water.....and a full 4 quart pot of 125* water and a quart of Coffee....its an enema kinda morning.

I only drank about 10 ounces of carrot juice and my quart of apple cider. Nauseated again this afternoon. I used about 3/4 of a cup of coconut oil today...still got shaky this afternoon. I really hope I don't have sugar issues when its time for this to be over!

Tuesday, April 17, 2012

Preparation Day #3

Well, I haven't had too much of a hard time with the fast, other than wanting to actually MAKE the juice....well its not making the juice that is the issue, but cleaning up the juicer!

I made myself 8 ounces of carrot juice this morning
I had 2 hot apple ciders and put about 1T of coconut oil in each of them YUMM...and I added Ocotea Essential Oil to my last 16 ounces of Juice. I didn't finish off my juice until about 6:00 tonight, the day sorta got away from me.

Around mid-day I was feeling a little nauseated, just yucky in general. I ended up taking a nap this afternoon. Maybe I'm detoxing. Still peeing a ton, but what should I expect drinking so many liquids.

At dinner, I had left over juice from last night's red cabbage, red bell pepper, celery, and pineapple juice. I bottled it up with "no room for air" I'm sure it wasn't the highest quality, but it was better than having to make something!

I'm on day 3 of no pooping....guess tomorrow morning I will have to do an enema.

Monday, April 16, 2012

Preparation Day #2

Well, the last time I looked at the clock it was 2:45...I think it might be safe to say that I fell asleep around 3:00. Eric's alarm went off at 4:30, he came in and said good bye a little later and Corban woke me up around 6:30. Took my Basal Temp....not sure how accurate it can be with such crazy sleep, but it was 98.2

Scale: 127.5 back down to my personal lowest weight of 2012....even if it is just lack of solid food, its still nice to see the numbers!

I started this morning with a shot glass of water with 2-3 drops each of Young Living lemon and Grapefruit oil. Then I slowly have finished off a total of 16 ounces of water

Time to start the apple juice....and I think I need to get some real nutrients in me, for sure will do some Carrot juice with some coconut oil in it.

16oz water
4oz apple cider/12oz carrot juice
120z apple cider
16 oz water
8 ounces of celery beet juice/8 oz cider
8oz hot cider with 1tbs coconut oil.....finished by 3:30 YUMMO! Can't wait for more tomorrow!
16 oz water
dinner juice- cabbage, celery, bell pepper and about 1 ounce of pineapple juice
80z water

56 ounces of water
32 ounces Apple Cider
28 ounces fresh vegetable and fruit juice
1lb of carrots
2bunches of celery
1/2 small beet
1/2 head of red cabbage
1/2 bell pepper
1 ounce of Pineapple juice
2Tbs of coconut oil


Plan to use the same oils as last night, plus adding ocotea to help balance blood sugar.

Sunday, April 15, 2012

I'm Blaming the Apple Juice

Well, we did get to bed late tonight. Just after I laid my head down, I checked the clock and it was 11:20. UGH....

Well that wasn't the worst of it! I laid there and laid there, tossed and turned. Couldn't warm up. My feet were really the only thing that was cold, but somehow even with our extra warm blankets (micro-fiber, so NOT "crunchy", but very cozy and warm) even after an hour I was not warmed up.

I thought maybe I will take a detox bath, hopefully the epsom salts will help me sleep and hot water will warm me up...but I laid there a little longer, and I did finally get warmed up, but I was still awake. I decided to go ahead and get up and take a nice warm 1am Bath.

I took my temp just for curiosities sake... 98.1...which is considerably lower than I've been running during the day. I've been taking my temp 3 hours after I wake up, 3x every 3 hours...usually 10, 1, and 4:00. My temps have ranged from 98.4-99.7, mostly in the 99.5 range...seems odd to me!

So I dumped in what was left of the epsom salt...have no idea how much probably only 1-2cups (I was too lazy to go out to the garage and drag in the 50lb bad) , and 4 cups of baking soda and 4 cups of hydrogen peroxide. Soaked for 30 minutes and finished reading Chapter 10 of One Thousand Gifts....you can read my blog about it here

Took my temp after my shower just for kicks... 99.6, ahhh, that feels better, but why I"m running so warm...I have no idea. I thought for a moment that maybe I was cold because we left the windows open in the baby's room, maybe he needed them closed and I experienced some kind of physical maternal warning....I shut the windows just in case.

So here I am 45 minutes after my soak, still not cold anymore, but NOT TIRED either....UGH, stinking sugars! I"m blaming the apple juice!

Its 2:18 A.M and here I am, but signing off hopefully to get some rest.

Preparation Day #1

Today is day One of Preparation for the Gallbladder and Liver cleanse. I'm following the instructions from the book by Andreas Moritz.

He suggest eating no animal products/dairy...and since I"m on GAPS that leaves me with veggies, fruit and nuts. I decided to give a juice fast a try and see how it goes. The full cleanse is 7 days, I don't think it will be too big of a deal to do a juice fast. We have several fruits and veggies that need to be used up, so this will be a good opportunity to take care of those. I just hope I have the energy to do all the juicing and clean up. Totally dreading cleaning the juicer up several times a day

I must drink 32ounces of apple juice every day for 6 days. We purchased 150oz of jarred apple cider that I will drink over the week and finish off juicing apples.

I started the day with 2- 2liter salt water high enemas and a coffee enema. I could have used more rounds with the water but it was getting late and we had a busy day ahead of us and I didn't want to get the coffee in too late. I finished around 11:00.


Starting weight 131PM/130.5am
Sleep- woke up several times, dreamed strange dreams.
Basal Temp (not sure I got 3 hours of continous sleep before taking temp. 98.5
Average Daily Temperature 99.1
No supplements

32 ounces of Apple juice finished by 7:30pm
48 ounces of Kangen Water
(no juicing...the kitchen was a mess and I didn't want anything else to clean up! Mtostly laziness.

I felt pretty good today. I got some of the housecleaning caught up...nothing miraculous but much better than I've accomplished in the past few days. Could have been the Coffee enema partially, but I haven't had that much sugar (from the juice) in my system for a while either. It was WAY more fluids than I've been consuming...between the 4 liters of water from the enema, 1 liter of coffee enema, 32 ounces of juice and 48 ounces of water, I've been peeing a lot!


Used Young Living Oils before bed
Sandalwood: 3rd Eye and back of neck
Cedarwood: top of head
Release over Liver
Digize under tongue

Monday, April 9, 2012

The cycle of life takes a lot out of ya

Cycle Day 14. Been crampy for 3 days now. I woke up early this morning with a slight headache. 2L Salt water+EO (marjoram and peppermint) and a Coffee Enema at 6am....by 2pm headache progressed to a migraine, tried a couple rounds of water enemas (3-4liters) with salt and EO (marjoram and peppermint). Nauseated but never got sick. Ended up taking a Tylenol 3 and a nap. Woke up at about 6:00 felt better, had some dinner. Still crampy

I just randomly fed the kids whatever I could pull out of the fridge an hand to them.
They had meatballs, almond butter freezer treats, boiled eggs, yogurt, apples, dilly carrots, sunbutter with butter and honey and a shot glass of weak stock. Some of the things they had a few rounds of...breakfast, morning snack, lunch and afternoon snack all sorta blended together.

The boys had a pretty good day considering they woke up before 7 and had no nap....and a mama that could barely keep up with their requests for food.

I managed to get the roast in the crock pot before noon and vacuum the egg yolk covered part of the living room. There are Walnuts in the dehydrator that are ready to come out. Hopefully they will make it into a ziplock baggie before we hit the sack.


Eric saved the evening and prepared a proper meal.
Roast, carrots, cauliflower gravy and a baby romaine and cucumber salad. Banana cinnamon ice cream for dessert. Perfection.

Eric built our raised bed frame for the strawberry plants I plan to order.
Looking at the Azure list of plants that are available:

Here's our considering list
Cilantro
Sage
Basil
Thyme
Dill
Parsley

STRAWBERRIES!


Butternut Squash
Zucchini
Summer Squash
Bell Pepper
Celery
Cucumbers
Sugar Snap Peas
Shilling Peas
Tomatoes

Snapdragons
Marigolds
Borage

Friday, April 6, 2012

Day 41 Skinny Fingers



Nothing new added today.

Eric has dropped a ton of weight....or well maybe just 23lbs. He's at his lowest weight since I've known him and he's looking good! He noticed today even his wedding band is loose! My weight-loss has pretty much stalled out since the first couple weeks of GAPS. I still seem to be bouncing between 129-132, one morning I did hit 127.5, but that's my lowest so far.

I seem to be rather itchy today....I can't tell what is causing it either, there are no rashes or redness (except after I keep scratching) and its random places, like my palm of my left hand, the side of my face and the crook of my arm. Weird. I must be allergic to liver. HA.

Well I survived my first whole week on my own since Mid-January. I've been tapering off from my part time help for the past several weeks. I can tell my energy level is still not where it should be, but I am getting better at recognizing my limits....following them is more of a struggle.

Today's menu
Juice: Left over juice from yesterday + 1 egg and 2 extra yolks and 2TBS sour cream
Breakfast: Banana Carrot muffins and Cinnamon honey yogurt
Lunch: Liver and Onions and more muffins
Dinner: Scrambled Eggs (and Perry finished off the liver...hooray!)

Today's Prep
Spent most of the day working on the grocery list...trying to figure out what foods to add in next!
Also working on a plan to figure out what comes next as we journey further into full GAPS
Started a new batch of yogurt (1 1/2 gallons worth!)

I'm starting to lose track of the poop scoop. I don't think anyone went today...and no enemas for me.

Thursday, April 5, 2012

Day 40 We Survived!


Full GAPS!

Weak Coffee (1tbs grounds/20oz water) for Eric,
I still take mine in the other end...full strength.
Cinnamon
Adult drink for Eric


Today's Menu:
Juice: red cabbage, celery, carrots and 2 apples
Breakfast: Yogurt with Apple Jam (1tsp)
Lunch: Roast and Carrots
Dinner: T-bones, Green Beans, Baby Romaine Salad with apples
Snack: meatballs
Treat: Apple Pie Ice Cream

Today's Prep:
Soaked Walnuts
Put Almonds in the dehydrator

Wednesday, April 4, 2012

Day 38 &39

Well, I didn't record much at all from yesterday. Energy is pretty low. The boys are waking up when Eric gets up for work (1.5 hours earlier than normal.) I followed the advice of my colonic technician and did a "quickie" this morning and went strait for the coffee, not sure if it was quite as effective, but it was nice to have the process over in about 40 minutes instead of 2 hours. Oh I did use half the amount of coffee because its the bottom of the jar and looked like it was possibly stronger and the time before I got pretty jittery...so it could be the combo of the weaker coffee and not doing the cleansing enema before the coffee.

Day 38:

Lunch Roast and carrots
Dinner: Chicken Wings and Green Beans
Day 39
Breakfast: Banana Egg and almond flour muffins....ended up making a second batch, I added some carrot pulp to that one the boys gobbled them down.
lunch: scrambled Eggs
Dinner: liver and onions
Treats: I tried the Russian custard, threw some raw almonds in it. Eric is making apple cinnamon ice cream at the moment....guess we will get a taste in a bit.

I have a feeling we are kinda bailing on intro and headed for full GAPS. I feel like I may be having issues but I'm not sure what to cut out, it isn't anything major, so I don't know what to do about it. I'd like to see Wyatt and Clayts bellies not bloat so much, they both seem to get rashy outside, I really don't like that either, but it doesn't seem to bother them. I don't feel like I have the energy to figure it out.


I also want to take note that Wyatt has started cutting one of his molars...one little sharp point poking through on the top "B" tooth. So that throws in the question was the yucky poop and rash from teething?

Also just as we were going to bed last night Wyatt woke up ANGRY again! Screaming mad, nothing we could do to help him. Anointed him with some cedarwood oil and he started calming down. He woke up again, about an hour later but wasn't quite as upset. He let me hold him and give him his water bottle. I prayed over him and rocked him for a bit and put him back in bed. I also decided to put some Melrose on his jaw line and around his ears, as he kept rubbing th side of his face. Then anointed myself with some cedarwood and slept well until morning.

Monday, April 2, 2012

Day 37: Early to Rise


Stage 6
Baking soda (not sure that was legal move...but we did it anyway!)

Well, the plan backfired a bit.

Here is what the mental picture looked like...Eric wake up at 5, get ready for work, while I prepare my enema stuff. Then he cooks breakfast, I have my "coffee break" and the boys wake up at their normal 7:30 wake time after I have everything cleaned up and breakfast cooking.

Here is what reality looked like: Eric get up at 5, get ready for work and cook breakfast. I get up at 5:25 start preparing my enema stuff, Corban wakes up and has to poop at 5:30 (He says "my poop made a C" ....nice #4s by the way). I continue getting everything ready. Just as I'm all set up, at about 6:00 here comes Clayt...he's gotta poop too! So while my salt water and oils are quickly cooling, I, as patiently as I can, I wait for him to get his business taken care of (#5's by the way). I send them back to their room, hoping they will lay quietly in there (was I DREAMING? LOL....anyway, it works for about 10 minutes.) I try to not make the enema procedure a mysterious, panic guarded event....we call it my "bottom medicine" to help my poops. So there's a bit of an open door policy, there were several visits...but we made it through the whole procedure....and in record time I was done by 8am. Sadly, I was pretty jittery from the coffee...I am counting on it to get me through this extra long morning. I"m praying that the early wake time means they all take good naps today! (yes, they DID...all 4 of them!



After Juicing and Cleaning up the kitchen we have spent the whole morning outside. As wonderful as it has mostly been.....Corban and Clayt got into a bit of a baby brawl. There was screaming, yelling, throwing toys at each other, biting, pinching, pushing, shoving and more YELLING. I let them duke it out, then they started on me. I let them. While I was trying to decipher if their behavior was food related or just poor parenting.... I talked to the biter and pincher and told him that wasn't nice and he should say he's sorry....and he did, of course Corban wouldn't listen to him. That made him SO mad, but I told him he did his part, and it was okay. Corban continued to have short bursts of testing his anger, pushing over and throwing toys and sand. I didn't ask him to stop. I talked to him plainly about breaking things and getting sand in people's eyes. He asked about throwing it over here....away from the people. I talked to him about not having sand to play with if we throw it out of the sandbox. A few minutes later Corban (4) came over and sat on the step next to me and said he was sorry and gave me hugs and kisses. My normal reaction is to break up the fight, punish the "worst" offender, scold the other...all while misbehaving myself and letting my emotions control the tone and then demand that they apologize to myself and each other.

I'd say, after letting the episode play out, even though in the middle it was looking pretty bad, (REALLY bad) that just maybe it was the right thing to do. They are all happily playing again. Guess it wasn't the food, or poor parenting. WHEW.

Today's Menu
Juice: 1/2 head of red cabbage, 1 bunch of celery, and some carrots. Added Raw egg and sour cream and had a full fledged "GAPS Milkshake"
Breakfast: Fend for yourself freezer Meatballs
Lunch: Chicken Soup and Almond bread with butter and Sunbutter
Dinner: Roast, Green Leaf and Cucumber Salad with our homemade dressing, Fermented Beets, and apple Slices


Today's Prep
Made almonds into Almond Flour (2 cups), and the rest into almond butter
Yogurt in the Dehydrator should be done about 4:30 tomorrow, just in time for afternoon snack!
Eric peeled about 20lbs of carrots for me and Sliced about 3lbs into rounds, 5lbs into carrot sticks, and 5lbs into 4inch pieces...yes that is a load of carrots and we still have about 50lbs worth to take care of. I Grated 1lb of carrots to make into ginger carrots....the whole process took me 5min 32seconds. I timed myself so we could see if knife chopping or using the processor was faster. My time included putting the processor together and cleaning and drying it. Eric helped a ton in the kitchen...after all the carrot business, we had a fun afternoon of playing mad dessert creationists. The Almond butter I was making turned un-creamy when I added the honey...Eric tasted it and thought it would make a perfect "pie crust" We were immediately dreaming of apple pie....but then I added some butter and it turned runny...

Eric tasted it again and thought COOKIE DOUGH...So we threw in a few more ingredients and WE MADE COOKIES!

So the best I can give ya, is a Ingredient list, because we didn't measure anything!

Almond Butter <1cup
Salt
Honey 2T?
Butter 3T?
1 egg
Baking soda (1/8 of a tsp, best guess)
Cook 350* for 7 minutes

There were little people anxiously awaiting cookies while I took the picture.....they were hounding me with each flash!

I also put some of the batter into the freezer molds because the dough looked and tasted so much like caramel...I can't decide if I like the cookies or the "dough" best! You could say we are going a little apple-honey-nut crazy. But it is SOOOO YUMMY!


I'm pretty sure that Eric has decided to stop the peanut butter as soon as this last jar is gone. He's gonna try sunbutter instead. Although, I haven't given the little boys any peanut butter and both Clayt and Wyatt seem to be reacting to being outside. Not as much as it was before GAPS, but they tend to get a bit red, and Wyatt has had an intermittent rash on the back of his neck for a couple weeks.




Today was day full of Poopin! Wyatt woke up from morning and naptime with a poopy diaper and was really rashy. It was very sore. He would walk around with his legs apart for a while after I got him cleaned up...and I let him go in the buff so he could have some air-out time. I also applied some Animal Scents ointment, he cried when I put it on, but he seems to do that no matter what I touch him with...even coconut oil he acts the same. Soon after dinner he pooped as well....so, it seems there's something in there bothering him. Maybe it is the raw apples? I am not sure. Corban pooped 2x today....that is a first I believe! Clayt pooped 3 times, upon waking, after lunch and dinner. Nothing from me except for what happened this morning with the enema.

Sunday, April 1, 2012

Day 36 Early to bed


Stage 6
No new foods





Well, hopefully we will be drifting to dream land at about the time I'm usually STARTING to type up our daily update. We had a busy fun day today. I took Corban to the JBF sale to get him some shoes and shorts....we came home with 1 pair of sandals for Clayt, 2 pairs of Skidders for Wyatt (and for only $10 for both! I got two sizes) 3 pair of shoes for Corban...water shoes, sandals and tennis shoes. Birthday Presents for 2 of my nieces, 6 Tshirts, 3 pairs of shorts, a game and 4 books. Love the JBF sale...but its a good thing it only comes around 2x a year! After Corban and I got home, Eric and Clayt went on a fishing trip. Fishing was short lived (about 30 minutes), but they caught 6 fish! After a bit of playground time they headed home. Eric and Corban left to go by Grandma and Grandpa J's house to drop of our nieces birthday present then home for dinner, a little bit of playing outside and off to bed. They were tired from not having naps, but still did not want to go to bed! Eric is changing shifts for April, so he will be rising and shining about 2.5 hours earlier than we have been for the past 2 months. Tomorrow shall be interesting!



Today's Menu
Breakfast: meatballs, quac-treats, applesauce +probiotics
Lunch: Leftovers from last night: hamburger, celeriac and onion. 1 slice of almond bread (with butter) Boys had sunbutter on theirs as well, and raw apple slices.
Dinner: Ribeyes, Salad with cucumbers, kraut and apple slices
Snack: Almond flour pancake bites with sunbutter
Orange Guac-a-honey pudding



Today's Prep
Searching for a GAPS honey ham brine recipe
Put Marrow Bones and Roast in the crock pot
Peeled carrots



Orange Guac-a-Honey Pudding
Blend together equal parts of
Avocado (3T)
Sour Cream
Butter
1T of honey
2 drops of orange Essential oil
1T of lemon juice (optional)


Serve in a bowl, or freeze in small molds

First thing this morning Corban asked to go poop...back to #4! Yay!
Clayt went this morning, after lunch and Dinner, all #5
Wyatt had a poo-ey diaper after lunch....wonder if it was the almond bread and apple slices?

I think I'm going to skip the enema tonight and give it a try in the morning, hopefully the boys will get up at their normal wake time! I've had a few tummy rumbles this evening. I'm also pretty tired....but its not 8:00 yet...SO kinda hoping that 2nd wind doesn't come.

Saturday, March 31, 2012

Day 35 Which way?


Welcome Stage 6!?
Sour Cream
Raw, peeled apple slices





Well, we welcomed stage 6...of course Eric is excited and I'm still sitting here thinking maybe we should drop back a few notches. Clayt and Wyatt seem to be really bloating and still reacting to the grass outside. Eric's reacting to outdoor allergies a bit more than he was the first couple of weeks. I hear if it is a reaction or intolerance it will just get worse...and if that's the road we gotta take, well lets skip on down and at least have an answer! Even if Eric wasn't ready to move on forward, I'm not even sure what to take out. In the other direction.....Still trying to figure out how to move onto Full GAPS...lots of new stuff, more advanced foods....what comes first?


Today's Meals
Breakfast- scrambled eggs
Lunch- little boys had fish sticks (made from cod)
big kids had roast
Dinner-Hamburger helper GAPS style- onion, celeriac with butter, olive oil and a bit of sour cream. Eric and I also had a salad with cucumber and lemon-honey vinaigrette. Kraut...and apple slices.
Snacks-Almond Bread with butter and boys had sunbutter as well
Guac-cicles and meatballs.

Today's Prep
Got some of the almonds out of the dehydrator and turned into flour for our double batch almond bread.
Put the sour cream into the fridge (it fermented 25 hours)
Have our Easter ham thawing and trying to figure out how to brine it
Have ribeyes, a small roast and some marrow bones thawing for tomorrow


I was back to 129lbs this morning...feeling skinnier than I have been the past few days. Period is light. I didn't eat much today...very snacky type meals. I had a fish stick (singular) I thought they turned out really good, but not quite enough to go around, I only set aside a small amount of fish so I could experiment. No juice today either. I can't remember if I took my supplements....so lack of food and possible supplements probably contributed to having a draggy day today. Didn't get hardly anything done and still felt worn out. Had a slight tinge of a headache, and I think it showed up after eating the almond bread....still not sure if its the almonds or the butter. Maybe I should try a muscle test....hmmm. Oh decided to wait for the New Moon on the Gallbladder cleanse so another 2 weeks before I do that.

ETA: Wyatt woke up just after 11:00 in a rage....screaming and fit throwing, wanted nothing to do with being held. We let him run around and scream for a few minutes, he went to the garage door and banged on it, and Eric let him go out there and see, didn't seem to help though. He laid on the floor and did leg-lifts (slams). I tried letting him sit in my lap and he just tried to reverse headbang me. So, I changed his wet diaper, anointed him with oil (digize) on his tummy and put him back to bed. He was quiet after about 5 seconds, and only making occasional noises for the next 5 minutes, now all is quiet.

Dinner tonight was an Eric-throw together, it turned out very tastey...but that's not surprising. I really enjoyed it and chowed down on Wyatt's rejected food. Clayt and Wyatt don't seem to be too sure of the celeriac.



I think the only pooper in the house today was Wyatt and he had 3 poopy diapers. The last one of the evening was more watery, the others were his normal. Still didn't call and get the poop scoop from my mom about yesterday.

Nothin from me today. I did at least look up the emotions attached to Constipation and the Bowels....but didn't really study any of it. At least the book got off the shelf!

Friday, March 30, 2012

Day 34 Fish for Dinner

Stage 5
New Foods: Sunbutter


Today's Menu
No Juice
Took supplements with a bit of applesauce and a few bites of roast.
Scrambled Eggs for the boys
Lunch: roast, beets applesauce and almond bread
Dinner: Codfish with carmelized onions, butter, parsley and lemon. ACV Soaked cucumbers with leaf lettuce salad and homemade Honey Lemon Vinaigrette. Fermented Beets.

Today's Prep
Chicken Neck Stock


Well, I was a bit afraid to eat after all the trips to the pot yesterday....so I took it pretty slow with the eating. I had a colonic at 10:15 which went well. I believe we are seeing some improvement. I think I'm ready to move forward and do the Gallbladder and Liver Cleanse. I need to read up and see which day I should start. Thinking Sunday...

I was gone for several hours and didn't quiz my mom on the toileting happenings, so no update for the boys today!

Thursday, March 29, 2012

Day 33 Bellyaching



Stage 5
No new foods

Man! Something is messing with my midsection!






Today's Meals
Juice: Cabbage, Carrot and Beet + raw yolk (2 yolks + 1 egg for me)
Breakfast: Scrambled Eggs- Boys
Lunch: leftover Meatball soup & Daddy had Chicken Soup
Dinner: Grilled Han-ga-burger patties topped with caramelized onion and red bell pepper + pink Kraut
Supplements: FCLO for me and the little boys. Biokult 1 capsule for the boys, 4 for me & Eric. 1 iodoral, 3 raw B complex, 2 Zinc...bedtime: Life 5 and Omega Blue and 2 Sleep Essence.


Today's Prep
Crock Pot Applesauce
Freezer Treats
a bag of Chicken Necks for stock Thawing










First I woke up menstrual crampy with a backache...enough to grab the heating pad and hang out in my recliner for most of the morning. Then it was an intermittent stabbing pain in my 'upper mid-section" which has been an all day thing, then a little bit of gas (burping and toots) and the big surprise of the day was diarrhea! I haven't pooped on my own in about 80 days (without the use of either a salt tea cleanse, Natural Calm to bowel tolerance, or the enemas. The only thing I had eaten before it happened (2:00) was the juice that I drank around 10am and a cup of stock around 1:00. I didn't eat much other than that except for dinner, which I ended up back in the bathroom around 5:00, 8:00 and a gain around 11:00. Oh....after dinner I could not stay awake. I was sitting with Libby and she was reading and I was litterally nodding off....I was so tired! Then about 15-20 minutes later I was fine (obviously, consiering it's midnight and I'm still up....and still on the POT! UGH.

Corban- Pooped today at naptime #4-5. Did not take any nap. He came out after 20 minutes and said he took a good nap. I let him stay up and he was pretty good for a couple of hours but went down hill for the evening until daddy got home.

Seriously I can't remember about Wyatt or Clayt....I really have no clue. No chart printed off either! Wyatt woke up ANGRY at about 10pm. I have no idea what his problem was but he was screaming mad. I put some peace and calming oil on him and Daddy took him outside and that helped. Let him toddle around a bit, changed his diaper and put him back to bed. He laid down good.

Wednesday, March 28, 2012

Day 32 Perfect Pooper


Stage 5
No New Foods

The boys have been playing outside a lot and are a tad pink...today I noticed that both of them looked a little splotchy on their upper chest....not sure if that from the sun or if is a rash showing up. Neither of them complained about it itching or anything. No naps at all today. Clayt was SCREAMING MAD about So. Many. Issues. Today. I think it must be die-off. On the other hand, Clayt has also been saying SO Many cute little things lately. I really need to write them down....but they are more "in the moment cute" it seems like when I try to retell it, it doesn't do the moment justice. We haven't noticed any delays in his speech, other than some stuttering/repeating words that both Corban and Clayt seem to do on occasion. It is random, and not all that often. Clayt is about 1 month out from his 3rd birthday, so common timing for a boost in vocabulary. Its so fun hearing him express his thoughts! (the cute ones, rather than the demanding mad little-man ones)



Today's Menu

Juice: carrot and celery + raw yolk (2 yolks and a whole egg for me, no breakfast)
Breakfast: Scrambled Eggs
Lunch: Chicken Soup, 1 slice of almond bread with honey butter + pink kraut
Meatball soup + pink kraut
Late evening Snack: Squash Souffle with honey.
Supplements: Forgot the FCLO...but gave the boys their probiotics before bed with a spoonful of applesauce. I took 1 Iodoral and 2 zinc tablets...Eric and I both took: biokult, life 5 and Omega blue

Today's Prep
Made Butter
Put away dehydrated Almonds
Made 3lbs of meatballs (put them all in the soup for dinner)



Corban had a perfect #4 poop today!
I didn't take a picture, but for a passing moment I thought about it! I sure told him about it though! He had to go around nap-time today.

I got my family poop chart made, but I need to print it off so we can fill it out. Clayt and Wyatt both pooped today but I don't remember any of the details. You're Spared. Oh...but there's still MY stuff.

I noticed my head starting to hurt after dinner. So I decided to make it an impromptu Coffee Break. I did halve the amount of Coffee since it was already 7:30 when I got started. Pretty sure I noticed my headache going away during the salt water and EO (marjoram and peppermint) rinse....but the coffee was already mixed up and ready so I went on ahead. Here I am after midnight, still up, but not too wired. Period is pretty heavy today. Slightly crampy and backache until after the Coffee Enema, I noticed that went away too!

Tuesday, March 27, 2012

Day 31-Bare Basics




Stage 5
New Foods: Peeled Cucumber and Lettuce



Well, having trouble recalling all the details of the day, brain fog still seems to be an issue. Although I do not feel like I"m totally dragging energy wise. I was in bed by 10:30 last night. Slept okay, woke up a couple times and felt wide awake. I thought I might have trouble falling asleep, but it wasn't too bad. Got out of bed at 7:45.

Eric was GRUMPY this morning...he didn't sleep well at all. Allergies acting up after being around a lot of mowing going on. We also did add that 8billion "whatevers" in the BioKult Probiotics.....could be die-off. He's locked up as far as breathing goes, runny nose and itchy throat and eyes. I think he needs to slow down on the peanut butter each day, although the honey and coconut oil are healing ingredients. He's also semi-boycotting the FCLO I think....btw honey, you can drop down to taking 1tsp of the nasty stuff since we have been doing the higher dose for a couple of weeks.




Today's Menu
Juice: 1lb carrots, 1 small beet, 1 bunch celery + 1 yolk for boys. 2 yolks and 1 egg in Juice for me....took 2 zinc and 1 iodoral
Breakfast: Scrambled Eggs, Stock (boys)
Lunch: Chicken Soup, Almond Bread with Honey butter
Dinner: Grilled Chicken Wings, Lettuce Salad with garlic olive oil, lemon juice and salt. Peeled Cucumber in ACV, water and salt. Kraut
Snack: Applesauce

Today's Prep
Beet Kvass
Fermented Beets prepared
Almonds still in the dehydrator
Added some chicken bones to the stock.


Wyatt had 3 poopy diapers and ran a 101 fever in the evening. Woke up around 10:00pm and temp seemed nomrmal. He took a morning nap from 10-12 and afternoon from about 3:30-7.

Corban has been saying his tummy hurts after drinking juice. Today he pooped (#5) right after Drinking the juice. I gave them a little less juice (about 4 ounces) I added a bit of water since their stools have been loose. He took a great nap, didn't get out of bed once! Corban thought he needed a detox bath after his poop today...so I took him up on it, and plopped Corban, Clayt and Josie in the tub. They played for a bit. Corban was itchy after getting out (I used 2c epsom, baking soda and h2o2) He wouldn't let me rinse him off though.

Clayt had 2 poops, after Breakfast and just before naptime, both 5-6. Took a good nap as well. He's been getting pink from playing outside...need to up the coconut oil internally for him.


Enema afternoon for me... I was able to fit it in during nap time and done by 3:30, hoping the coffee doesn't effect me.! Period started late this morning making my cycle only 25 days....my last one was 38! Wondering what that means. Maybe the slight headaches I've been having were from my period gearing up? Had no idea it was coming, not crampy or anything.

Hope to head to bed very soon, its already 11:30...took my sleep essence about an hour ago (plus Omega Blue and Life 5)

Monday, March 26, 2012

Day 30



Stage 5
No New Foods

We didn't get to bed until after 12:30. I took 2 sleep essence and I think they helped but I did not sleep well at all (although I didn't feel the need to get up out of bed either, pretty sure it was the coffee that caused the sleep issues), I had a bad dream, and a bit of a headache all night....but plenty of energy to get out of bed and get breakfast started. I passed out probiotics, then stock, fried eggs and made some juice for Eric and myself. Eric reacted to the 2 carrots worth of juice I gave him (strait juice about 2ounces) I tried a new juice today- Orange and Celery with 2 whole raw eggs. I'm feeling jittery and anxious at the moment (while finishing the last of my juice. Took 1 Iodoral tablet and a zinc supplement. I wonder if it was the orange juice?

I opened up the blog and tried to work on some answers to my questions from yesterday....made a few posts on various GAPS groups....don't really have any new ideas or plans of action. Maybe tomorrow I will get it figured out!


Today's menu
Juice: Celery and Orange for mama, and Celery and Carrot for the boys. Carrot for daddy.
Breakfast: Fried Eggs, kraut and stock
Lunch: carrot soup, almond bread with Honey butter, kraut, stock
Dinner Rump Roast, Green Beans & Onions, Kraut, and Stock
Snacks: meatballs, applesauce (1-2T) and freezer treats


Today's Prep
Made Almond Flour with nuts from the dehydrator
Made Almond Bread with the flour
Started 6 cups of soaked nuts in the dehydrator
Baking Beets to lacto-ferment tomorrow
Package of Wings thawing
Peeled 2.5lbs of carrots
2nd round for the chicken bones

I've had a bit of a headache all day, kind comes and goes, I think maybe it is just die-off. We went on a family walk this evening and let the boys play on the school playground it was almost dark when we got home. Eric was a tiny bit stuffy...someone by the school was weed-eating.

Took 2 sleep essence again tonight, plan to get in bed at 10:30.



That poop chart I said I needed to make did not get made. So....pretty sure Corban pooped during naptime. Its getting closer to #6, so not sure what I need to do differently...not sure if that is technically diarrhea or what. I think Clayt may have only gone 1 time today....not sure about that and Wyatt was poopy this morning when we got him up (I think). FOGGY TODAY! I did not go, not really much of a surprise. I may see if I can give an enema a go tomorrow while my helper is here....so I'm not dosing myself up on Coffee before bed. We'll have to see how the morning goes.


Oh and one more little side note: for the 2nd day Wyatt has taken a 5 hour nap (slept from 9-2:00) instead of a morning and an afternoon nap....in my experience this usually means we are headed for only one nap time....not sure If I'm quite ready for another schedule change!

Sunday, March 25, 2012

time for making lists... Day 29




Intro Stage 5
New Foods
1 BioKult Capsule for Boys-sprinkled in 1tsp of Applesauce




We got a bit off schedule with our introductions last week and piled a few new foods on all over a few days. I'm seeing some small reactions here and there and with all these new and YUMMY foods the meal planning is feeling a little chaotic and the urge to make lists and prioritize is ever increasing. I have a few questions that will require more researching.

  1. What are the 85% foods?
  2. What are the 15% foods?
  3. How much does 15% equate too when it comes down to serving sizes?
  4. What reactions are we having
  5. What is CAUSING them or are they simply detox?!
  6. Which symptoms are a priority and what is the GAPS action to treat them.
Today's Menu
Breakfast: Leftover Casserole, Fried Eggs....
I just had GAPS milkshake cause I slept in until 10!
Bottled juice from yesterday + 2 yolks and biokultx4capsules
Lunch: Carrot Soup, Chicken Wings, Kraut and Almond bread with Whipped honey butter
Dinner: Chicken Wings, Hamburger steak, kraut-no stock

Food Prep
Made 500 meatballs (4lbs of ground beef)
Almonds in Dehydrator
Almonds soaking
Roast in Crock Pot (was supposed to be dinner but wasn't ready)
Made butter

Eric had 1T of Carrot juice and...................NO REACTION! WAHOO!

I had little headaches several times today. I'm pretty sure its something in the Freezer Treats. Will have to start trying out the ingredients one at a time. I'm starting with coconut oil and hoping that is the problem, cause that means its likely just detox. :)

Clayt and Wyatt both Grass rashy today. I notice Wyatt seems to get rashy around his neck line (in back) Clayt more on his tummy. Both of their bellies are really bloating and they are both eating a TON OF FOOD and Peeing a TON!

Gave the boys a detox bath today (2 cups of Epsom Salt 2 cups of baking soda)


Poop Files
I'm really gonna have to have a chart...because I just can't remember. I'd like to keep track of the type and time of day, so we can see if there are any patterns. All of the little boys are having #5-6 types of BM. Corban and Wyatt went once, and Clayt went 2-3 times.
Tonight was an enema night for me. I'm so thankful I figured out how to handle gas during the enema, the last week or so it seems that I've had a lot of rumbling going on....don't ever notice it until the enema though.





Saturday, March 24, 2012

Day 28: Variety Means WAY MORE WORK!


Welcome Stage 5-
New Foods
-applesauce
-walnut butter
-almond bread (kids, Eric and I had our first slice last night ;)

First things first....woke up, shoved the casserole in the oven because I wasn't sure how I'd convince the boys to wait 45 minutes for their breakfast. I wasn't too tired after staying up super late, knowing that my DH expected me to get up with him and the boys in the morning...no sleeping in for the night owl.... Who-o-o, Who-o-o. I think even though I did the coffee enema around 6pm last night, it still effected me, and I was up until at least 2. The baby woke up first, at 7:15, I was up an at'em and left hubby snoring in the room. He was up much sooner than I thought he'd be, and joined me with in 10 minutes.

By this evening I was tired, but along came the trusty ol 8:00pm Second Wind. At least it helped me get some of the kitchen cleaned up. There is plenty of prep that still needs to be done for tomorrow...starting with menus so I can set something out to start thawing. Feeling kinda limited in our options, Eggs, chicken and beef everyday....We really need to sell off some of our beef and get some piggy.

So, I'm starting to think that maybe all this new variety isn't so awesome after all. First off, nearly everything requires extensive preparation...Butter, Ghee, Almonds...soaking, dehydrating, grinding.....and then there's the ever growing List of goodies to get in regularly. Wasn't daily making 2 GALLONS OF STOCK ENOUGH? Don't forget actually finding a container large enough to hold 8lbs of vegetables to soak overnight to prepare for juicing and remembering to thaw enough meat to feed a small army of toddlers who are eating double adult portions and asking for food 6 times a day.

Secondly, most of the wonderful stuff we want to fill our bellies with is supposed to be limited to 15% of the daily intake. My brain is so foggy I can't even begin to start figuring what that means serving wise. Everything we want seems to fall into that 15% category...nut flour, nut butter, applesauce...and then there's all the things we are dreaming of from the Full GAPS list. I think the fact that it is homemade with good ingredients makes it all that more easy to indulge. I'm sorry, but it doesn't matter how much coconut oil is in our nut butter fudge...eating 4 small bowls of it each day is still way too much. I'm really struggling to keep out of the freezer treats, and find my self getting just a little taste as many times as I think of it! Then there is the honey that I want to put just a little bit with, but after we've had some with our FCLO, in our applesauce, and the most delicious honey butter spread for our almond bread, freezer treats...the list is just getting longer day by day!

We didn't have any Crispy Almonds ready and we were OUT of almond butter AND freezer treats! I checked the freezer and we had some Walnuts that had already been soaked and dehydrated so I tried my hand at making Walnut Butter today. I was SHOCKED when it was finished in 2.5 MINUTES! That sure beats lots of scraping down almond dust, 15 minutes of chopping and overheating the processor! Eric even liked it!

I noticed a couple of times that after having a couple freezer treats that I would get a slight headache. I'm hoping its just detox from the coconut oil. I need to try the Walnut butter plain and see what happens I guess.







Wyatt- 1 time #5-6
Clayt - 2 times today #5-6 Afternoon and Bedtime
Corban-1 time #5-6 After bedtime
Me- nada
Eric- confidential ;) but stinky gas tonight! SHEW!



I noticed that Corban had a pimple looking spot on his cheek and a red spot under his bottom lip. He said the spot on his lip hurt, not sure if that was a bunp/rash or just an owie. No nap for Corban but he did stay in his bed for a little bit.

Clayt was a bit rashy from playing outside today. He also got a bit of sun on his shoulders.

Wyatt has been pretty happy as long as you are giving him food and replenishing before it runs out. It doesn't matter how much you give him, there is a body slamming fit in his high chair when the food is gone. His belly looks so big after he eats., not sure if its just SO full or if he's dealing with some bloating.


I just realized that I never really got into the swing of giving the boys their probiotics. They do eat sauerkraut each day and love the juice, but I'm gonna have to figure out a way to keep it in stock and not end up with several jars of dry kraut in the fridge!

Eric and I are working to get into the swing of taking our Bio-Kult first thing in the morning...I told Eric that we are supposed to gradually increase the amount we are taking until we get to the full dose. He asked what the full dose was...I said 4 capsules and he popped 4 out and down the hatch they went. So much for going slow....I'm not much better considering I took 3. We have been regularly taking Young Living Life 5 , Omega Blue and Digize before bed for about 3 weeks now. If your interested in why we chose these products I love to chat oils! Shoot me an email @ wateroilsfoodforlife.gmail.com

Today's Menu
Juice- 3lbs Carrots, 1 bunch Celery, 1/2 head of red cabbage and raw yolks
Breakfast: Casserole 24 eggs, 2lbs ground beef, 2 onions, 1 bell pepper and a large celery root
Lunch: Carrot & Cauliflower soup with hidden avocado & butter. Almond bread with honey butter. Sauerkraut on the side.
Snack: Freezer Treats Walnut Butter, Butter, Coconut oil and honey.
Dinner: Grilled Chicken legs and wings. Steamed broccoli with garlic infused olive oil Sauerkraut on the side, Stock

Prep for tomorrow
  • almonds still dehydrating
  • starting a second tray of almonds in the dehydrator
  • soaking more almonds
  • thawing hamburger to make millions of meatballs...okay maybe just 1000.
  • thawing Roast
  • Chicken Bone broth bubbling in 3qt crock

Friday, March 23, 2012

Day 27


Stage 4

New Foods

Butter

Almond Bread (just Daddy and me)

Hmm, cant I even remember this morning...a bit of a blur. I remember the little ones making several messes in almost every room of the house. Oh yes, that was because I was busy juicing. Our juice was a nice purple today, got a bit more red cabbage in there with the carrots celery and raw yolks. I put 3 in mine and remembered to take my Iodoral. The boys liked the juice just fine. Corban said his tummy hurt and didn't quite finish all of his. We missed our dose of FCLO. Lunch was kinda flying by the seat of my pants...I had a bit of leftover ground beef and liver that ended up mostly burning in the oven and I made our standard squash pancakes at lunch....except we put honey-BUTTER on them>>>>YUMMO! Yay for intro of RAW Homemade BUTTER!

The boys fought nap time, Corban didn't sleep at all. At the beginning of nap-time I started noticing that my head was very slightly starting to hurt...my first thought was OH NO NOT THE BUTTER! Then I realized the date...and It seems like it could be getting close to that time of the month. My older kids were dropped off at the house for the weekend, which worked well because I was going to have to load up all of the babies to go pick them up, it was nice to not have to. The headache was getting stronger so I decided before it got even worse I'd try a coffee enema while it was still early. While I spent 2 1/2 hours in the bathroom the older kids watched the littles and helped tidy the house. Eric came home and started on Dinner and the gravy was perfecto! Not sure if all the work in the kitchen got to him, or what...but all evening he's been a bit.....grumpy. Its been a long hard day, so I don't blame him. He's done about 10x his share of the work, but I still wonder...die-off?

I made almond meal and turned that into Bread. Eric and I tried out our first slice tonight. Two thumbs up. Now the trick is to stick to just 1 piece a day and gradually increase! I slathered it with honey butter.....and so far no headache, so I'm ruling out butter as the cause for now! ;)

It took a little while, but the headache is GONE! THAT doesn't happen! Normally it will lessen to barely nothing, but is still there. Rarely does it just "go away". I think the coffee helped. I just hope it wasn't my brain asking for coffee after the night I had the day before yesterday...or was that just yesterday? Hopefully 1 quart of coffee couldn't cause the brain to EXPECT more caffeine THAT quickly.

Poop Files: Clayt and Wyatt both went. Corban no. Me: did the enemas and got hardly anything. I used pink salt with Grapefruit EO and about half a drop of peppermint. Took about 3 quarts. Then, I did a quart of coffee.

On the peeing side of things....Clayt and Wyatt are peeing a TON. I thought buying special "night time diapers and pullups (even got the size 4-8 for my 2 year old) and they SOAKING TWO each night! Wyatt is drinking a ton of stock, so I"m pretty sure that is what his is all about. Clayt loves to drink water....but they both have the big ol' 3rd world country looking bloat bellies. Not sure if theres another underlying issue there or not...I keep seeing something about oxalates being mentioned. Haven't had the energy to study what its all about.


His Story:
Made a gravy tonight to top our beef short ribs, I wanted to test my theory on beef stock making better gravy, it really does...the color is lovely compared to the unappetizing pale yellow of the chicken stock gravy. I appreciate the depth of color in a good gravy, it just seems more MANLY!! Anyway......I carmelized some onions in butter with a little salt and pepper along with some garlic infused EVOO and added it into my cauliflower/beef stock mixture and blended it in, Erica had to dip her finger in and taste it before I could offer her a taste. The boys (after finishing 3 helpings of beef) had three more servings of just gravy.....I need to attempt a french onion soup in this manner. One downfall, I didn't get a plate...... we had all the kids here and I knew there wouldn't be enough if I did so I skipped dinner and started on breakfast, a caserole with a mixture of hamburger, onions, red bell pepper and chopped celery root and after it cooled I poured on 24 eggs to cover to put in the oven in the morning. If that doesn't feed everyone at the table I don't think anything will. Then I made butter.......twice, peeled and cored 6 apples and made applesauce for the morning. Erica also made our first batch of almond bread tonight, I bet I could make some killer apple butter jam with that applesauce to top the bread with our home made butter. I am beat, I have been cooking for 5 hours since I got home from work!

Gut Psychology....a lot about POOP!

G.A.P.S stands for Gut And Psychology Syndrome

Lets go over a couple of terms so you know what your coming up against while reading these posts.

gut [guht]
noun
1.the alimentary canal, especially between the pylorus and the anus, or some portion of it.
2. guts, the bowels or entrails.


psy·chol·o·gy[sahy-kol-uh-jee]
noun, plural -gies.
1.the science of the mind or of mental states and processes.
2.the science of human and animal behavior.

So put those together and you will understand, we're talking a lot about digestion....and after digestion comes POOPING. Yes, I said it pooping. There is a whole world of information out there about pooping and we are not being told the truth. The majority of our Family MD, pediatricians, OBGYNS, and even those in specialized GI fields don't know crap about proper elimination habits. They are often the same medical professionals that believe diet doesn't really matter if your eating off the USDA "plate". The industry who train our doctors have their own agenda in mind and it is not to provide healing but to "maintain" health. There is a HUGE difference. We want to be well, not maintained.

Gut Sense
is a good place to break the myths being spread around by our modern medical professionals. Starting with the truth about fiber.

So be forewarned posts will likely contain detail about the contents and or the experience of bowel function. As odd and somewhat embarrassing as it is, I'm sharing this information because understanding bowel health is so important, and as a general rule people are largely misinformed because they have been told their bathroom experience falls in the "normal" category or are given "treatments" that do not reverse the problem and only "maintain" it.