Anti-Nausea Smoothies/Juices

I've had some pretty hardcore morning sickness this time around, and I wanted to revisit my old friend, Juice.

Here are a few recipes I've tried out that help my queasy tum (also helpful for those who are battling winter colds and such).

Anti-Nausea Banana Smoothie

A local restaurant, Grilla Bites, has a Jungle Juice that I crave ALL of the time.  Apples, carrots, pineapple, lime, and ginger.

THIS site has many different recipes.  Overall?  I feel like you really can't beet (ha ha) good ole' ginger. Seriously effective for an upset stomach.

Roses Are Red, Violets Are Blue...

... guess who's pregnant with #2?

It's official!  I'm almost 13 weeks (goodbye first trimester!) and I've been battling some pretty violent morning ALL-DAY sickness roughly since the New Year began.

I've been living on my couch, so I've had some time to go through some old files from my first pregnancy (i.e. baby names, baby shower ideas, etc.).  I stumbled upon my list of things I'd brought with me for labor and things I wish I would have thought to bring.

So here you go, ladies, my official Things I Brought With Me To The Hospital During Labor And Things I Wish I'd Have Thought To Bring list.  Feel free to chime in and help a prego out!

For Labor:

-Gourmet lollipops (they help distract from hunger AND early contractions).  I found mine at Raley's, but I think they carry them at Wal-Mart as well.

Gah! Why is she smiling?!

-Birthing [exercise] ball (helps to sit on and roll your hips around during contractions, my hospital provided one).

It's for my back, mom, I swear!

-Back massager (one of those little handheld ones).

-Oversized nightshirt (my team let me wear mine instead of the uggtastic hospital gown) or cute frock from Etsy or the like.  So many choices, and SO worth paying a little more for something that will be in all of your pictures (although, to be fair, I found the gown pictured brand new on eBay for twenty bucks).

-Magazines/books/movies (being in labor for hours gets BORING).

-Lip balm.  You know.  Hee-hee-hee-hooooooooooooo.





After Labor:

Ahh.  Soft and clean.

-Super-soft slippers/robe/jammies (much needed comfort, and OH!  Did they mention when your water breaks you will be completely soaked and you will probably want to throw away the aforementioned cute hospital gown?  No.  No they don't).

-Snacks (all I wanted to do after giving birth was EAT.  Chex cereal was my craving).

-Breast pads/maxi pads (you'll definitely need both, and my hospital actually supplied the maxi pads).

She won't be smiling when her milk comes in...

-Nursing bra (Motherhood Maternity has some soft cross front bras for about $17, great for layering under tank tops and shirts).

The more ruffles, the better.

-First outfit for baby (bring two, my newborn was so much smaller than I could have ever pictured).

-Baby book (not only can you immediately record the height, weight, etc., they may put baby's footprints right into the book for you).

-Camera (although I think most people just use their phones now).

-File folder (for all of your hospital paperwork).






-The obvious (multiple changes of clothes - you never know how long they'll keep you, diapers, toiletries, car seat, etc.)

I'm sure I'm forgetting things, my last pregnancy was five years ago, so feel free to add items in the comments section below, and enjoy a few of these throwback pictures from my first experience!

See the eye?  That, my friends, is what happens when you push your baby out in about TEN minutes!

Game On - Day 1

So, if you missed my last post, I'm playing a four week diet/exercise competition where you play in teams and get points for basically being healthy.  You can read the rules HERE.

Here is my own quick overview + personal goals:

1.  I got a perfect score for my meals today (I'll post my dinner recipe at the bottom). 

2.  Perfect score for exercise.

3.  I know I'll get perfect sleep points because I always wake up at 5am and it's easy to be in bed before 10pm (for my 7+ hours total).

4.  Perfect water score (3 liters).

5.  Perfect score for my new habit, which I chose as flossing my teeth twice a day (I'm not good at keeping up with flossing).

6.  Alas, no score for getting rid of an old habit, which was biting my nails.  I sat down to tally my scores and put my damn nail right into my mouth.  SO close!

7.  Perfect communication score.

8.  No penalties.

I promise not to post things like this every single day for four weeks, I'm going to try and gear this more towards recipes, since there are way more meals (and WAY less to them) than I'm used to.

Since we get a "free" 100 calories to use as we wish once per day, I waited and used two small corn tortillas (50 cals each) for fish tacos.  Sound familiar?  I'm really still obsessed with these things, so I had to find a way to make it game-appropriate.

-2 corn tortillas (free 100 calories)
-PROTEIN: 1 palm-sized portion of Tilapia
-CARB: 1 fist-sized portion of rinsed black beans (portion cut in half)
-CARB: 1 fist-sized portion of brown rice (portion cut in half)
-FAT: Thumb-sized portion of natural green olives
-Mixed greens (lettuce is a freebie)

I baked the seasoned fish (light sprinkle of sea salt, pepper, cayenne pepper, parsley flakes, garlic power, onion powder, and paprika) at 350 degrees for 20 mins.  I should have added a little water or something since I chose to have olives instead of using olive oil for my fats and it was a little dry on the edges.

I then wrapped my tortillas in a damp paper towel and warmed them in the microwave for about 10-15 seconds.  I had my portions pre-sorted, so I plated everything and scarfed them down!  They look bigger in the picture than they actually were, one of those fish pieces was about the size of two fingers put together.



Game On!

Has anybody heard of this "Game On!" diet?

My sister-in-law told me about it just last week, and before I knew it I was on a team of three against three!

We begin this Friday, and we are only going for four weeks (I think most people do eight).  I don't have the book yet, and I've had a hard time finding much information on it, so I figured I should blog about it and get more information out there for people to find!

Here is the overview, seems a bit overwhelming, right?  We aren't going through this website, we started our own private Facebook page for the team and we're just using it as a guide.  I printed out all of the pages and read it out loud with my SIL, reading it out loud and talking about it as we went REALLY helped to understand each section much better than trying to read it alone and getting frustrated.

I will keep everybody updated with recipes and challenges!  Stay tuned!

 



Old Farmer's Day

Apparently, October 12 is Old Farmer's Day!  How will you "celebrate"?  Farmer's market?  Shopping at local grocery stores?

I pick tomorrow to go grab some lemon cucumbers for my juice!

Ch-ch-ch-ch-chanGES!

The nice thing about blogging? 

It's not my JOB!

I got started during my juice cleanse a few years ago, and every time I think about it I feel GUILTY.  Like, I should be posting stuff every day! 

But, alas... I cannot.

I can, however, embrace my 500+ followers and start thinking of FUN things to read about instead of peeking around the corner, seeing my blank laptop screen, and feeling sheepish that I don't blog often enough to deserve so many lovely readers.

So, remember back when I had a Holter monitor?  Well, that fun heart stuff happened again.  I am on day ten of a twenty-one day stint with a little computer logging all of my arrhythmias.  I juice.  I'm healthy.  My heart just likes to freak out for no reason whatsoever.  Fun.

Abrupt change of subject.

Since I've been juicing for so long, and thinking about experimenting with new recipes makes me feel exhausted, I will share with you my go-to, simple, cram-as-much-shit-as-you-can-into-one-recipe official Mean Green (copyright Joe Cross, me thinks) recipe and fruit juice recipe.  I make them about every two days, and I have the fruit juice for breakfast and the green juice throughout the rest of the day.  I use some vintage Tupperware pitchers and they seal just fine. :-)

Green Stuff:

-6 on-the-vine tomatoes (I like tomato flavor...)
-12 ounces of spinach (I buy a big 1 1/2lb bag and use half for my batch)
-1 cucumber
-4 celery stalks
-2 large carrots
-2 red apples

Fruit Stuff:

-1 crate of strawberries
-4 large carrots
-4 apples

Sooo, enjoy.  Love how the juice will make you feel. I promise to update more often!

 

Juicer Replacement Parts

So, if you have a Jack LaLanne juicer like I do, I highly recommend NOT ordering replacement parts direct from the website. 

I needed a new crescent tool (FYI, it is magnetic.  It will stick to the bottom of your baking sheet.  Always check the bottom of your baking sheet before putting it into your hot oven.) and bought one for $7.99 with free shipping (they've since raised the price to $9.99).

Not my disaster, but you get the point.

I got the part yesterday, and it was the wrong color to boot.  I ordered the part in APRIL.  After about a month of using a screwdriver to get my blade out for cleaning, I realized I should probably check on the delivery status.

Turns out it was backordered.  No call, no email, nothing.  The customer service guy (Bob, from India) could have cared less about my annoyance for their lack of communication.  So I took out my feelings on the Facebook page, and apparently LOTS of people have issues with their orders.

In conclusion, if you're in no rush for a replacement part, by all means please order through the website.  Otherwise, try eBay.  Same parts, same prices, faster shipping.