finally clean of sugar!

do you know that sugar is an addiction? well, it is. here is one of the many articles on this subject.
i am one of the people with this problem. well, i was. i had to have sugary snacks all the time. i didn't feel full if i didn't have at least one dessert-like food item at least once a day. usually several a day. i would even eat a bowl of cereal or some chocolate chips to get a fix. i stopped keeping cookies and other sweet snacks in my home, but that didn't stop me. i told myself several times i was going to stop but never followed through. my husband and i counted calories on our phones, and that helped us see exactly how much we were consuming, but it didn't help me with my little problem (which i didn't think was a problem!). but that didn't help me lose some extra weight i had gained. i just kept going up and down. one day i googled "how to stop eating so much sugar" and soo many articles about sugar addiction came up. i took in all i could, and it hit me that i had a problem. i determined to go home and never eat sugar again, went home and ate a powdered donut my husband had bought. good job!
a couple days later i was eating a candy bar and suddenly felt guilty. i went home, read some more articles, and decided to go seven days without eating any sugar at all. i tell about those seven days in the video below, and about how i felt afterwards.  i feel great now, i feel like i'm in control of my body and what i eat, not the other way around. the key to weight loss and maintaining a healthy weight is diet. more so than exercise! i hope this video inspires you if you feel like you have a similar problem! you too can feel this way!

decompressing

summer is flying by! this summer i was selected to sit on a grand jury for 5 weeks. only 2 weeks left now! it has been a really amazing and educational experience! i am learning a lot, hearing some terrible things, and feeling like i'm contributing something to society. but it also rearranges my schedule and this throws me off.
this week has been a little bit stressful. this weekend will be the third in a row i have an event to help out with. i haven't been able to have lunch with my husband as much as i usually get to. the weather is terrible. the sun is gone, it's even chilly!
 we have a wedding this saturday that my husband is ushering in and i'm helping with the setup/teardown. last night we set up the reception area and tonight is the rehearsal. i din't get very much sleep last night because i had to work early.  we didn't have much of a dinner because we had to go right to the church. same thing tonight.
i suppose i am a routine person, so if one or all of my routine is disrupted, i get a little stressed and quite anxious. then i don't feel like doing anything! so i've just been going around, doing the bare minimum but not accomplishing much. not working out. not folding the laundry.

but, life goes on of course. life is made of exciting moments, new adventures, lessons, helping others with something like wedding plans. there isn't a lot of room for routines. yet, i need something to hold onto! something to keep me grounded in all the crazy things that come our way.
since i was feeling a little stressed, i decided i needed to clean up the apartment. just a little bit. pick up the clothes, do the dishes and do a quick vacuum. a messy, cluttered home makes me more stressed than i already am. does this happen to you?
with order restored, i know that, even though we won't be home for most of tomorrow, when we wake up everything will be nice and clean. and when we get home, we will come home to a clean, uncluttered, stress-free home. cleaning your apartment might not be your idea of stress relief, it might not seem like the answer, but it works for me. it's how i decompress this bottled up anxiety i
am holding onto.
my husband will be coming home a little early, so we can have a routine real donner!
now with a few hours till dinner, i can work out! *sigh* i feel better already!

waffles and wildflowers. (no falafel)

 well, i attempted to make my falafel i talked about, but i ended up burning it... smoke detector went off and everything. word to the wiser than me, when you are cooking something in hot oil, don't turn your back to shape pita bread dough. make the pita bread before or after the thing on the stove. so we ended up going to five guys when ez came home, after a few tears from me. it was interesting. i was really looking forward to falafel!


i did make some really good waffles saturday morning. i used a recipe from my vintage better homes and garden's cookbook, sour cream waffles. they turned out really good. they were light and fluffy, and i put some fresh strawberry slices on them. the batter is a little thicker than i'm used to for wallfles, but once you add the egg white it really fluffs up the batter and it's easier to pour out. speaking of waffles, someday i want to try experimenting with "savory" waffles instead of sweet breakfast-type waffles. anyone ever done this?

sour cream waffles
1 cup sifted flour
1/2 tablespoon sugar
1 tsp baking powder

i'm not really sure what year this is from, i'm guessing the 50's

1/4 tsp baking soda
1/4 tsp salt
1 egg yolk
1 cup sour cream
1/4 cup milk
3 tbsp melted butter
1 stiff-beaten egg white

mix first 5 ingredients in a bowl. mix next ingredients up to egg white. add to flour mixture. fold in egg white and cook in waffle iron. makes 4 waffles

i took a jog and decided to pick some weeds by the side of the road and put them in a jar. i like this look, i find it very rustic and unfussy.

enjoy what's left of your weekend!

Summer Vegetarianism

summer has finally reached the northwest. when it get to be hot here, ez and i like to cut back on the amount of meat we eat. we don't have air conditioning in our apartment, and we eat primarily at home, plus meat makes us feel sluggish. all of these factors make light meals in the summer the logical choice.
i cook a variety of meals, mostly mediterranean inspired. i though it would be fun to share my summer meals with my blog readers and youtube viewers! so, i will be making videos and posting about what i made for dinner. maybe not every day, but i will try my hardest to be diligent in my posting! stay tuned, because tonight is falafel, which is superrr yummy stuff!

Grocery Shopping

H\hello dear readers! here is my second healthy eating video, my tips on grocery shopping for healthy eating on a budget.

took me long enough, didn't it!?
june was a good month, my husband graduated from college and got a new job! i will post pics of the graduation party i threw, i'm pretty proud of it.
hope you enjoy the video and your summer is going great!