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Brunch/ Featured/ GF, Vegan & Raw/ RECIPES

Coconut Bacon Recipe

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Yep, you read that right. Coconut bacon. It’s a thing–a very good thing! I have continued to be amazed at the genius recipes I find in the vegan world.  Although I am no longer vegan, I still try to eat a ton of plants and use meat as a type of garnish or side dish. As far as meat goes, we really only eat fish, organic chicken and organic grass-fed beef.  I will also buy organic, nitrate-free sliced turkey for my girls lunches on occasion.

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Bacon

It had been ages since I have bought bacon, but I recently bought some from Trader Joes that was nitrate-free & really enjoyed it on my salads.  What I didn’t enjoy was the added cost to our grocery budget, and I really don’t want to get into the habit of buying bacon again.

I was recently scrolling through Bloglovin’ & came upon a recipe for Coconut bacon that stopped me dead in my tracks. I love coconut. I love bacon. I love anything salty-sweet, and I knew I would be making Coconut Bacon as soon as I possibly could.

Continue Reading…

FAMILY/ Featured

My Favorite Necklace & Why I Get One Every Year

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{this post is was written for my one word of 2015.  Stay tuned for an upcoming post with my one word for this year!}

Every year I choose one word to keep close to my heart throughout the year.  This year my word is ‘COMPLETE,’ and I literally keep it close to my heart by wearing it on a special necklace.  I have a tradition of getting a one word necklace each year with my ‘word’ on it from our dear  Krafty Kash, and it is always so special to me.

Let me tell you why I chose the word ‘COMPLETE.’

Almost 1 year ago I was at a conference called Refresh My Heart that was put on here in Nebraska by my friend Lelia Chealey.  I was  looking forward to the retreat for so many reasons.  My sweet pink sister Karen, whom I met through this blog, was coming all the way from California to be with me and attend the retreat. She was there to support, for I was speaking on “How To Fully Live While Facing Death.”  I am a two-time cancer survivor, one whose chances of living a long life has been cut short by cancer.

When we arrived to the conference, at the sign in table there were tiny little boxes that had each of our names on them. We were to carry them with us and NOT to open them until we were told. The anticipation was super fun and I wondered what was in the box…

…I’m writing about my one word choice from last year over at Krafty Kash today. Join me for the rest of the story of how I am living ‘complete’ & to see how the necklace looks on me over there?

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Want your own one-word necklace? There is a great deal going on now. Use olw2016 for  to receive 20% off your order. The offer is good through 1/18/16.

Drinks/ Featured/ RECIPES

Creamy Banana Mango Smoothie

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Come January I am usually trying to cut out processed sugar after the holidays, & this Creamy Banana Mango Smoothie has been just the thing to help me in that process!

A Natural, Healthy Sweet

Whenever I am craving something sweet, a fruit smoothie really helps satisfy the craving. I love a green smoothie, and I love berry smoothies, but this smoothie with banana and mango is a great break from my typical green smoothies.  My youngest girl, Avery, loves this one because there are no seeds in it from berries, and because it is extra creamy!

Health Benefits of This Smoothie

Banana gives great potassium, mango is full of vitamin C, & the yogurt gives great probiotic’s that help keep the gut healthy and happy. Yogurt is also a great source of protein.  I love when a smoothie recipe has natural protein in it, whether it is from yogurt or soaked nuts.

Storing Your Smoothie

We like storing smoothies in these fun little glass milk bottles, and I usually double my smoothie recipe just so I can have extra to store in the refrigerator, ready to grab and go.   I ordered these glass milk bottles off of Amazon and you can too, using this link. They are a great size, especially for a snack or for kids. They look so sweet all lined up in my refrigerator! We always drink our smoothies with a straw. I’ve been drooling over these extra-large stainless steel straws for smoothies, and want to order some soon.  I have the regular size stainless, but extra large would be great for thick smoothies!

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What are your favorite smoothie recipes?

Do you ever make extra and store it?

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CREAMY-BANANA-MANGO-SMOOTHIE

Creamy Banana Mango Smoothie

3/4 cup organic yogurt

2 cups frozen cubed mango

1 frozen banana*

honey to taste (optional-usually not needed-depends on the sweetness of your fruit)

 

Blend yogurt, frozen mango & frozen banana on high until smooth. Add water if needed to thin enough to create a nice vortex, but not so much that you lose the creamyness! Taste. Add some honey if it is too tangy & blend some more until incorporated.

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Tip:

*to easily peel a frozen banana, I fill the blender up with warm water & place the frozen banana in it for a few minutes.  I use the blender container because it is tall enough to submerge the entire banana & I will be using it anyway. Once it has soaked enough for the outside of the banana to feel soft, (you don’t want it completely thawed) slice off one end of peel, (I just use my fingers), empty the water,  & help the banana slip & slide right out into the blender.  If it does not slide easily, you need to let it thaw a bit more, but don’t soak so long that the banana thaws completely.  It only takes a minute or two.

Brunch/ Featured/ Homemade Gifts/ RECIPES/ Sweets

Cranberry Chia Jam

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I cannot get enough cranberries for some reason this season! I crave them. It all started around Thanksgiving with my Hall of Fame Cranberry Sauce, which was so good that I started putting it on my toast in the morning.  Then the New Year hit and I wanted a healthier version, so I came up with this Cranberry Chia Jam recipe.  This awesome recipe is sweetened naturally & packed with 2 superfoods; cranberries and chia seeds.

Cranberries

Cranberries are so very healthy. According to WebMD:

Cranberries have vitamin C and fiber, and are only 45 calories per cup. In disease-fighting antioxidantscranberries outrank nearly every fruit and vegetable–including strawberries, spinach, broccoli, red grapes, apples, raspberries, and cherries.

One cup of whole cranberries has 8,983 total antioxidant capacity. Only blueberries can top that: Wild varieties have 13,427; cultivated blueberries have 9,019.

Cranberries are amazing, but being as tart as they are, it is tempting to use sugar to sweeten them up. There is a reason my Hall of Fame Cranberry Sauce is so good, and that is the 1 1/2 cups of brown sugar in it! I am really trying to detox from sugar so I had to find a way to keep my cranberry -jammed toast habit, but dump the sugar.

My solution was to sweeten the recipe up with honey or maple syrup instead of brown sugar, and cut the amount of sweetness way down.  Another way I added some sweetness is by using the juice of the orange.  The recipe calls for grated orange peel, so it made sense to use the juice from the orange as a natural sweetener.

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Chia Seeds

Using juice and a liquid natural sweetener made the cranberry mixture a bit too runny after cooking, so my solution to this was chia seeds! I was giddy to think that not only would they thicken the jam and act as pectin would in regular jam recipes, (chia seeds swell and turn gelatinous) but they would add more health benefits on top of my toast!

 

Here are a few reasons why chia seeds are my favorite seed:

 ~they are jammed packed with protein and minerals and healthy fats and fiber
~they provide more plant-based Omega 3’s than any other food, even FLAX
~5 times the calcium of milk, plus boron which is a trace mineral that helps transfer calcium to bones
~8 times the omega 3’s found in salmon
~3 times more iron than spinach
~2 times the amount of potassium than bananas
~more antioxidants than found in blueberries
~they have 5 GRAMS of fiber PER TABLESPOON!
~the are a complete source of protein, providing all the essential amino acids
~can be stored for years without deterioration of flavor or color
~they are flavorless and dissolve in juice, soups, stews, shakes etc..
 ~they are low-calorie way to get super FULL!
Jar of cranberry chia jam

My Morning Toast Habit

I am in a major morning toast habit.  I have found my favorite bread from Sam’s called Dave’s Killer Bread, and it is full of seeds and nuts and all kinds of organic goodness. It has 6 grams of protein, 4 grams of fiber & 670mg of Omega 3’s due to all of the great flax and pumpkin seeds in it. I make 2 slices so all of that goodness doubled. I like to use a softer bread for sandwiches, unless they are grilled or Panini pressed, but this bread is delicious with just a touch of sweet & makes wonderful toast.  I buy it in bulk and freeze it.  I take it straight from the freezer to the toaster. You can buy it here on Amazon or at Sam’s.

I use either Earth Balance spread or organic butter…whatever we have on hand.  We do not drink milk around here but I have added some organic animal products back into our diet.  We just do better health- wise with some good organic animal fats & protein, and it especially seems to be a positive thing for our family when it comes to brain health– but that is another post!

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Cranberry Chia Jam As A Gift

Here is where I have to make a confession.  I had a jar of my Hall of Fame Cranberry Sauce all packaged up and ready to give to my sweet neighbors during the Christmas season.  They always give us great home-baked goods and I wanted to send a little something their way, too.  I even shared a picture of it on my New Nostalgia Facebook page.  I made a jar for them and a jar for us. Confession: I ate the jar for us… and the jar for them.  I know! I know! I just couldn’t imagine my toast without cranberry sauce on top and mine ran out so I just had to open their jar and help myself.

Because of my selfishness, our poor neighbors didn’t get a gift until New Year’s…ok…I confess, I delivered it just yesterday.  But, I feel like it all worked out well.  They are very health conscience, so it felt great to give them my Cranberry Chia Jam instead of the sugar-filled Hall of Fame Cranberry Sauce, and last night I got a text from my neighbor letting me know he was looking forward to toast in the morning.  I did have to dump the original Christmas packaging idea, and instead added a fun polka dot tag and a little hint of sparkle, as New Year’s day really was not THAT long ago, right?

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Cranberry Chia Jam Recipe

makes 1 pint

2 cups fresh or frozen organic cranberries, sorted and rinsed

1/3 cup of organic 100% maple syrup or honey (more if you want sweeter)

1/8 teaspoon allspice

1/8 teaspoon cloves

1/4 teaspoon cinnamon

Peel of one orange, grated (or 2 clementines) I use the fine side of this grater.

Juice of one orange (or 2 clementines)

1 Tablespoon chia seeds

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Add all but chia seeds to a medium saucepan.

On medium heat, let the cranberries pop and cook, 7-9 minutes, mashing and stirring as they cook.

Let cool, then stir in the chia seeds.

Store in a jar. Jam will thicken upon standing.

This will keep for about a month in the refrigerator.

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Enjoy!

Do you love the taste of cranberries?

Do you use chia seeds? How?

Did you make any homemade gifts this holiday season?

Featured/ Healthy Eating/ How-Tos/ RECIPES

5 Practices To Start Your Week With Healthy Eating

Healthy-EatingThere are several things I do at the beginning of the week to make sure we can easily access healthy food and snacks during the week.  I try to get the grocery shopping done on Saturday or Sunday, which really helps make me feel ready for the week.  I especially do this during the school year, when I need to make sure we have all that we need to pack school lunches and have healthy after-school snacks.

1. When shopping, keep foods as clean and pure as possible.

Avoid packaged foods with mile long ingredient lists.  We eat packaged foods in our family, but I make sure I buy them from stores that promote more healthful ingredients, like Trader Joes or our local health food store. For example, if you look on the package of Trader Joes chocolate chip cookies, it is familiar ingredients I would use here at home to make chocolate chip cookies.  I like that I know what they are and can pronounce them.  This is not the case if I were to buy packaged cookies from a regular grocery store, unless maybe if they were in the specialty organic foods section.

Making food homemade as much as possible just tastes better and you are in charge of the ingredients.  The freezer salsa in the above picture was made with our homegrown tomatoes and tastes so good!

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2. Buy organic…or not. Know when to compromise.

Most of the time I buy only organic fruits and veggies, but lately, to get my kids to snack on more vegetables during the week, I have been picking up this tray of already cut up vegetables and dip.  It is from Sam’s and the dip is a ranch greek yogurt dip.  Yes, I would love it to be organic, but it is not. Sure, the yogurt dip has some ingredients that are not so clean and pure, but I’m ok with it.  It is only 9.99, it is super convenient, and it gets a ton of vitamins and phytonutrients into our bodies.  We eat it up every week, and I often will chop some of the veggies up even further to throw on our dinner salads.  Eating healthy is not about eating perfectly.  Compromise is ok.

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3. Hard boil some organic eggs.

I’ve been doing this at the beginning of every week & it is a great way to get added protein into the body. I often find my girls with the egg slicer out, ready to snack on a protein rich hard-boiled egg.  I also love throwing them on top of our dinner salad for added flavor, texture & protein.

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4. Make some tea.

At first glance, caffeinated tea might not seem like the best healthy option, but it really depends what you are comparing it to.  It is SO much better than grabbing a coke, whether diet or not, and does not have added sugar, artificial colors, or dreaded artificial sweeteners. Tea also has antioxidants which other sweetened beverages do not.  I usually try to buy my tea organic but right now I’m crushing on this Tazo Iced Blushberry Black Tea.

Get rid of the pop, get rid of the Kool-aid.  Drink tea!  I make a big pitcher at the beginning of the week and it lasts quite a few days around here.  It makes a nice change from typical plain water.

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4. Keep lots of leafy greens on hand.

Here is another purchase I make from Sam’s at the beginning of each week.  The container is huge and the price is right.  I have a salad many times for lunch, and if not, I throw these greens into a green smoothie.  I also try to make sure we get some sort of leafy green salad with every dinner, so a big package is a must around here.  I’m very happy that Sam’s usually gets fresh shipments in daily, so the date on the package gives us a good week to eat up our greens. Tonight we will be topping taco’s with these greens.

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5. Go nuts with nuts.

I really like having lots of nutritious nuts on hand during the week, and I really like storing them in mason jars.  Putting them in a jar shows them off a bit, and makes it super easy to grab and start snacking.  I also like how easy it is to just unscrew the lid and sprinkle them onto our salads.  I have a big crush on cashews right now, and top almost every salad I make with them.  Who needs croutons when you have crunchy cashews?

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What are some ways you start your week off to help with healthy eating throughout the week?

Featured/ Meals/ RECIPES

Chicken Fried Rice

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This recipe is a new staple at our house.  It tastes better than takeout and is much healthier, too.  You control the amount of oil and it uses brown rice for extra fiber.  It uses ingredients that most would already have on hand, and it is a recipe that the whole family loves and gets excited about.

It is super convenient to have a whole meal in one, as it contains protein from the meat, fiber from the brown rice, and even has your serving of vegetables. The recipe calls for uncooked chicken breast, but if you have leftover, already-cooked chicken, use that and make this meal SUPER easy!

For an extra special meal, try serving this with my Baked Vegetable Egg Rolls.

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Chicken Fried Rice

3 cups cooked long-grain brown rice (preferable leftover rice)

3/4 lb boneless skinless chicken breasts, diced into 3/4 inch pieces

1 Tbsp sesame oil, divided

1 Tbsp canola oil (or coconut oil) divided

1 1/3 cups frozen peas and carrots blend

3 green onions, chopped

2 cloves garlic, minced

2 large eggs

3 Tbsp low- sodium soy sauce

Salt & Freshly Ground Pepper

Directions

In a large non-stick wok or skillet, heat 1 1/2 tsp sesame oil and 1 1/2 tsp of canola/coconut oil over medium-high heat.  Once hot, add chicken pieces, season lightly with salt and pepper and salute until cooked through, about 5-6 minutes. Transfer chicken to a plate and set aside.

Return skillet to medium-high heat, add remaining 1 1/2 tsp sesame oil and 1/12 tsp canola or coconut oil.  Add peas and carrots blend and green onions and salute 1 minute, then add garlic and salute 1 minute longer. Push veggies to edges of pan, add eggs in center and cook and scramble.  Return chicken to skillet along with rice.  Add in soy sauce and season with salt and pepper to taste.

Featured/ Homemade Gifts

Lemon Sugar Hand Scrub

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I recently was part of a planning team for a local IF: Conference.  I had the fun job of decorating. I got to create an atmosphere where the women who came felt comfortable, loved on and cared for.

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Lemon Sugar Hand Scrub was a small touch, both for beauty and for pampering, that I put in the restroom.  It got rave reviews from the women who used it.  I personally love this recipe, and was delighted when it was so well received.  I even got sweet comments on my Facebook page that evening– women asking for the recipe.

IMG_0193{photo from conference via Lelia Chealey}

This Lemon Sugar Hand Scrub is quick to throw together and leaves the hands so very refreshed and soft.  Just take a small spoonful, rub into hands, then a quick warm water rinse and a blot dry. This will leave you with a slight bitof moisture that can be rubbed into your hands.  It is a cleanser, scrub and moisturizer in one!

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Don’t forget to rub the scrub into those cuticles.  Winter can wreak havoc on cuticles and dry them out.  When rubbing the scrub into your hands, gently massage into the cuticles, too.  Then rinse. Then massage the leftover oil into your cuticles.  My cuticles have never looked better after using this scrub!

It is addicting and amazing.

I keep a jar at all times at my kitchen sink. It sits on my kitchen sill in a cute little mason jar & has a fun, tiny little spoon with it.

I also have made a batch for the shower and used as a full body scrub.  It is amazing stuff!

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I highly recommend adding lemon essential oil to this recipe.  It makes the world of difference in how your hands smell after using the scrub, and adds great cleansing and even lightening properties for those pesky age spots we get on the back of our hands.  It truly is divine!

 

Lemon Sugar Scrub

{via I Heart Naptime}

 

2 1/2 cups sugar, divided

1/4 cup coconut oil, melted (almond or jojoba oils works well, too)

1 lemon

5-7 drops lemon essential oil (optional, but not really!)

~Put sugar in a large bowl.  Set aside.  Measure out 1/4 cup of coconut oil and place it in a microwave safe bowl.  Heat coconut oil in the microwave for about 30 seconds, or until the oil is melted.  Add 5-7 drops lemon essential oil & stir. Pour oil over sugar and mix to combine.

~Using a zester or small rater, zest the rind of 1 lemon.  Then, cut tested lemon in half and, using a juicer or a fork, juice the lemon.  Remove any seeds from lemon juice.  Add lemon juice and zest to the sugar mixture and stir to combine.

~If sugar scrub is still too “wet”, add up to 1/2 cup more sugar until desired consistency is reached.

~Store in a cute little jar, with a cute little spoon.

~Add a free printable label courtesy of I Heart Naptime.

Keep for yourself or give away as a sweet and meaningful gift. Enjoy!

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