Blog / green juice recipes

Hi there!

this week has gone by so very quickly! I am unsure if I'm stopping completely - actually I think I'm going back to the modified Fuhrman thing. That seems to suit me very well. I feel pretty good so a part of me wants to continue because I am not experiencing what I've experienced in the past. It was funny because after I did the 10 day juice fast, I thought I'd do 7 because that seemed to be more doable. I didn't have a desire to do it again for a while. This time it was like a spur of the moment thing. You see, I had planned on attending Hippocrates program that was to begin 2/17. It didn't work out for me to go and I was really REALLY upset about that. I had so wanted to be taken care of - I wanted to be given a program and food and told, "Do this."

I decided to just do it myself (as usual) LOL. So here I go. Because this program would have either been 3-9 weeks, I'm dedicating this time to myself in this way. I figure if I had been at hippocrates, I'd probably be on a cleanse for at least a week and then a modified program including juices, wheat grass, etc. So, I'll do that for myself and I'll keep posting.

morning juice:

2 stalks celery
a whole lotta baby spinach
radish sprouts
1 pineapple (shared a bit with the kiddos)
4 oranges

This time I kept the greens separate and only included a little bit of the sweet juice in it (enough that I could tolerate it) - it was yummy! Then I drank the sweet stuff. I probably should have switched it but I wanted to have the delight of the pineapple orange juice as a kind of treat.

lunch juice

actually, I made a smoothie! I liked yesterday's so much:

2 bananas
1 local apple
2 cups local blueberries
heaps of baby spinach

I shared this with the kids. It was fresh and delicious. tasted like fruit.

dinner juice:

3 stalks celery
1/3 cuke
2 oz radish sprouts
heaps and heaps of baby spinach (can you tell I ran out of other greens today?)
3 plum tomatoes

I gotta say, I love my dinner juice with the 1/2 avocado, miso, dulse and hot sauce in it.

So, that was the day! OH Confession! This afternoon I made the kids some lunch and I tried some. (Had to test it to see if it was good and then I had a couple more bites!) It's always pretty interesting to taste things after a fast. The flavors are way more pronounced. I also felt pretty stuffed by those few bites. That was amazing.

I rode on the bike for a while (45 minutes on the circuit training program, level 11) and got a good sweat in. I wished that I had done more sweating this week. I'll be sure to get more sweats in somehow in the coming 8 weeks. (Might as well go for 8 weeks now)

well, I'm going to sleep. thanks for reading. let me know what your favorite juices are. I am grateful for this break and I look forward to continuing on in some really good way that makes me feel oh so juicy.

lots of love,
Linda

it's a cold day today. woke up at 8:45 - slept well - better than the last few weeks, very grateful for that. I went downstairs around 9:30 after having done my morning meditations. wasn't hungry much but was experiencing sinus drainage in my right sinus. This is the nostril that has been bugging me for a couple of weeks now - the air is so dry and the woodstove is drying. I have been keeping water on the stove for steam and a humidifier going on top of that but still, the insides of my nose is dry and cracked. I've been using the neti pot and also using ALL HEAL SALVE to help moisturize my nose and this morning, it was draining a bit. I had about 16 oz of tea this morning - did the smooth move again - not really sure why exactly except, I have this notion in me that it's good for me to clear all this shit out (metaphorically and literally speaking!) LOL Somewhere around 11:30 or so I made a big juice. I looked at the greens and fruit that I have on hand and the oranges were still speaking to me. This is interesting because I haven't had citrus in AGES. morning juice: 1 stalk celery 1 bunch kale 6 oranges I slurped it all down and it was quite yummy. we took the dogs out and then I decided to ride the bike. I did 50 minutes on the stationary bike, level 12 (out of 16) on the cross training program. It felt very good to get on the bike and ride. It's a recumbant bike which has been very helpful for my back and sacrum over the years. Still, one day, I hope to have a stair master. I love those things. after the bike, I took a hot bubbly epsom salt bath. I languished in it while I read and read. I could have stayed in there for hours but a knock on my door told me it was time to get out. I made another juice around 3:30. it's wild - I go from completely satiated to incredibly hungry very very quickly. When I got out of the tub, I felt famished. afternoon juice: 4 ounces radish sprouts 2 stalks celery 6 oranges I don't know what it is, but those oranges were still speaking to me. I drank down that delicious juice and went over to a woman's group that I belong to. Had a wonderful couple of hours of sharing and support with phenomenal women and then walked home. It was around 6:30 when I got home and probably because of the dinner smells in the house, I got extremely hungry. I decided to have a savory juice since those things are so friggin satisfying on juice fasts for dinner experiences. This juice was delicious. dinner juice: 2 stalks celery 1 bunch kale 1 zucchini 4 carrots then I put it in a blender and added 1/2 avocado and a small bit of raw marinara sauce that needed to get eaten or else it would go bad. I also added some dulse and a spoonful of miso. It was absolutely delicious. Tasted like an italian dinner. This really helps me to feel sated and not deprived. About an hour after dinner, I decided to have more tea. This time throat coat tea - it tastes delicious and is sweet all on its own. It's a cold night and the house is cold despite the wood stove going so the tea feels good in my hands and in my mouth. Some observations thus far: 1) Aside from the drainage of sinus and also the um need to be near the bathroom, I am doing quite well thus far. I don't think I've gone on a fast where I've had to use the bathroom as much and I know that the tea is helping (although I've never had that fast a response from that tea before.) OK, TMI. Anyway, we'll see what the next day brings but so far, so good. I'm not sure how long I'll do this for - no more than 7 days, maybe less. I'm going to play this by ear and take each day in earnest. 2) I'm sensing some clarity which I'm very grateful for... Circumstances in my life have been full, intense and at times emotional. I was hoping to go away and have time to think and have someone else take care of food and other things for me but I'm finding a way to do that myself. I was also noticing that when the going was getting rough, I was finding that I was not responding the way I wanted to. Wayne Dyer has a great saying and it goes like this: When you squeeze an apple, all you'll ever get is apple juice. When you squeeze an orange, you'll get orange juice. What happens when you get squeezed? what comes out of you? Well for me, I was noticing that I was turning pretty sad and mad at myself and that shit just had to change. 3) I am getting a sense of rebooting the system. I was mentally and physically feeling stuck for almost a month and feeling as though I was spiraling down to a place I didn't want to be. Physically I was experiencing some kind of crazy immune response - maybe it was the dry weather coupled with stress but I was getting little tiny bumps on my fingers and toes in the last few weeks. By the time of this writing, these bumps are nearly gone (only 2 days of juice feasting!) Whoever says that this is bull-melarky needs to try it for themselves in earnest. It's pretty amazing. My nose is way better tonight than it's been the last 3 weeks. I'm very grateful for this. 4) It's pretty darn easy this time to juice and drink. I've asked Matt if he can handle the dinners for him/the kids this week and that I think will make things easier for me. I'm not putting a whole lot of thought into this. I'm just reaching for things that seem appealing to me and doing them. I'm not staying to some strict amount and I really enjoyed the half of avocado tonight so I'll do that again if it seems like a good thing to do. I'm drinking a minimum of 96 oz of juice - more like 100 oz and also drinking tea or water but (not surprisingly) I'm not that thirsty for extra liquids. 5) I was wondering how doing this in the winter would be and so far, so good. I'll keep you posted. I don't believe the hype that we need hot food in the winter. I tend to think that if we eat things that are easily digestible then our bodies are not bogged down in the digestion process as much and can put more emphasis into things like circulation. Think about how tired you feel after a heavy meal, it's because the body slows other things down in order to put a big focus on the stomach to digest the food. I'm not saying that is a terrible feeling - I'm just saying that it would be hard for the body to have to keep warm, digest meals and do other things like keep immune systems up and healthy. I still get cold when I eat raw foods - I just find that I don't get that shut down feeling that I do when I eat heavy cooked meals that weigh me down and make me sleepy. I tend to feel VERY cold after a cooked meal at night. Even when that meal has curry or ginger in it... 6) So far, I'm not missing all the sweets and chocolate I've been eating lately. No matter how far I've come with emotional eating, I still have triggers - when stress comes, I notice that I tend towards sweets. And the past few months, I've been going gang busters with sweets (compared with how I normally like to eat, or how I eat when I feel the very best in my body.) I sort of think this takes a toll on the liver as well as immune function. We know that eating sugar suppresses the immune system. We also know that sugar feeds/fuels things like obesity and disease. We can gravitate to sweet tastes for many reasons. I learned that fruits are the cleansers for the body and greens are the healers. I know many fruitarians that espouse great things from eating a diet of mainly fruit. I'm not there, however, I like not making fruit evil. It seems to me that if ripe fruit was so bad, nature wouldn't have created it for us to eat. I would love to see the studies on how fruit and green juices help in healing. Maybe one day I'll be a part of a study in some way. I write this from my experience doing this... So, ok - I'm rambling. It's nice to get some of these thoughts out. More tomorrow.

day 1 of a juice fast - doing this again. I was expecting to go to a spa-like place beginning tomorrow (3/17) and be taken care of and drink juices and eat sprouts for a couple/few weeks. Those plans didn't pan out (dammit) so I decided to do a juice fast for a few days anyway. It won't be the same, but it will be fine.

I woke up this morning and had a cup of tea. I decided to have smooth move tea for some dumbass reason.

My first juice was:
2 stalks celery
2 small beets
4 carrots
1 bunch kale

this made about 32 oz veggie juice. it wasn't super sweet but it was good.

I had some water later in the afternoon.

somewhere around 3 I was hungry again so I made a big big juice of
pineapple
oranges
1 bunch kale
1 stalk celery

I kept the pineapple and oranges separate - the color was beautiful. the juicer that I use is more like a smoothie in a way - pulpy and yummy. It makes a lot of juice come out. I added some of the fruit juice with the greens and drank it down and then feasted on the pineapple and orange juice. SOOOOO yummy.

I read a bit and then took a nap with the dogs. Very sweet. It was cold in the house though so I was grateful for 2 warm dogs to curl up with.

Woke up, took the dogs out for a walk, fed them their dinner and then made myself a big juice. I liked that pineapple orange so much that I decided to have it for dinner. This time:
2 stalks celery
4-5 oz sunflower sprouts
pineapple
oranges

This time I put the whole thing together. It made about 40 oz of juice. DELICIOUS. Easy to drink.

So now the time is 8 pm and I'm loving feeling full but not stuffed and gross feeling. Day one was a good day. Let's hope I have as much of a good day tomorrow. :-)

all love,
Linda

Wanted to list out the rest of the day so far:

It is snowing outside and accumulating fast. I went to do some orders and pick up some produce for this week and part of next. I got mesclun mix, spinach, kale, radish sprouts, bananas, strawberries (on sale) and zucchini (so the kids can make their "paleo" brownies - this cracks me up because nobody was making brownies in paleolithic times.) :-) Oh yes, and more brussels sprouts. I've been loving brussels sprouts so much these days.

I made the kids a vegan mac/cheese with quinoa pasta and a cheesy sauce that they seem to like a lot. I ate a few bites of it and then made my lunch of:

nori
raw cheddary cheeze spread
dulse
lettuce
a few pieces of marinated eggplant bacon.

Rolled it all up and ate it. YUM. That is yummy and satisfying. We went to walk the dogs after lunch. It is slippy out and very cold. The temperature is WAY warmer today than last week, but the wetness of the snow makes it almost as cold to bear as -10-20 degree weather (almost). So I didn't stay out long - just long enough for one of the dogs to pee. (My son stayed with the 2nd dog because they both had a need to run around.) Then I went to do the orders and take them to the post office.

Got back with all the produce and needed to make room in the fridge so I made a green juice of:
a bunch of parsley
a bag of pea shoot sprouts
1 head of kale
1/2 head lettuce
3 carrots
2 green apples

The three of us drank it and it was very good, although heavy on the parsley taste.

So that's the food update so far. I feel pretty good today. Greens and veggies always feel the best to me. I'm delighted about the morning smoothie, too - it was good for my kids to get some fruit in them and I'm tickled pink that they drank the juice, too.

The days just roll into each other and that feels good for summer. I've been reading an excellent book for the last 2 days that has captivated me. The bad news is that I'm staying up really late because I can't stop reading. I'm loving that the days are flowing so nicely, though. It means that I'm getting into a nice groove of things here. The food/diet/whatever you want to call it is feeling very effortless. I'm still noticing emotional cues that make me feel uncomfortable while eating so I just stop, breathe, notice, breathe out and move on. This is a good lesson. As much as I think I've come so far (and I have), I still am on the journey and some things take time. yesterday morning's yummy juice: 1 bunch local kale, 1 local carrot, 2 stalks celery, 2 apples, 2 peaches, 1 1/2 grapefruit - made 2 20ish ounce juices of yumminess exercise: hopped on the rebounder for all of 5 minutes before my kids took over. (I guess they wanted to have fun too!) yesterday's green smoothie: 2 bananas, 1 10 oz bag of red raspberries, 2 scoops rice protein powder, 6 or 7 leaves of kale, 2 TBSP vitamineral green, 1 TBSP coconut oil - made 2 quarts of smoothie exercise: walked up and down a hill for a little over 2 miles. this is a nice hill that gets your heart pumping immediately dinner: a bed of local greens, leftovers of kelp noodles, jicama salad, a couple dollops of raw marinara sauce to finish it and an ear of corn. Yesterday was a busy day of making food. I've been steadily selling out of everything and with a person short at the cafe, it's hard to keep up with all the tasks. I really need at least one more person in the cafe each day to keep food prep up. Yesterday I made raw mayo, sunflower seed cheeze, sunshine salad, not tuna and onion bread. This was in between helping customers, answering phones and getting orders out. It was a full productive day and my back and legs were slightly sore from all the standing. It was good to take a walk to move them in a new way, get lymph moving and get circulation going. I'm still at the same weight from the fast. I'm not bothered by this at all. I'd like to step up exercising to see where takes me. this morning's peach nectar juice for one amazingly thirsty person: 5 or 6 leaves of kale, 2 ounces of pea shoots, 1 stalk celery, 5 small peaches and 1 orange. It's heaven in a mason jar. This made like 40 ounces of juice plus.

yesterday's juice: 1/2 head of lettuce, 2 stalks celery, 2 carrots, 2 apples, 1 grapefruit - made 2 16 ounce juices. this was a very yummy juice. exercise: 6.3 miles on the stationary bike, 25 minutes on a hill setting, 151 calories burned. I love being able to do the bike when time constraints are present. I get in a good sweat in a short amount of time. I would love one day to be able to walk or bike in the mornings outside. I'll get there. I walk once a week and we'll make that more, I'm sure. But for now, I take my exercise whenever and however I can get it. lunch smoothie: 1/2 bunch of local collards, 2 bananas, 1 bag frozen blackberries, 2 scoop rice protein powder, 2 spoonfuls of bee pollen, 1 TBSP coconut oil. this made 2 quarts of smoothies afternoon smoothie: 1 banana, 1 cup raspberries, 4-5 leaves of local chard, 1 scoop rice protein powder. this made 2 16 ounce glasses. dinner: big plate of local green lettuce, small bit of local zucchini with raw marinara sauce and jicama "potato" salad. Also had some steamed broccoli and I had an ear of corn on the cob. evening snack: lemon blondie (tiny square.) It's been very easy to do this challenge. It actually doesn't feel like a challenge at all. Well, that's not entirely true. What feels like a challenge is to not gorge myself with huge portions of food. That's the thing I'm working on. But eating this kind of food is not the challenge for me personally. I've been doing this so long that it isn't hard to have a green juice in the morning, green smoothie in the afternoon and dinner to be a raw food dinner. I don't focus any more on the fact that this is 100% raw - it just seemed to make sense to end a 10 day juice fast with juice/smoothie/light meal. I was thinking I was going to continue with no fat for the 11 days after the 10 day juice fast but that didn't work out for very long at all and I don't mind one bit. I definitely like fats. :-) Who doesn't! Our brains like it, our bodies like it. It's a good lubricator for the entire body. I have a tendency to like something and go a bit overboard so the desire to be totally away from fat for 10 days was a good choice for me. When I'm really aware, I'm better at noticing my body's natural stopping points for eating and also what my body wants to eat and do. Busy-ness, chattering thoughts and distractions helps to impede the natural flow of eating with awareness and intuition, etc. The 10 day fast really shifted the whole thing. It got me hungry, which I haven't been really hungry for a long time. It also showed me the emotional panics I get into when false hunger comes in. It showed me the boredom eating or the mindless grabbing for something and eating it when pressed for time. I saw how much I grab for snacks because they are easy and they are right there. I basically saw lots of bad habits that I got myself into while working this cafe. The juice fast also changed my taste buds so I don't want very sugary or salty foods, and that is a very good thing. I still like sweet and savory but because of the juicing, I'm finding natural sweetness and natural salts in foods. By the way, foods taste amazing after a juice fast. Everything has been gorgeous tasting. I think my taste buds became alive again and I already had very sensitive taste buds, I thought. This morning's juice was delicious. this morning's yummy juice: 1 bunch local kale, 1 local carrot, 2 stalks celery, 2 apples, 2 peaches, 1 1/2 grapefruit - made 2 20ish ounce juices of yumminess I think I'm going to hop on the rebounder for a little bit before going to the cafe. Have a blessed morning

this morning's juice was very tasty

• 4-5 big leaves of kale
• 1/2 european cuke
• 2 granny smith apples
• 2 stalks celery

made 1 24 ounce juice. this afternoon's smoothie = kickass

• 6-7 big leaves of kale
• 3 ripe peaches
• 1 cup of fresh cherries, pitted
• water
• 1/2 cup coconut milk
• 2 scoops rice protein powder
• 2 TBSP vitamineral green
• 1 TBSP coconut oil

blend and serve. Emily and I are savoring this incredible juice. This made almost a full pitcher in the vitamix (almost 64 ounces)

this is Day 4 of the 2nd part of our green juice fast. We decided to continue to eat simply for 11 more days because that would make a 21 day challenge altogether. It's said that it takes 21 days to create a new habit. I'm wanting to write out the intention so I can read it if I need to. Yesterday was a difficult day for me but in a very different way than the green juice fast was. What was difficult? Well for starters, it was the first day of my monthly cycle and I was craving chocolate and fat - anything fat. I had a small piece of the lemon blondies I wrote about the other day. I found that I had a big desire just to eat and eat and eat. I had to finally go upstairs at 10:30 just to avoid being near the kitchen. I haven't felt such a strong desire to do that. Even on the green juice fast, I was hungry but there wasn't this strong pull to get up and start stuffing my face like there was last night. Hey, maybe the full moon was turning me into a wolf in the kitchen! *arrrr-oooooooooo* The other thing that was difficult was that my challenge partner left. Matt and Sam went on a father/son weekend and maybe my demons came out stronger because I felt like I could cheat and no one would know it or something. I know that he's not able to do this challenge because he doesn't have easy access to juice/smoothie/raw food but maybe he too wanted to have a break. He had grilled veggies and fries last night. They called to check in and went on a walk to walk off their dinners. Anyway, it helps me to have these kinds of challenges forefront in my mind and with my challenge partners around for support AND to keep me accountable. I'll be honest, my craving-munchies-demons came out strong after I heard what he ate for dinner. When I went upstairs to avoid the kitchen, I thought it would be good to write out the intention for this part of the challenge so that I can hold that steady. It worked so well with the juice fast part. So here we go:

• I'm doing this to create a habit of eating WAY less sweets and less fats. To eat more simply and to eat less.
• I'm doing this to continue on with the ease of inflammation that burdens a lot of my body.
• I'm doing this to get down to a healthy weight - it is very tiring to always be in the overweight category. I'd like to get to and maintain a healthy weight for my height and bone structure.
• I'm doing this to get my boat pointed in the direction of being more athletic. Phase 3 is going to incorporate a more structured exercise program. Eating will probably change again but I want good habits and awareness here so I can move onward and upward.

OK, that feels good and centering. I'm glad I did that. Here's the juices/smoothies that I had yesterday: morning juice was interesting but tasty (this was the "I'm running out of everything so I'm just using what I have juice"): 4-5 leaves of kale, 1/2 lb local mesclun mix, 1 red bell pepper, 1 carrot, a little bit of fennel, 5 small apples from the tree. in the afternoon, I had a taste of a delicious juice I made for a customer: 1 cuke, 1/2 lemon, 2 stalks celery, 2 granny smiths. YUM YUM - very refreshing! my lunch smoothie: 1/2 head red leaf lettuce, 1 banana, 1/2 cup frozen blueberries, 1 scoop protein powder, 1 TBSP bee pollen 1 TBSP coconut oil, 1 heaping TBSP Vitamineral green, water. my dinner was a big bed of red leaf lettuce and some kelp noodle heaven on top. (I kept the carrots and cabbage off but instead had a boat load of red onion slices on it and that was amazingly delicious!) Later on I had a piece of the lemon blondies as I wrote above. I drank some water and then went to bed early.

So we're on day 2 of our next phase. I tell you it feels very easy to do this in comparison to a green juice fast/feast. We start out with a green juice, then in the afternoon have a big green smoothie and then in the evening have a light raw food dinner. Yesterday went smoothly although Matt and I both had the munchies after dinner. We split a coconut water between us and the sweetness of it seemed to curb the cravings. Here we are on day two. We are running out of fruit for the juices so Matt went to gather some apples that fell from the tree. We used 1/2 lb mesclun mix, 6 leaves of kale, 1 thumb size piece of fresh ginger, 1 beet, 1 carrot, 1 container strawberries and 2 apples. It was a good juice and it was about 20 ounces each. I exercised a bit after that and am about to make the smoothie. I did 5.5 miles on my stationary bike in 23 minutes on a random hill pattern. I got to sweating so that was good. Today I want to make some of those lemon blondies from LJs RAW FUSION RECIPES book because a small small bite of that would be a nice addition to what we are doing. We are doing low fat and those blondies are high fat, but definitely a good fat. We want to exercise more so we'll be wanting a bit more macronutrients and well, for me, it helps me to feel like I'm not depriving myself when I have a kickass sweetie like that around. I was thinking about them last week during the fast. They are really delicious. OK, I'm off to get dressed and make the smoothie. OH! I also wanted to write that the whole family here had a very weird night's sleep. I wonder if the full moon coming up here tomorrow is what has made the night so sleepless and then full of lucid dreaming. Anyway, I haven't had a night like that in years, thankfully. It did, however, remind me of about 6 years ago when I habitually slept terribly, waking up in night terrors, etc. It was interesting to have the comparison and I'm grateful to sleep better now. When we have nights like this, I often wonder if others are as well... OK, I'm off! Back again. Made the smoothie just like yesterdays. It is good and filling! It is so yummy to have these again. I love my green smoothies. p.s. I weighed myself and am 2 lbs lighter so that's good news!

This is Day 1 of the next phase of our lil juice fasting experience. Yesterday, August 10th was day 10. We did (what turned out to be) the usual 16-20 ounce green juice in the morning, 24-32 ounce green juice at lunch time, a 16 ounce juice around 4:30 but what we did for dinner time was a small juice consisting of 1 big bunch of kale, 1 beet with greens, and 3 green apples. We drank a smaller 12 ounce juice each and all the while had kelp noodles soaking in lemon juice to soften them, I spiral sliced 1 zucchini to make zucchini pasta and I made a light local tomato marinara sauce. After we let the juice rest for a short while, we made a small plate of zucchini and kelp noodle pasta with a couple dollops of the marinara sauce. Matt served the portions and I asked him to. I was too hungry to serve myself a proper portion. (Sometimes my eyes can get the better of me.) He used dessert plates and served out our dinner. We all sat at the dinner table and ate. There were a couple times I had to take little breaks and breathe because it tasted so delicious and I felt so hungry for it, that I could picture myself devouring it. It was the perfect amount and it filled us up super well. I didn't think that was going to be possible. I thought I was going to want seconds and thirds. My stomach was very satisfied. It was nice to chew food, too! I had wondered what we were actually going to break the fast with. I was thinking fruit first or possibly a simple soup. But I was drawn to the kelp noodles. We talked how we were going to phase out of the fast and how we were going to continue on. All during the fast there was the desire to continue on. I like starting new life habits for a period of 21 days because it's said that it takes 21 days to create a new habit. So for these next 11 days, we're going to do green juices in the morning, a nice green smoothie in the afternoon and then a raw dinner. We'll adjust if we need to as we also want to start more exercising to this program. So this is Day 1 of the next phase of this endeavor. Wish us luck! I went to bed last night thinking it's kind of fun to plan your life in 10 day increments! I wanted to write on this blog the best yet savory green juice that Matt made up. Growing up in CA, he really has a knack for working with various hot peppers. This is what he and I came up with. I put the veggies that I wanted to juice and he worked out the proportions: Day 9 kickass savory juice = hella yummy: 1 head escarole, 1/2 bunch kale, 1 small cuke, 1 red bell pepper, 1/2 bunch parsley, 3 cloves garlic, 2 jalapeno peppers, 2 pints cherry tomatoes, 3 carrots. This is divine. Made 2 quarts of juice. I think he also added a scallion or two in there and he definitely added a shot of Vital Heat and a dash of coconut aminos. It was a magical drink and it instantly squashed any cravings. We were happily full afterwards. 10 day juice fast gratefuls:

• I'm grateful to have released 11-12 lbs during our juice fast
• I'm grateful to feel SO awesome in my body
• I'm grateful to have so much inflammation gone from my body
• I'm grateful for the clarity of mind and the increased energy to do other things
• I'm grateful for the decluttering and organizing that seeemed to just happen during these 10 days. Even yesterday, instead of getting on the computer in the morning, I tacked the 2 big piles on my desk and filed away some and recycled way much more. I even paid some bills that were there.
• I'm grateful for all the shifts going on in my life, in my heart and in my mind. That's the biggest part.
• I'm grateful for my body and for this experience.
• I'm grateful for my kids who did a great job to make themselves green smoothies and put together their meals so that I didn't have to do too much of that.
• I'm just plain grateful. :-) <3 <3 <3

what a difference a day can make! I woke up feeling loads better this morning. I'm not sure what all was going on but I trust that my body needed to do what it needed to do. I'm happy I just slowed down and vegged out. In retrospect, it would have been THE perfect time to get a colonic or enema. I'm looking forward to when my bathroom gets done so I can have a colema board on premises for such times as this. For now, I just drank a lot of water and rested. I felt better after the savory juice that Matt made last night. It had jalapeno peppers and garlic in it. Maybe those things helped to clear out something that was making me feel so zapped. I'll post recipes from yesterday and today down below. I keep commenting that it's unbelievable how much fruit and veggies we are going through. It's a juice feast, not a fast. We are drinking from about 80 - 90 ounces of juice per day. My joints, muscles and bones feel very good. I feel like so much inflammation has just dissolved out of my body. I definitely want to keep steering my boat in this direction for sure. I feel way better in my body. Even when I felt my body feeling tired yesterday, I was still able to walk up and down stairs with great ease. You don't realize how you are feeling until something is different and then you have a place to compare it to. Over the last 10 years, my body has been so happy with the diet and lifestyle changes that I've had thus far. I went from being in constant pain for 7 years where it was hard to eat, sleep, walk, sit, stand and be without shooting, screaming, yelling, horrible pain. I even had one doctor tell me that I'm just going to have to live with it. I finally found a great chiropractor in Montpelier, Leita Hancock, who helped me start to get back into a place of minimal pain. When I shifted my diet to incorporate what Joel Fuhrman writes about, that's when I had the fastest and biggest shift in my body. 45 lbs released and I could start to walk again. I went from not even being able to walk 1/4 mile without Matt having to come and get me with the car because I was crying in pain to being able to walk 5 miles a day. Still, there has been continuous and chronic inflammation patterns. I was doing about 80-90% better and I would have these things where some flare up would happen every 6-8 months (not really that regularly.) But I'd be doing great and then something would happen and I'd be screaming out in pain and not being able to move for a few days. The most recent was in November when a deep tissue massage sent me into a 2 month back spasm. I discovered sound therapy with Eileen McKusick which helped miraculously. The other thing that I've been doing with regularity and finding gratifying results and pleasure with is Lydia Russell's Anusara yoga. The yoga is helping me to strengthen core muscle groups so that my body knows what it feels like to hold itself up. The Anusara part helps me to remember the bliss inside me and live it up each day. The journey continues. I fell back into eating more fats from nuts/seeds/oils and way more sweets than I need. This fast is breaking that cycle and pointing my boat in a different direction. I thought I was feeling so much better and yet now I can see how I feel now in these last 9 days. But if I'm honest, as of 10 days ago, I was coming home and feeling so much pain in my legs from standing for 4-6 hours each day. I thought I was doing better because I wasn't feeling the old pain in my hips and back. But it just shifted to my knees and legs. I also put on some weight that didn't make things easier on my body to move either. So this is all a very fortuitous series of events here, starting with the back spasms in November. OK onto the recipes. A recap from yesterday: morning juice of Day 8: big bunch of lettuce, 3 carrots, 2 oranges, 1 grapefruit and 1 apple. made 24 ish ounces of juice for both of us. YUM afternoon juice of Day 8: 1 bunch of kale, 2 beets with greens, 3 carrots, 2 pears, 1 apple and a container of strawberries. This made a whopping 32 ounces of juice for each of us. It’s pretty delicious too. early evening juice of Day 8: 1 bunch kale and 3 pears. served 2 16 ounce juices evening juice of Day 8: finally! a yummy savory juice! Matt made this: a bunch of kale (the last from the garden), 3 carrots, pea shoots, 1 beet with greens, 1 red bell pepper, 2 jalapenos (de-seeded), 3 cloves garlic, 3 stalks celery, 4 tomatoes. Spiced up with coconut aminos and chipotle spice. - this made about 24-20 ounces each person. I actually couldn't finish it - it was so filling! and this morning's juice of Day 9: this morning's juice that Matt made: 6 carrots, 1 container strawberries, 3 pears, 2 oranges, 1 grapefruit. It's delicious. I'm afraid to drink it. I like a lot of greens to help with the sugars of the root veggies and fruit. Better exercise after drinking this! I gave Emily some so that I didn't have a lot. It's very yummy though!

Well I woke up around 6:30 this morning and couldn't really get back to sleep until I did a meditation tape and then started to drift off. How funny is that! My energy level this morning on day 8 has been a bit low when compared to energy level all week thus far. It's the time before my cycle when it gets that way anyway and this morning I just felt draggy. I've been laying pretty low today and I had to cancel a fun date in town that I'm bummed about. I took some Adapt to Change tincture which has licorice root in it. I thought that might help with whatever is going on. It is helping and yet my body is still telling me to take it slow today. So I'm listening despite a brain that says, "do this! do that!" We're on our 2nd juice today. Matt has made them so far today and he's made really really big juices today. I also had 1/2 liter of water so far and also drank some young coconut water with a splash of coconut kefir water in it for the electrolytes and probiotics. This morning's juice: a big bunch of Pat's lettuce, 3 carrots, 2 oranges, 1 grapefruit, 1 apple. This made 20-24 ounces of juice this morning for both of us. YUM! This afternoon's juice: 1 bunch of kale, 2 beets with greens, 3 carrots, 2 pears, 1 apple and a container of strawberries. This made a whopping 32 ounces of juice for each of us. It's pretty delicious too. Yesterday (Day 7) I felt really great. Loads of energy and a happy happy spirit. I still get hungry around meal time. I've gotten rid of 10 lbs and a boatload of inflammation so far. That's great news for me. I spent the day around the house and outside. We walked to a lil book sale in town here that supports a local charity. We did a little family thing where we picked names out of a hat and we are doing something nice for that person: could be doing a chore for them, write them a nice letter, make something special for them or whatever comes to mind/heart. We're continuing that until we have our own names picked out of the hat so we can do something nice for ourselves too. Yesterday was a chore day as well and straightened up the house some while Matt worked on his new truck. A nice Sunday for sure. That's the recap. I'm going to finish this incredibly large juice here and maybe do some painting if my body is up for the fun. Also have to jar up some kim chee I made last week. Oh, here's the juices from yesterday:

this morning's juice: Bunch of Pat's lettuce, handful of Pat's string beans, 3 stalks of celery, 2 carrots, 3 of Pat’s apples, 2 oranges and a grapefruit. *burp* (it's actually quite good!)

afternoon juice was VERY refreshing: 1/2 bunch fresh parsley, 1/2 bag pea shoots, 1 bunch collards, 4 kiwi, 1 orange, 1 apple. YUM! Made 2 16 ounce juices

evening juice: so many bunches of lettuce from Pat's garden, 1/2 bunch parsley 1/2 small watermelon, quart strawberries and 1 apple. YUM. this made 2 30 ounce juices

later evening juice: a whole bunch more of Pat's greens, 4 of Pat's carrots, 2 cloves garlic, 1 oz or so of pea shoots and 4 tomatoes. A savory juice that felt great to drink but taste-wise wasn't as good as the rest. I added some habenaro tumeric hot sauce dabs and a drizzle of coconut aminos to make it more palatable for me. Next time I wish I had some celery and a cuke.

Hoping you are all well and happy. xoxo, Linda