Blossoms & Bliss Balls

Every spring I chase cherry blossoms around the city, so if you aren’t a cherry blossom lover, stop reading now.

The insane beauty of the city exploding on petals ranged from soft pink to fuschia fills me with awe every year.

Chasing all of these blossoms works up an appetite so here is a recipe for delicious little energy balls to take with you when you’re on the go. There’s a lot of high level nutrition packed into these little balls:

Cashew Bliss Balls

• 1 cup cashews, ground in food processor
• 1/4 cup maple syrup
• 1/4 cup hemp hearts
• 1/4 cup unsweetened shredded coconut
• 1 T raw cacao powder in half
• Splash filtered water

Mix ingredients together, form into balls, chill, serve.

Staying Healthy during a Pandemic

Panic surrounding the covid-19 virus is spreading every day with the world slowly but surely shutting down, one service at a time. Panic buying of toilet paper, fights in wine stores and general hysteria seem to be prevailing.

In reality though, there are a lot of things you can do to stay safe and healthy and none of them involve stock piling TP in your home.

Staying calm, well rested, connected to friends and family, and nourishing our bodies should be priorities right now. Here are a few more tips to keep you healthy during this anxious time:

• Eat lots of fresh fruit, veggies and take your vitamins to keep your immune system healthy
• Don’t panic. Panic and anxiety are huge immune suppressors. Stay calm.
• Meditate. Do yoga.
• Wash your hands often and thoroughly.
• Walk in nature. Nature heals.
• Don’t completely isolate. Being part of a community strengthens our immune system and uplifts our mood.
• Do something nice for and elderly person or immune compromised person. They are the ones who are truly at risk.
• Refuse to live your life in fear and greed.

This too shall pass. Be balanced, care about others, wash your hands, do the elbow bump, and we will survive this beautifully.

I’m ending this post with a few photos from my morning nature walk. Nature will always calm, heal and rebalance.

Intermittent Fasting

If you know me you know that I LOVE checking out new health fads and crazes. I recently tried food combing and my verdict was that it’s good for short term digestion issues or weight loss but almost impossible to keep up long term. Then I went totally sugar free. That was tough and didn’t make me feel as healthy as I had hoped so I’m back to using honey and maple syrup as well as treating myself to the odd dark chocolate bar.

Now I’ve decided to see what intermittent fasting is all about. I’ve been doing this few a few days and I swear I feel the effects already.

I’m doing 8/16 or 9/15 depending on the day, meaning that my window of eating every day is 8 or 9 hours and fasting is 15 or 16 hours. During the eating phase of the day you should have 3 balanced meals and try not to binge on unhealthy foods or you’re pretty much shooting yourself in the foot.

Eating this way leaves 16 hours for your body to take a break from digesting and focus on regeneration and healing. Doesn’t that sound like a good idea? Think of our hunter/gatherer ancestors ~ they weren’t bogged down with digestion all day long. They ate, went out to hunt and forage again and, if they were lucky, had another meal. If they weren’t lucky, they were naturally intermittent fasting. This way of eating is so natural for the human body and has a ton of health and anti~aging benefits that I’ll discuss in an upcoming post.

One word of caution though. If you’re active, only schedule activities during eating hours or you’ll be depleting yourself and breaking down muscle as well as fat, doing your body more harm than good.

I truly believe though that in our modern world where we are inundated with unhealthy food choices 24/7, intermittent fasting may be the path back to balance and health.

Happy Fasting.

Photos of a hike to Dog Mountain on Mount Seymour.

Memories not Things

Nick is patiently waiting for Santa Paws this evening.

Luckily though my little pup isn’t really expecting any presents because a) he’s a dog and b) I stopped buying Christmas presents about 8 years ago.

When I stopped buying presents the Holiday magically went from being a grind to a beautiful time of the year that I 100% look forward to. Instead of feeling the pressure of having to buy (maybe – probably) unwanted gifts for people who already have everything they need, I can now just relax and ask people out for drinks or dinner or for an evening at my place instead. Then we can focus on what I think the true meaning of the Holiday are: celebrating the friendships and connections you have with the people you care about in your life.

Getting together instead of spending money on things is easier on your budget, way more fun and relaxing and very eco-friendly. Imagine what our landfills look like after Christmas. Full of wasted paper, tinsel, online shopping boxes and bubble wrap and cellophane. Not very healthy for our beautiful planet.

Giving up gift exchanges was the key to unlocking the magic of this beautiful season for me. I highly recommend.

Wishing everyone a magical Holiday Season full of love, food, hygge and happiness.

Golden Glow Smoothie

There is nothing better than a walk through the pumpkin patch at the end of October.

And after picking the perfect pumpkin I can’t wait to get home to start making muffins, pies and smoothies.

This smoothie is one of my fall faves. It’s sugar free and full of skin beautifying antioxidants, turmeric and collagen.

Here’s the recipe:

• 1 1/2 cups unsweetened cashew milk
• 1/2 cup fresh pumpkin
• 1 banana
• 1 tsp lakanto monk fruit sweetener
• 1 scoop unsweetened whey protein powder
• 1 scoop vital proteins collagen
• 1/2 tsp turmeric
• 1/2 tsp cinnamon

Blend all ingredients together and enjoy this sweet smoothie that will make your skin glow.

Sugar Detox Challenges

I’m on sugar free day 7, feeling amazing and power walking around Vancouver’s beautiful seawall.

The first few days were rough, feeling low energy, foggy thinking and wanting to go home to sleep for most of the day. It truly felt like a typical detox from an addictive substance. Day 4 was better. And now I’m feeling really good and really energized. I’m also spending my spare time researching the effects of sugar on the human body. Did you know that the average North American eats 20 tsp of added sugar per day? 20 teaspoons!! Think about how much that is for a moment. And that’s not fruit sugar.

That’s cane sugar, high-fructose corn syrup and other refined, processed sugars. 20 teaspoons of sugar is not going to do your body good. That amount will mess with your blood sugar, your hormones and your mood. How can people be eating so much? Try checking the labels of pretty much any packaged food and you’ll find sugar lurking there in some form. Soups, salad dressing, condiments, drinks. There it is. So, before you know it, you’re consuming several teaspoons without even knowing it. I’ve definitely been scrutinizing labels the last week and it’s been an eye~opener.

Step one on a sugar~free journey: Read Labels

Life Lessons from a Terrier Mix

Earlier this afternoon my little Terrier, who had been running wild around a sandy beach at low tide with me, decided to chase after three huge Canadian geese.

Each goose was probably at least 10 pounds heavier than him so it was pretty funny to see him chasing after the large birds. My friend who was watching the shenanigans with me commented “I’m surprised the geese haven’t gone after him. He has no idea how small he is, does he?”

He made a good point since there were more of them, they were heavier than him and Canadian geese have been known to be fierce, hissing at and even chasing people who venture too close to them.

But I knew exactly why the geese ran from my little dog. My dog fully, unwaveringly, 100% believes he is an 80 pound pit bull. And, because of this, he has a huge, confident energy.

I’ve seen him go after large, powerful dog breeds and he never gets hurt. I think he believes so strongly in his power that other beings end up believing he is powerful too.

Imagine if we all had that kind of confidence; if we all believed that we had the power to influence our lives as much as my little pup believes. We would be unstoppable. We wouldn’t stay in less than loving relationships, we wouldn’t let our work be anything other than our passion and we would believe that we are deserving of all good things.

We would be courageous in standing up for others and ourselves and our confidence would shine. Imagine how much happier our existence would be. Add a little empathy and compassion to the mix and imagine how much happier and successful this world would be.

This thought brought to you be a stubborn, confident Terrier mix.

Food Combining

 I’ve recently tried food combining. I’ve been struggling with pesky digestive issues lately, and by lately I mean the past few years. So I decided to see if this method of eating would help my bloated belly feel better.

Spoiler alert! It did.

What is food combining? It is the belief that protein and starches digest at different rates and, if eaten together, cause a sludgy build up of undigested food in the gut. This build up can lead to an unhealthy gut, bad bacteria, disease and allergies.

There are a few major rules around food combining and here they are:

• Only eat fruit on an empty stomach, especially melons.
• Don’t combine starches and protein.
• Don’t combine starches with acidic food.
• Try not to combine too many different types of protein.
• Only consume dairy products on an empty stomach.

The last rule is to wait at least three hours ~ preferably four ~ between eating starch and protein.

This may sound like a lot of rules but food combining is relatively easy, and delicious, once you get used to it. And if you’re suffering from gut issues and their symptoms, it’s so worth putting the extra thought into your meal plans.

It can be as easy as eating that burger wrapped in lettuce “paleo style” or having your pasta dish with vegetable only tomato sauces.

The benefits of food combing is so worth the extra effort. Here are a few:

• Kick ass digestion
• Improved nutrient absorption
• Glowing skin
• In cases of overweight – weight loss

Who doesn’t want at least a few of these benefits?

Beach Yoga & Choco Energy Balls

Throwing it back this Thursday to last summer’s beach yoga. Practicing barefoot in the mud during low tide took me right back to happily playing in the mud when I was a child.

And what is summer all about if not keeping your inner child happy?

Another thing that keeps my inner child happy is chocolate. Here’s a grown-up, healthy and vegan chocolate snack that will make your inner child smile and do your body good:

Choco Energy Balls

• 1 cup raw cashews
• 1/2 cup unsweetened shredded coconut
• 1/4 cup dark chocolate chips
• 1/4 cup raw cacao
• 1/4 cup pure maple syrup

Summer

As the warm summer sun and carefree beach days start to fade away, remember..