Day Two - Daily Green Smoothies

Day Two.

Weight: 138 lbs. One and a half pounds down from yesterday.
Skin: two small pimples on chin
Feeling: tired, groggy to start the day, energetic and then again groggy after time on the mountain.

Today started off a little rough but turned out to be an amazing day.

So I woke up feeling rather tired this morning, which surprised me. I went to bed at 1am last night as I was reading "The China Study" and found it absolutely intense and I'm only in the beginning chapter! I can't wait to read more tonight. So although I was tired, I got up and began my day. Got me ready, kids ready and out the door.

The Quest for a ripe organic banana began at about 9:15am this morning. I dropped my oldest off at pre school and went shopping to pick up some more greens. Funny thing, start making smoothies and the greens that usually sit in the fridge for long periods disappear in a matter of a couple of days! I also wanted to get more bananas. Well we started off at Planet Organic, our local organic, whole foods grocery store. Got good deals on greens, but bananas the colour of Kermit the Frog were all that were available. So on to Safeway...green bananas again, but got a few as they were at least closer to being ripe than the others had been. Figured we'd try Superstore...got more groceries there, but not one organic banana in sight. My son was a little distraught that we didn't get the other bananas, the conventionally grown ones. How do you explain to a very upset almost-three-year-old that we don't choose to eat those ones without making the situation worse?!

So on we went, still to find a ripe banana! It was now closing in on 10:15am. So we drove to Costco to get a box of organic spring mix, as we also had not found any of those without some rotting red leafed lettuce in it. Yes, Costco had great boxes of salad so got two of those, but of course no organic bananas there, so finally we had to try Save-On Foods. We walked in and my son burst out..."Mommy, yellow bananas!!" That was around 10:40am when we had finally paid for them. Yikes, five stores and almost an hour and a half later we had some usable, ripe, organic bananas.

We had to rush home to get things packed up and ready for our first trip to the mountain. My parents bought my daughter ski gear and skiing lessons for Christmas this year. We are working on trying to give experiences rather than plastic toys and such. So this was their gift to her. She was so excited and I could hardly peel her off the ceiling this morning when I told her we were going up to Cypress Bowl Ski Mountain this afternoon. I blended up my smoothie for the morning around 10:30am. I wasn't hungry yet, but would not be near a blender until around 5pm so figured I had better get something into me.

2 bananas
1 lb. of fresh strawberries (yes, organic, and in the winter...didn't check where they were from, probably Mexico)
1/3 of a tub of organic spring mix
2 cups of water

It wasn't as sweet as I am trying to make do with only two bananas per smoothie. I made up 5 cups and my son drank one of them. My daughter wasn't at home to drink any.

I have not been skiing in almost six years. Ever since I was pregnant with my oldest I have not skiied, therefore not been to the mountain. It was really snowy on the ground and foggy on the hill. The air was so cool and refreshing, the scenery was extremely pleasing to the eye and everyone seemed to be happy and busy about their skiing day.

I was not concerned about how my daughter's first lesson would go, she is a very independent, confident young lady who will take on any challenge head on. She's quite athletic as well, already at such a young age. She figured she would be teaching the ski instructors a thing or two today. lol.

We had some "power food", which was a snack of raw nuts and seeds with some dehydrated fruit, like apples and apricots. My kids eat this stuff up. They saw all the others with french fries and asked to get them, but ate heartily of the snack I prepared for them. It's difficult in social situations like that to have the kids understand the importance of eating well for the body and not just eating due to convenience or just because everyone else does. I feel badly for them in some ways, but in others I know in the end they will thank me for being so concerned about their food and their health.

The lesson went extremely well, more snacks and back home. While on the mountain I ate 7 dried apricots, 1/4 cup of raisins, and about 5 pecan halves. Later on I had a Smart Monkey bar. Ani Phyo's latest creation and now available at places like Planet Organic and Choices. I almost fell asleep in the car, again that surprised me that I would be so tired after not having exerted myself at all. I really felt like I had been the one skiing the whole time. I had that "apres ski" feeling without ingesting anything sordid!

That tired feeling didn't leave me until I got home and started moving around getting things tidy and ready for tomorrow. My husband made dinner due to our late arrival home and I made a smoothie for myself.

1 cup frozen blueberries
1 huge bunch of kale
1/2 cup of bean sprouts (non organic)
2 bananas
2 cups of water

The kids were eating their dinner and saw me drinking this and my son asked if he could have cup for himself. I was thrilled. He's probably ingested more greens in the last two days than in the last two months. Again, my daughter decided against having any. She's good though. She'd rather chew on a leaf of kale, so I tend not to worry about her greens intake as much. She'll come around eventually with the smoothies, as I have already seen some progress there.

I was stuffed, and as I had sipped up 5 cups of green smoothie! My son had one cup. I notice that his stools are extremely loose today and he went three times instead of his usual one, so things are moving there which is great. My daughter is also going more often. She was once a day as well and went twice today. Me, loose still and three times today.

We also had some raw ice cream tonight. I made three cups of banana, blueberry (which is a favourite around here) and we each ate a cup of it. Around 8pm I had seven dried figs. I am still stuffed, but not uncomfortable and it's almost midnight.l am wakeful, calm, and preparing for a work day tomorrow. I also want to get to my pilates/yoga class tomorrow night. I love that workout and it's great to get out and moving. I am also looking forward to starting the Sun Run training program at a local rec centre here on Sunday. Running is something I have enjoyed in the past and feel that my body is so much lighter now that I will have greater success at it as well.

In Happiness. Goodnight.