Spring is Coming, Spring is Coming!

     Today was my first day back from Spring Break, and what a beautiful day it was indeed. Classes kept me indoors for the first half of the day. However, this afternoon I was able to go for a short 4 mile trail run at Turner Lake Park. Turner Lake is probably my most favorite place to run because it's only 5 minutes away from my house, and the only other trail runs are 30+ minutes away. Today was perfect running weather: 72 degrees, a slight breeze, clear skies, and trails bursting with fresh spring flowers and greenery!

   Turner Lake's trails are a perfect place to work on increasing my running speed, strength, and endurance.  Today I chose to hilly route and aimed "power through" the hills, pushing to go as fast as I can up them, instead of slowing down (which is what my legs and lungs wanted me to do, but I told them no and kept going. LOL),

   After I got home and took a shower I had just enough time to grab a dozen dates before accompanying my mom to the grocery store. I had promised her that I was going to make her a special raw vegan dinner, and we were out of a couple ingredients that I needed. When we got back my mom was famished, so I quickly set to work on preparing some Jicama Nori Rolls.

   This delicious meal is salt free and 100% raw vegan, and best of all, my mom adored it! It's hard for me to come up with savory raw dishes that she likes, mostly because her taste and mine are so different. I was just so happy that I was able to concoct a recipe that was tasty, healthy, satisfying, and raw.

My mom is camera shy when it comes to putting her face on the internet.

 However she did allow me take a photo of her chopsticks, 

getting ready to tuck into her meal.

   This recipe will be featured in my our upcoming health & lifestyle/recipe book, as well as my LFRV recipe book. So stay tuned to find out the secret ingredients to my special Jicama pate! =)

   Now, once my mom was settled into her food, I wasted no time in whipping up a fruity green pudding smoothie.

Kiwi, Mango, and Spinach (a dinner that Popeye would love)

   The rest of my evening was filled with homework, returning emails, and working on my recipe book. It was only just a few moments ago that I realized how late it is; this time change had really thrown my internal body clock off. It's amazing what a difference just one our can make isn't it? Oh well, hopefully by the end of the week I'll be back "in tune" so to speak.

Running for Beginners: Getting Started & How To Keep Going Pt. 2

Amanda's How To Start Running Guide Continued. . .

Part Five: Variety = Better Preformance

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     Once you've gotten into the swing of things in your running routine, you might be tempted to run every single day, however, I don't recommed that you do this. When you're running you're putting stress upon your knee joints that can cause a lot of wear and tear over a period of time. TO avoid this it's a good idea to give your knee joints a rest every now and then. Go for a bike ride, swim, do some strength training, practice yoga. Any one of these things are a good source of movement without putting a lot, if any,  stress on the joints.
     
     Another good reason for doing other types of exercises in between running days is that you are toning other muscles and shedding fat around other areas of the body. The leaner your body, the faster you can run, so using other muscles in your body other than you legs and you will be on your way to becoming a lean running machine!


Part Six: Recovery
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     When you do any sort of high impact workouts, the muscles you use are broken down. It's during time after a workout that the body begins to rebuild those muscles and they will either become stronger or weaker depending on what sort of nutrients the muscle has at its disposal to use as building block for the new muscle.


     I have found personally that the best kind of recovery meal is some sort of smoothie. The nutrients in the food are already "chewed up" making for quicker digestion and nutrient absorbtion, which is good what you want so that you can get the nutrient building blocks into your body as soon as possible to build stronger muscles.


Some smoothie combonation ideas:

• banana/mango/spinach
• banan/date/coconut water
• banana/pineapple/spinach
• banana/grape/spinach
• banana/spinach/apple juice

Note: Raw fruits and leafy greens will provide you with the correct carb/protein/fat ration needed for your body to rebuild and repair itself. If you want to know a more about the protein myth that has been spread across the nation by medical propganda, then I recommen reading "The 80/10/10 Diet" by Dr. Douglas N. Graham, "The China Study" by T. Colin Cambell and a previous blogpost that I wrote here. 

     It's also very important - especially if you are participating in high impact workouts everyday - to take a full day off from high impact workouts. Doing so gives your body a break from contantly breaking down and rebuilding muscles on a daily bases. This doesn't mean that you have to be a lie around all day, it just means to obstain from any really strenuous activities. For example, on your rest day you could do go for a walk or do some housework, ect.

Part Eight: Keep Up Your Health

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     The key to having an energy filled run and still having strong energy levels through out the day is to make sure that you are keeping the 7 steps of health: NEWSTART

1. Nutrition - Keeps you fueled for your runs and keeps you from getting sick so you can workout. Eat plenty of carbs from fresh, raw, sweet juicy fruit! Eat some raw leafy greens, vegetables, nuts, and seeds as well and you have yourself a nutrient and water rich diet! 
2. Exercise - e.g. running
3. Water - When you sleep you aren't drinking water, when you exercise you sweat out water, and your body is approx. 75% water. If you don't replenish your water body's water supply you won't be running anywhere.
4. Sunshine - Allows you body to make vitamin D which is used in the absorbtion of calcium (which strengthens your bones so you can run without bone problems) and vitmain D gives you a boost of positive energy (will keep you energized and motivated to run).
5. Temperance - Alcohol will dehydrate you body and kills irreplacable brain cells, not good!
6. Air - Fresh air keeps your blood cells running and can give you body a pleasent, relaxing sensation, getting rid of stress.
7. Rest - When you run you have broken down muscles in your body and released free radicals into your system due to the stress put on your body during ecercise. Your body need to shut down for a minimum of 6 hours while 7 hours is prefered, and 8 to 10 hours would be the best.  Whatever the number of hours you choose, the most crucial hours of sleep that you body needs to regenerate is between 10pm and 2am (has to do with specific hormones that are secreted at this time of night). Miss these four hours and you've dprived your body of muscle repairing time and you will most likely find your energy during your run and throughout the rest of the day will take a nose dive. 
8. Trust in the Creator - Spiritual peace is important for your emotional well being. Trust in the Creator brings emotional stability to cope with life, which leaves your body free to function positively for your running and anything else in your life.

Part Nine: The Conclusion
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     I hope that all the information, suggestions, and ideas that I have provided in this two part article for you, will help you reach your running goal(s). There is so much more information I would have loved to write and share with you, but if I did that I know it would turn into a book!  So I leave instead with this basic synopsis that will steer you in the right direction, and I am sure that over time as you become a better, more seasoned runner, that you will discover many tips and tricks that will benefit your preformance along the way. Good luck!

Sunday, Georgia ING Half Marathon!

     So yesterday was the long awaited and pain stakingly trained for day. Saturday I spent the whole day resting (with the exeption of going for a light walk in the sun) and drinking about 14 cups of freshly juiced OJ! For my dinner juice I deciede to experemint in creating a new green juice, and boy was it ever delicious! I did this in order to rest and cleanse my internal systems while still carbo loading for the race.

Salty, Sweet, and Sour Green Juice

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- 1 medium Pineapple

- 2 small Gala apples

- 2/3 stalk of Celery

- 1 medium Lime

- 4 leaves of Dinosaur Kale

     I turned in around 9:30 that evening and depite my anxiety for the coming morning, was able to fall asleep rather quickly. However, I must have subconciously been paranoid that I would accidently oversleep and miss the race because after fallin asleep, I woke up periodically every hour with the overwhelming urge to check the time. LOL! My fears turned out to be unecessary, as my alarm clock went off precisely at 4:40 on Sunday morning.

     After getting up I managed drink a quart of water, shower, get dressed in my racing clothes (with my racing bib firmly in place), and my gear bag packed in time to leave. Since it was early in the morning and the race was taking place in downtown Atlanta, where the roads incredibly difficult/dangerous to drive on if you are still a novice driver (like me!), my mom was kind enough to drive. 

     We departed and approximatly 5:30 (a little bit later than originally planned) and while my mom drove, I polished off the rest of my pre-race breakfast. I know some people advice against eating at all before a half marathon, but I've always experienced some serious blood sugar problems when ever I have tried to undergo intense exercise without atleast some form of fruit sugar in my system (e.g. shakes, weakness, and dizziness). So for breakfast I blended 4 ripe medium bananas with 4 medjool dates (no water) into a pudding. It was light enough that it wouldn't bog me down during the race and blended for easy digestion/quicker assimilation, while still giving me my much needed glucose energy.

     We arrived at the race around 6:10 and parked in a parking garage about 1/4 of a mile from the ING racing area. The walk was a good warm up, and helped me manage my adrenaline jitters from my nerves. The ING racing area had a Gear Check tent, Information tent, Result tent, and plenty of porta potties (haha)! A little tip for any runners new to half marathons, always make sure to have plenty of time before the start of the race to wait in line to use the facilities because let me tell you, 18000 runners, most of them wanting to use the facilites at the same time as you do, equals long lines.

Needless to say I made it to the starting corrals just in the nick of time as the race started just a couple minutes later at exactly 7 o'clock. 

My mom managed to take a couple of photos of me heading towards the starting line.

(My Bib number: 17437)

            

     The whole race was so much better then I expected it to be. I started training for this half marathon mostly due to boredom. I wanted try something different so I could challenge myself. I just didn't expect this half marathon to be so much fun! I also didn't expect to preform as well as I did. Despite all my training, I still hadn't been able to run for more then 20 minutes before having to slow down to a fast paced walk to catch my breath. But on Sunday morning, as I broke into a run upon crossing the starting line I kept on running for 10 miles non-stop without any problem! The last three miles I only had to walk about a total of 5 minutes (mostly so I could rehydrate).

     The hours and pavement just seemed to flow by, and before you know it the finish line was in sight! When it was over I actually cried a bit when it sunk in that I, Amanda Jane, had just completed a half marathon! A year or two ago if someone would have told me that I would have done this, I would have though they were nuts.

     After finishing I met up with my mom before spliting up with her again so that I could head over to the results table to find out my clocked race time. Now I had estimated from my training that it would take me atleast 3 hours to finish the race, so you can imagine my suprise and utter delight to find out that I had run 13.1 miles at a clocked time of 2:25:55!! 

     On the drive back home I spent my time relaxing my sore legs and ankles while rehydrating with Penta water and eating the most sweet and juicy red delicious apple I have ever had in my life! :-) Once I arrived home I showered, got into my comfiest sweats, and plopped myself infront of the TV where I proceeded to watch Leave It to Beaver and Voyager episodes while consuming 2 large honeydew melons, a large smoothie (7 bananas + 4 dates), and a HUGE salad over the course of the day. Afterwards I crashed into bed at around 9:25 and was dead to the world for 10 hours straight.

     This half marathon has given me a new passion that I am eager to continue. Running is my new addiction and I can't wait for my next half marathon. My goal is to keep running halfs until I can finish one with a clocked time of approx. 1:20:00 before trying to do a whole marathon. 

     This is a shout out to all you other runners out there, as well as anyone considereing taking up running! Running is amazing and our creator gave us brilliant legs to do it with, so don't waste those legs, GO RUN!! :-D

Just finished crossing the finished line. 

Walking back to the car.

Note: I'll be posting more photos of the half marathon event, possibly with som video as well, as they become available through the Georgia ING Marathon website.

Green Grape Smoothie

     Finally! I've been planning on making this video for ages, but have kept putting it off for reasons unknown to me. Here it is though, I hope you can gain something from this video. 

     Au revoir! :-)

Banana Bonanza!!

     Today, as is you can see, I bought a lot of bananas! My family and I go through quite a few bananas throughout any given week, and I was just getting tired of running back and forth to the store JUST to buy bananas. So today I drove down to my local Kroger and bought every ripe or almost ripe banana bunches they had. I think I can now be confident that I can grab some bananas to devour without worrying that my mother or brother might want one because there is plenty for all!


     I have had quite an eventful week. I created some new recipes, my special superfood order came in, my friend Terra moved back from Oklahoma, I've looking at potential property with my mom, I've been working on CSNN and college applications, and helping out my lovely mother any way I can. Lot's of stuff and I'm loving it all! I really enjoy keeping busy, especially these last couple of days as I have been feeling steadily euphoric. I don't know why but for the last couple of days I have been feeling so good both physically and mentally. I hope it lasts.

     So let's start with my superfood order. Now, since my raw plant based diet is basically the exact same thing as the rv80/10/10 diet, I don't really do superfoods anymore. However, with the economy the way it is today, it doesn't hurt to stock up on nutritionally dense supplements that are as close to a whole food as possible. Bananas, I believe, will always be relatively cheap and available, but other fresh fruits and greens (especially organic) might become more difficult to afford and/or obtain. So, my mom and I decided to stock up on cacao powder (my brother loves this stuff), spirulina (because it contains B12), and a sample pack of some other superfoods to try to see what we like.


All Raw and purchased from http://livesuperfoods.com/:

• Organic Cacao Powder
• Organic Spirulina Powder
• Organic Yacon Powder
• Organic Purple Corn Extract Powder
• Wildcrafted Green Papaya Powder
• Organic Pomegranate Powder
• Organic Acai Powder
• Organic Mangosteen Powder
• Wildcrafted Acerola Cherry Powder
• Organic Noni Powder
• Wildcrafted Mangosteen Powder
• Organic Green Stevia Powder

     For the last couple of months my mom and I have been looking around online for plots of land for sale within our price range. We both would like to be able to have enough land to start a garden, have a goat and a horse, and start a bee farm, and living in suburbia puts a clincher in this dream. Last Friday we discovered a 10 acre plot with a barn and a small lake up for sale, and only 45 minutes from where we live. My mom and I went out to take a look at it and found it had potential. I don't think we will be making an offer on it anytime soon because we do want to see what else is out there, but it was nice to actually SEE something that could give us a better idea of what we're looking for.

The stairs lead to a living apartment. Basically if you lived here you would be living above the barn. :D

     As for recipes, I have created the most AMAZING raw Cinnamon Apricot Jam. It's a big hit with my mom. She and I can polish a batch of this stuff of in about 4 days, so I have to have dried apricots on hand all the time. Seriously everyone, this stuff is now officially a staple in my household for the rest of this winter. My mom likes to spread it on her nine grain toast in the morning, and I like to have it as a dipping sauce for my crispy sweet apples.

Cinnamon Apricot Jam

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1 1/2 C. dried apricots, soaked in water for 6-12 hours

1 1/2 Clementines or Tangerines

1/8 tsp. Cinnamon

1 tbs. Raw Honey or 3 Medjool Dates

Blend until thick, smooth, and creamy!

This recipe is so good and SO easy to make, that I plan on making a recipe video on how to make this, just look for it sometime within the next week at - http://www.youtube.com/user/Rawaholic.

     Today I tried two new recipes that I've been meaning to try but haven't ever got around to it because I never was able to have all the ingredients on hand at the same time. The first one was a recipe that I got from joannabanana (check out her blog at - http://acupofjoanna.blogspot.com/) on the goneraw.com forums. She has ranted and raved about this green smoothie and I just had to give it a try today for my lunch. OMG it was the BEST green smoothie I have ever tried. I put like a TON of spinach into this smoothie and I didn't taste any of the greens.

Green Grape Smoothie

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2 C. red Grapes

1 C. frozen Bananas

4 1/2 C. Spinach

I will be making more of this tomorrow only with even MORE spinach now that I know the taste won't be coming through anytime soon. Grapes and bananas do wonders in dominating the flavor of this luscious concoction.

Then for dinner I made a lovely raw fruit cereal out of 2 large bananas, 1 1/4 C. blueberries, and 1 C. raspberries with fresh coconut milk (just the water and meat of 1 Thai coconut blended with a splash of vanilla). I haven't really had any overt fats in the last week (i.e. oil, avocado, nuts, & seeds) so this was a real treat for me, and man did I love it!  So good. . .

Am I making you all green with envy yet? Hehehe! :D

     I think that's about it this time, it's getting late and I get up at 5:50 a.m. every morning to I need to get some sleep. Posted below me are a video that I found on youtube that I think are worth sharing with you. Feel free to make comments on anything that you read or watch on this post or my blog in general, and I hope you all have a wonderful holiday!

My 48 Hour Juice Fast

     For this past week I had been really bad and gone back to drinking soy cappuccinos on a regular basis which I think many of us would agree isn't a very good thing (decaf or no decaf). Eventually it started getting to me as my appetite decreased, my face (which is currently recovering from acne) started to slow  in the clearing process, I became thirsty often, and in general I just felt "heavy."


     After giving it some consideration I decided that my colon needed a break and my body needed to rehydrate, so I decided to go on a short fast. Now, being 18, active, and already on the lower end of a proper weight for my height, I have to be careful as it is quite easier for me to lose weight than it is to gain it. Also, I wanted to make sure that I wasn't depriving my body of the crucial nutrients and simple sugars I need to function throughout my days. With this in mind I decided to attempt a 48 hour juice feast.


     In the end the juice fast went magnificently well! From 7 p.m. Monday night until 7 p.m. Wednesday night I drank nothing but water, kombocha tea, herbal tea, and fresh fruit and veggie juices.


     All through out Tuesday I had an increasing good mood with loads of energy, and the later it got through the day, the lighter I started to feel. The general good mood I had reached its zenith that night when I went to karate where we focused on stretching, forms, and drills. Moving around, getting the blood flowing left me with a boisterous smile on my face until I went to bed.


     Wednesday I didn't have quite as much energy as the day before, but my mood still remained steady/positive/uplifting for the entire day, and my skin began to clear up considerably. I also experienced a great sense of focus and was able to get through my CSNN studies much more easily as my concentration was better.

Throughout the entire 

fast I drank about 2 of the Volvic water bottles a day (which is 68 liters) and 1/2 a bottle of Synergy kombocha (8 oz. a day). Keeping me really hydrated and maintaining good intestinal flora.

My first juice Tuesday morning (bottom left pic) was pomegranate/orange/

grape juice blended with ice and raw honey.

My second Tuesday juice (top right pic) was

pineapple/carrot/beet

juice blended with ice.

Tuesday night, before my karate class, I made my mom and I each a 2 oz. shot of wheatgrass in lovely little martini glasses. We joke about having sweet green martinis. LOL. Cheer! :D

After downing that sweet grassy treat, I proceeded to make myself a nice big green juice made up of apple/pear/celery/lemon/kale blended with spirulina and ice. Yummy!

This green juice really gave me a good energy booster for karate. I really needed it considering the instructor had me punch the living daylights out of punching bag until I broke the skin on my knuckle. Ouch!

Now you see it . . . 

Wednesday morning I got up and my lovely mother an Raw Orange Julius for her breakfast on the go. You juice two oranges, add a tbs. of pineapple juice (optional), 1 small very ripe banana (fresh or frozen), 3-4 ice cubes, and blend! It was gone before she could even make it out the door!

Now you don't!

My juice was a simple orange/pineapple juice blended with some raw honey, ice, and a dash of cayenne pepper. It think this was my favorite juice out of all the ones I had.

For lunch I pulled out the watermelon. I wasn't able to juice the rind since it wasn't organic (going to have to wait until next summer to try that), but it was still a lovely juice. My mom made a beeline for some of the cut up watermelon as soon as she saw it. She was so exited, "You got watermelon?!" :D

Eventually on Wednesday 7 p.m. rolled around and it was time to break my fast. I had prepared a lovely low-fat nutrient rich RAWslaw for my mom and I. I hadn't expected to be all that hungry until I took the first bite. After that I really had to concentrate on pacing myself and chewing well as not to overeat.

     Overall I would say that I enjoyed this experience and might actually for a longer one at the beginning of the summer when more fruits are available and when it's warm enough to soak up lot's of sun! Since this really seemed to work wonders for my physical and emotional well being I may do a few 48 hour - 2 day juice fasts through the winter months if I feel the need to clean out my system and boost my immune system. I also realize that reigning my coffee drinking back in and keep consuming lot's of raw fruits and greens will help keep the "heavy" feeling and dehydration away. We all have our vices that we struggle on and off with, coffee just happens to be mine. 

Welcoming Autumn with Activity

September is gone and October is here! Here in the South the weather is finally lovely! Last week we had a bunch of flash floods so all the bridges had to be closed down (I live almost right next to two of them) which made getting around town quite difficult. But now the temperature high is in the upper 70z, there is sunny and breezy weather with clear blue skies, and almost zero humidity. Yesterday was the same and I spent a couple hours outside doing my CSNN studies while drinking a decadent Spirulina Smoothie of my own spontaneous concoction!

So I haven't really written anything for a few weeks but honestly I've been quite busy adding things into my schedule. I now swim for 30-40 minutes at Johnson Park about 3-4 times a week and I've started attending my brothers karate studio to finish my advanced brown belt training and hopefully test for my 1st degree black belt by nest Autumn. At the house I've been trying to cram as many hours of CSSN while still keeping the house clean, the laundry done, keeping my brother and mom fed, running errands. . . just life in general.

Despite all this life for me is going alright. Just yesterday the two books I ordered from

Amazon.com came in, the 2010 Poetry Market and Sarma's new raw food book! I love buying

raw food recipe books for when my mom or I has company to blow them away with the delicious

and nutritious wonder of raw food. I bought the Poetry Market book because I am hoping to publish

my book of poetry that I have been working on for 4 years now.

This is what I want to encourage everyone in, stay busy! I find whenever I start feeling depressed

or alone that if I go for a swim, a walk, or pick up a book, start a project, just do SOMETHING productive,

I can temper or even completely eliminate the down feelings I have. We are human and we crave stimulation.

When people don't receive physical and mental stimulation we don't form any new muscles in our

body, and the synapses in our brain don't create new connections. This result in a deteriorated mind and body,

who would want to live like that? I can't think of anyone.

When life is dull and you wonder what's the point, that is the moment you need to reach out

and make something out of nothing. We are the dominant species of this planet. Why? Because we

are smart and resourceful and we have zest for LIVING not just EXISTING. We what to do things better,

we want to do things better, we want to learn, and we want to discover. Society today wants to shove

us in a box with a label and have us stay there for the rest of our lives. Not me, and hopefully not you!

Peace out everybody! Until next time. SMILE!! :)

P.S. And here are some recipes and pics:

My New Book!! I really admire Sarma.

She is an amazing woman.

A kiwilicious breakfast. Did you know that kiwi, along with blackberries, are actually a great source of zinc?

My mom wanted pudding so she asked me to make her a raw pudding. We only had the bare minimum of food left since it was the end of the week, but a managed to whips this up for her breakfast.

Tropical Mousse

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

1 large ripe banana

1/2 cup of fresh coconut meat

1/4 cup of dried coconut flakes

1/4 cup cashews (pre-soaking is optional)

1 1/2 cups fresh pineapple, chopped

1 tbs. agar agar flakes soaked for 10 minutes in hot water

1/4 cup agave nectar

1/4 tsp. real salt

juice from 1/2 a lemon

1 tsp. vanilla extract

3 tbs/ coconut water

Blend the 1st five ingredients until smooth, add the rest and blend until smooth and refrigerate overnight.

Serve 4

I made this smoothie as a little treat for my breakfast that same day. Not much left in the house but I'm a resourceful raw smoothie loving girl! ;)

Coco Cacao Beauty Smoothie

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

1 cup coconut water

1 cup chopped frozen banana

1 rounded tsp. raw cacao powder

1 rounded tbs. raw cacao nibs

1 tbs. raw honey

1 tsp. vanilla extract

Blend until smooth

Serves 1

While studying this last Thursday afternoon I got really hungry. It was quite warm out so I decided to invent a new smoothie. OMG, I made this tried it, had my mom tried it, and we have both had this every. single. day. for the past three days. This smoothie tastes amazing, is incredibly satisfying, and gives me the most incredible burst of energy and mental clarity that I have ever experienced.

The Green Peachy Keen

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

1 large peach (about 2 cups)

11 frozen strawberries or 7 fresh strawberries

2 frozen bananas

1 tsp vanilla

2 tsp. Hawaiian Spirulina

1 1/2 "scoops" of stevia ( I use the Now brand)

1/4 cup water

Blend until smooth

Serves 1-2