"You're at the age where we should start looking into anti-aging procedures"

It's been a rough few months for my body.  First my facialist told me what sort of precautions I should be taking to prevent my age from showing on my face- I heard the work botox and wanted to cry, regained composure and told her I'd be happy to continue my chemical peels and see how the next ten years go before trying anything radical.  Then just this week my OBGYN told me that I was no longer at the age where I could avoid weight gain.  He politely told me that I would have to work out more each year than I had the year before just to maintain my current weight.  He then told me that my drugs were not causing me to gain weight I was just lazy and happy.  Everyone seems to be blaming then crazy thing called happiness for the extra pounds.  Then as if in cahoots with my facialist and OBGYN the gym I signed up for 3 months ago and have only attended maybe 4-5 times called to tell me its time to come in and get weighed and measured. Just shoot me now.

So I took a step back and really looked at myself in the mirror and saw that my body really has gained some new curves.  I decided to step on my Wii Fit for the first time oh in a few months too- since before we moved and it tells me I've gained 7.5 lbs- since April.  My BMI is 26.4 and it should be between 18 and 24.  Now this doesn't sound like too much but I'm at least 8 lbs overweight and I'm supposed to be between 98 lbs (in someone's dreams) and 132 (which is more than I'd liked).

I enjoy exercising I've never disliked it, I'm just too tired for it.  I love healthy, fresh good for you food, I just don't always feels like cooking.  But as Dr. Troy pointed out what I used to do is no longer working and so it's time to at least begin to change.  I always start with food because obviously that is my biggest problem.  I love to eat and I love to eat rich and creamy pastas, with custards for dessert.  Mmmm that flan I had for lunch was delicious!  So I need another food makeover which luckily Bruce is fine with since I'm the one doing the cooking...

So ten hour days at work are really not my thing and there are usually at least 2 hours of those ten hours where I'm just useless, so I search online for interesting articles or videos.  That's when I ran into a Good Eats episode called "Live and let Diet".  Apparently Alton Brown (please tell me you know who he is) gained  alot of weight during the last twoish years- 90 lbs to be exact and as a food host on the Food Network he didn't have the most time to exercise so he drastically changed his diet (eating habits).  His food plan sounds like something I could very easily do except for one part you'll see-

Things to eat daily:
Fruits
Whole Grains
Leafy Greens
Nuts
Carrots
Green Tea

This seems pretty easy cause I can combine a lot of those into smoothies like my green smoothie- fruits and leafy greens right there, and carrots with almond butter for a snack and then some brown rice and green tea.  DONE!

Things to eat 3 times a week:
Oily Fish
Yogurt
Broccoli
Sweet Potatoes
Avocado


I really like all these things, I just don't eat sweet potatoes and broccoli too much cause it's more effort but hey I'll put that effort into it and see what happens.  Avocados YUM! and yogurt and fish are good too.  DONE!


Things to have ONE time a week:
Red meat
pasta
desserts
alcohol


OMG what the hell? Who do you think I am? I can't possibly have only one alcoholic drink a week! That makes me sound like an alcoholic when really I'm just a normal member of my family- we don't do that.  And Pasta really? What about Wheat Pasta? I promise to just eat wheat pasta and how about we move that one up to category two- just three times a week!  Desserts fine, I can do just once a week and then I don't eat a lot of red meat to begin with so that will almost be a challenge to make me do it once a week.


The hardest will definitely be the once a week category- I have family dinner every week with booze and my hobby is karaoke which alcohol is a requirement for.  This is gonna be tough.  But I'm determined I'm just gonna keep looking at this picture to remind myself why I need to do this...

Frustration and Food Porn

I can't write the blog post I want to write right now.  I've tried three times this week and it keeps getting out of control.  When I hit 7 paragraphs I realize no one is going to want to read it and that it's too far gone to even edit at this point.  So I will put my blog post about coincidences and how I feel about them on the shelf for another time till I can write concisely how I feel about coincidences.

So my boss has been bugging me to take more time off forever but I keep telling him that there isn't time! He then tells me I have plenty of time in the bank but then I remind him that there just isn't time because there's too much I have to do.  This argument happens most Mondays and Fridays and occasionally on Tuesdays, Wednesdays and Thursdays.  Apparently it was getting to be a problem.  So he told me to take next week off.  It's spring break we're off Thursday and Friday anyways and he told me to make a week out of it.  I argued but in the end gave in and turned in a leave slip for the whole week.

A whole week off?  What on Earth am I supposed to for 9 whole days (two Saturdays and Sundays plus a work week)? In three years I have never taken that much time off- I've probably taken 9 days total off in that time but never together.  I don't know what on Earth I'm going to do but I plan to enjoy it.

Which brings me to food porn!  I love food and I love to cook.  But unfortunately I don't have the time to do it as often as I'd like.  So I try to live vicariously through other people's stories about food, cooking and that amazing thing called "free time".  I think I spelled that right.

For a while I've been a fan of Happy Foody and a lot of my healthier eating habits come from that site.  My Green Smoothie recipes and all the fun stuff about Chia.  My new found love of Almond Milk comes from here and I'm dying to try this recipe.  Sarah, the blogger, writes so passionately about food and how eating is such a whole body experience for her and her family.  It's inspiring.  It makes me want to eat healthier and live greener.  It makes me want to dread my hair.  It makes me want to travel the country in a veggie oil powered RV and car! Until I read Smitten Kitchen...

Smitten Kitchen is food porn at it's best!  Oh the richness, the decadence and the impending heart attacks await!  It's Paula Dean meets New York City and I love it!  I have yet to make anything from her amazing blog but if I baked I'd bake chocolate whiskey and beer cupcakes or if I wanted to channel Martha (Stewart of course do you know another one?) I'd make Martha's Macaroni and Cheese.  I could go on forever.  But each recipe comes with a delightful story about her discovery of the recipe and then her execution.  She isn't perfect and sometimes her recipe fails and she shares that and the blogosphere collectively weeps for the failed caramelized brown butter rice krispie treats that had so much potential.

While I have long given up on the idea that I will ever get to be the amazing housewife/cooking machine that my mother was/is I still dream of finding time at least 3-4 or more realistically 1-2 times a week to cook something amazing and tasty (hopefully sometimes healthy) for my family some day.  Next week maybe I can pretend.  Maybe I'll try Martha's recipe because I'm pretty sure that could feed me all week long depending on how much Bruce eats while I'm sleeping.  The beer cupcakes are screaming to be made and eaten with my sister Haley in her awesome kitchen.  Then that almond milk recipe must be tried and perfected, because I'm tired of buying the way too think and un-drinkable-straight brand they sell at HEB.  I want something thinner.  So on my glorious 9 days of freedom I hope to try some of these recipes and feel that sense of calm that I see these women posses as they talk about food and enjoy the best part- eating as well.

Chocolate Guacamole Does Not Sound Appetizing

Thanks Blake! No one wants to try my Chocolate Avocado Pudding anymore.  I just call it Chocolate Pudding now because everyone else is too disgusted when I say there's avocado in it, but I promise it's delicious.

A few weeks ago I was at Deirdre's (my birthmom) house getting my hair dyed.  This is usually a great time for us to catch up and talk and I actually get to see my siblings cause they don't tend to frequent the Thursday Night Music Club where I almost always get to see Deirdre.  My little sister is a 16 year old vegan and she has been for years now.  She used to be mostly vegetarian but now I'm pretty sure she's completely vegan.  At first I was appalled cause I love meat and I just never thought you could get all the great flavors without the savory-ness of meat.  But over the years I've warmed to the vegetarian lifestyle and a lot of the dishes.  I try to eat two vegetarian meals a day then try to only eat one meal with meat a day and I try to always have that one meat be chicken.

This year I've been trying lots of awesome healthier vegan, vegetarian and raw foods like my Green Smoothies which rock, vegan chili, Chia Seeds and just general healthier stuff. So far it's going great.  I've definitely lost some weight but I also feel a lot better.  I feel healthier and I have more energy.  Those Chia seeds and Green Smoothies really make me feel like I have more energy so yay.

So anyways my little sister came into the kitchen while my hair was setting in it's color and started adding some avocado to the blender.  To this Deirdre asked if she was making her chocolate pudding thing.  My sister Grace then went on to explain what it is.

Chocolate Avocado Pudding
1 Avocado
2-3 tablespoons Cocoa powder (depending how chocolate-y you want it)
Agave Nectar to taste
A splash of vanilla

Whipped together in a food processor

She then let me try some of the concoction and it was great! It tasted just like chocolate pudding and you couldn't even tell there was avocado in it. Grace told me that she suggested letting the mixture sit overnight to get more of the pudding texture out of it. I was super excited and put that little recipe in my head for later use.  We talked a little about chia seeds and my sis Grace is apparently a fan of the gel and then just adds stuff to it- I like to doctor it up from the start- see previous post on Chia :)

So weeks went by and I noticed some avocado in my fridge about to be too mushy and so I bought some agave nectar and cocoa and decided to try it.  After I gathered my ingredients I realized I didn't have a food processor.  I almost gave up and waited till I could buy one but then I just bit the bullet and started mashing with a fork.  Luckily the avocados were soft enough and mashing wasn't too bad, I added the rest of the ingredients and tested it.  It tasted great! It was a little thick but it had all the potential of an awesome chocolate pudding.  Because I had some in the fridge I added about a 1/4 a cup of vanilla almond milk and it got much smoother and even looked like pudding.

I put it in the fridge to set and started dreaming about eating it with bananas the next morning for breakfast.  A few hours later Bruce came home and I wanted to put him to the test.  I run up to him with a spoonful of pudding and said "honey I made homemade chocolate pudding wanna try it?" and shoved the spoon in his mouth.  He said it tasted great and then I told him what was in it.  He seemed surprised but not as disgusted as I was expecting.  So it passed the Bruce test yay!

The next day I took it to work with a banana and everyone in the office seemed more than disgusted by the idea.  I posted it on Facebook and again got a pretty grossed out reaction.  So for now it looks like there are only a few fans of the Chocolate Avocado Pudding...but it is really good.  You know you want to try it.

Chia Seed Pudding

Still on my healthy foodness. I killed my blender last week so I needed to replace my Green Smoothies with something else healthy for breakfast. Enter Chia Seeds! I've read a lot about these awesome little seeds and was skeptical to try them till I heard that my Vegan Sister Grace was cool with them.

So what are Chia Seeds. Chia seeds are just like the stuff you smear on terra-cotta pots to make Chia Pets only you eat them instead of letting them grow green fuzzy grass. Apparently the folks down in Mexico have known about these guys for a while and make their Chia Fresca with them. Here's what they look like raw and in my fave pudding (see video at the end)

So Chia Seeds are super jam packed of good for you stuff. They have more protein that any other food of it's type, tons of calcium and boron, potassium, more antioxidants than blueberries, iron and omenga 3s and 6s. So basically they're just all around good for you. And unlike Flaxseed they wont go back and you don't have to refrigerate them after opening them. For more info visit

Chia Seed Info

Chia seeds will absorb whatever liquid you soak them in. As they absorb liquid they form a thick gel around them. The ratio is something like 1:9 Chia:liquid. So you can make just plain Chia Gel and add stuff to it or you can make a gel out of the liquid of your choice. So last week I ate a lot of Chia for breakfast and snacks.  I read lots of recipes for it and chose the one that sounded like the best for breakfast.  Chia Seed Pudding!  As I try to drink less Cow's Milk I'm trying lots of milk alternatives.  I hate soy milk but almond milk and I get along just fine.  So I put 5 tablespoons of Chia seeds in a plastic container and added a cup of Vanilla Almond Milk, shook it up and let it set in the fridge overnight.  When I woke up I had a delicious almost tapioca pudding type breakfast and a video on it is below

Chia Pudding from Tyler Archer on Vimeo.

I hope you try Chia seeds and come to enjoy them as much as I do!

Cooking for Two

I love to cook. Growing up I used to watch my mom cook and she made dinner every night for us and we had a family meal (without Haley though cause she was usually at dance class). But I remember sitting on the countertops and watching her cook and just seeing how calm and serene she looked while doing it. The majority of the time my mother and I spent together growing up was in the kitchen. So maybe thats why I love to cook.

Before I started dating Bruce I probably cooked for myself once or twice a month. I just never really did it because I hated cleaning up the mess and cooking for one is just so boring and wasteful. So the first few meals I made Bruce were kinda meant to WOW him, I made things with lots of flavor, lots of flair and made sure the table was always really nice. In the first few months I made him Chicken Piccata, Green Enchiladas, a roasted whole chicken, countless breakfasts, Carrot Cake, Dump Cake and more.

I haven't been cooking as much this semester cause we've both been so busy. What I have been doing though is keeping lots of food in my fridge so there's at least always something to eat. I keep healthier food around and try to limit the amount we eat out. I am loving the healthier food, I find myself eating substantially less fast food and fried food and actually rarely even crave it anymore. I eat all three meals a day usually with a snack in mid-morning and mid-afternoon. Things I like to always have on hand are: eggs, wheat bread, low-fat cheese, low-fat yogurt, milk, various nuts, stuff for sandwiches, apples, lettuce, spinach, cottage cheese, granola, wheat thins, cranberry juice, tomato juice, avocados, wheat pasta, trail mix, apple sauce, frozen fruit (for smoothies) and red potatoes. I know not all of this is healthy but a lot of it is much healthier than what I'm used to.

For me it isn't so much the losing weight, it's just about eating more balanced stuff. I used to live on Whataburger like 3 times a week now I can barely have one without feeling super super sick. Part of why I want to eat healthier is so that as a side-effect I'm also helping Bruce eat healthier. I know I can't control what he eats when he's not with me but I can make sure that when I cook, I'm cooking healthy balanced meals that are good for him too. He's diabetic and so these last few months I've been really reading up on it and trying to cook things that I know are good for him. Left to himself his diet usually consists of lots of fast food and about gallon of Diet Coke a day. Through my research I've found that there are certain vegetables and different things you can cook with that are great for diabetics and help work to keep his sugars down and kidneys working, so I always try to incorporate those into meals as well. He's definitely noticed my new found interest in getting healthy and I think its starting to have the effect I want and rubbing off on him. He's eating a little less, not drinking as much Diet Coke and most importantly smoking less.

So this week I've taken it a step further. On Sunday I made my birthmom's Vegan Chili which was about 4 cups of beans (red and black), bell peppers, onions, celery, carrots, chipotles, adobo sauce and seasonings. I cooked it all day and it turned out great! Bruce loved it, even though at first he was at first skeptical of the lack of meat. It was Super Bowl Sunday so I guess as a man it is the day to crave meat. But he loved it all the same. I made some spanish rice with it (which was not healthy) but luckily the chili is so filling that he didn't eat as much of the rice. Then for the rest of the week I've been making my Green Smoothies as seen below and they have been great. They are filling and I really feel the difference in my energy levels. When I have one in the morning it helps me stay awake and alert for the rest of the day.

So yesterday morning I was making my 4th Green Smoothie of the week and I ran out of Spinach! So I will definitely have to double my purchase or maybe just get a much bigger bag. But last night I was getting ready for bed and Bruce asked if I would make him a Green Smoothie and stick it in the fridge for him in the morning. I was so excited! I hadn't even thought to offer him one because it just didn't seem like the kinda thing he would normal go for but I was so thrilled that he wanted to try it. I told him I'd run out of Greens but that I'd happily make him a smoothie, I'd just have to figure out a way to put the lowest sugar fruits in it for him. So this morning I woke up and put a banana, 1/2 and orange, 1/2 an apple a small handful of blue berries and blackberries and then a good amount of carrot in the blender for him and whipped it up. I tasted it after to make sure it wasn't too sweet and it tasted fine. It didn't taste nearly as sweet as the ones I make for myself so I stuck it in the fridge for him. I am just so happy he asked, today I'm gonna look up online fruits and their sugar contents and try to buy some that I can put in the smoothie that will be good for him. I would hate to be giving him these delicious smoothies that are healthy for me to him and have them be unhealthy for him. I'm just so thrilled he is making a conscious effort to add some healthy-ness to his diet.

So it looks like my strategy is working. If I eat healthier he'll see it and want to do it himself! I know I wouldn't have started all this healthy stuff if he wasn't in my life. I want him to get healthy and the best way to do that is to get me healthy at the same time. For me the important thing is just adding lots more fruit and vegetables to my diet. I'm not taking away things, except for fast food, I'm just adding good stuff. I can't wait to keep exploring all theses great healthy food options. The best part is, that healthy food often has much more flavor than fatty-fried foods. They're also a lot of fun to cook. One day I hope I'll have little kids in the kitchen watching me cook healthy wonderful meals so they can grow up to do the same.

Green Smoothies Day 2

Green Smoothies Day Two from Tyler Archer on Vimeo.

So I'm slowly trying to add more healthy things to my diet- I'm not dieting per se I'm just adding healthy stuff to what I already eat. Right now its the Green Smoothies. One of my favorite blogs Happy Foody talks a lot about Green Smoothies and they have always been tempting but I just had never tried them. They seemed messy and like more work than they are so I just never went there. Well this weekend I was making Deirdre's Vegas Chili and decided to take the plunge and also try my first Green Smoothie. Happy Food has a very simple first recipe for them and I made my first one on Sunday. It was easy, it wasn't as messy as I thought and it tasted delicious.

The recipe is super easy:
1 Frozen Banana
1 whole peeled orange
handful of mixed frozen fruit (strawberries, cantaloupe, lots of berries and pineapple)
Fresh pineapple
Lots of Spinach

One thing that Happy Foody says that I wanted to try was putting you smoothie is a fun cup cause you'll be more likely to finish it. Also using a big straw so you get more of the good stuff faster. I'm using my Vegas cup from Fremont Street and it works great.

The green smoothie is awesome and freaking people out while drinking the green goop is fun too!

A Healthier Me

The way people eat often reflects the type of person they are or are trying to become. I think food can be a spiritual thing for some people but also a healing thing for others. I greatly believe that what you put into your body is reflected in your physical appearance and energy. I'm really working on what I eat. I'm not trying to do anything drastic all at once like I've tried and failed at before, but I'm just trying to change the way I use food. I am definitely a stress eater, an angry eater, an emotional eater, and a social eater. I can eat all the time. If I'm upset the first thing I'll look for is all the chocolate that is hidden around my apartment for those such emergencies. I crave carbs and can stand in my kitchen eating tortillas with butter on them for 1/2 an hour before realizing what I've done.

I started last semester trying to take my lunch to work and try to have balanced meals and snacks. I was able to keep that up for about a month. Then when I started dating Bruce I started cooking a little more often, but also started eating Whataburger close to 3 times a week. When I cook I always try to have a salad and veggies but that is the extent of what was healthy in my meals. As the needle on the scale quickly started racing towards 140 I decided that none of the measures I'd taken to lose weight worked and if they did, they were not working for me. Last summer I tried several crazy diets- the 3 day diet which is basically starving yourself and eating less than 700 calories a day. I made it half a day. Then I was suggested Diet Pills (I should have known better I know). I took 3 or 4 Venom (The name alone should have scared me) a day and while yes I had great energy I also was incredibly dehydrated and had to force myself to eat the little these pills allowed me to keep down. Needless to say these were both horrible ideas.

So this semester I will try again. So I've gone to HEB twice since the new year and each time I've tried to get lots of veggies and healthier food. I hate wheat but I've been eating wheat toast, wheat sandwiches, wheat pasta, wheat cereal and more I'm sure. And I try to have at least one piece of fruit today. I drink low-fat milk and try to drink a ton of water throughout the day. I snack on whole grain wheat thins with a low-fat laughing cow cheese wedge. After only another month of this I haven't noticed that much of a difference. I've lost some weight but the clothes aren't fitting. One thing I have noticed is I'm not craving salty things anymore like chips. And if I eat something really fried it hurts my stomach. Which is sad cause I miss my Egg Rolls from Jack-in-the-Box, but hey I don't need fried food. I'm actually not craving any fast food. Now its only been a few weeks and I'm already really bored with my lunches. I do still allow myself to eat out but I try to only have fast food once a week (usually Sunday's when I take lunch to my mom up at the hospital). When I go out to eat I order something healthier and tend to eat only half of it and save the rest for lunch the next day. This seems to be working cause magically I've lost 8 pounds already.

Now enter the Wii Fit. I have been waiting for my Wii fit for about a year. I've been wanting it and after 3 days with it, I'm loving it. When you first get your Wii it puts you through all these tests to find out you Wii Fit age (it tests balance, coordination and center of gravity- it's cool). Based on the tests I'm about 8 years older than I should be. My BMI is right below the level for being Overweight at 24.4 and my Wii trainer suggests I lose about 16 more pounds to reach an optimal weight. So far I really enjoy the yoga on the wii. It's kinda like having your own yoga instructor- there are all types for more advanced and less. I also enjoy all the step-aerobics type activities too. The Hula Hoop training is fun but right now my personal fave is probably rhythm Kung-Fu. So I'm doing about 30-45 minutes a day on it and we'll see how long that lasts. Again I'm not looking for drastic changes, just a little at a time and just trying to be a little healthier overall.