Pancakes with FLARE!

For the past six months I have enjoyed eating oatmeal, blueberries, and nuts every morning and last week I woke up and said to James: “I AM SO SICK OF OATMEAL!” We needed to find a breakfast alternative STAT! We busted out some super food pancakes, and I started looking forward to my breakfast again.

How on earth do you stuff super foods into pancakes? Easy! We used whole wheat flour, pumpkin, walnuts, almonds, pumpkin seeds, soy milk, cinnamon, and ginger to create a delicious breakfast alternative. We mixed several days of the mix to save time in the morning and skipped the syrup for thawed frozen berries and a teaspoon of honey.

Click to print or save the pancakes with flare recipe: PANCAKES WITH FLARE

What could you learn from someone else today?

Have you ever thought about what you could learn from someone else? We often get caught so caught up in what we know that we lose the opportunity to learn and grow from people we meet along life’s journey.


In my professional life, I am a registered nurse; specifically, my career focus is wellness. I recently resigned from my position as a wellness educator/coach to pursue my PhD. I can honestly say that when I first accepted my position at my former employer, I expected to “educate” patients about healthy living. What I did not expect is that I would grow and learn more from “patients” than they could ever learn from me.

My experience as a wellness coach provided an opportunity for me to talk with individuals bi-weekly in an intimate setting. Week after week, I found myself learning that ultimately we are all the same: we all desire energy, optimal health, physical and mental health; we all desire to act as role models to children and those around us; we all experience stress, challenges, moments of weakness. Individual goals and the time required to achieve success vary, but the ultimate desired outcome is the same.

I learned that when I took the time to listen, the journey of life is perfectly designed to teach me exactly what I needed to learn from every person who crossed my path. The people who crossed my paths came to me for help achieving their wellness goals, but when I took our interactions as an opportunity to learn from them, they richly blessed my life.

I will share some of the lessons I learned from wellness patients throughout my journey:

Lesson 1: about exercise: Our body is a miracle; it will do what we tell it to do!


Lesson 2: about life: You have to believe in what you want.


Lesson 3: about food: Sometimes you just need to broaden your horizons to healthy foods


Lesson 4: about mistakes: You have to live in a house without closets before you know you need them


Lesson 5: about strength: Sometimes being strong means you have to break down and cry


Lesson 5: about being too busy: If you are caught running with your bike helmet on, you need to slow down


Lesson 6: about beauty: Beauty is not defined by thin thighs and tight waist lines; beauty exists from deep within, when we take the time to listen, we learn that everyone posses tremendous beauty.


Lesson 7: about relationships: No one is perfect, but two people can be perfect together.

My experiences with each individual throughout my tenure as a wellness coach allowed me to recognize the importance of taking the time to learn from everyone, not just those who we expect to teach us something. Everyone knows something that someone else does not know. We each have our own voice, our own perspective, our own way of viewing the world. Sometimes hearing someone else’s words, thoughts, and ideas helps us through our own challenges even if the topic of the conversation seems worlds apart. Listen to someone today, you will be glad you did.

Patience pays $$, LITERALLY!!

Did you ever wonder why patience is a virtue? Did you ever think that patience would pay? Since James and I began to practice gazelle intense financial management to achieve our DEBT free goal, we both have to practice patience with purchasing items we really want (not need, want).

                                   "He that can have patience, can have what he will" Benjamin Franklin


I will share the best thing that happened to me from practicing patience this week! I continuously check out three "Super food" books from the library. I checked out and renewed the books for the greater part of the last year. I need to purchase the books, but they are too expensive for me right now.

James and I dropped some clothes off at GoodWill. I said: "let's go look around GoodWill!" We went inside and right in the front of the store is a bin of books. I walked over and started sorting through the books, and I said: "hey James, wouldn’t it be crazy if I found one of my Super Foods books here?"
                             
                                                    "All good things come to those who waits" Proverb

Literally immediately after the words rolled off my tongue James placed my favorite of the three Super Foods book in my hand!!! I am not joking! We looked at each other and laughed, and I wanted to cry!

The best part: when we checked out, the bin of books where we found my Super Foods book was the 50% off clearance box! Final cost for my book: $1.50 (now that fits my budget)!!

"The keys to patience are acceptance and faith.  Accept things as they are, and look realistically at the world around you. Have faith in yourself and the direction you have chosen."  Ralph Marston

15 Voices of Wisdom for Marital Bliss!

Over the past week, James and I liquidated our apartment in preparation for our big move. Throughout the packing and organizing process, I found boxes of memories I saved from James and my wedding. Tucked away in one of my file folders, I discovered 15 small post-it notes with words of wisdom from experienced married couples who attended my Aroostook country bridal shower.


James and I celebrated our two year Anniversary on Monday! Two years into the marriage, I am happy to read the advice offered to me during the “pre-marital” phase because I realized that wise women attended my bridal shower; I included their happy marriage wisdom below:



1. Take one day a week for “date” night with your husband

2. Tell him you love him

3. Cook something good (I am really slacking in this category!!)

4. Don’t hold things in, always communicate (Talking is my specialty, just ask James)

5. Be true to yourself

6. Keep the curtains closed

7. Even though you know that you are right, be smart and make him think he is right

8. Don’t start our married life waiting on James; better yet get him to wait on you! (A+ on this one)

9. Pinch each other’s butts in public…and laugh about it (do it at home, too!)

10. (5 votes) Don’t go to bed mad

11. You have so many moments on earth. Every time you use a moment to worry or be angry, you lose a moment to be joyful

Marital bliss is easy when you marry your best friend

4 cheerful reasons you should make veggie burgers from scratch!

What if I told you that home-made veggie burgers would satisfy your hunger and provide energy that would last throughout your day! Would you believe me? I hope so because the main ingredient in our cheerful veggie burgers is black beans!

You can purcase cheaper black beans if you soak and cook them yourself!

Black beans excite me and here’s why: they are CHEAP, contain 15 GRAMS of fiber (1cup), offer 12 grams of protein, stabilize your blood sugar by providing slow burning energy, low in calories, high in antioxidants (antioxidants help our cells stay healthy to prevent crazy medical conditions like Alzheimer’s, stroke, cancer, Parkinson’s….and the list goes on), and they taste FABULOUS!!

Black Bean Veggie Burgers!

You body WANTS real, home-made, nutrient rich food, not imitation store bought food. Here are 4 great reasons why you should ditch the store bought veggie burgers and switch to cheerful home-made veggies:

1. Cost: Everyone complains that healthy food costs too much! Well healthy food will cost more when we take the easy way out. This box of 4 garden burgers nearly breaks that bank at $4.49 for 4 BURGERS! Homemade veggie burgers cost at least 50% less than store bought burgers!

WAAOSSASAS! PRICEY BUSINESS!! $7.18/unit price!

2. Divert your heart attack: Yes, I bet you wouldn’t imagine that buying store bought veggie burgers would lead to high blood pressure? The truth is that 1 garden burger contains 400mg of SODIUM!! Sodium contributes to high blood pressure, and did you know you are only supposed to consume between 1200mg-1500mg PER DAY? Who knew that 1 veggie patty would drain your sodium account by 1/3 (without condiments, cheese, or the bun!)

Heart Healthy Veggie Burgers (with a side of fiddle heads)

3. Avoid “knock off foods”: The garden burger is filled with 42 ingredients! You might think, “oh wow, tons of super foods?” NOT! How do you feel about eating: guar gum, smoke flavor, autolyzed yeast extract, modified vegetable gum, or annatto?? What are these foods? Are they even food? Wait until you see the super foods stuffed into the home-made vegetable burgers!

The ingredients consume the ENTIRE side of the  graden burger package!  My iPhone could not capture a clear picture, and I was trying to snap the picture quickly before the store clerk caught me!!

4. Improve Satiety: Home-made vegetable burgers offer the body real food and believe it or not when you eat real food you feel more satisfied than when you eat “knock off” food. I can see the little cells inside your body jumping up and down and doing cart wheels when they are fed real food!

Kristina enjoys a veggie burger after her run! She approves!

Click here: to print the Cheerful Veggie Burger recipe!  Don't forget to enjoy on a whole wheat bun!

Fresh Dose of Optimism from Kentucky!!

How has the economy affected you and your life? Have you found yourself in a “dead-end” useless job making less than you are “worth?” Danielle, one of my blog readers, wrote in from Kentucky about how she turned despair and hopelessness into optimism despite the failing economy!

Danielle is a medical assistant who worked three long years to earn her associates degree only to find that the job market for her field is unpromising. She applied for countless jobs as a medical assistant and finally accepted a job as a bakery clerk.

Danielle felt like a failure, she believed that she was starting “at the bottom again.” How could she be respected in this world while earning low wages and working under a meaningless title?

After reading the blog: Does your career define you? Danielle realized that she was chasing “societies” dreams and expectations, rather than her own. When she sat and reflected deeply about her life and her dreams, she realized: she already had a rich, successful, and respectable life!

                             “Sometimes things need to fall apart before the fall into place”

She recognized that failure did not result from absence of high wages, or a fancy job title; failure occurred when she degraded and gave up on herself because she allowed societies perceptions to determine the value of her life.

Danielle married her best friend on earth, and her goal is to devote her life to raising a wonderful and loving family. Happiness and success radiates from Danielle when she chooses to focus on what genuinely matters in her life.

   “When life veers from the course you planned out, re-evaluate your priorities, and maybe you’ll find that what you have is better than what you had planned”

23 Power House Foods that Dropped my Husband's "BAD" cholesterol 46 POINTS!!

Do you think you could eat super foods most of the time? Six months ago, James and I set out on a “Super food adventure!” We pledged to consume nothing but super foods for one week. Well, one week turned into two and before long, we decided to devote our eating habits to super foods.



Why did we decide to embark on such a seemingly radical adventure? For starters, I read a significant amount of research about the health benefits associated with super foods and since James is a good husband and listens to me talk endlessly, he thought: “if these foods are so great for you, why don’t we just eat them!?”

Even though Super foods are grounded in evidence based research, I never imagined that we would experience personal and drastic health benefits from eating them!




I am here to scream from the mountain tops the value of eating a diet rich with super foods! Why? Because here are the facts: our healthcare system is collapsing around us, we must eat to survive, we CHOOSE our own healthcare, why wouldn’t we want to feed our body the best medicine on earth: food, specifically nutrient-rich, power house, super foods?



Six months ago James had his cholesterol drawn, below are his results (good thing he isn’t a modest husband, here I go plastering his personal information over the internet!)

(12/2009)

Total Cholesterol: 172

HDL (healthy cholesterol, the more you have the better). 50

LDL (loser cholesterol, the less you have the better). 116

SIX MONTHS & LOADS OF SUPER FOODS LATER (06/2010)

Total Cholesterol: 145

HDL: 55

LDL: 70

James total cholesterol DROPPED 27 points, his LDL dropped 46 points, and his HDL increased 5 points!  Is that, or is that not, AMMMAZING!? We have experienced other health benefits, too: improved sleep, increased energy, increased concentration, decreased stress, improved GI, increased athletic performance, and the list goes on.... 

I included the complete list of super foods below. Each super food listed has a “partner in crime” Pratt (2009) defines these little partners as “side-kicks” meaning they have a similar nutrient profile as the defined super food. The partners in crime help to add variety to your diet.

Remember, the power of super foods exists from eating each food consistently. You cannot expect to eat a big Mac from McDonalds and wash it down with an apple and be “okay.” Super foods improve your health when you consume most of them daily. Trust me, if James and I can make this happen, you can make it happen, too!!



Original 14 Super foods & Their Partners in crime:

Beans: all dried beans, string beans, sugar snap peas, green peas

Blueberries: purple grapes, cranberries, boysenberries, raspberries, strawberries, fresh currants, blackberries, cherries, and all other fresh or frozen berries

Broccoli: Brussels sprouts, cabbage, kale, turnips, cauliflower, collards, bok choy, mustard green, Swiss chard

Oats: wheat germ, ground flaxseed, brown rice, barley, wheat, buckwheat, rye millet, bulgar wheat, amaranth, quinoa, triticale, kamut, yellow corn, wild rice, spelt, couscous

Oranges: lemons, white and pink grapefruit, kumquats, tangerines, limes

Pumpkin: Carrots, butternut squash, sweet potatoes, orange bell peppers

Salmon: Alaskan halibut, chunk light tuna, sardines, herring, trout, bass, oysters, clams

Soy: tofu, soy milk, soy nuts, edamame, tempeh, miso

Spinach: kale, collards, Swiss chard, mustard greens, turnip greens, bok-choy, romaine lettuce, orange bell peppers

Tea: green and black

Tomatoes: watermelon, pink grapefruit, Japanese persimmons, red fleshed papaya, strawberry guava

Turkey: skinless chicken breast

Walnuts: almonds, pistachios, pumpkin, sesame and sunflower seeds, macadamia nuts, pecans, hazelnuts, cashews, peanuts, pine nuts, Brazil nuts

Additional research uncovered the following additional super foods & super spices

Apples: pears

Avocado: asparagus, artichokes, extra virgin olive oil

Dark Chocolate (don’t let crazy packaging fool you, real dark chocolate doesn’t really taste that great)

Dried Super Fruits: raisins, dates, prunes, figs, apricots, blueberries, cranberries, cherries, currants

Extra virgin olive oil: canola oil

Honey (the darker the better)

Kiwi: pineapple, guava

Onions: garlic, scallions, shallots, leeks, chives

Pomegranates: plums

Super Spices:

Cinnamon

Oregano

Cumin

Garlic

Thyme

Turmeric

I included a few of our favorite super food recipies below, I will continue to post more recipies as we create, taste, and give the Strout stamp of approval!
Macoronin & Cheese

Breakfast Oats Recent additions: 1 tsp cinnamon & 1 tsp honey

Pizza

Sketti & Meatballs

Meatball Sub

Shopping for superfoods on a budget!

5 helpful hints to deciding what you want to do when you grow up

What do you want to accomplish in your life? Did you ever stop and wonder how some people get everything they want out of their lives? Do you believe that some people are just “lucky?” Or do you believe that people who actively participate in their life create the life they want?

Throughout the past year, I encountered a significant epiphany: I realized that I could be “one of those people” you know, the type of person who does everything he or she ever wanted to do and more.

As I observed the human behaviors of those around me, I recognized: people who work in their preferred jobs, participate in their favorite activities, enjoy life; embrace new opportunities, and set and achieve goals are people who believe they control their lives.

Interesting, I thought: “life and happiness is really this simple?” I just think about what I want out of life and then I plan to make exactly what I want happen!?”

To start planning for the future, I knew that I needed to refine my career goals. I do not believe that my careers define me, nor do I believe that my career determines my happiness; however, I do have a strong drive to improve our health care system and the nursing profession, so to me, loving my career is a high priority.

What and who do I want to be when I grow up? This is the question we asked ourselves, many people ask themselves this question even after they are all grown up. Here is how I used laser beam focus to determine what I want to be when I grow up, if you are still thinking about what you want to be, maybe you will find the tips helpful:

1. Reflect on Past Experiences & identify the highlights:

I needed to hold onto the components of my career that love. I definitely wanted to continue to work within the wellness profession, hands down. I also wanted to work with people, not over the phone, but in person: real, live, people. I want a strong sense of purpose; I want to contribute and improve the nursing profession and most important, the greater good of society.

2. Reflect on Past Experiences & identify the challenges:

I needed to relinquish the components of my career that I did not enjoy. The first on my list: living in a cubicle. I do not know who thought that shoving someone in a 5.5X5.5 space without sunlight for 8 hours every day, five days every week was healthy? I knew that I needed to “let go” of cubicle land!

I also needed to “let go” of the restraints of time: showing up at work at specific times and leaving at specific times for no apparent reason, just to say I was there

I need autonomy. I need to experience forward growth and daily challenge in a supportive workplace.

3. Identify your strengths:

Targeting my weaknesses is easier than targeting strengths. Sometimes we get so caught up in weaknesses that we do not allow or minds to think freely and creatively. We hold ourselves back from living because we cannot gravitate toward our natural talents. I recognize that my signature strength is sociability! I genuinely love people, and I truly and passionately want to encourage others to achieve everything they dream in life. I am also driven, motivated, and committed. I need a career that will embrace my energies and strengths.

4. Define what you love:

I love school. I enjoy learning, researching, and thinking. I enjoy community, diversity, and charity.

5. Calculate: Strengths+ loves+ challenges + keep

Once I determined my strengths, loves, challenges and keeps, I arrived at my final career choice: Nursing Professor. Why? Because as a professor I can focus on wellness research, influence and mentor new nurses, build wellness education into the foundation of the nursing career, enjoy a flexible schedule that provides autonomy, challenge, diversity, and I can ESCAPE the cubicle- YAY!

Identifying my career is step one. Planning is step two. Over the past year, James and I have planned our lives in preparation for our new career change. We organized our finances, sacrificed, paid down debt, learned to live minimally, applied to colleges and universities, interviewed and finally arrived at step three: we will both begin working toward our PhDs (mine in nursing and his in engineering) starting September 8, 2010.

I believe in loving what you do, identifying what you want in life and going full steam forward until you get exactly what you want. For me, earning my PhD is something that I identified, planned, and will achieve. Maybe for you, your dream is to be a stay-at-home mother, a writer, a photographer, a janitor, a dominos employee…what you do is not importance, but feeling connected, committed, and excited about who you are through what you do will generate tremendous joy and happiness in your life.