Gosh that looks delicious!

Good for you on learning that you don't have to be so strict with your body all the time on raw.  It sounds like you're letting yourself be a bit more creative with combinations and hopefully your confident raw cheffing skills will come running back too!!!!!

The one word that I saw written on the forums & I often keep in mind with raw is 'abundance'.  I like to have an 'embracing all the good things' state of mind, rather than a state of mind that looks at what I can't have.  Makes all the difference for me.

PS:  you and Caitlyn definitely do look alike! It's too cute.  Bizarre that she doesn't look like her grandmother but you do, I guess the 'halves' of people that add up to what they look like came from different people there!

Me too. I feel different about food at the moment. I am enjoying many things!


Well Eve I am NOT going to change my pic if it's going to have people falling off their chairs! LOL. I don't want to be responsible for your concussion! Tee hee.

Thank you very much though, I feel younger too. More vibrant and definitely happier. At least these days when I am unhappy I can pinpoint why with truth. I always could when I was depressed too but there was an element of drama and truth bending there. These days I am a lot more accurate!!!!

I've mentioned here a few times about how I have dreams where I am runnig that are soooooo real. I also have dreams that I am roller blading or doing yoga and in my dreams I always do these things extremely well. Lately I have been having these dreams more often. and I have started waking up with sore muscles. The other night I dreamed that I went for a run and stopped to do some stretches half way through my run. In my dream I was sitting on the ground with my legs straight out in front of me with my body lying flat on my legs.

I was saying to myself, my body knows it can do this. My thoughts, my beliefs are stopping it. When I woke in the morning I was so sore at the backs of my legs and I can stretch about 10 cm further than I could before! Trippy.

I just hope that I am not sleep walking/running/yogaing.... I sleep in my birthday suit and running around in the middle of the night gives me the creeps! No mud on my feet in the morning. If anyone has any ideas on why my muscles hurt after these dreams I would love to hear!

Another big thing I am up to at the moment is practicing acceptance for the things I can't do anything about. Like the serenity prayer I suppose.

One of our neighbours has a dog that they have decided in their wisdom to let outside to bark all night. I don't know why...

When I was a child, we had a blue heeler whose neighbours, who at their own admission could sleep through a bomb, let it roam at night and it used to drive my dad mad. Dad just cannot sleep through barking dogs and his insomnia lead to terrible moods back then. These days he still can't sleep but is pretty mellow from what I can tell.

Anyhow, I get really angry when people let their dogs out at night to bark and bark. Last night I realised that Caitlyn, Brock and Bill were all sleeping. Other neighbours never hear dogs barking... so it was me! At first I raged about how these owners were selfish and that they should move their dog inside at night to have consideration.

Then my little brain through the word acceptance at me. I was lying there with my eyes screwed shut and I literally saw the word in lime green letters float through the blackness. So I decided that I have the problem. If everyone else could sleep with it so could I. Everytime the dog barked after that I repeated a mantra to myself "I accept that this dog will bark. I accept that I can sleep knowing that this dog is barking" and I kid you not, I was asleep in less than 15 minutes.

Awesome.

I have some more photos to share today.

I bought a big 12 kg watermelon the other day and chopped it up for smoothies and sorbet and Caitlyn wondered around taking shots here and there.



I'll have some more later.

Hi there! I'd thought I'd stop by your space finally to say hi! I have been reading for a while so now I'm outta the shadows! You and your kiddies look so gorgeous, healthy and full of life.

I hope you enjoyed the rest of that beautiful watermelon.

love x

Jennie take a look at no dig gardens. That would be perfect for that location. You build on top of the soil and it's easy. That's how I did the whole garden in front of our last place in Bilambil Heights and it went from clay with no drainage to a gorgeous garden in about 6 months.

Another interesting concept is square foot gardening. That book specializes in growing as much as possible in small spaces. They have some tremendous results. I think you can find some information on the net too.

Love,
Sheryl

Jen, we too did all of our patches by the NO DIG method that Sheryl mentioned. Start saving newspaper and card board now in preparation. It really is easy.

And I would definately utilise the wall. I have just spent my tax cheque on trellis for our fences and our beans, cucumbers, peas and tomatoes love it. The colourbond fence was too hot, but I think your bricks should be just fine.

I would have to say I eat nearly 100% Raw when my garden is productive. When I buy organic we struggle financially, but I figure health is the most precious thing one can have. And I just can't buy non organic tomatoes and such after eating our own.

So I now am getting up early in the mornings and spending no less than 10mins sowing new seeds, weeding and tending. And it is working. Every few weeks I'll start new tomatoes, lettuce etc so that I will have a constant supply.

And I feel great, grounded and not so bad about spending time at work inside.

Plant your garden Jen and you'll be wondering how you ever lived without it 
xxxxxx

Thanks everyone for the gardening advice. I've passed it on to Bill and he is quite exited. One of my brothers friends runs a business growing and selling organic seedlings and I'm going to hit him up for permaculture advice as he has studied that extensively.

I was going to work tonight but I am completely tuckered. I have been eating so much. Not giving myself time to get hungry. I have allowed food to become a habit while I am at my desk. Who needs to eat as much as I am while sitting on their heiny anyhow? Not I... I must have had six full meals today.

I've also overdone it on kale, baby spinach and silverbeet in smoothies. I am getting a sore throat after them which I have been told is a sign that I have eaten too much oxaclic acid. So I need to find other greens. I'm really craving clover. I'm looking forward to having this patch. I'm sure that most of the clover in our back yard has been peed on by Bella and I'm not really keen for that but when I look at it my mouth waters!

I used to have heaps of it in the gardens in the front yard and then we mastered how to mulch to keep weeds out of the garden and to keep water in also.

I am off to read Autobiography of a yogi. I've discovered that when I am overworked that I sleep like a person with their eyes shut all night after just a couple of pages of that book. Good stuff.

Hi Sheryl, that was a great garden you had going there. Yummm! All those greens...

Jungle it's great to know the name of the milk thistle. I really enjoyed it in my smoothie and on it's own it had a charm also!

Amaluca, it's great to see you again! Thank you for letting me know how much time you spend in your garden each day. I'll tell Bill. 10 minutes a day is not a lot.

Hey Freedom! It's a very trendy compost thing isn't it! I think we will end up dividing it in two as it is huge! We really need to look after it as well as it is just outside of Caitlyn's bedroom and she is worried about the smell.

I'm a  little worried that the area will not get enough sun but I'm sure that we will find stuff that grows in there just fine!

xoxoxxo

Hullo JJ. Mwah! I am so exited that we'll be catching up soon. I feel so lucky that you are dropping by my place! I'll buy one of those cakes and have a lunch or dinner while you are here and we can eat the whole thing! Well... maybe not the whole thing but what a dessert!

I have learned a lesson! For months now I have been putting myself under incredible stress. By saying "I have to do this now" or "I need to get this done" along with "there is not enough time" and worrying incessently about not getting everything done TODAY (everyday) I have not been good to my health.

I believe that our emotions are as important to our health, if not more so than food. Truly I do. My emotions surface internally mostly. So I have clear skin and eyes from the food I eat and look great... however I reckon, with the physical feeling in my stomach that I am near to having a stomach ulcer again. I only get these when I smoke (9years since I've had one) so that says a lot.

Funnily enough the tummy stuff didn't really cause me to take notice. In fact because it is a familiar feeling I didn't even really notice it. It was when I fainted the other day... I mean, so stressed that I have to pass out to have a break? Come on Jen!

Yesterday morning I nearly fainted again. So I let some blood rush to my head and went and took a ten minute break. During that break I made myself a rockmelon smoothie and got some sunshine. I felt like a million bucks afterwards!

I've been pandering to my stress. If I've been thinking 'I have to get this done by ...o'clock" I have not taken breaks. I have just kept going. Often I don't leave the office for 12 hours at a time except to go to the loo!

Yesterday that changed. I will not be a slave to worrying thoughts. They are only thoughts and that is all. I am only human... perfect in my imperfections yes? So yesterday if I felt stressed I walked OUT of the office and sat in the sun until calmess timidly knocked on the door. Once I had invited calmness in stress became huffy and left the premises slamming the door behind him. Child. Anyhow, the first time it took ages. But by the end of the day all I had to do was walk out and look at the sky and feel better.

I got loads more work done in a shorter amount of time and was a lot happier by the end of the day. A good experiment yes!

I met up with Bliss in the afternoon and am pleased to report that she was just as I thought she would be. I have spoken to her on the phone though. If I had only read her posts then I would have thought otherwise as she writes a little differently to how she speaks thank goodness! I understood everything she said which was awesome!  We had a great chat about Raw Spirit and have come together with some good ideas. It will be a great event!

I am going to make myself a smoothie and calmly get on with my day!

Have a great and good day all...

xoxoxox

Oops, near on forgot a funny for you...