Welcome Back

Welcome back to our Blog.

I Know you've missed us!

We were at a 'Blogging for wellness' Roadshow on Saturday in Banbridge  Library. We both really loved it and are inspired to blog again. Its been well over 2 years since I was blogging and I have no idea why I stopped, to be honest. Because there are two things I really love to do. One is writing and the other is talking. So I'm Back hopefully with hubby and son in tow too.

I did a small vlog tonight testing out a mobile phone tripod Andrew picked up in Poundland today for us. Highly recommended by one of the speakers on Saturday. And It has me so psyched up that I can't sleep. Not the tripod but the vlog. The vlog is by no means perfect, far from it, but we were encouraged to just start, no excuses, just do it. It'll get better as time goes on. So I'm excited about the opportunities that lie ahead. 

My head is spinning with ideas and so I better make a plan; So far we are going to continue with this blog which is about our family, our health issues, our desires to be healthier and how we go about doing that. We also will continue with our Christian devotional blog as well.

However, I am thinking of writing on many other topics as well.

Also alongside us writing and vlogging I'll be looking for Guest bloggers as well. If youre Interested let us know. So thats all for now.

Watch this Space.

P.S. Video below of my vlog in case you didn't see it already

https://www.facebook.com/elaine.dickson.988/videos/10157174322120127 

A Rant about M.E. not just me.

I haven’t written much in a while so I think it’s time to get into it today. My Chronic illness (Both M.E and Fibromyalgia) steals so much from my life and often writing is one of the things I just have to abandon so I can prioritise living through each day. And when I say living through each day I mean that , from getting out of bed in the morning, to eating breakfast, to getting washed, setting my son up for his home education (which he works hard at). Then after that usually I’m away back to bed, get up for lunch, have lunch, try to potter about tidying away a few things and then back to bed for the afternoon. That sets me up for the evening, Hubby makes the dinner, I supervise lol (not that he needs any), have dinner, spend a bit of time watching my fav programmes and then away to bed. Sounds mundane doesn’t it, (And thats a good day) well that’s what it is and that can get me down, it would get anyone down, and that’s why I want to write, I want to write to rise above it, I want to write to feel inspired, I want to write to share that while life for me is difficult there are so many people suffering from ME that can’t get out of bed at all. Their carers day in and day out look after their every need and worry continually about their wife, husband, daughter, son, granny, grandad..etc. Why, because the Health services don’t really care, well not enough to create a care pathway for ME patients, or change their attitude about us, what we suffer, how much we suffer, and for many health professionals to finally believe that we are physically ill.

Coming up in May there will be a number of ME/Fibro Awareness events so I've posted a link to my local advocacy group Hope 4 Fibro & ME event;  https://www.facebook.com/MillionsMissingNewry17

Also if your're from further afield the link below will inform you of all other events globally in and around 12th May;

https://www.facebook.com/events/294671740906882/

Making Life simpler

I haven't been on for a while here. So apologies, but I fully intend to write regularly again.
Part of the reason I haven't been here is because I was making this blog too complicated with trying to put a new recipe up each time and that was too time consuming. However I will still put up recipes so never fear.

My mojo has disappeared, I have looked everywhere and I can't find it, its not in the fridge, cupboard or anywhere in my house. I thought I saw it briefly on Monday at my weight watchers class, but it got away.

This year has been so up and down weight wise sometimes you just want to give up, I really feel like giving up! But then I know if I give up, that's it, I'll never lose my weight. I'm going on 42 at the end of the year and I want to lose this excess weight once and for all. What I need is a plan.

My Current plan for this week is to track my food better but my plan for the next 2 months before Christmas is this beautiful dress I bought earlier on in the year, it nearly fit me at the time but sure I've put up since then. So I want to lose a stone before Christmas and that is why if I make it public here I'm accountable to you all, whether you like it or not...lol.

The Dress, photo doesn't do it justice but the diamantes at the neckline are gorgeous. 

 

Still haven't found that Mojo but that's ok, while I'm waiting for it to come back, I'll keep on going, I'll keep going to class, keep going with healthy meals, keep going with blogging and then we'll see if Mojo returns soon.

Consitency is the key, but its hard to find!

It's been a hard enough few weeks over the July holidays to be consistently eating healthy for Andrew and I.
What we have been focusing on, is what motivates us;
Andrew stated: 'What motivates me most is this', as he pointed to all the tablets he takes in the morning, 'I want to come off these tablets, and oxygen machine (which he uses all night & on and off during the day) so that's why I want to eat healthy. '

Andrews tablets in the morning & he has more to take in the evening!

That's why eating this is important.

So one of the things that motivates us as well is that food needs to look good. If its pleasing to the eye it is much more enjoyable to eat, but of course porridge and shredded wheat have its place too.

One of our lunches

We like to set up the day well with a good breakfast, every morning, but especially love our cooked  breakfasts (usually at weekends). Below is one of our favourite breakfasts, Poached egg with avocado, wheaten and tomatoes.

 Recipe: Poached egg with avocado, wheaten and tomatoes.

Serves 2  Approx 11(Smart Points) per serving

Ingredients:

1 Avocado 
2 eggs
4 slices wheaten
low low butter
Salt and Pepper to taste

Method

1. Peel the avocado and mash with 1 tsp oil and a 1/2 tsp lemon (just a drop), small pinch of salt and pepper.
2. Toast your Wheaten . We used Ormo Toasting wheaten (3 sp for 1 slice, 5 sp for 2 slices)
3. On one slice spread the avocado as much as you want (remembering that an average whole Avocado is usually about 10 sp, we used about 3sp worth guesstimate)
4. Poach an egg and lay it on the avocado spread
5. On the 2nd slice of wheaten use a tspn of Low Low butter and top with 3 or 4 cherry tomatoes halved
6. Pepper to taste

And Voila, there we go, doesn't take long to prepare at all and you have a great looking Mediterranean breakfast. 

 

Normally when we have a big breakfast we have a light lunch and then a regular dinner.

This sets us up well for the day and motivates us to eat healthier throughout the day.
Sustaining that motivation can be difficult, its easy enough to eat healthy at lunch and as long as we're prepared a healthy Dinner but for us it is usually the evenings that catch us out. For us the big challenge is to have snacks prepared that will keep us on track  and not ruin our whole day's efforts.
So as we travel on this healthy journey we will share as we learn ourselves what snacks can keep us going in the evenings.
Next blog coming sooner...( we hope to put a blog out at least once a week)

Welcome to our healthy home blog

A big welcome to everyone who reads this blog. My husband Andrew and I (Elaine) have been thinking for a while now to start a blog about eating healthy, living healthy and living a simpler life. We both suffer with ill health and we have an 11 year old son whom we home educate. 
We both attend Weight Watchers since September 2015. Our weight loss is going slow so this blog will be a way of keeping us accountable on our journey. We also hope to share with you our ups and downs along the way and recipes by Andrew the best unofficial chef I know.  

In the Kitchen.

At the moment we have a very small kitchen so often it is not the most encouraging place to cook and bake. However we can come up with very tasty meals and Andrew is very good at the presentation so we'll have some good photos to go along with our recipes.
So enough said we'll start with a dinner we prepared a few days ago. 

Spicy Minced steak & Dahl with Courgetti & Chappatis (Approx 12 sp or lower)

Serves 6

Ingredients:

For the Dahl
220g Yellow Split pea lentils (washed)
1 heaped tsp Garlic powder 
1 Chicken Stock Cube 
Water
1 stick Celery (diced)
1 Carrot (grated)
1 Onion  (diced)

For the Mince Dish
400g Mince Lean (we used MeatMarket Mince from the 'Today' shop)
1 red pepper (diced)
1/2 onion (diced)
1 tsp Ground Coriander
1 tsp Worcestershire sauce
45g Tomatoe puree
1 tin Tomatoes (chopped)
Salt & pepper to season

For the Chapatties 
440g Chappati Flour
100ml Water or more
2 tbsp oil (olive oil or vegetable oil)  

Courgetti 
1 Courgette (spiralised)
1 tbsp Olive oil
1tbsp lemon juice
Pinch of Salt

 Method

 For the Dahl: (taken from an 1800s recipe)
1. Put the lentils in a saucepan, cover in water, add the garlic powder and stock cube, bring to the boil.
2. Once its boiled leave it on a rolling boil for 20 Minutes
3. Add the celery, turn down to a simmer for 5 mins before adding the onion and carrot.
4. Simmer for a further 5 minutes, remove from the heat , mash it up and put a lid on it.

For the Mince:
1. in a large pan Saute onions and then add the mince
2. Once the mince has browned add the red pepper, onion, coriander, Worcestershire sauce and tomatoe puree; Stir and cook for 5-10mins
3. Add the tin of chopped tomatoes and bring to the boil, allow to simmer for 20 mins
4. Cover the pan and leave to one side

For the Chappaties:
1. Mix the chappati flour with the water and pinch of salt, use a fork to mix it then get your hands in there and knead the dough . (Be easy on the water, you may need more or less)   
2. Then add the oil and knead together until it is a well coated shiny dough (ooohh, shiny)
3. Roll it out on a well floured board, then divide it into 12 dough balls. (As equal in size as possible) Using extra chappati flour to shape the dough balls and avoid stickiness
4. You can leave in the fridge for a while if you want but you can cook them straight away
5. Heat up a chappatti pan or pancake pan (which we used, because we have a chappatti pan but can we find it..no..but its somewhere in the house)
6. Roll out one ball at a time into a crepe shape and cook on a dry pan, turning over about three times, you will know its ready when it puffs up.
7. leave to one side to cool 

For the Courgetti:
1. Simply spiralise the courgette (or use a good old fashioned Julienne peeler like we did)
[we used the middle of the courgette diced it up and added it to the mince]
2. In a bowl mix the courgette noodles in the olive oil, lemon juice with a touch of salt, its best to use your hands again at this stage to mix it thoroughly.
3. It is ready to serve

Plating Up  

Serves 6 so plate up all the food evenly between the 6 plates and we added a sliced egg at the side.

We have estimated the meal at 12 Smartpoints per plate, but you could just have one chappati. (chappati 2sp each, serving of mince 4sp, serving of Dahl 2sp, 1 egg 2sp)

  
 We hope you enjoy this meal. We did and even our son ate it too. This is one we will cook again in a few weeks. Its the best indian/italian combo dish, better than any restaurant could dish out. I know I'm probably a bit biased but you try it and let us know what you think.