New feature and poll results

Not surprisingly, most votes in my poll were for Christmas. Seventy five percent of voters (18 people) said they were celebrating Christmas. Five people voted for the Winter Solstice, two for Yule, two for Nothing and four for Other. There are still a few hours left to vote.

I just added a new widget. I have recently become interested in yoga. I found some magazines at the library which were quite good - Yoga Journal - and they have an interesting website with a library of poses and vegetarian and vegan recipes, among other things.

The widget is for the Pose of the Day! I seem to have added the html code correctly, and even went so far as to edit it slightly to fit the widget into my sidebar better. Hopefully, this gadget automatically updates every day. If you click on the tiny writing "step by step" you will be flung into Yoga Journal's site and given a detailed description of how to do the pose! Very cool.

Climbing the walls

I was climbing the walls tonight....but in a good way! Tai Chi Man and I took two of the boys to the indoor climbing centre - a friend's son came too.


Lego Nut has been before but the rest of us were climbing wall virgins!


It was fun! Hands are a little sore now, and I'm sure there'll be a few muscles letting themselves be known tomorrow. The kids want to go back again....and again....and again!

There's a drop-in on Saturdays so I'm sure I'll take them now and then (and I'll sit upstairs and knit and occasionally watch them climb). After all, I can't risk damaging my knitting fingers, can I?

That red blob in the centre is Tai Chi Man - you can hardly see him for all the handholds and tape on the walls.

And the best part? The boys' school paid for them to climb as an educational expense.

Good morning

Did anyone else have trouble with Bloglines this morning? I clicked on it as usual, and some of my regular blogs were highlighted, as if there were new posts. However the numbers said 121, or 200, or 43 and when I clicked on them they were all old posts. Bizarre!

I had a good start to my day. I dragged my butt out of bed extra early and drove through the stormy windy wet weather to the rec centre for a yoga class. An hour of me-time - yeah - and very relaxing and invigorating it was too. I doubt it will become a regular event - I can save myself the $9 and the gas and do it at home. Sometimes, though, it's nice to take a class to make sure that you're doing the asanas properly.

I will be going to the gym for weight-training and another yoga class at the Y with a friend next week, so that'll be more of a social event. Have to keep up the fitness while I'm playing hooky from Taekwon-do.

Awesome socks, books and music!

Aaah, the excitement of finishing a sock. The toe is the best part - you know you're almost there, the rounds get shorter and shorter, and before you know it the sock is on your foot. Of course, there is still another one to knit :o)


There seem to be elections everywhere this week, so I thought I'd add a couple of my own votes to some great music and books. The above book, The Fall, has my vote for Book of the Week. The sub-title is "The evidence for a Golden Age, 6000 years of insanity, and the dawning of a new era."

This is a well-researched book that explains the type of culture that existed in "pre-civilisation" times (matriarchal, peaceful, artistic, close to nature) and then goes on to show how things changed (patriarchal, warlike, material). I haven't read much of it yet but the summary on the back promises to suggest action we can take to return our society to a state of harmony.

The sub-title should, I think, be "It doesn't have to be like this"! It is very apparent from my reading with the children (Story of the World by Susan Wise Bauer) that the last 6000 years have been a period of one war after another, male domination and oppression of women, children and nature, constant fighting for power, land, wealth. All in all, a miserable state of affairs, but one which I hope we can change by not accepting that it is normal or natural for human beings to live like this. Why can't we return to a time of peace, co-operation, equality? I can always hope.


My exercise this week has been on my rebounder (mini-trampoline) and following the yoga poses in this book. Some of them I can do and others are more challenging, but I enjoy trying. I especially love the Salute to the Sun (video from YouTube below)...

You can do this one any time, anywhere, and I usually do a few in a row, as I find I get more flexible with each one. It really makes the energy zing!

While I was on the rebounder, I was listening to my current favourite music - Afro Celt Sound System. This stuff is effing brilliant - a fusion of African drumming and Celtic fiddling, great vocals, a beat to make you want to get up and dance. I borrowed all three CDs that I could find at the library and I wish I had more.

I just found a video of one of my favourite tracks - it's called Release and features Sinead O'Connor's voice.

Well, a long post, but lots of food for thought. Enjoy the music!

Electromagnetic radiation

If you're a cell phone user, or considering getting one for your child, perhaps you should watch this video first. If brain tumours in kids are up 21%, then isn't it a strong possibility that cell phones and the huge amount of electronic equipment we use in our homes today is causing them?

Salad for breakfast

I wish I had a photo of my colourful breakfast, but I wouldn't have done it justice and anyway I wanted to eat it straight away! It was a layered mix of baby salad greens, green onion, grated carrot and grated beets with a dressing of olive and flax oils, lime juice, Himalayan salt and garlic. Doesn't that sound horrendously healthy!

I have to say that the cleanse that Tai Chi Man and I did at the weekend certainly worked. We felt like hell! Detox symptoms included bad breath, weak muscles and a generally tired feeling. I did manage to do my rebounding every day, and Tai Chi Man mixed concrete and filled in a hole in our driveway, so we weren't totally useless.

On Saturday, we kept to the liquids, but by Sunday evening we were ready for something else. I made a "blender salad" (which is acceptable on the cleanse, we weren't cheating). It was a blended up mixture of salad greens, avocado, jalapeno, cucumber and good salt. Bliss!

Monday morning we had the same again. My enthusiasm in drinking 5 litres of water/Nile water was definitely flagging by the third day. Monday night, we had a big salad of whatever I could find in the fridge that was green.

It was nice to get back to solid food Tuesday, though it is still from the alkaline side of the chart.

The pH Miracle

Tai Chi Man has been reading lots about the health benefits of eating certain foods to alkalinise the body. Most of what we eat is acid-forming in the body which in turn creates weight problems, illness and disease. Take some of the things which form the standard diet - coffee, meat, dairy - and research shows that they are acid-forming.

We currently have two books from the library by Robert and Shelley Young - The pH Miracle and The pH Miracle for Weight Loss. Both are good, but I think I'd like to buy the second one - not only does it have a list of foods and their alkaline/acid effect on the body, but it has an excellent rebounding (small trampoline) workout and a lot of recipes.

This weekend, Tai Chi Man and I are undergoing a three day juice cleanse. We are drinking diluted green juice (that I make in my juicer with salad greens, parsley, celery and cucumber) and lots of water and Barlean's Greens powder. One of the staples of the alkalinising program is "green drink" which we call Nile Water! To a litre of water, I add a teaspoon of the green powder, the juice of half a lime and a few drops of hydrogen peroxide. I am drinking three litres of the Nile Water each day plus two litres of plain water, plus my fresh juice.

I'm glad that we're both doing this cleanse, because it helps to have support. Most of the time I feel fine, but I have noticed a little weakness in the muscles which is a sign of detoxifying.

After the three days, we will be eating only alkalinising foods for at least a month. For us, this won't be as hard as it would be for someone eating the usual omnivorous diet. Being vegan, we don't eat meat, fish and dairy, and we don't drink coffee or black tea. However sweet fruits have always been a favourite of mine, and those are out. Some nuts and grains are also out.

After a period of eating just alkalinising foods, we will be able to introduce some of the foods from the acidic side of the chart, but keeping them to a maximum of 20% of our diet. It is also recommended that at least half of what you eat is raw, which is fine with me.

I am hoping to see some great results - I already lost a couple of inches in the first day and would love to say goodbye to cellulite forever.