We're Vegans Again!

"How on earth could you be a vegan???"

People often ask us how and why we would ever want to follow a vegan diet.  The answer is simple, we tried it once and experienced an unbelievable increase in overall health and we have never felt better than we did during that time.  We noticed a huge difference in energy, skin tone, allergies, weight and SO much more!

Recently, some things have happened in our lives that have led me to believe that the Lord is giving us time to truly take care of ourselves and to achieve the health that He desires for us to have.

Kevin and I have ALWAYS struggled with weight, always fluctuating and going up and down.   We have tried so many different diets.  They all work, the problem is finding one that will work forever and become a lifestyle, rather than a diet.  We don't think that being vegans forever is the answer for us, BUT we do believe that it will give us the jump start we need while also allowing our bodies to detox all of the bad stuff!

We are going to stick with this until the middle of November and then evaluate our progress and decide if we want to add some grilled chicken to dinners, etc.

You may be wondering how we ever decided to try this in the first place.  My first year of teaching one of the parents of my students looked so great and was so fit at the age of 40!  I asked her how she maintained it and she told me about the Hallelujah Diet.  We had never heard of anything like it.  It really got me interested when she told me that she was a breast cancer survivor without any chemo or radiation, ONLY this diet alone!!!!!  This is not a diet where you buy pre-packaged foods or eat health bars...it is about eating the foods that come from the earth.

Kevin and I figured we could give it a try and see what happened.  I bought numerous books and spent weeks educating myself about what a healthy vegan diet consisted of.  I learned SO much along the way.  Our first grocery trip took us 5 hours as we discovered things we had never even heard of!  When eating a vegan diet it is VERY important that you are taking the right vitamins to make sure you get things like B12 that your body needs.

We were very committed the last time we did this.  The problem was that we just got tired of the restrictions and quit all together once we achieved the weight loss we wanted to.  THIS time we will set short term goals and constantly evaluate our progress and make changes as needed to keep us on track!

We do plan to eat meat again, but it will ONLY be organic!  Throughout the research I have done about the vegan diet I have learned so much about the importance of eating RAW fruits and vegetables EVERYDAY, no matter what kind of diet you follow.  I was shocked to learn what I did about the pesticides on our fruits and vegetables and the hormones in our milk and meat.  

Here is what our vegan refrigerator looks like...

NO sodas, NO caffeine, NOTHING processed, NOTHING white, NO refined sugars, ONLY real, natural food!  We are SO excited!!!  

Here is our meal plan for the week;

• Monday- Fresh Salad & Oven Crisp Black Bean Corn Flautas
  
• Tuesday- Stir Fry
  
• Wednesday- Leftover Black Bean Corn Flautas
  
• Thursday- Fresh Salad & Spaghetti
  
• Friday- Soft Tacos on wheat tortillas with brown rice, avacado, pico de gallo, vegetarian beans, salsa, etc.
  
• Saturday- Fresh Salad & Baked Potatoes with Steamed Vegetables

Here is our vegan pantry!

I am SO excited about this!  We will be eating SUPER healthy, drinking carrot juice twice a day, exercising and taking our vitamins!

At the end of November or December I am headed back to the doctor again to get something checked that we are worried about and I CAN'T WAIT to see if this diet helps to change anything and give us the answers we are hoping for!!!!!!  

We'll see!