123 I'm Gluten Free.

So a few months ago I was feeling down, My down days had got worse and I was in bed again more than I was out. Something clicked in me and I decided something had to be done. I was going to start eating healthy again. Now this is easier said than done. I have always said if you are going to diet whether for health or weight. Your head must be in the right place. So, I knew the time was right and this time the diet was not for weight issues. It was to see if I could get more energy!!  I knew I was going to try Gluten Free again as I had dabbled in this before and I did think my energy levels got better. What I learnt from last time is this;

• It is very hard!!

•  Having pain, Fatigue and trying to cook every night is almost impossible.

• What happens if you make these new recipe's and don't like it? You have no food and no energy left!!

• This is also going to be very costly and hard work getting certain ingredients.

 You really have to take it as slow as you can getting your store cupboard staples but also need so much to start. So I decided to get prepared and scoured the internet for some great Breakfast, Dinner and Evening G/F Meals. What I didn't expect was to find Deliciously Ella 

 

  *affiliate link*

Ella  was everywhere, How had I never heard of her before? Her book looked fantastic but I needed it now!! and it was 10pm. arghhh, but wait, when you look further she has an amazing website and ap that is full of Recipes and advise. I was extatic!! I paid for the Ap, which is just £3.99 and although I hate spending out I knew I needed an easy way to get some good quality meals and then set about finding out what I need. The good thing about Ella is that a lot of her Recipes use the same ingredients so although sound rather samey really are not. I made a huge Shopping list;

Pumpkin Seeds
Sunflower Seeds
Flax Seed
Chia Seed
Almonds
Walnuts
Cashews
Brazil Nuts
Pure Cacao Powder
Spinach
Butternut Squash
Brown Rice
Oats
G/F Pasta
Medjool Dates
Nutritional Yeast

and much much more ha ha. I put my list into sections that I knew would be more beneficial to buy as I knew I wouldn't be able to afford everything. So I knew Almond Nuts were going to be a huge buy as I wanted to make Almond Milk and Butter plus it is a staple in a lot of energy foods and snacks. One thing I didn't factor is once I got to Morrisons to do my Shop that they would have the Deliciously Ella Book on sale!!!
Oh no what to do, do I sacrifice some ingredients for a Book. Hell yes!!! haha I love Books.

So in it went to my trolley, I was so excited. It has been a huge life saver. What I didn't realise at first what I was doing was actually going on a Gluten/Vegan Rawish Free Diet. This just happened. I have since tried adding Meat and Eggs to my diet to see if I feel any different and am  now back on the Gluten/vegan root for a few weeks as I am keen to see if it actually affects me and will do a post on what I have learnt.

Almonds are needed in large quantities and I use a lot of Cashews :) A good staple to buy in is also Pumpkin and Sunflower seeds :) *affiliate links*

Ella's book is amazing and really well thought out. It has sections in her book on all the different food groups; Grains, Nuts and seeds, Pulses, Vegetables, Fruit etc and she gives really good information and nutritional advise on each. I have learnt so much about what I am eating and why I am eating it. She has her story at the beginning which is lovely to read about how she got to where she is. I am so glad I bought this book as it has helped me so much. I don't always follow the recipes as written as don't always have a lot of the items needed and I have made some really delicious foods and snacks and I want to share these with you. To maybe help you if you are on a journey like me or just to show that Gluten/Dairy free can be beautiful. My taste buds have opened and my food range has widened. Don't get me wrong it has been hard and I haven't been able to stick to it ridgedly as my illness has got in the way. It hasn't given me my miraculous recovery I was hoping for but I do think it has given me a better quality of life and made me stronger to hopefully start pushing myself more and more without crashing. I want to share this journey with you and maybe help people trying to do this themselves but I don't want this Blog to be all about illness and recipes. I also want to show the fun times I have. Times I spend with my Grandchildren and times I manage to craft. Share tips and advise and things I learn and I hope that is is exciting enough to grab you and want you to read more and follow me on my journey. 

My Book, Well read and tagged

 

 So back to Ella,  she has an amazing Blog and posts regularly on all different topics and is always adding recipes. The only downside I see to following Ella is that somethings she posts things that are very pricey. Some juices she Blogged about for a detox she did sounded fantastic and just what I felt I needed in my life but when I checked them out it was like £70 for a one day pick me up and I just dare not look how much a retreat stay was she wrote about was but I do totally understand if she gets given things she has to Blog about them. I know I would snatch the offer up. Also things like Medjool Dates. I started off using them because Ella rates them very highly but as the costs were rising I changed to just normal dates and although they are not as juicy, They do still work.  

See the difference in price! If you can afford them definitely go for Medjool but if not normal dates with a bit of Water, Milk or Date syrup work just as well.

So with my savvy saving and Ella by my side I am hoping to be in this for the long run.
I am so excited to share my Gluten free, sometimes Dairy Free diet with you and hope you enjoy reading. xx

Keeping Organised - Free Calendar

So one of the things that has changed recently is that I am able to keep records easier of my day which helps to look back on. This probably seems an easy task for some but when suffering with a chronic illness things like this are the last thing you can do on a bad day and when you have a good day you just want to roll with it. Simple tasks like colouring my days on a calendar were just not possible before due to depression, pain and fatigue but now I colour each day in with either black for bad, green for o.k and orange for good and it is nice to see how my weeks are going. I still have a lot of green days but not so many black as I have had in the past and it is lovely to colour in orange as I remember a time there was no orange in my life :D

I still get bad days when I am unable to do this and times that just fly by and I forget but for the most I can hazard a pretty good guess how it went or I do actually remember. It is a good step in the healing direction.

I suffer from a lot more pain in my life at the moment. I think this is because I am much more active now but luckily I am able to have six sessions of physio from the Doctors and they are helping me with my posture and core muscles and I am really enjoying learning as I think I am ready. Before when I was given appointments to go to I wasn't ready for them and letting people down and also breaking down in front of people was very stressful for me and would just bring on my symptoms stronger and make me worse. I think it is very important for both your mind and body to be ready to get better from this nasty illness. Before I had way too much put on me. Right in the beginning when I was first ill, I was going all over the place to different help groups. This I now realise was way too much. I am now however in a place where I am enjoying my appointments and learning all these exciting things that can help me in my life. This illness is such a slow process and I am such a go get it person, Well I was and still am in my mind. It is so hard to sit here and not be as active as my mind is but at least I can now see some progress. (if you would like to catch up on info about my illness, my first post is here I don't want to be going on and on about my illness but it is a huge part of me and so will come up a lot)

If you are interested in trying this Calendar colouring for yourself or would just like a pretty Calendar. I am offering a free PDF version of my June Calendar for the rest of this Month.  Just visit my Craft Facebook page Wendy's Crafts and find it in the freebies tab. 

 

More Calendars will be available soon in my Etsy Shop. Something I am enjoying having the time to work on. Something that has been in my mind to do for years and I am finally able to make a start selling. This is a huge step for me and so exciting.

Thank you for reading. If you would like to continue following my progress with getting better and my Crafty makes. Please sign up to my Blog. There is an Email sign up on this page to the right. 

Hope to be posting again soon

 

Wendy. xx

Getting back on track

Although a lot has changed in my life since my last post. The one thing that hasn't changed is wanting to write in my Blog. Sadly the thing that stops me hasn't changed much as yet and is still there but I am doing what I can. I have started just jotting things down and not worrying about publishing. Hoping that on better days I will be able to edit and post as and when. Everything I do I am thinking about posting. When I make a meal I am thinking of blogging about it. When I get to go out I am thinking of blogging about it, How I wake up in the morning I am thinking of blogging about it. Honestly everything and as I am having a few better days. I seem to have some pretty great things to blog about and don't want to miss anything. So hear goes. A quick catch up and let's see if I can get this Blog rolling.

So, I am trying a Gluten/Vegan free diet. I tried back last year and noticed a difference but never had the strength to keep it up. This time I have been on it for over 12 weeks and have learnt so much already. I hope to cover this a lot in my Blog as there is a lot to learn!!

I have started Yoga arghhhh I have so wanted to do yoga literally all my adult life but just never found the time or then was too ill but I have started. I can't manage every week but I have been 3 times and feel so proud.

I am going to start doing reviews of items I find help me in life. Be it from food or information. I need somewhere to keep everything I have learned and there is nowhere better than my Blog. Here is a sneak peek at somethings that have been helping my life :D

I am 42 now (here is my original about me post) and I feel so much more positive then when I turned 40. I have learnt so much. I still do not understand why I have had to go through this awful time and still get very bad days but I am hoping the better ones will come more often. I have learnt a lot more Crafts and although I still don't get that much time to practice them when I do I will be posting about them here and more in depth on my Wendy's Crafts Blog page.
I feel an excitement more now than I ever have in the last 4 Years which is so cool and such a nice feeling :D I hope to keep my Blog posts short, simple and easy to read and so what better place to end here and give me time to edit more posts.
Thank you for reading, I hope you enjoy. If you have any questions or suggestions on anything you feel may be suited to my Blog. Please leave a comment. Even to say Hi. Every comment I get is just amazng. Thank you.
Wendy. xx