MommaDogs

I'm interested too. I have DAR on both sides of my family, mom and dad. Never did it because it seems too difficult. Looking forward to hearing if you get it done.

LOL I'm addicted to Stevia. I use the English Toffee flavor liquid, or the powder in the raw... but I also grew my own and the only way I could use it was in an extract. It's not bad, and especially if you add some vanilla or other flavorings, it's divine. And I drink it in my coffee and herbal tea every day... but like I said, I use the liquid form. Maybe it's the toffee flavor or maybe it's the liquid, but I never detect an after taste. Here's some info from a stevia article... and by the way, it has medicinal properties as well. While there is no question that stevia is sweet, many users will admit that they have also experienced a bitter aftertaste from some brands. In fact, one of the problems with stevia products currently available from health food retailers is that many of them just plain do not taste good. They often have a distinct grassy taste, with varying degrees of bitterness associated with the sweet. These differences in quality may partly be a result of using non-Paraguayan stevia, partly due to poor extraction and processing techniques and partly the result of ignorance on the part of manufactureres concerning the real nature of the stevia plant. One knowledgeable producer of stevia products is attempting to set up industry standards for grading stevia leaves according to their quality. Grade A stevia would be the highest quality, an extremely sweet grade, with little bitter aftertaste and a concentrated degree of sweetness. This grade is very difficult to obtain due to climatic conditions that prevent harvesting at just the right time. Grade B would be a little less sweet with some minor deterioration of the leaf. Most of the best stevia arriving in the United States from Paraguay is Grade B. The vast majority of stevia sold in the United States would be classified as Grade C, a poor grade with a good deal of grassy, bitter flavor. Extracts of Grade C are particularly unpalatable, possessing far too much bitterness. Manufacturers often try to dress them up with other flavoring agents, but such attempts seldom work. Once you have tasted a premium stevia, you will never be satisfied by lesser products. The bitter principles are actually found in the veins of the leaf, while the leafy material between the veins contains the sweet components. Great care must be taken during production of stevia extract to avoid contaminating the sweet with the bitter. This pertains as much to extraction as it does to milling. http://healthfree.com/stevlife.html

AWWWW thanks It's good to be back - missed you guys and thought of this place often :)

btw if anyone ever needs help budgeting, I'm more than happy to volunteer some time for you. It's a true passion for me to help people get control of their finances.

Sounds like you have a budget, but have you done a post mortem for the past few months? In other words, looked back and categorized your spending? Doesn't help at all to have a budget if you don't know what you've been spending your money on. I'm an accountant and I do budgets for people all the time to help them get out of debt (reminder to self, take own advice lol) I'd recommend making a spreadsheet - on paper or the computer, doesn't have to be very elaborate, only as much as you want. Make categories on what you want to spend money on, and then put your week or month's worth of spending into a category. ex. groceries - 200 a month... then go back and count past 3 months what you DID spend on groceries. Don't forget to pay yourself. I personally TRY for 10% tithe (not doing well there honestly), 10% savings and 5% me/family money. . If you neglect yourself all the time, it feels like punishment. If you have the money to eat out once a month, do it. If you don't, but you can afford a "new" outfit at the thrift store, then do that. If it's only quarterly, then at least you have something to look forward to. Something even Dave Ramsey recognizes is that discipline is a large part of this, but psychology is also up there. If you feel on a diet, for example, like you NEVER get to eat anything other than rabbit food, how long will you stick to the diet before binging? However, if you occasionally allow yourself a "treat" you are more likely to go with it long term. Rewards - both short term and long term (meeting your financial goals and not being on the street are some of them) - need to be in place to make it a lifestyle and not a "diet"

Saw a youtube video - person tried various ways to preserve avocado. In water, lemon juice, airtight, and with an onion. Believe it or not, the onion did the trick. Now I store my cut avocados in the fridge with a half onion in the bag and believe it or not, I get about a week before I have to eat it. (not that an avo would last that long for me, but one time did when I had forgotten it )

I have health care through my work, which I am required to take - it didn't cover the medical care I was receiving prior to the O plan, and my previous annual physicals and labs, which have been covered FREE for the past 20 years of my working life, now cost me $800. I have over $2k in medical bills and I don't know how I will be paying them. Prior to "affordable" coverage everything I needed was covered with just a small copay... in other words, it's not just those unfortunate enough to not have "regular" healthcare through employers, EVERYONE is suffering now, workers, retirees, and unemployed citizens.

How about making your own from a local dairy? If you could find it for cheap enough at a local dairy... You get about 1 1/2 lbs of butter from a gallon of cream. If you can get it cheap enough, all you need is a blender or food processor (or a jar to shake if you don't have those things, but that takes a long time)

Out here in the Northeast, I frequently see hair dye in the clearance section of Walgreens and Rite Aid, sometimes supermarkets. Combined with coupons it can be very reasonable... how about ebay? Maybe you could get lucky and get a free shipping win for just a buck or two?

How much? $99 for only the mother's side. I wonder how accurate it is. After all, we have mapped the genome but we have hardly mapped all known variants.

I always liked art stuff, and it can be had cheaply. Drawing, water paints, and picture books of animals. Lots of good suggestions up there.

Oh, one more note. A bit of essential oils in the bathwater, with some coconut oil as a carrier... dunk yourself under the water to get your hair wet. When you're done bathing, drain the bathtub and shampoo your hair under the shower. It's like a hot oil treatment, and my waist length hair is shiny and beautiful, I never have split ends (I trim my hair yearly if it needs it or not LOL) - and it is not oily since you shampoo after you let the oil soak in for a bit. In fact, my shampoo froths up nicely with the coconut oil in my hair. It has a nice, synergistic effect on it.

I also use it on and in everything. Baking, cooking, dog food, chicken treats, skin, baths, teas. I buy the 5 gallon gold label from Tropical Traditions when it goes on sale... and I pay for the membership, it works out very cheaply compared to other quality EVCOs. It's truly much different than any other oils I have tried - including store bought from Spectrum Organics. And it's storage profile is unmatched by other oils. It has a minimum 5 year storage life, but Tropical Traditions tells me that it really has never gone bad in their warehouse, due to the nature of the product. (antiviral/antibacterial, etc) NOTE: I also make a wonderful antibiotic ointment from EVCO and honey. Equal parts raw honey to virgin coconut oil - blend well and it mixes up into a white, creamy, almost frothy ointment that looks eerily similar to triple antibiotic ointment at the store. Given the moisturizing components of both ingredients, plus antibacterial, antiviral and antifungal properties, and it's edible nature, I use this every time I need to treat the animals for wounds. Keep some on hand to toss in tea or coffee, yum. LOL. Friend walks into house - me - you want some tea - them, yes please... OK, here, just let me toss some triple antibiotic ointment into that for ya. Yum yum. Why is it that my friends never come to lunch anymore?

Hey, all, threw my back out shoveling snow today, so DH is going to do the next step in my ginger beer fermentation tonight. I'm on stage II. Have been doing a lot of root beer lately, and really wanted to try doing the raspberry orange again, now that oranges are more affordable. Did some whey recently in preparation for sauerkraut this weekend, but I think I will change it to kimchee.

When are you going to swing by me? I had wanted to join, but haven't had time to pack my wagon. Any chance you'll be leaving directions for us last minute adds?

Hey, how did I miss this thread before? LOL. Glad to see the new forum, where everything can be kept together. Excellent idea guys! I am making kefir (which is always on my counter) and sauerkraut right now. This weekend, I'll be doing some beets, yogurt, and creme fraiche. Almost out of kimchi, so probably will make some of that while I'm at it. Going to check out the fermenting 101 thread now... I assume all the definitions are on there so anyone looking that is wondering, will be able to see what everything is??? Don't be shy if you are wondering, go ahead and ask.

Great post, Donit! Wanted to add that in the spring, summer and fall here, we have a large local vegetable stand that has buckets under their tables. They have their workers (usually teenage kids who get yucky feelings about food that has one brown spot on it) go through the produce a few times a day and throw things into these "compost" buckets. I am able to go there and get several pounds a day of good produce, probably a day or so old, to feed to my animals. Last week I got plums, tomatoes, cukes, basil, lots of lettuce, spinach, water spinach, beet greens, turnip greens, carrots, and more from this place. In the summer, rabbits, guinea pig, chickens, ducks, turkeys, and dogs all eat from this free food. (For dogs, just food process it until it's well broken down so they can digest, mix with eggs or ground meat and they love it) May be worth checking it out near you. Of course, where I go is in a richer town, and people stare at me and my DH has too much pride to come in with me when I go in there, but I don't care. LOL. My animals really appreciate it and don't care if it was "thrown away" by humans.

I never wash my eggs, I don't want to wash off the coating the momma hen puts on it. I sometimes refrigerate and sometimes not. I'm not picky. And I never, ever run under water since eggs are porous and I don't want to wash any fecal bacteria into the egg, thus contaminating it. If they are getting dirty, it usually means that the nesting boxes need to be cleaned. As long as there is fresh straw/hay in there, we're usually good. I also feed my chickens yogurt and other probiotic foods. (as a note to the pumpkin) I choose not to use artificial light because it shortens the lifespan of the chickens, and we get plenty in the winter anyway. The chicken coop has two large windows, which we faced south-ish, and I notice very little difference between winter and summer. And I mix up the pellets with crushed/powdered eggshells for extra calcium and then leave a bowl of oyster shell around for free choice. I am feeding them grower right now because the baby chicks are in there with the big hens, and I can't separate them to feed them, so everyone gets grower plus calcium. I notice that even when they are on layer pellets, the egg shells are thin sometimes, so I always leave out egg shells and oyster shells for them. It seems that the hens know what they need. The babies don't eat the oyster shell, but the hens do, but not all of them. The farm around the corner from me once told me they only feed oyster shell, no grit. I thought that was frowned upon as the oyster shells dissolve readily, but they have been farming for 3 generations, so I'm not arguing with them... just another perspective, I guess.

Hey, all, I decided after sjllm's post, to give the CO a try before meals to lose a few pounds. I'll let you all know how I progress in case anyone else is thinking of it. Starting right now with a tablespoon in my tea. It's not all that bad, actually. I kind of like it. I'm having it in my jasmine green tea, and I barely notice a bit of a flavor there, but not really.

If by "CO" you mean coconut oil, Tropical Traditions says that properly processed (their gold label) coconut oil shouldn't produce allergies as it doesn't have impurities. Give them a call, they're really nice and helpful. I'm sure they'll be able to fill you in more.

http://www.mercola.com/article/water/distilled_water.htm Early Death Comes From Drinking Distilled Water During nearly 19 years of clinical practice I have had the opportunity to observe the health effects of drinking different types of water. Most of you would agree that drinking unfiltered tap water could be hazardous to your health because of things like * parasites * chlorine * fluoride * dioxins Many health fanatics, however, are often surprised to hear me say that drinking distilled water on a regular, daily basis is potentially dangerous. Paavo Airola wrote about the dangers of distilled water in the 1970's when it first became a fad with the health food crowd. Distillation is the process in which water is boiled, evaporated and the vapour condensed. Distilled water is free of dissolved minerals and, because of this, has the special property of being able to actively absorb toxic substances from the body and eliminate them. Studies validate the benefits of drinking distilled water when one is seeking to cleanse or detoxify the system for short periods of time (a few weeks at a time). Fasting using distilled water can be dangerous because of the rapid loss of electrolytes (sodium, potassium, chloride) and trace minerals like magnesium, deficiencies of which can cause heart beat irregularities and high blood pressure. Cooking foods in distilled water pulls the minerals out of them and lowers their nutrient value. Distilled water is an active absorber and when it comes into contact with air, it absorbs carbon dioxide, making it acidic. The more distilled water a person drinks, the higher the body acidity becomes. According to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, "Distilled water, being essentially mineral-free, is very aggressive, in that it tends to dissolve substances with which it is in contact. Notably, carbon dioxide from the air is rapidly absorbed, making the water acidic and even more aggressive. Many metals are dissolved by distilled water." The most toxic commercial beverages that people consume (i.e. cola beverages and other soft drinks) are made from distilled water. Studies have consistently shown that heavy consumers of soft drinks (with or without sugar) spill huge amounts of calcium, magnesium and other trace minerals into the urine. The more mineral loss, the greater the risk for osteoporosis, osteoarthritis, hypothyroidism, coronary artery disease, high blood pressure and a long list of degenerative diseases generally associated with premature aging. A growing number of health care practitioners and scientists from around the world have been advocating the theory that aging and disease is the direct result of the accumulation of acid waste products in the body. There is a great deal of scientific documentation that supports such a theory. A poor diet may be partially to blame for the waste accumulation. These and other junk foods can cause the body to become more acidic: * meats * sugar * alcohol * fried foods * soft drinks * processed foods * white flour products * dairy products Stress, whether mental or physical can lead to acid deposits in the body. There is a correlation between the consumption of soft water (distilled water is extremely soft) and the incidence of cardiovascular disease. Cells, tissues and organs do not like to be dipped in acid and will do anything to buffer this acidity including the removal of minerals from the skeleton and the manufacture of bicarbonate in the blood. The longer one drinks distilled water, the more likely the development of mineral deficiencies and an acid state. I have done well over 3000 mineral evaluations using a combination of blood, urine and hair tests in my practice. Almost without exception, people who consume distilled water exclusively, eventually develop multiple mineral deficiencies. Those who supplement their distilled water intake with trace minerals are not as deficient but still not as adequately nourished in minerals as their non-distilled water drinking counterparts even after several years of mineral supplementation. The ideal water for the human body should be slightly alkaline and this requires the presence of minerals like * calcium * magnesium Distilled water tends to be acidic and can only be recommended as a way of drawing poisons out of the body. Once this is accomplished, the continued drinking of distilled water is a bad idea. Water filtered through reverse osmosis tends to be neutral and is acceptable for regular use provided minerals are supplemented. Water filtered through a solid charcoal filter is slightly alkaline. Ozonation of this charcoal filtered water is ideal for daily drinking. Longevity is associated with the regular consumption of hard water (high in minerals). Disease and early death is more likely to be seen with the long term drinking of distilled water. Avoid it except in special circumstances. Zoltan P. Rona MD MSc

G&V You could always start a group near you. Oink, one of the differences is that kefir has yeast and bacteria. Another is that the types of bacteria in kefir helps to colonize your digestive tract, whereas yogurt does not. Here's something from Body Ecology's website. Both kefir and yogurt are cultured milk products... ...but they contain different types of beneficial bacteria. Yogurt contains transient beneficial bacteria that keep the digestive system clean and provide food for the friendly bacteria that reside there. But kefir can actually colonize the intestinal tract, a feat that yogurt cannot match. Kefir contains several major strains of friendly bacteria not commonly found in yogurt, Lactobacillus Caucasus, Leuconostoc, Acetobacter species, and Streptococcus species. It also contains beneficial yeasts, such as Saccharomyces kefir and Torula kefir, which dominate, control and eliminate destructive pathogenic yeasts in the body. They do so by penetrating the mucosal lining where unhealthy yeast and bacteria reside, forming a virtual SWAT team that housecleans and strengthens the intestines. Hence, the body becomes more efficient in resisting such pathogens as E. coli and intestinal parasites. Kefir's active yeast and bacteria provide more nutritive value than yogurt by helping digest the foods that you eat and by keeping the colon environment clean and healthy. Because the curd size of kefir is smaller than yogurt, it is also easier to digest, which makes it a particularly excellent, nutritious food for babies, invalids and the elderly, as well as a remedy for digestive disorders.

The best part about traditional diets, after the health benefits, is that if TSHTF it's so easy to get maximum nutrition out of your foods. For those of you that don't know, a lot of vitamins are locked in grains, and the phytic acid (which is the substance on the seed that stops it from sprouting until it gets wet) is an anti-nutrient. That means it leaves your body in worse shape then when it entered. Like distilled water, it has the capability of actually taking vitamins and minerals out of your body. By simply soaking your grains until they've sprouted, you unlock the nutrients. By getting some cultures now, such as kefir grains and learning how to use raw milk to make butter, cheese, etc, and then using the whey to lacto ferment your veges, like sauerkraut, you are unlocking a huge powerhouse of nutrients that you can eat and make at home. This is the way our ancestors ate, long before modern conveniences, and it's so easy to get more bioavailable nutrients out of food... as a survival as well as a daily health tool, learning about these issues is so key. Almost forgot, one of my favorites, www.bodyecology.com Also, if any of you are interested, go to the www.westonaprice.org site and find a local meeting. They're awesome to attend. I attend two separate groups near me and the one I go to tonight is bringing in a speaker, an expert on organic gardening.

I am so pleased to see this topic on here. For all of you lurkers, let me please add the cookbook Nourishing Traditions, the website www.realmilk.com and www.westonaprice.org. Of course, www.mercola.com I buy my coconut oil in large quantities (also my palm oil and my palm shortening) from www.tropicaltraditions.com - added bonus to us preppers is that coconut oil has a very, very long shelf life. Over 2 years, and Tropical Traditions said in an email to me once that due to the high antioxidant content of the oil, they've never had any go bad. Health foods we should all add to our diets kefir kombucha coconut oil cod liver oil blackstrap molasses No soy, except for naturally fermented soy sauce and miso fermented beverages and vegetables Less sugar and sprouted grains instead of traditional flours (added bonus of making it easier to grind)