Tree of Life Mothering

Yay! My 14 y o son got back from the Youth for Freedom summer camp last night, exhausted and slightly sunburnt.Youth for Freedom is an inspiring summer camp for youth based on freedom-based education. See http://youthforfreedom.org. It’s been held every year the past three years at the Clear Creek Family Ranch between Zion National Park and Orderville. The whole area is so beautiful!

I so wanted to drive him down there, but my baby was not quite over the chicken pox and my potential hosts did not want to risk getting it from him, since they have summer plans that involve being well. So here I stayed and sent my son down on a shuttle bus, all arranged for while I was at the Seven Peaks water park. It was the day I had arranged to go to the park with my friend Shauna to use our free seven peaks reader passes before I knew my son would be going to Youth for Freedom and I didn’t want to disappoint the younger kids by postponing it. Talk about a crazy day! I must say, more and more girls wear bikinis at Seven Peaks these days. I have been going there off and on since I was young. I used to see only two or three bikini-cladsters, now it seems like they fill half the park! This is not the place to go if someone has a porn addiction!

It is hard to have fun and relax when working on arranging for a five hour car ride to Youth for Freedom and wondering about my chicken pox baby home with his brother tending him. My brain did not go from planning-mom-mode to having-fun-mom-mode quickly. So I ended up going into the Lazy River to be with my little girl and I forgot about my cell phone in my pocket. The one I had been just using to call different people about potential rides. This is what happens when I let my son wait until the Sunday before Youth for Freedom to decide he wants to go for sure. Needless to say, said phone is in a bowl of dry rice, hopefully resuscitating. Anyway, my son is back now and I am so happy that he got to go!

I have been asking him to tell me all about it. I feel sad I didn’t get to be there for the beginning and end like I did last year or get any pictures. I love watching the oral exams at the end for the Andau prize, a scholarship to George Wythe College. The above picture is of my older, firstborn son, competing for the prize that he ended up winning last year. This year he was a counselor there and had his smartphone but only took one picture!  Boo-hoo! He just doesn’t think like his blogging, former scrapbooking mother, who grew up idolizing Marielen Christensen, LDS mom and founder of the scrapbook movement. So I am going to post some recycled pictures from last year. My computer crashed last month. The crash took with it all my pics from last year but I do have some old pictures on this blog I can use.

It has been strange this past week to have all three of my youth/teenagers gone, my two oldest sons at the Youth for Freedom camp and my daughter at BYU’s modern dance camp. I have reverted back to the days when my oldest is 10!

Last night I got to finally go again to the Eternal Warriors meeting. An overnighter with my husband and chicken pox has interrupted my attendance. This is an addiction-recovery and prevention program that my friend Aneladee Milne is teaching. I am learning so much from reading the unofficial companion books for the course. Maurice Harker is Aneladee’s boss and he recommends the book Putting on the Armor of God by Steven A. Cramer. It is probably the most important book you could read outside of the scriptures. For the rest of this blog post I will call it the “green book,” because it has a forest green cover. You can read excerpts of it HERE.

Another companion book is the resource that Maurice wrote, himself, found here http://sonsofhelaman.org/?p=interactiveBook. It is written specifically for parents who have sons who struggle with pornography but anyone can apply it to understanding the brain chemistry behind any self-betrayal/addiction. I also got to listen to a recording Maurice did at a fireside recently and that added even more enlightening pieces to the riddle of overcoming self-betrayal.

So here is what I have learned from these three sources:

• it is imperative to learn the methods that satan uses to bring me down. As the book states, quoting Elder Melvin J. Ballard, “It is well to know the forces and the powers, that are arrayed against us, that we may close our ranks and fortify ourselves” 

• here’s another gem of a quote from the book: “A study of satan’s methods can alert us to his seductions.” from Elder Ezra Taft Benson

• from the author, Steven A. Cramer, (a pen name) “Even though satan has a well-planned agenda, many people think that if they ignore the reality of the devil, and avoid thinking of him, they will be protected from his influence. Precisely the opposite is true. It is difficult, if not possible, to conquer an enemy we do not recognize, understand, or respect. The less we believe in satan, and the cunning devices he uses, the more he will have power over us.”

• satan is a very sneaky spirit who never rests. he does not play fair. he is constantly attacking us, day and night. As the book says, “We must realize with soberness that we are engaged in a war that will determine our eternal destinies, a war that deserves every caution and awareness we can muster. It is unfortunate that so many people are so preoccupied with the daily affairs and pleasures of this temporal world that they go through life as if it were a playground instead of the battleground it really is.”

• the biggest thing to learn about satan is that he attacks us by speaking to us, using our own voice! This is something that we’ve all experienced but rarely acknowledged. Maurice likens this to the Vietnam War, when sometimes the enemy would broadcast a voice over a loudspeaker. The Vietnamese trained the person to speak with a Texan drawl, so that the Americans would think that the speaker was one of them, an American, when really, he was the enemy. 

• I have been paying attention a lot more to when my thoughts, that sound as my own voice in my head, are negative, accusatory, whining, feeling like a victim, complaining, dwelling on other people’s faults, and reminding me of my past mistakes. I remember, oh yeah, that’s not really me talking to me, it’s satan, the enemy, using my voice! I then tell myself it’s just satan talk and tell him to scram.

• satan can have no power over us once we learn his methods. As Elder James E. Faust said, “We need not become paralyzed with fear of satan’s power. he can have no power over us unless we permit it.”

• we can permit this power by our lack of searching out his methods of attack and educating ourselves and our children of how he operates. Elder N. Eldon Tanner said, “They (children) must be taught that satan is real and that he will use all agencies at his disposal to tempt them to do wrong, to lead them astray, to make them captives, and keep them from the supreme happiness and exaltation they would otherwise enjoy.”

• Maurice likens satan to a deviant prankster. Maurice describes this scenario. Say a young man is on the beach. He sees a tide pool with a sign by it that says, “No swimming allowed.” So he follows the rules because he is a reasonable, obedient young man. Maurice then says suppose the young man lies down on his towel to rest on the beach. After a while he wakes up and sees that he has a syringe of heroine stuck into his arm. He didn’t do it, but all the evidence is gone as to who did, and since nobody is around, it seems like the young man did it to himself. But it was really satan. He is so sneaky that sometimes self-destructive awful things, that are beyond reason, that seem like we did it to ourselves, actually come from this deviant prankster. But in a sense we do do it to ourselves because of omitting to prepare to fight this deviant prankster, learning how he works as a subtle serpent.

• This deviant prankster has learned to attack our brains and cause a chemical spill inside the brain. He doesn’t know how to read our minds, for “There is none else save God that knowest thy thoughts and the intents of thy heart.” (D&C 6:16.) However, satan has been around for eons and knows what images or thoughts will cause chemical reactions on our bodies that will cause pain, and weaken us so that we will be vulnerable to self-destructive behavior that provides instant pleasure with a flood of chemicals in the body that are as addictive as heroine.

• satan chiefly operates by attacking us with a satanic spin. This is a cycle in our minds. It starts with a “flash.” That is thought or image from satan to get us to do something bad. It can be so subtle that we don’t even know it. Maurice, in his PDF book, tells the story of how decades ago, the Coca-cola company found that it could insert one image of a Coke in one frame of a movie. The image flashed by so quickly that people did not consciously know they had seen it. But sales of Coke skyrocketed because the subconscious mind had seen it. This is how satan works. After the flash comes the chemical spill. This is a small spill that causes a slight uncomfortable shift in our bodies. He wants to increase the feelings of boredom, anxiety, and depression, to weaken us. There is more to the satanic spin that I won’t share here because I am still trying to understand it all. Basically the spin happens in less than a second, and it leaves you feeling stoned because of the chemicals in your mind. I can see how it happens to me, with my self-destructive behaviors. Unless you are Mother Teresa, you have them too, so I highly recommend these resources to you. 

A Weston A. Price chapter leader here in Utah contacted Sally Fallon Morrell, founder of the Weston A. Price foundation, to see if Sally would come do a conference in Utah. Sally said if enough people joined the WAPF as members, she would come! You can watch the above video to hear Sally, the Queen of Butter, expound on the benefits of butter over margarine. I hope my skin is as pretty and wrinkle-free as hers when I am her age! The video below shows her explaining key principles of a healthy diet.

Many people wonder, “What is a healthy diet? Is it all raw food, vegetarian, vegan, Atkins, Paleo, the right food for your blood type, and on and on?” Sally discovered that Dr. Weston A. Price found the answer. So she founded the WAPF to share Dr. Weston A. Price’s work with others. Dr. Price, a dentist, discovered several traditional societies, in the 1920s, who had great diets of real food and vibrant health: no cavities, no birth defects, no crooked teeth, no chronic illnesses. These people had all this without access to modern doctors and dentists. Amazing! Dr. Price found these societies were all untouched by the modern, commercial food industry. They all ate a little bit of meat, especially organ meats, and all their food was locally produced by nature. Let’s get Sally to come to Utah and share more of her Dr. Price’s findings and wisdom! Scroll below to get the details. In the meantime, you can learn more about Dr. Price’s work by reading his book pictured below, and Sally’s cookbook, Nourishing Traditions, pictured below it, which applies his teachings and has so many juicy tidbits about how evil the modern food industry is.

Please contact your closest chapter leader and join during this membership drive! The WAPF of Utah is holding monthly workshops to encourage people to join.  Here’s more info on the June workshop:

The Davis County & Salt Lake County Chapters of The Weston A. Price Foundation invite you to attend the June Membership Drive Workshop.

Held in Taylorsville, Utah on Saturday, June 30th from 11 AM – 1 PM, local chapter leader Anji Sandage will be hosting the workshop: Using Medicinal Herbs: Build an Herbal First Aid Kit.

Admission is FREE for WAPF members or $20 for non-members (or you can join at the door!).  New members will also receive the Healthy4Life book FREE, while supplies last.

 To register for this event, please contact your local WAPF chapter leader.

Box Elder County – Angie Libert, alibert_7@hotmail.com

Cargon/Emery County – Anne Cox, anniecox@gmail.com

Davis County – Katherine & Troy Atkinson, kacorner@comcast.net

Layton – Russ & Norma Silver, rsilver@xmission.com

Layton – Caralee Ayre, amodernpioneer@gmail.com

Salt Lake City – Anji Sandage, anji_s3@yahoo.com

Sevier County – Kari Carlisle, karicarlisle@yahoo.com

Utah County – Betty Pearson, betty@ourldsfamily.com

Caralee is the wife of her wonderfully supportive husband, Josh, and mother of their seven beautiful children, ages 14 years to 18 months.  She is a member of the Tree of Life Mothering network and my informal nutrition mentor. She discovered and began embracing WAPF principles in 2002, after previously living a vegetarian lifestyle for twelve years that left her with some baffling health issues, including rampant tooth decay, with one wisdom tooth that completely rotted out of her mouth. She went to heal several cavities by using the principles of Nourishing Traditions taught by Weston A. Price.  See her story about that HERE

Sally Fallon’s book, Nourishing Traditions: The Cookbook that Challenges Politically Correct Nutrition and the Diet Dictocrats, changed her life and her health, as she has been passionate about learning and incorporating WAPF principles into her family’s diet ever since reading it.  Her health challenges have since been overcome which she can only attribute to a deeper understanding of and putting into practice those nutritional principles taught by WAPF.  She and her husband have worked hard and sacrificed much to purchase a home on an acre where they can raise their children on a small family farm, experiencing and benefiting more fully from all she has learned through WAPF.  She has been an assistant chapter leader to the Layton WAPF Chapter for the last couple of years and loves to mentor and help others on their quest to achieve more radiant health!

One of Weston A. Price Foundation’s recommendations for achieving optimal health as found in their Dietary Guidelines is to consume “full-fat milk products from pasture-fed cows, preferably raw and/or fermented, such as raw milk, whole yogurt, kefir, cultured butter, whole raw cheeses and fresh and sour cream, and to use animal fats, especially butter, liberally.”

Cows that are pasture fed are producing the most nutritious,  most valuable milk right now, as they are dining on the rapidly growing green grass.  In Ron Schmid’s book, The Untold Story of Milk, Revised and Updated: The History, Politics and Science of Nature’s Perfect Food: Raw Milk from Pasture-Fed Cows, he discusses the work of Dr. Weston Price found in Nutrition and Physical Degeneration, specifically the evidence presented that showed healthy primitive people had very high levels of fat-soluble vitamins from certain animal sources in their diets.  I quote from his book, page 359, “One of these was a previously unrecognized fat-soluble substance, which plays an essential role in optimal mineral assimilation, bone structure, dental health and growth, and he demonstrated its presence in the butterfat of milk, in fish eggs, and in the organ and fats of grazing animals.  He measured the amount of dairy products, and found that the substance (Activator X) was present only in butter from cows eating rapidly growing green grass.”

“Price analyzed over twenty-thousand samples of dairy products from various districts throughout the United States, northwestern Canada, Brazil and New Zealand.  The greatest influence on the content of nutrients, including Activator X, ‘…was found to be the pasture fodder of the animals.  Rapidly growing green grass, green or rapidly dried, was most efficient.’  These periods of high-vitamin content were more directly related to whether or not the grass was growing rather than to the amount of sunshine or the temperature.  In temperate climates, these periods occur in the spring and early fall.”

Activator X (mostly likely the same substance as the animal form of vitamin K, called vitamin K2) along with high amounts of Vitamin A & D found in the whole milk of cows eating rapidly growing green grass is what makes this milk so valuable, not to mention delicious!  Dr. Weston Price called whole milk from grass-fed animals “Nature’s only complete diet for mammalian infants and by far the most important single item of food for growing human beings in all periods of stress.”

“He found that primitive races controlled dental caries with diets high in body-building factors which included Activator X.  He found significant positive changes in the chemical constituents of the saliva and the growth of L. acidophilus in human subjects that added butter rich in Activator X to the diet.  Vitamin K2 contains one of the highest concentrations of vitamin K2, where it is involved in the synthesis of the myelin sheath and other components needed for a healthy nervous system, and it contributes to learning capacity.  Dutch researchers found that vitamin K2 protects against the calcification and inflammation of blood vessels and the accumulation of atherosclerotic plaque – that the intake of vitamin K2 is inversely associated with heart disease.

“Vitamins A & D are found in appreciable amounts only if the cows are outside on pasture, as vitamin D comes from sunlight and vitamin A comes from the conversion of carotene in green grass.  These two nutrients work synergistically with vitamin K2 – vitamins A & D tell the cells to make certain proteins and then vitamin K activates these proteins after signalling by vitamins A & D.”

Vitamins A & D have a myriad of uses in the body, including mineral metabolism, hormone production, protein metabolism and the health of virtually every organ.  They are necessary for calcium metabolism so that the calcium in milk is effectively absorbed and built into the bones and teeth.  Another nutrient found in grass-fed ruminant animals, CLA (conjugated linoleic acid), has been shown to play an important role in disease protection, has strong anticancer effects, as well as appearing to have fat-burning and muscle-building characteristics.  Only whole milk from cows on grass contains significant amounts of CLA.”  (These are excerpts taken from pages 361-364, The Untold Story of Milk by Ron Schmid, which book I highly recommend for much more fascinating and important information about the history, politics, and science of nature’s perfect food:  raw milk from pasture-fed cows.)

How do we use this nutritious, delicious milk while it is abundant?

Besides drinking it, pouring it on top of your favorite properly prepared whole grain cereal, or adding it to your cultured milk or coconut  milk smoothie, here’s a list of some of my favorite ways to use grass-fed raw milk.

Raw Milk Cheese (Thanks to my friend Mary Liechty for introducing me to this great recipe!)

• Take 2 gallons of whole raw milk and pour them into a big stainless steel pot.
• Fill the sink up with the hottest water that will come from your tap.
• Put the pot into the hot water and stir off and on until the temperature gets to 90 degrees.  you’ll want the temperature to rise slowly.  I take the water out and put a lid on the pot and it usually stays at 90* during the whole fermenting process.  You’ll want to check every now and then to make sure it stays pretty close to 90*.
• Once the temperature gets to 90*, add one package of Mesophilic direct set (C101) culture and mix well and put the lid back on.
• Then set the timer for 30 to 45 minutes.  (The guy that taught me, said if you leave it in 45 minutes, it’s sharper.  I didn’t notice a difference.)
• While the milk is fermenting, dissolve a 1/4 table of rennet into a little bit of warm water.  (If you have liquid rennet, then put exactly 40 drops into 1/2 cup of cold water.)
• When the 30 minutes are up, add the rennet, mix well, return lid, and let it go another 30 to 45 minutes.
• After 30 to 45 minutes, it should be a little thicker than yogurt and enough so that you can make a clean cut.  Take a knife and slice vertically and horizontally, making about 1-inch squares.  Then take your knife diagonally and slice it underneath.  This doesn’t need to be perfect.  Then fill your sink back up with hot water and stir the curds until the temperature reaches 100* – 110* (I keep it at 100* to protect the proteins).  This is called cooking the curds.
• After you reach 100*, strain your cheese curds into a cheese cloth.  I save the whey, of course, and use it to soak grain.
• Tie the top of the cloth and hang it from your faucet, and let it drip for 1 hour.  After the hour, cut the cheese curds into 1/2 to 1-inch squares, put them into a bowl and add 2 tablespoons of Real Salt or other high quality unrefined salt (Himalayan Pink Salt is delicious!) and stir.  (Use less salt if you don’t like it that salty.)  We love cheese curds, so we just refrigerate and enjoy.

If you want to make a hard cheese, you need to buy a mold and a press and go from there.  It takes about two days to press the cheese and more time to age the cheese.

The cultures and rennet can be purchased at Real Foods in Orem, or Union Station Fermentation in Ogden on 25th Street (801-392-9772) or from Cultures for Health.

Homemade Raw Milk Yogurt

Sarah Pope, AKA the Healthy Home Economist, is one of my favorite WAPF bloggers and I look forward to her daily posts.  She has put together many informative videos and posted them on her blog.  One of those is Raw Yogurt (Made in the Microwave) – no, not WITH your microwave – that is one of those appliances that should not be used to cook food!, but it happens to be a great place to let the yogurt incubate.

Homemade Butter

Here’s another video post from Sarah on How to Make Raw Butter.

Homemade Ice Cream

Check out Sally Fallon’s delicious homemade ice cream recipes in her book, Nourishing Traditions on pages 550 & 551.

Try a Raw Milk Fast

So it’s obvious by now that I really appreciate Sarah Pope and refer to her blog often!  She truly is an incredible resource, and I hope you all go and explore her blog.  Here she embarks on a 10-day fast with raw milk, and you can read the reasons and results for yourself in her The Milk Cure 2012 post.

I was so inspired that I started my own raw milk fast last Saturday, and I cannot believe how great I have felt since being on it!  I have consumed approximately 2 1/2 quarts of pasture-fed milk each day – nothing else besides some water, and I have not felt hungry or deprived in the slightest.  I’m thinking of doing it each Spring, as a way to gently cleanse my body while still nourishing it.

Where to find milk locally from pasture-fed cows.

If you don’t happen to have a Jersey in your back pasture, fortunately there are a number of places in Utah where you can purchase high-quality, grass-fed milk.

C-2 Farms – 435-469-9161.  They have pickup locations in Pleasant Grove, West Jordan, and Huntington.  you must pre-order milk before pickup.

Real Foods – see their website at RealFoodsMarket.com for phone numbers.  They have stores in Orem, Heber City, and St. George.

Green Pasture Products produces high-quality high vitamin butter oil so that we can get all the benefits of Activator X and vitamins A & D all year round, even when we are not able to purchase local whole raw milk from grass fed cows.  I also highly recommend their high vitamin fermented cod liver oil.  Ask your local WAPF chapter leader for more details!

Learn about real nutrition, join The Weston A. Price Foundation.

Jenni Wilson over at http://momessentials.net is offering a great sale on Dr. Christopher products! Just click on the link with his name and scroll down the page to get the good deals!

This month, ALL Dr. Christopher products are 40% off.  Take advantage and stock up on some
great summer supplies! Use coupon code CJUNE40.  Here are some examples of how you can save big:

 Vitalerbs Capsules regularly $29.99, on sale for $18.00!

      Elder Berry Extract regularly $14.99, on sale for $9.00!

 Herbal Cleansing Extract Kit regularly $180.99, on sale for $108.60!

Don’t miss out on these fantastic prices!

To your home medicine empowerment!

Here’s a super blog post that my friend Anji shared on Jenni Wilson’s http://momessentials.net site. If you haven’t checked out momessentials yet, go do it, you will love it! Jenni and Anji both gave me permission to copy this blog post here. The following are Anji’s words:

Anji Sandage

When I tell people that I used to get bad colds at least twice a year, but now I haven’t had a cold in almost 5 years, I don’t think they believe me.

The year it began was the year that my cold went from a cold to bronchitis to pneumonia. Six weeks of sleeping while sitting up in bed so you don’t feel like you’re drowning, can do funny things to a person. I knew at that time that food has powerful qualities. Besides just filling your belly, it can heal your ills or it can kill you. It just depends on what kind of food you choose to eat, because pneumonia and colds are not the only illnesses that the right foods can heal. Some foods even cause illness.

Now rewind to 11 years before the year I got pneumonia. I had much worse problems…I just didn’t know it yet. When I was 28 I had my second child. I had also just graduated from a university with my BA in English Teaching and had lined up a long term substitute teaching position, which would give me the experience teaching, which would help me land a permanent teaching job the next school year. Things were busy, finances were tough and packaged food was REALLY cheap, especially if you used coupons. I thought things were great. I loved teaching, but I was having issues with depression and fatigue and I had started to gain a lot of weight.

After my first child, I banished fat from the house and by the next year I had hit over 320 lbs. Before I had the baby, I wasn’t thin, but I was about 175 after my first child, about 25 pounds more than my pre-pregnancy weight (which was really upsetting to me at the time). I had almost doubled in weight since then, which was really horrifying to me because when I was only 22 ( just 6 short years earlier). I was thin and athletic. I could run a 2 mile distance in a little less than 13 1/2 minutes. I only had 17% body fat (you know it was a big deal if I knew that), so this was a BIG deal.

Even before that, after I had my first child I had tried to continue with my fitness routines, ramping it up to swimming 40 laps 3x a week, running 2 miles daily, weight training 2x a week and doing aerobics 3x a week, but in spite of that, I was slowly and steadily gaining, until I was so physically exhausted that I just couldn’t do it anymore. I was also having miscarriages: one when my husband and I had been married about 3 months, another when my oldest was about a year old, and another a month or so before I found that I was pregnant with my second.

Halfway into my second year teaching I was in the doctor’s office. I never felt rested, I was extremely overweight, and I had stopped menstruating. I guessed that maybe I had a thyroid problem, so I requested the tests. When the results came back, I was told that I was fine. I asked if maybe the results were borderline, and I was told there is no borderline with thyroid your either fine or you aren’t, and I was FINE. Go home, get off your lazy butt, lose some weight and all of your problems will go away. Not in those exact words, but I was so upset by the condescending way that he spoke to me that I never went back, and I never looked for another doctor.

I tried to eat better by following the USDA advice and following the food pyramid even more closely, cutting out all fat, being sparing with the meat, and ramping up on carbs. I developed sugar cravings and had dry brittle nails and itchy skin. My hair was shedding so badly that it was in the vacuum, plugging the shower, and it was in the laundry and all over the carpet through the whole house (because the vacuum wouldn’t pick it all up – I had to sweep the carpets and would pick up a giant ball of hair every time I did).

By the time my son was 3, I was having hot flashes and night sweats like a menopausal woman. I was only 31. I had given up on the idea of having any more children, and I felt so sick and tired that I would wish that I could die rather than drag myself through the rest of my life feeling the way I did then. I never acted on that feeling because I had two small children who needed me. I quit teaching in 2001, and concentrated what energy I had on basic survival, which with kids in the summertime means a trip to the library at least once every other week.

And that is where it all started to change. I found a book in the library discard pile that got me thinking. It was “Calories Don’t Count,” by Herman Taller. I had been considering getting a food scale and diving into the world of calorie counting, which I had always refused to do, because I have always believed that eating should be an enjoyable, natural part of life, like breathing. Counting calories in my opinion was the equivalent of counting breaths. It was unnatural. So I paid the librarian 25¢ and took the book home and read it. For the most part, it wasn’t even about dieting, but discussed in basic terms the physiology of fat and why our bodies need it. It seems silly to me now, but at the time, it was an eye opening read. I remember thinking it was nuts, and then question forcefully came into my mind “what if everything that you have previously thought and been taught about nutrition is completely WRONG?”

Taller had briefly mentioned some low-fat experiments with rats that he had done, and some research by Dr. Weston A. Price, having to do with dietary fat that really fascinated me. It really hit home because I was having all of the symptoms that the rats in his study had, and after researching Dr. Weston Price online, I realized that I was doing this to myself with my FOOD.

It seems so obvious now, and I have always made an effort to be healthy, but I still can’t figure out how processed pasta 6 nights a week fits into that picture. Luckily, being a farm girl, I had the know-how to cook real food. So I started doing it. Adding fat back in was weird. I remember choking down the grease in my hamburger which I had been rinsing off with hot water through a colander. I started feeling better. Over the next year, I went from 300+ pounds to about 215. I changed out all processed flour for whole wheat flour and started making my own pancake mix. We switched from regular table salt to sea salt. We got rid of the sugar. We bought a freezer and dumped canned foods. With every change I began to feel a little more normal, but I was still infertile.

I started looking for a source of raw milk. I was not trying to get pregnant at this point; after 5 years I had pretty much given up on having any more children. I spent time calling every dairy in Utah, I even called the Utah State Department of Agriculture. They all told me that raw milk was illegal and dangerous.  I drove around in the countryside looking for milk cows and even got up the nerve to knock on a couple of doors to inquire about Bessy out in the field. I finally was directed (hush, hush) by a goatherd to a ‘gray market’ operation, where I would go in and pick up milk at night and put my money in a box.

I noticed for the first time in years that my strength was coming back, and my muscle tone was firming up. I obtained kefir grains and started drinking a quart of kefir every day. I had been having terrible trouble with candida and would get open weeping sores in the folds of my skin that were really painful, but after just one quart of kefir, they were noticeably improved. After a few weeks they were gone. When I started adding flax seed oil to my kefir, within two weeks, I found out that I WAS PREGNANT!  The pregnancy went without a hitch and I didn’t gain an above normal amount of weight. I was back to my pre-pregnancy weight within a few weeks after the baby was born, and with my last pregnancy, I actually weighed less than my pre-pregnancy weight afterward.

Things still were not (and are not) perfect. For example, the thing with the colds that later became pneumonia, spurred me farther along the path to more complete healing. But now I have 4 children, and feel that my family is complete. They are healthy and smart and beautiful. So what more could I ask for? Healing with food is real. Not just in a potato poultice, but in real whole food that you EAT every day.

After all, as Hippocrates once said: “Let food be your medicine and medicine be your food”

Anji Sandage currently resides in Utah and serves as a chapter leader for the Salt Lake County Westin Price Foundation. She maintains two blogs, meanroostersoup.com and  100percentnaturalfamily.com, along with a Facebook Page called Find Raw Milk.

Read her articles Politically Correct Nutrition vs Traditional Wisdom Part 1 and Part 2.

It’s been a while since I posted a personal post so I thought I would break the dry spell. Things have been exciting here. My baby got the chicken pox this past week. He is the last to get them. The oldest of the five youngest got it four weeks ago, then two weeks later, two more of the kids got it, then my towhead boy had it, and now the baby. I call him my baby but he’s almost three. I am glad that we are almost done. In the midst of this, my older kids and I held a simulation for youth. That was hard and fun and we learned a lot and I am so glad it is done! If we do another one it will be a lot better. I purposefully haven’t blogged about it because I don’t want to relive the painful parts. It was kind of like one of those experiences where you go into it wondering how it’s going to all work, then during it you have little moments of panic, and you can’t wait for it to be over. Hmm, sounds a little like birth sometimes!

My dh and I also got to go on an overnighter in the Alpinesque hotel called the Zermatt up in Midway. That was fun but way too short. I remember the days when I totally envied my friend who had kids old enough to babysit the younger ones while they stole away for the night. Now it’s our turn! Hooray! The room was free because my husband was there for a public defender conference. Then this past week Honor had a week long simulation to attend because he won a scholarship for it by winning the Freedom Bowl. So we’ve been carpooling the hour drive one way for that. I thought my life was busy with all of this but then I found out my friend, a mother of ten, had two daughters in a Miss Syracuse pageant last weekend, did the Ragnar relay this weekend and is going camping on Monday. And I thought I was busy!

As far as chicken pox goes, what we’ve found works best to soothe the itch is oatmeal baths, with tea tree and lavendar oil drops in the water (20-30 drops each). My six year old little girl freaked out at the prospect of oatmeal touching her skin  and would not get in the tub at 4 AM with the prospect of slimy oatmeal touching her. We were both exhausted because we hadn’t been able to fall asleep with a constant round of itchiness, apply the calamine, and then take a bath. I learned that if you put the oatmeal in a nylon, the milkiness can come out and soothe the itch and the slimy oatmeal doesn’t get out. Then we also apply oregano oil and then Redmond clay after the child gets out of the tub. All of that helps a lot more than baking soda and calamine lotion. Mr. Towhead Boy only had the pox for two days and then they started scabbing over.

We have this robin who decided to build a nest on the ladder that somebody forgot to put right away and left leaning against the front of the house. By the time the somebody decided to put it away, that person discovered a nest on the top of the ladder, snuggled against our home. A robin has built a nest on our front porch. Every time she hears the door open or shut, she gets spooked and flies away.

I finally moved the ladder carefully and climbed up and was delighted to discover these pretty eggs. I have never seen robin egg blue in person. Talk about a natural thrill! It really is fun to see in real life things I’ve always read about or seen in books.

So I’ve been thinking about how spring and early summer is my favorite time of year, because of the symbolism of eggs and seeds being planted for gardens. I myself have some eggs that I am working on hatching to bring forth new life, in the form of goals and dreams. I am using my vision board like I learned from Kirk Duncan. My daughter really took his words to heart and put hers up. She got to hear him speak about vision boards and goals at the last Master of Influence in May. She decided she wanted to go to a modern dance camp at BYU. It was hundreds of dollars, out of our reach for signing her up. When we lived in Provo she took creative dance classes at BYU. BYU has an excellent dance program, and she really enjoyed it. We were so sad to leave Provo! Right before we moved she had just achieved a high enough level in the dance program that she had made the company class, so she got to go to class twice a week. We always dreamed about moving back to Provo so our kids could return to their creative dance classes. The roses in the photo above come from a gift her dad gave to her of a little potted rose bush he gave to her after she choreographed her first dance that got picked to be in a recital. We planted it in our flower bed at our new home. It’s such a joy to see it bloom again every spring. It reminds me of dreams that are tucked away, waiting to bloom every year when the time is right.

She looked at her vision board every day and did her declarations, which is something else Kirk teaches that I haven’t done yet. Well, I was wondering how she would be able to go. Unbeknownst to me, she figured out how to apply for a scholarship. She just got news this week that she got the scholarship, and also that by working for her grandma over the summer, grandma would pay the difference. So she’s going on Monday, for two weeks! I also put on my vision board that my son would be able to go to Youth for Freedom this week, as this is the only week he can go. We didn’t know for weeks if he would be going. And now he’s going! My older son is a counselor for it and is loving it. He was there this past week for the first session.

To learn more about vision boards, go here http://3keyelements.com/new/audio.php

It’s such a great time to be pregnant right now, what with all the empowering books coming forth. The Gift of Giving Life, a book for LDS childbearing moms recently got released, and I turn around, and here’s another beautiful book written by an LDS mom about birth.

It’s called Wise Childbearing by Jennetta Billhimer. It will be launched next Thursday June 21. Jennetta is a long-time fan of empowering women to birth naturally. Four years ago when I went to watch the screening of The Business of Being Born, in Logan, she helped promote that. Now she has written this book and is putting on a big party next Thursday to release it. Woot-woot! I am eager to use this book the next time I have a baby!

You can go  to learn more about it and claim some gifts, three audios by Sarah Buckley, Polly Perez, and Amy Walker. Sarah Buckley is a medical doctor in Australia who has given birth at home to her children. She has written about the safety and joy of natural, ecstatic birth. I read her articles years ago in Mothering magazine and thoroughly enjoyed them. Here’s one about ecstatic birth and here’s one about  the amazing placenta, a mother’s first tree of life, here. I read this article to do research for my book, featured at the tab above that says “the book.” Polly Perez is a nurse who advocates for natural birth, and Amy Walker is a presenter for http://3keyelements.com. I am not sure what Amy has to do with natural birth. I guess I will find out by listening to the free audios being given away right now up until the day of the party. Go here to sign up for the audios so you can learn tips about having a more enjoyable birth. http://associationforwisechildbearing.com/

Here’s what Jennetta says about the book:

A wonderful welcome for your baby…what an amazing gift to give yourself and your baby.

Would you like to be one of those women who have

beautiful, ecstatic childbirth experiences?

By

Author Jennetta Billhimer

       Founder and Director of Association for Wise Childbearing ), BS

Wise Childbearing, What You You’ll Want to Know

as You Make Your Birth Choices

will show you how!

Are you ready to achieve your dreams of a joyful birth for your baby and yourself?

From all you hear, is it even a possibility?

Women are designed to give birth! Babies are made to be born!       

Receiving a truly excellent childbirth education, and making the best choices for you, are the most

valuable actions that you as a woman/couple can take to accomplish a truly wonderful welcome for

your child.

Packed full of insight and wisdom, easy to understand, full of facts and data, interesting and enjoyable to read, this book holds a wealth of information.

FIND THE ANSWERS TO THESE QUESTIONS AND MANY MORE:

• Is it possible to have a comfortable, even ecstatic birth experience?

• What are the critical questions I need to ask when selecting a midwife or doctor?

• Once a cesarean, always a cesarean? Can cesarean surgery be avoided?

• Which comfort techniques are the most helpful?

• How can I get rid of these nagging fears before they ruin my experience

and cause me to make fear-based choices?

• What are the benefits of waterbirth for me and my baby?

• What can I do to give my baby a more compassionate experience?

• What are my options and choices anyway?

• How do I evaluate my birthplace, whether hospital, birthing center, or home?

• How do we nurture our marriage relationship as we experience all of these life-changes?

• What tips will help us to have a positive first year with our new baby?

Find the resources you need to have the best birth you possibly can!

It’s interesting to think that we have two kinds of stores that sell food: regular grocery stores and “health food” stores. How telling that we have to make a distinction, because the food at the grocery store is not necessarily “health food.” Do you realize that not all the food at the health food store is not healthful either? Watch the video below to find out how you can get the best guide to buying food at the health food store. You will find out that even that staple of “healthy food,” Ezekiel bread, is not good for you. That’s news to me! I didn’t realize it has soy in it. 

Do you all know that the modern yeast available in the grocery store is not a completely natural whole food? Yes, there is a whole foods version of yeast, it is natural yeast that you can make at home.

Caleb Warnock, the author of The Forgotten Skills of Self-Sufficiency Used by the Mormon Pioneers (my favorite Christmas present last year), has a chapter about natural yeast in his book. Now he devotes a whole book to the topic of natural yeast in his new book, pictured above. If you are gluten intolerant, have celiac disease, or just want to eat more nutritious bread (the more nutritious your food is, the fewer calories you have to eat to feel full) you will want this book! I am so excited about it.

Here is a special message from Caleb with info on getting the book:

Hundreds of you have gotten free, non-sour natural yeast starts from me. Many of you have written me about your success with your starts. Some of you have struggled. To help those with questions and struggles, I have written a detailed blog post, with photos, all about trouble-shooting natural yeast problem. I have also posted an excerpt from the forthcoming book about health and natural yeast. Natural yeast flattens the glycemic index, takes away heartburn and acid reflux forever, helps prevent or reverse gluten intolerance and, in some cases, full-blown Celiac’s disease, turns natural phytic acid into an anti-oxidant, controls allergies, and turns flour into a yeast that is both pre-biotic and pro-biotic. Natural yeast is healthful and free.

Thanks! -Caleb

I have been told by 5 friends, repeatedly, that I would love this and benefit from “3 Key Elements”.  My children dont listen very well to what I ask them to do.  Perhaps I need to learn about the body language thing and then practice with the children?  I see myself attending this event soon.  Perhaps I will get to go through Celestia’s giveaway?  Count me into the contest!!!