Ramses The Great

Ramses is 15 weeks old, and he's learning and changing so much. This week, we spent a lot of time at the park since the weather has been beautiful. When we're there we work on recalls, retrieving, and listening to whoever is directing him while people and dogs wander by.

All I can say is this puppy is FAST! Today, we were at a baseball field playing, and the other 2 dogs were exhausted, while Ramses was still running laps. You can tell he's leaving baby puppyhood behind. The nap thing definitely doesn't happen as much! But along with that comes sleeping through the night, and knowing what he can and can't chew on - at least a little bit!

This weekend we're going to have fun playing games, but I also want to get some spinning and knitting done. There is a situation brewing where the kids are going to have a massive need for warm clothing. I'll tell you about it later, but let's just say it's a situation involving outdoors, and November.Scarves and hats are in the works, along with my poor spinning which has been languishing on my wheel. I swear I will have that finished up by Sunday, no matter how tempting it is to play with the puppy! And speaking of, here are the weekly puppy pictures.

Paint Shop Pro

Looks like mother nature is hitting up some Paint Shop Pro action again. I love the fall. I just wish it wasn't followed by that 4 letter word.. I took these photos a couple days ago on a walk to the river. I'll take some more soon, as already the trees color palette has changed again.

Six Months Of Loaves and Fish

Or eating Pescetarian rather.

A little over six months ago, my sister was diagnosed with MS. And a little over six months ago, I gave up all meat except for fish and started to drastically cut down on Saturated fats.

How has it been? The easiest part for me, has been the meat. Only once have I eaten a meal with any meat in it, and that due to being a guest at someone's home. Every other situation I have managed to avoid it, whether or not I was left with eating simply side dishes. I went from eating fish 2-3 times a week, to maybe once a week at the most.

In the past 6 months, I've noticed that I have more energy, our food bills have dropped, and I definitely feel better. I often tell people giving up meat was the best decision I made.

On the negative side, I can not eat fat and grease the way I used to. The other evening I had to eat at a banquet. I ate the vegetables, the salad, and the bread and got extremely sick later that night. I just can't handle processed, greasy, fatty food any more.

In the last few weeks, I have been researching vegan cooking. I discovered http://www.thehappyherbivore.com and her cookbook, and I was really intrigued by her recipes and how low fat they were. It also made me start researching more on Saturated fats. I am now even more determined to cut down saturated fats.

I am reminding myself again, that eating a mostly plant based diet, doesn't mean I can never have another slice of gruyere cheese, or have to give up salmon at Ivars. Instead it means eating deliberately and reasonably. Now, eating deliberately over the past 6 months has made me leave meat far behind, and that may be the case here too, but if not, I know I am still drastically improving my health.