In Celebration

Today, many of you may be celebrating Cinco de Mayo and rightfully so. I would like to introduce you to the holiday that my family celebrates on the 5th day of the 5th month. Kodomo no hi, is Children's Day in Japan and it became a national holiday celebrating all children in 1948. We personally celebrate Tango no Sekku, which is Boy's Day and the original holiday celebrated by Japan on this day; which originated sometime around 593–628 A.D . The reason we celebrate the Boy's Day tradition is that we have two boys and what little kid doesn't want to have a special day?


This holiday is to celebrate the health and strength of boys, symbolized by the Kobuto or samurai helmet that you see pictured above (that is not a full sized helmet, but a model of one). It is also a day seen as an expression of gratitude for the mothers, since Mother's Day is an American idea. I usually set up the samurai helmet at least a few weeks earlier than May 5th and we hang our carp wind socks. We were lucky enough to be in Japan before Boy's Day last year and were able to find a carp for each family member. Traditionally these are put on a pole in order from the father to the youngest son, the colors corresponding to the birth order of each son (mom has the next place after dad). Ours hang on our porch and they have been waving like crazy with the amount of wind we have been experiencing this spring.

Carp wind socks before they got put up this year.

There is also a traditional sweet that is eaten on this day. It is a rice flour dumpling filled with adzuki bean paste and wrapped in an oak leaf, kashiwamochi. The oak leaf is for decoration only. Today I'm making my first attempt at the dumpling, so we'll see how that goes. It is very similar to dango, just with a different shape.

Pictured is a commercially made variety.

If you have been following my blog for a while, you may have caught the hint I dropped yesterday. Next year we need to either get another carp for our new addition, or start celebrating Boy's Day as Children's Day. Apparently, all the diet and exercise has paid off and the barren body I once thought I had after my 2nd son was born is now fertile. We will be expecting our third child sometime this winter and I hope to feel well enough to share some tidbits about being pregnant and gluten free.

That is part of the reason that I haven't posted nearly as often as I would have liked in the last month. One of the bonus' about knowing all your food sensitivities is that many of the foods that they tell you not to eat during pregnancy are already removed. I have had some morning sickness, which really manifests itself as all day sickness, but I haven't had the same aversion to certain foods due to the fact most of the ones that turned my stomach before are gone from my diet. I'm hoping not to crave Taco Bell this time around (especially now that I've read the ingredients, yuck!), but only time will tell.

As for running and exercising, I plan to continue but not with P90X or any serious race training. I'm no longer planning on any races at all this year (even just for fun), but watch out for me next year. Will see if I'm brave enough to post prego pics as I'm still in shock a bit myself and haven't even filled out my jeans enough to feel the need to go shopping.

Well, that is it from the Gluten Free, It's A Lifestyle home-front. I hope that you all have a marvelous Boy's Day (or Cinco de Mayo).

Kelly

Thoughts Fly Toward My Second Home

Kanagawa Prefecture One Year Ago

I am sure that all of you have heard of the devastating quake and tsunami that hit the Pacific coast of Japan Friday. It has been hard not to watch the images scroll across the TV and internet as the images are vibrant and shocking, pulling on the heartstrings even if you don't have friends or family in the area.

If you have been following my blog for any length of time, you know that my husband's family is still over there. They live in Yokohama, which thankfully is in a protected area near Tokyo and has not seen the massive waves that have affected much of the area to the north. Phone lines are still down and information of the area is sketchy since most of the news focus' on Tokyo and not the nearby areas. I've had the NHK World News running on my computer all evening, hoping for information. Needless to say, when your heartstrings are attached to something, it pulls all the more.

Hopefully we will hear soon from family and friends in the area as soon as phone lines are restored. The thing that the people of Japan need the most right now is prayers and aid. You can contribute to the later through the International Federation of Red Cross. I will be following this closely for obvious reasons and will let you know if there are any other ways to help as they become available.

Kelly

To Run or not to Run? "Lifestyle" Decisions

I have been thinking a lot about running my first race lately. I grew up not thinking of myself as much of a runner, and here I’m thinking of entering the Boulder Bolder which is held every year on Memorial Day. Now, I’m not saying that the distance would be that hard for me to do. Not to brag, but I completed my first 10K distance just last Sunday. I think I’m wondering more at the whole experience of racing. The one time that I went to the Boulder Bolder was as a spectator and it looked like a big, crazy (some runners complete with costumes, but this is Boulder we’re talking about) mob when they took off at the starting line. One of the things I love about running is being in the outdoors. It’s just me and the world in motion. It not only gives me a break in my routine, but it is a stimulant; a rush of endorphins and stimuli that one can’t get from being still.

When I run, I can let my body get in a zone and just go for as long as I need, while my mind wonders through random thoughts, shifting between the internal and external. Breathing? Yep, still feels good and steady. Is my foot hitting the pavement the way I want it to? Yeah, but maybe I could spread my toes a little more for a better landing. Hey, didn’t I just hear this song on my MP3? Oh, there’s that osprey again. I bet that’s his favorite branch. I love that the randomness of the thought is sometimes what helps me to stay in my zone better, allowing me to complete my run without focusing on all the little things; the little things that would stop a less experienced athlete from pushing the boundaries in search of what their body is capable of.

The thing about running is that I haven’t been running that long. As I mentioned in my first post, I am a P90X graduate. This is an extreme program, but there are some thing that I learned about myself while on this video based, at home program that I would like to pass on to you. This program is not for everyone, but in order to explain some of my theories on fitness better, I think I’ll have to take my readers back to a couple of years ago. Two years ago, I was back to normal, at least as normal as I thought life as a wife and mother with hypothyroidism should be. I’d been on the gluten free diet for a year and I had been playing with the elimination diet for a couple of years before that. Actually, there were several foods that I had given up due to pregnancy preference that I never really enjoyed post baby, but I digress.

My numbers where finally in a range that I would call normal. My TSH levels were low enough that I felt good and it had been a small victory that I finally talked my doctor into upping my prescription so that I didn’t feel so tired all the time. Sure, I had some baby chub, but don’t we all after two kids? The problem was, and I didn’t realize it until it was almost too late, that I had anemia due to iron deficiency and messed up cycles. It was bad enough that I had to go to the ER for a four-pint blood transfusion, because my body wasn’t keeping up. I don’t know what the scientific numbers are, but a friend of mine mentioned to me, after my low iron levels had sent me to the ER, that it was common for people with gluten problems to have nutrient deficiencies. I’ve read enough to know that she was more than likely correct in her assumption that my body wasn’t lacking nutrients, but the ability to absorb them.

This was the shot in the arm, no pun intended, that I needed to get me serious about my physical health. I was already aware of my digestive and food allergy related problems, but I still needed to do more to get my body to work the way it was meant to. Thank goodness, God knows everything that I need long before I need it and he is the one who created me the way I am, because he put people and events in my life in the right sequence to help me on my road to recovery. I don’t think I would have started writing again like I did in high school if I hadn’t had been put in a position where doing everyday chores became a struggle. I ended up spending that time using my mind and practicing my creative writing skills, when I wasn’t taking care of the basic needs of my children. Without it, I don’t think I would have had the courage to write this blog.

My body was weak from the anemia, but I got tired of not being able to do very much after the first couple of months. It was about this time that school started and we live close enough that I could walk the kids to school. The first couple of weeks were hard because I was wiped out after just walking my son to Kindergarten every day; pushing his younger brother in the stroller as we went. I have Irish/German stubbornness in my veins, so I knew I had to keep at it. Like the age-old saying, “What doesn’t kill you will only make you stronger.” After those first few weeks, I was finally able to walk the kids to school at a normal pace and I started feeling well enough to get other stuff done around the house too.

Before kid number two, I had been rollerblading to lose the baby chub from my oldest son and I did this for many of the same reasons I love to run. I decided to bust out the roller blades and the jogging stroller and the more stamina I gained, the more my competitive streak started to push me to try longer distances and different routes. I started to feel human again. My friends and my husband were very supportive of these little steps to gain my health and I think every positive comment just propelled me to keep at it. I also noticed, that the days that I didn’t do something, I would physically ache by the end of the day. Since aches are a part of hypothyroidism, I just decided that whatever I was doing physically was working out those aches during my workout and that just made me realize that just because I have a bad thyroid, that I don’t have to let it determine how I feel. By exercising and eating right, I was daily gaining back the health that many of us take for granted.

By this point in my story, my husband decided that he’d had enough of being out of shape and had picked up the P90X DVD’s from a college at work. I was skeptical about this infomercial workout program and told him that he could do what he wanted, but there was no way that I was going to join him. It took the first round of me watching him try not to kill himself to realize that I could do this workout. I started to pick and choose videos from the program and try them out on those days that I couldn’t rollerblade for one reason or another. I had been told by a chiropractor that I should do yoga to relieve the aches and pains that I had from my thyroid, so that was one of the first ones that I tried. Not an easy workout by any means, but I was soon hooked.

It took me a while to do the entire program according to the book and almost a year after my trip to the ER to have the stamina to even attempt the six day a week program. It seriously kicked my butt, but it was as if I was back in that stinky gym in high school lifting weights and I was loving it. I was seeing muscles that I hadn’t seen since my landscaper days and my clothes were threatening to fall off the more calories that I burned. I was hooked. Fast forward to last fall when I decided that I had done one round and I was ready for the next challenge. A mommy friend of mine mentioned that she was starting to run again and I thought, “I’m in pretty good shape after one round. I wonder how far I could run.”

I decided to start by running home after dropping the kids off at school, a little over ¾ of a mile one way. Soon, I was running farther and farther. I worked it into my workout schedule, because they have a variation called “Doubles” where you have the option of doing cardio on the strength training days. Not only was I hooked on Tony Horton’s workouts, but now I was running. One of the women at church, who happened to be a stay at home mom and a half-marathon runner, wanted to get a running club going. I was maxing out at 3 miles a couple of times a week at this point, but decided to give it a shot. The first time I ran almost 5 miles and was ready for a good nap. Now I’m running on average 6 miles a couple times a week and our group usually runs between 3.5 miles and 6 miles, depending on how everyone is feeling that day.

Which brings me back to the present day. Should I take my running to the competitive level? Probably, but let’s just say the Boulder Bolder question is still up in the air until I have at least one other person that is willing to run in that mob with me. I’ve learned that exercise is a crucial part of keeping my body working right. God made our bodies to work and it is much happier when it does so. I also don’t fight the aches that come with my chronic illness and I don’t feel chronically ill when I’m active. I’ve also learned that if I want to be successful, in life as well as fitness, small obtainable goals are key. I don’t look past the next 90 days or the next potential race with my fitness goals, but I do know that I am able to keep at it daily much better than I ever have in my adult life.

Health is important to me personally. I’m not in it for fame, even though our running club did end up on the front page of the local paper (talk about a shocker there). Would I love to win a race some day? You bet! Will it be this year? Personally, I’ll be happy if I’m at the front of the pack. Do I want to end up looking like I did two years ago, out of shape, fat, and unhealthy? I’ll give you a resounding “NO!” I know what it takes to look this good and I want to keep it that way. I’ve learned that being on top of my health has so much more to do with not only what I eat, but how I treat my body. God gave me this body so that I might do his work. I can’t do that if I’m flat on my back with more health problems than I know what to do with. Am I cured? No, but my numbers are good and I feel great. I plan to take this one small goal at a time and see where it takes me. Who knows, I might try for a marathon one day, but I think I need to go shoe shopping first. I’ve almost worn clear through this pair.

It’s all part of the “Lifestyle” now.

Picky Eating

I was browsing some of my favorite Autism links online and I came across a new article about 'Autism and Defining Clinical Nutrition,' along with a comment section. Now, it wasn't so much what the article had said that sparked the topic I'm going to spin off on, but the comments that came after it that sparked my urge to write. Most of the comments were along the lines of how their kids were so picky or texture driven that they were in a constant battle to get them to eat, much less eat healthy. I really get where these parents are coming from, as my oldest son is a picky eater and has texture issues. Trust me, getting my son to eat pancakes if they were not made to his texture requirements is a challenge. Before I understood what was going on in his little body I would usually be thinking, "It's just a pancake, so what if I cooked it a little to long on one side, eat it!"

Well, that is the way most parents think before taking this journey down the road with a kid that has texture issues, Autistic or otherwise. It has taken a long time to understand what sets him off about a certain food so that I can avoid the confrontation during the meal. As most time pressured moms, I love to make one pot meals. What's better than throwing everything in a pot, setting the timer, stirring here and there, and dinner is ready. I have had to learn that my son doesn't like his food to have sauce on it or other bits from other foods touching. Chili, forget it. When I did do Hamburger Helper, no way. Beef stew, nope. The Hungarian Goulash I made two nights ago, not unless you clean off his potatoes first. It was so much easier when he was a baby, because everything was the same texture and he didn't know any different.

Don't get me wrong, there are a lot of things he loves that most kids his age wouldn't touch. The child loves tofu. I usually cook it in Nabemono (Japanese style of cooking everything in one pot called a Nabe, which I'll post some recipes later) or I have to dust it with a little potato starch and deep fry it. He loves whole foods such as apples, oranges, tomatoes, and baby carrots. I've had to just take the American diet blinders off and try all sorts of things with him to see what he'll eat. He loves to eat nori cut into pieces and eaten like chips. Sushi is a favorite, but don't try to give it to him with real sushi rice; just plain rice, a few little bonito flakes, and rolled in a sheet of nori, thank you. He eats dango plain. I love dango, but I personally think that just rice flour shaped into a dumpling is too boring without the sweet syrup. He has to have ketchup on all his meat or he wont touch it. It doesn't matter that it already has sauce on it.

Now that he is almost 7, I have learned most of his quirks, but that doesn't mean I don't try to introduce new things. I'm still trying to get him to eat chili and stew without having to pull out each food item and have it separated on his cafeteria style plate. I still try to put a few cooked carrots on his plate before giving him the raw ones, bribing him to get at least a few down before I do. He has been the reason that I make the gluten free foods that I do. I don't know if it has to do with genetics, but he is the one that has pulled us towards Asian style foods more than my husband or even my own tastes did. He just does better with these flavors than American or even Italian ones (notice I still have an Everyday Italian cookbook). I make a sweet potato biscuit that I tried with miso soup instead of milk one time, and he ate them up so fast that I still make them at least every couple of weeks just to make him happy. He's also my baking tester. If he doesn't like a new recipe I've been working on, forget it, you won't find it on this blog.

So to all you parents out there that are struggling with picky eaters and their texture issues, I know where you are coming from. Hang in there and hopefully you'll find the textures and tastes that your kid favors the most. Eventually you'll be able to use that to expand their menu little by little, then these articles about the importance of kids and good nutrition won't make you feel like such a guilty parent. Trust me, there are still more days than I want to admit, where he doesn't eat much more than plain rice. Give him a couple of days and he'll be eating me out of house and home like a typical kid. Also, if you have an Occupational Therapist, they may have some ways to help get your kid to try things with textures in ways you would never think of. It all will balance out eventually as long as you don't loose heart and give up.

Kelly

Welcome and Gluten Free, Dairy Free, Egg Free Rice Bread

My name is Kelly and this is my blog, Gluten Free, It's a Lifestyle. Writing has always been something that I enjoy and it just seemed natural that I start my own blog. I started out by sharing my gluten free baking tips on Facebook and my friends like my recipes so much that I wanted to share them with the rest of you out there.

Now being gluten free is not just a way of loosing weight or eating healthier, even though I have, but it is a true lifestyle change. This journey started when I was diagnosed with Hypothyroidism and around that same time my oldest son was diagnosed Autistic. These two journeys may seem entirely separate from each other, but through much research I realized that they have somethings in common. For one, food intolerance. I'm not talking about allergies, that is something different. Allergies are when the body can not tolerate even the smallest particle of that substance and has a violent reaction. Food intolerance is often linked with autoimmune response where the body creates antibodies to battle the substance, resulting in a reaction that can range from violent to mild.

In my case, I would get eczema really bad and it became worse after my second son was born. I also have a hard time with my digestive system. Heartburn was common for me and I lived off Tums some days. In a quest for a cure for my thyroid problems, I read several sources that linked gluten and dairy to Hypothyroid. I decided to give it a shot and took myself through an elimination diet. I had removed eggs, milk and processed foods when I was pregnant due to morning sickness and so I started there, one food at a time. I found that I felt so much better once I switched to soy milk that I removed cheese and the rest of the dairy from my diet. I kept a diary and after about two years of playing with recipes I am now gluten, dairy, and egg free.

I also found that the American diet is full of refined white sugar and that I didn't feel so bloated when I removed it from my diet and that my headaches went away. I also know that I'm sensitive to canola oil as it makes my skin itch and the tomato/pepper family is something to eat every now and then. My biggest lesson learned was that I need to listen to my body. It knows what it needs and doesn't like and I just adjust my menu as needed. If I had too much sugar one day, I back off for a week or so until my body feels more in balance. It's all about paying attention.

Early in my own food intolerance journey, my oldest boy had a bad reaction to a popular tubed yogurt that he had at preschool. I had a friend with a boy about my son's age that had bad food allergies and I remembered her saying something about the ability for her boy to concentrate was a symptom of his allergies. We had yet to have him diagnosed, but I went ahead and started a food diary for him and realized that everything he had a hard time with had corn. I took him off any foods containing corn, which is a lot in our American diet, and he began to calm down and his ability to concentrate was greatly improved. I did take him to an allergist and he encouraged me that even though the test were negative that if I noticed a difference that I should do what I thought was best for my son.

Once he was diagnosed, I found many a resource that listed Autistic children as having problems with gluten and dairy, as early research had indicated that the bodies of these children reacted to gluten and dairy as if it were an opiate; messing with their concentration and increasing hyperactivity. Since I was already on my own food intolerance journey, it didn't take long to decide to remove dairy and gluten from his diet as well. He has shown great improvement and he is able to keep up with his classmates and make friends. He has also had a great set of therapists, so I'm thankful for all the hard work, food, and training that has brought him as far as he is.

Not only is eating a part of this lifestyle, but exercise as well. Just as my oldest son needs body movement to regulate his mind, so does my body. My husband got me hooked on P90X and after 6 months of this at home program, I'm hooked. I love that I have more energy and that I have rid myself of my baby chub. This isn't an easy task as those of you who have a thyroid problem know that the thyroid is in charge of the metabolism. It took having my medication balanced and a little help from the Thyroid Diet to get my body to the point that I could lose weight. Healthy eating, portion control, and getting my intolerances under control made going through this exercise program successful. This is now part of the lifestyle and I intend to keep up with staying fit through running, rollerblading, chasing my kids, workout videos, or whatever means of fitness are available to me at the time. A healthy body is an efficient body and I plan to keep it that way.

Through this journey I have found many helpful blogs and recipes online that I tweeked to my own tastes once I learned what replacement foods I could use and where. Now I am more comfortable in my skills and through the encouragement of my friends I am going to share some of these lessons with you. I am by no means a professional chef or a lifestyle coach, in fact I'm a Horticulturalist by trade, but I have learned a lot in helping my family to eat better and I hope I help at least a few of you as you continue on your own journey.

Join me on my journey in this gluten free lifestyle.

Gluten Free, Dairy Free, Egg Free Rice Bread



Note: I live at high altitude, so the cooking times may be shorter at lower altitude.

Quick and easy; makes a wonderful breakfast toast.

INGREDIENTS:

1/4 cup brown sugar
1 Tbs ground flax seed (or pre-ground flax seed meal) plus 3 Tb hot water mixed and set aside for 10 minutes. (can use one egg if not vegan)
1-1/2 cups Brown Rice
2 Tbs Potato Starch
1 Tbs ground flax seed or flax seed meal plus 3 Tbs of hot water
1/2 tsp Baking Soda
1 tsp Cream of Tartar
¼ tsp salt
1 tsp yeast
2 Tbs vegetable oil
2 tsp gaur gum
1 1/2 cups Rice Milk

Preheat oven to 350. Lightly grease a 4" x 6" bread pan, set aside.

For those that are new to the whole gluten free or vegan diet:
To replace 1 egg: I use one Tablespoon of flax seed that I grind in my coffee grinder. I put this in a small bowl and add 3 Tablespoons of hot water-can be from the tap- and add it to the flax seed. You can also use flax seed meal, but I prefer to mill my own seed since the meal can go bad if not used within a month.

I also use the coffee grinder to make my own rice flour. It takes a few times to figure out how fine a flour you can make, but even my finicky child has no problem with the courser grind that I get from the coffee grinder. Plus, this saves a little money, especially if you get rice from Costco or Sam's. You can either use brown or white rice, but I find that the brown rice requires additional rice milk for this recipe to work. Needless to say, I don't grind much coffee anymore ;D

Directions:
Sift dry ingredients and add to wet ingredients. Mix well. Beat with a blender for at least three minutes.

Scrape the dough into a 1.5 pound loaf pan (or 7 to 8-inch round cake pan for ciabatta style) and smooth evenly (I use wet fingers). Loosely cover the pan (I use wax paper so that I can see how high it is just in case it gets too high and might stick to the cover) and allow the dough to rise for 20 minutes in a warm spot.

Preheat your oven to 350 degrees F. When the oven comes to temperature bake the bread until it sounds hollow when thumped. 60 minutes for people at higher altitude.(this might be anywhere from 35 to 45 minutes for lower alt) Lower style round pan loaves will bake at 30 to 40 minutes, usually.

If you like a crusty loaf, remove the bread from the pan and return it naked to the oven for an additional 10 minutes- keep an eye on it and don't let it get too brown. It should be a light golden color.

Cool on a wire rack.