HEALTH CHALLENGE

HEALTH CHALLENGE JULY 6-AUGUST 16

Every day you need to do each of the items below. For each one you do, you get 1 point. You can earn up to 11 points a day for a total of 77 points a week.

POINTS:
1. Eat 5 servings of fruits & vegetables. A serving can be a fruit or vegetable, a half cup of cooked vegetables or 2 cups of leafy green vegetables.

2. Drink 5-8 glasses of water a day. You can add Crystal Light if you want to make it easier, but make sure half of it is plain water. (Minimum 40 oz)

3. Get 7 hours of sleep a night. If you come up short, you can nap during the day- the 7 hours do not have to be consecutive.

4. Exercise 30 minutes a day. Make sure it is more than a leisurely walk. (You always get the exercise point on Sunday as long as you go to church.)

5. No soft drinks or alcohol. None.

6. No sweets. No cookies, candy, cake etc. (A little brown sugar or honey in oatmeal is fine.)

7. No unhealthy food choices; fries, chips, Cheezits, Ritz and other snack crackers and processed cheese. (Baked chips and Wheat Thins/Triscuits are okay, but try snacking on fruits, vegetables or nuts.)

8. No eating after 8:00 p.m.- unless you work out for 2 hours or burn 1500 calories.

9. Eat 2 servings of whole grains or legumes per day.

10. One-on-one family connection. Spend quality one-on-one time with your spouse, child or other family member.

11. Study your scriptures for at least 15 minutes.

During the week you get 3 free points. For example, one day you can use a free point for one normal size dessert or use another free point for missing exercise one day. These points do not accumulate. Use it or lose it.

Report your points every Monday to Danielle Cahoon at sdcahoon@hotmail.com or (801) 768-8125. You get one extra point if you report before 1:00 p.m.

If you are the weekly winner, you get 1 extra free point the following week. All 6 weekly winners and the 4 people with the top total points will be entered in a drawing for a grand prize.

You have 1 free day during the 6 week period where you can get all 11 points without having to follow any of the rules. Use it wisely!

Bulk Buy- Wheat

If you would like some wheat at a good price, here's you chance. I will be picking it up Monday, July 6th and I need your order before then.

DETAILS:
50 lb bag of Hard Red Wheat- $11.00, harvested last fall
(You could use our stake's drypack canner to package this wheat)
or
45 lb bucket of Hard Red Wheat- $18.50, harvested last fall

Danielle

You Can Start Early Too!

I have always started my canning in the fall. I love having a variety of apple, pear and peach items in my pantry along with the homemade salsa.

This summer I have activity looked for places to get free or very inexpensive fruits to preserve. One of the fruits people just give away are mulberries. Mulberries grow on trees and are not hard to harvest; you just set tarps on the ground and shake the branches of the tree. I have never seen anything like it! Pie cherries (sour cherries) are also ready to be picked right now. Perhaps you know someone that will not be using the fruit on their trees, please let me know and we will see if anyone in the ward could use it.

This has resulted in many jars of jams, syrups and preserves in the past couple weeks. You can find a lot of recipes online at www.fooddownunder.com or at the local extension office. If you have not canned before or are not an experienced canner, Michelle or I would be happy to show you the basics. (Since we are at a high elevation, remember to process your jars for long enough.)

This week I will be using pie cherries to make canned cherries and cherry pie filling. I will also be trying a vegetable Antipasto recipe soon. (I have made canned bing cherries, cherry syrup, bing cherry jam, cherry raspberry jam, mulberry syrup, mulberry apple syrup, mulberry cherry apple syrup, mulberry jam, raspberry mulberry apricot jam, mulberry peach jam and raspberry apricot jam.) If any of these recipes interest you, let me know!

Danielle

Water Barrel Storage

Those of you who were at the Provident Living Fair in March may have picked up information on building a water storage unit to store water barrels on their side. I recently got an email from Phil
Bruick about the use of those units. Here it is.

Michelle,
Your email about the barrels reminded me that I was going to contact you 
after your ward preparedness saturday presentation a few months ago.  
Bro. Johnson had on his table plans for stacking two of the barrels on 
their sides one above another. My brother and I had thought of that but 
when we talked to a bunch of people about such a project, we were 
informed that the barrels were never made to lay on their sides and that 
the seams would not hold eventually.  Based on that information we 
abandoned the idea but I'm concerned that some may try that and find 
themselves with a great deal of water in their garage or basement.
 
We have since found a source for 250 gallon barrels that are only 21" in 
diameter.  A little pricy but can store much more water in the same 
footprint.
Phil
 
I emailed Phil back and asked for the source of the larger barrels which
I will post for your information. I take full responsibility for that information being available, as it
was my suggestion. It was a good idea, but unfortunately not practical.
Thanks for your understanding.

Michelle

Organic Heirloom Vegi Plants

I would like to recommend you think about heirloom (non-hybrid) vegi's when you purchase your plants this year. If you don't know why that is important, I'll tell you. The plants and seeds you get from the store are what is called Hybrids. The problem is that hybrid vegetables can not be used to get seeds for the next years plantings. They are made this way on purpose, so you have to buy new every year. Right now that isn't so much of a problem, but in trying to live even more providently, or in the event that for some reason we don't have seeds or plants or money for that matter to purchase, we would already have seed available to us for free if we had heirloom seeds. Heirloom vegetables, unlike hybrids, do have the ability to produce useable seed for the next years planting. They are a little bit more expensive, like by a dollar or two per plant, but in the long run so much more frugal than buying new seeds or plants every year. I have information from a couple who grow and sell organic heirloom plants. I have the info. in an email, and since I'm pretty computer iliterate, you will need to email me if you want the info. Email me at getyourstorage@hotmail.com and I will forward you the email I got from them. It has a list of all their plants. Just to give you an idea, they have 65 different kinds of tomato plants and I believe about 100 types of plants to choose from. Imagine the variety you could have in your garden and then on your table for your family to eat. I will give info. on saving seeds in the fall. It's not hard at all. Happy gardening.
Michelle

Pasta Blow Out in Lehi

If you remember me telling you a few months ago about the pasta deals in Lehi, which closed, and you didn't get there in time. You're in luck. They're doing it again. Here is the ad from ksl.com.

Pasta blowout continues...

Lehi, UT 84043 - May 12, 2009

On Friday May 15th from 11am to 7pm and Saturday May 16th from 10am to 3pm we will have our pasta for sale at incredible prices. We will also be selling spices, flavors and more. We are back this week at Emmett's and Ethel's at 90 East Main Street in Lehi.

We encourage large groups to order to get the best price possible. You can get your bulk boxed pasta product as low as $.55 a pound based on the volume of your order! We also want to introduce more of our product line for Flavors Gourmet, which includes over 75 spices and flavors. What a perfect way to add to your food storage.

If you have any questions or for a list of available pasta send me an e-mail at steve@flavorsgourmet.com.

On May 23rd we will be in Logan, Utah. On May 30th we will be selling in Idaho Falls, Idaho. Details for our locations will be announced weekly.

I would get in on this if you can. I personally think their spices are a bit expensive, but it would be your choice to purchase or not.

Michelle

What have you been up to?

I was wondering if any of you would like to share, besides with your circle of friends, what you have been doing over the last few months to help get your family prepared? I know we can all learn from each other. Even if you have only done small things, you might inspire someone. Many times it's the small things that make the biggest difference.
Next week I will be posting more things for you to work on. Sorry it's taken so long for me to post anything. We also will be doing some group buys and making some useful kits and things. Keep an eye and ear out.
Let's hear from you. I know you're doing something, share it with everyone.

Kitchen measures and tidbits

A little information, to follow up from the basic cooking class on Tuesday, I found on the tipnut website, I thought might be useful to some.

Kitchen Measurement Hacks

1 pound all-purpose flour = 4 cups
1 pound cake flour = 4 3/4 cups
1 pound pastry or graham flour = 4 1/2 cups
1 pound granulated sugar = 2 to 2 1/4 cups
1 pound brown sugar = 2 to 2 1/3 cups
1 pound sifted confectioners’ sugar = 4 cups (approx)
1 pound oatmeal = 2 2/3 cups
1 pound rolled oats = 4 3/4 cups
1 pound butter = 2 cups
1 pound shortening = 2 to 2 1/3 cups
1 pound cheddar cheese = 4 cups, grated
1 cup eggs = 5 to 6 medium eggs
1 cup egg whites = 7 to 10 medium eggs
1 cup egg yolks = 12 to 14 medium eggs
1 pound finely chopped meat = 2 cups
1 pound cocoa = 4 cups
1 ounce chocolate = 1 square
6 oz. chocolate chips = 1 cup (approx)
9 oz. jar jelly or jam = 1 cup (approx)
4 medium apples = 4 cups sliced apples
3 medium bananas = 1 cup mashed banana
8 medium peaches = 4 cups sliced peaches
1 pint strawberries = 2 cups sliced strawberries
1 pound unpitted dates = 1 3/4 cups
1 pound pitted dates = 2 1/2 cups
1 pound raisins = 2 1/2 to 3 cups
1 pound rhubarb = 2 cups, cut
1 pound onions = 2 1/2 cups chopped
1 pound nuts = 4 cups chopped (approx)

Kitchen Tidbits

• 1 stick of butter = 1/2 cup
• 1 cup of whipping cream = 2 cups whipped
• 1 cup uncooked rice = 3 1/2 cups cooked
• 1 envelope Gelatin = 4 leaves = 1/4 ounce
• 1 pkg. yeast = 2 1/4 teaspoons active dry yeast

Swine Flu

• Some of you were probably waiting to see if and when I would say something about the swine flu. I hate to disappoint, so here you go. First, I would suggest that you visit the utahpreppers.com site for some good info on preparing for the possibility of a pandemic. You can also go to the providentliving.org site to find info. on preparing and handling pandemic issues.
  

When my V.T's visited me today, (give them some slack, I was recuperating from surgery last week, and the week before was spring break) I was asked what my thoughts are about the swine flu. I, of course, told them not to panic, we never want to panic, though many times we'd like to. Just use the panic energy to move us into action. I was also asked to give my 5 most important things would be to do right now. It was hard, but if I remember right, girls correct me if I'm wrong, but I told them these would be my suggestions and in this order:
1. water-we can live a long time with water, but not long without it. Remember, minimum of 1 gal. per day enough for 2 weeks, and this is just for drinking. Since there will most likely be a lot of people staying home because either they are sick or family members are sick, there may not be electricity to pump our water, so be prepared.
2.Food-making sure we have easily preparable (is that a word, apparently not but I like it) to get us through the most stressful time, which in my opinion is the first week or so, but please make sure you have at least your 3 month supply.
3.sanitation supplies-there are several things in this category. For over all germ cleaning, you bleach is good to kill the flu germs. Also, for when you need to care for the sick, face masks and gloves are good. It might be a good idea too, to get some hand sanitizer, for extra measures. These are just some basics, I could go on a bit longer, but don't want to over whelm you. Also, if you don't like to use bleach, there are other things you could use, like tea tree or lemon oils to kill germs.
4.light, cooking and heat-you will need to see at night, cook food and keep your family warm because if no one is working, there possibly won't be any electricity.
5.symptom control-to help make those in your family who do unfortunately come down with the flu, you will want some items to help them feel better. Items to help with chest congestion, coughing, vomit control, etc. May I suggest that instead of using a vomit bowl, keep paper bags (grocery sized for those who are small and would have a hard time getting to a smaller bag, start asking for paper instead of plastic where possible), put a paper bag inside a plastic bag. When someone vomits, they do it in the paper bag, you roll up the paper bag inside the plastic and take it out side. I don't know about you, but I don't like cleaning up after vomit.
Those are my top 5 tips for pandemic prepping. These are really basic and can for sure be added to, but if you have these things, you'll be better off than most, and will hopefully fair pretty well.
Think about the fact that if you're ready for a pandemic, you're going to be ready for just about any situation. It would be great if you would leave your thoughts and suggestions in the comment box. Let's do this together.
Michelle

Flax Meal as Egg Substitute

I just found this table for using flax meal as an egg substitute I thought some might be interested in. I got it from www.livingprovidently.blogspot.com. There is a slight difference in our name and theirs. You should check out the blog, it has some pretty good info and recipes. Here's the table

Milled Flax

Milled Flax can be used in many recipes by substituting eggs, butter and oil.

1 egg = 1 Tablespoon Flax + 3 Tablespoons Water
1 Tbsp margarine, butter, or oil = 3 Tbsp Flax

let me know if you try it and how it works out for you. or if you already use it, let us know how you like it. Have fun cooking!
Michelle