Juice Fast Day 1

What a great day. Nothing remarkable happened, but I flowed through it without much stress.

I made an apple/carrot/celery juice this morning with a squeeze of lemon. It was refreshing. Then I ate a half avocado around lunch time. For dinner I had the glowing green smoothie (pretty nasty but very filling).

The glowing green smoothie is made in a blender. I recommend a KitchenAid for a $100 budget or a Vitamix for a $400 budget. The Vitamix has an attachment to help push food down into the blades, and some Vitamix blenders will warm your concoction so you have soup or sauce made and stored right on the spot. But the KitchenAid does a great job of blending to a smooth consistency. That's what I use. I don't have $400 to spend on a blender. Someday. Must marry a rich man.

Moving on, the glowing green smoothie was something I read about in Kimberly Snyder's The Beauty Detox Solution. I read this three hundred page book about the "glowing green smoothie" on my Kindle, but she wouldn't reveal the recipe until the end of the book, and since I was reading it on my Kindle, I couldn't easily flip through the pages like on an actual book, so I read every stinking page before getting to the recipe at the end. I felt I had to incorporate it into my lifestyle, after reading about all it's amazing benefits. It does so many things for you, yet is so simple to make. Here's the recipe:

A handful of fresh spinach
A half-bunch of parsley
3-4 Romaine lettuce hearts
1 Granny Smith green apple

Just blend together with some water to help it all mix. Then drink it. Try not to gag, it's pretty bad. I add pineapple which helps a little.

After drinking the glowing green smoothie and rinsing out my blender, I took the three girls I babysit out to dinner at a kid-friendly place called Rhody Joe's, where they have kids spin a wheel for prizes, and there's also some arcade games spread out around the 3 room venue. There's also a bar and lotto ticket machine and lots of televisions everywhere, so adults love it too. The place was getting packed for Monday Night Football, and we had a hard time finding a parking space. But there was no turning back. The girls were so excited about going, and I had to just roll with it, despite their off-the-wall energy. And I got through the evening like a true zen master.

The oldest girl kept leaving the table to change the songs on the juke box. The middle child disappeared to play basketball. The three year old disappeared under the table and out of her seat to an empty table's seat directly behind me, so I just forked helpings of brocolli and mac cheese to her by turning around and feeding her there. At one point though, she was sprawled out on her belly on the floor in the aisle where people were walking, and I realized she might get stepped on, so I said calmly but firmly "Watch out, someone will step on you," and she retreated to her seat at our table.

All the kids finished their kid dinners, veggies, and chocolate milks. The middle child ordered a second meal and finished that. Plus they split an appetizer of mozzarella sticks. They had super charged sugar highs as we left. We managed to squeeze in a game of air hockey and a couple more games of basketball before leaving. The three year old hit her head on an arcade game as we were literally heading out the door, and the tears came, and I just scooped her up and had the kids buckled and driven home before no time.

It's 10:30 now and I'm wide awake but should go to sleep, since I have to get up at 5:30 and work a 12 hour day tomorrow. I'm actually looking forward to it.