Today didn't turn out exactly how I expected, but at least I got to go into the kitchen and cook up some delicious healthy plant based food and I always enjoy that. 

Our furnace started going crazy over the weekend, during my first plant based cooking class of course.  I thought it was from me cooking up a storm, but when the thermostat reads 77 degrees on a 50 degree day and we are opening windows...something isn't right!  So, we had the furnace man in this morning and it's time for a new furnace, ours is 17 years old.  Fused circuits boards and holes in heat exchangers = Not Good.

It is still cold and miserable in Michigan and it's nearly May.  Wahhh!  Wahhh!  I think half the country is pretty fatigued and sick of the cold after this brutal winter.  We aren't going to freeze to death before getting a new furnace in the next day or so, but it is a bit chilly around here. 

What's a girl to do?  BAKE SCONES!  MAKE TEA!  Great solution.  I got the oven cranked up and whipped up this batch of Lemon Blueberry Scones and enjoyed some fresh out of the oven with a cup of Green Tea in my Elvis mug.  That warmed me up.  Now we just need a working furnace and some love from Mother Nature here in good old Michigan. 

The warm weather will come I am sure.  Then I can move on to lots of salads and hot weather foods.  For now, we are still cozying up with warm comfort foods.  I am glad I have a wide variety of recipes from great sites like Protective Diet (scones recipe link).  I plan to share lots of recipes and start developing some of my own as I move ahead with Jennifer Parsley Nutritional Healing. 

Simon and I eat as much as we like of delicious filling foods.  We just remove the artery clogging and cholesterol raising saturated fats from things like animal products and oils.  We focus on whole foods as close to what Mother Nature intended as possible.  And we 'fill our boots' as the Brits say.  No calorie counting.  No obsessing over when, what, and how much to eat.  We are both at our ideal weights, have perfect health numbers, and take no medications.  We are in our 40s and feeling fabulous.  I wish the same vibrant health for everyone.

Enjoy your week!

I had a FUN trip to the eye doctor this week.  I have been sensing lately that my vision has probably been improving, I can read things from very far away that others around me can't.  I have been hearing people in some of my healthy plant based eating groups talking about their vision improving - picking up a pair of glasses from 3 prescriptions ago and seeing just fine. 

I had laser surgery on my eyes 13 years ago and just go for an annual checkup to make sure I am still seeing well.  I have had differences between the left and right eye, but generally still see 20/20, maybe a bit worse in one eye, but 20/20 overall.  I have also been told I will eventually need reading glasses as the eye surgery can't correct for the loss of near vision that comes with age, some time around 40.  I have had some abnormal range tests for nerve thickness, but just something to watch as it has remained stable.

So, I went for my annual checkup this week and started going through all of the tests - eye pressure, peripheral vision, reading the charts far away, up close.  I was telling all of the staff at the office about my new career coaching people in plant based nutrition.  The woman doing some of my tests commented on how great my vision was and we discussed the impact of diet on vision.  The same arteries that we need to keep healthy for heart disease or stroke feed your eyes as well, it is all related.  She wholeheartedly agreed. 

Then my eye doctor came in and we had similar discussions.  He did the distance and up close vision tests and my eagle eyes were better than 20/20 near and far.  I read every tiny line of letters they had and probably could have read even smaller, it was kind of fun putting my eyes to the test!  The good doctor said I have improved in every test they did and have no signs of needing reading glasses.  He also agreed on keeping the arteries healthy for healthy/improved vision.  I truly believe this year's improvement is due to me being vegan for almost a year and a half now and shifting to an even healthier low fat whole foods plant based diet for 8 months now.

I have been taking my Grandmother to appointments at an eye specialist for Age Related Macular Degeneration and she needs to get INJECTIONS in her eye almost every 6 weeks - NOT FUN!  I hold her hand, but can't even watch.  I am giving her lots of information on the impact of diet on this disease (click on links in this post).  I buy her Goji Berries as Dr. Greger has a great video citing studies done with elderly patients on the benefits of even 15 goji berries a day.  The guy at the Asian Market where I bought more berries said in China they make tea with the berries to help improve vision.

This Success Story from plant based eating tells about reversing eye damage from diabetes.  Lots of great evidence out there linking eye health to healthy low fat plant based eating and getting the artery clogging, high cholesterol foods (meat, dairy, even plant oils) out of the diet.

I just wanted to share, as I do with my Grandmother.  I try to be a healthy example and share my successes and those of others eating this way to possibly inspire others.  Enjoy!

My friend Ronda delivered my new Pampered Chef toys on Friday, so exciting!  She had a party with Sara TerBurgh, who is a fab consultant and puts on a great show.  She even tries to find vegan recipes for me.  Sara and Ronda kept the foods separate so I could have vegan salad and vegan zucchini pasta with beans and all sorts of fabulousness. 

I am hosting book club at my place tomorrow night, so I am getting a start on all of the recipes that I want to serve.  We are going to have a Mediterranean theme.  The oven roasted garlic and shallots go into a Cannelini Bean Spread that was highlighted in a recent newsletter from my favorite plant based doctor, Dr. McDougall.  It has fresh rosemary, roasted shallot & garlic, and should be deee-lish!  I will also be serving homemade Hummus, Tzatziki Sauce, and Whole Wheat Pita Bread from Protective Diet.  I will have some brown rice and fresh spinach out for making a hearty pita sandwich for those who want to make a meal out of it (that would be me for sure).  Throw in a bit of wine and some discussion of Empty Mansions by Bill Dedman and Paul Clark Newell, Jr. and we have ourselves a great night for the ladies.

I am also making some homemade Onion & Chive Cream Cheeze from Protective Diet and Carrot Cake Bars from fatfreevegan.com to have on hand for breakfasts during the week.  I find a great time saving tip is to choose fairly simple recipes that you start to make over and over again, so you know you and your family like the taste and you can start having those ingredients on hand.  Then, when you have a block of time, possibly on a weekend, you do some batch cooking to fill up the fridge and eventually the freezer as well so you always have your healthy foods on hand.  Foods that will help you reach your optimal weight and reverse a whole host of diseases that stem from the unhealthy Standard American Diet (SAD).

One last note on that Pampered Chef Garlic Baker - that thing is amazing!!! I had a small amount of broth on the bottom with the garlic and shallots, then baked at 400 degrees for over an hour.  It came out of the oven with the whole bottom of the pan really blackened with caked on roast garlic & shallot goo.  I thought I may have ruined the pan on the first try with not enough liquid.  But, no....it has such a good glaze that it cleaned up in about 2 minutes with a nylon dish scrubby and a little elbow grease.  Just like new.  Great addition to my kitchen.

Today's post is a mishmash of things.  A little photo from the comfort food dinner I made the other night.  Chickenless Nuggets with Creamy Ranch Dressing.  I have been cooking almost all of my recipes from the Protective Diet website lately (www.protectivediet.com).  Julie's recipes are amazing - filling, hearty, tasty recipes for beginner cooks and for foodies who just appreciate great tasting food.  She is especially good at transforming comfort foods, ethnic foods, and the foods most of us grew up with into healthy plant based versions that are truly delicious.  Julie has over 100 recipes available for free on her site just by signing up with an email address (to keep spammers off her site).  The Creamy Ranch Dressing recipe is one of these free recipes. 

Some recipes are tagged 'PD-Ed Exclusive' and come with a monthly membership to Protective Diet Education.  For $20 per month, you get weekly 1 hour online interactive courses every Tuesday night, which are recorded and archived for you to view at any time.  You get access to all of the classes, over 20 so far, on  a wide variety of plant based living topics.  And you get 1 or more of her great new recipes, such as the Chickenless Nuggets, each week.  Check it out.  I think it is a great value for the money, I have been a member since Lesson #1 and I love it.  I can spend $20 in a month pretty easily and get way less than that for it. 

This little plate of comfort food I whipped up this week also highlights the fact that I don't just survive on lettuce and lemon wedges.  I will be sharing a lot of what I eat on a regular basis in this blog so you can see the wide variety of foods, the hearty portions, and how filling this way of eating can be.  This diet plan works for everyone at every stage of life and meets all of your caloric and nutritional needs.  A very helpful quote from The American Dietetic Association:

"It is the position of the American Dietetic Association that appropriately planned vegetarian diets, including total vegetarian or vegan diets, are healthful, nutritionally adequate, and may provide health benefits in the prevention and treatment of certain diseases. Well-planned vegetarian diets are appropriate for individuals during all stages of the life cycle, including pregnancy, lactation, infancy, childhood, and adolescence, and for athletes."

I haven't decided yet if I will get into recipe creation and adding my own recipes to this site.  Simon thinks I am very good at it and I think I could definitely do it.  Yet there are so many wonderful healthy whole foods plant based recipes, doctors, and bloggers already sharing this type of information.  I know for sure that I want to teach you all about the health, environmental, social, and animal friendly aspects of this lifestyle.  I want to 'teach people how to fish' so to speak and how to create this lifestyle for themselves.  I will do plenty of cooking demonstrations and share information on where to find great recipes.  We shall see on the Jenny Parsley original recipes.  It will probably happen :-)

My last tidbit for today.  I added a page to my website entitled My Transformation.  On that page I share my transition from the Standard American Diet (aptly called SAD) to a vegetarian diet, to a vegan diet, to a low fat whole foods plant based Protective Diet.  That is how I lost the last 25 pounds before my wedding and hit my goal weight.  Check it out.  I even have before & after pictures in a bikini (gasp!).  I am proud of my success, feel so healthy, and am happy to share my story in hopes that it inspires others to take control of their health.  Check it out!

Please weigh in on the recipe topic.  Do you think I should start creating my own recipes and sharing them on my website?  Or do you think links to existing plant based recipes are helpful enough?

Good question.  She is a fairly new creation really.  I just became Jennifer Arnold Parsley on February 22nd, 2014 when I made the best decision of my life and married Simon Parsley.  Simon and I have been together for almost 9 years, through ups and downs as all couples have, but really it has been mostly UP for us.  We are very compatible, have similar goals in life, and we look forward to growing together and growing old together.

So, we got hitched.  We had an amazing wedding in a castle in Scotland (where Simon's Mum's side of the family is from).  Simon is British, but has been living in the US thanks to his chemical company job for over 10 years now.  He fell in love with a Yank (what the Brits call us Americans, it comes from Cockney rhyming slang, Septic Tank Yank, we are also referred to as Septics, can you feel the love from the Brits?) which made his decision to stay here a bit easier.  We had a wonderful honeymoon in The Maldives and another reception back in good old Midland, Michigan.  After over a month of wedding celebration, we have finished that chapter of our lives.  Time to move ahead.

For me, moving ahead involves becoming Jennifer Arnold Parsley (we didn't get married until we were 41 years old, so I am kind of attached to being Jennifer Arnold, hence deciding to keep Arnold and add Parsley).  Changing your name is an odd process which I am in the middle of right now, which has me wondering 'who is Jennifer Parsley'?  Right now I seem to be going by about 10 different names - Jennifer Arnold, Jenny Arnold, Jennifer Arnold Parsley, Jennifer Parsley, Jen Parsley, etc.  I am just going with the flow.  I will legally be Jennifer Arnold Parsley and we will see how it all shakes out, hopefully I settle with one or two common variations.

The name change is underway and so is my new business - Jennifer Parsley Nutritional Healing.  For those who may not know, I was a corporate drone for 18 years.  I graduated from high school with a love of math, science, and chemistry, then dutifully went off to Michigan Tech and got myself a brand spanking new Chemical Engineering degree in 1994.  Cool.  I really had no clue what chemical engineering meant, I was just good at school.  I have what I call a semi-photographic memory and can memorize and regurgitate anything.  I really liked chemistry in high school because I liked the fact that there were 3 different ways to draw benzene rings and it was fun to draw benzene rings.  Great reason to go into chemical engineering, right? 

It just happens because the whole system is pretty crazy if you really think about it - having a high school guidance counselor and maybe a few other concerned family members ask a 17 year old kid what they want to do for the rest of their lives.  Trust me, a 17 year old kid (well, me for sure) has no clue what they want to do for the rest of their lives.  So, I got thrown into the system and because I was smart and can memorize things, I came out with a shiny new degree in 4 years.

But, I digress.  I tend to ramble.  I apologize.  I am a fast typer and a fast thinker, but I will try not to bore you.  I can share the story of my 18 years in the chemical industry some other time.  Suffice it to say, it was not a passion of mine.  I truly enjoyed maybe 10% of it; was ambivalent about maybe 50% of it; and dreaded, hated, and was brought to tears by it maybe 40% of the time.  So hating your job slightly less than half of the time keeps you in it for 18 years I guess.  As does a good paycheck, benefits, security, blah, blah, blah.  They trap you.  Although security in the work world is fading fast...

With plenty of love, support, and encouragement from Simon and plenty of politics, backstabbing, pain, agony, and crappy coworkers in my last position in the corporate chemical world........  I finally made the leap!  I QUIT.  Done.  Can't take any more.  My body was telling me to leave, my emotions, every fiber in my being told me I could no longer take it.  So I quit at the end of January 2013.  I still have dreams lately where I am beavering away (British saying, I can't help it, I have been with a Brit for 9 years, love the British sayings) at the chemical factory and then realize - wait a minute, I quit this job, why am I coming in here and working so hard?  Will I get paid?  What I am doing here?  Then, luckily, I wake up.

2 weeks after I quit, Simon proposed on Valentine's Day 2013.  I had a wedding in Scotland to plan.  That took a lot of my time.  I was also starting to get clear on my passions in life.  I realized that they are Music (specifically The Blues), Nutrition (specifically plant based), and Spirituality.  I started putting together a new business plan for Jennifer Parsley Nutritional Healing where I can combine my passions in life and hopefully have a lot of fun along the way as I teach and coach people about the benefits of plant based nutrition. 

I have tons of cool business ideas, such as making a cooking show series called Jenny's Blues Kitchen which will feature healthy plant based cooking and awesome Blues music and musicians.  What a great combo.  Watch for videos soon.  And I do plan to contact The Food Network, because my show is way cooler than all of the butter and grease shows that they have on today.  The sky's the limit, why not?

Well, this is turning into a novel.  Thank you to anyone who made it this far.  I wanted to fill you in on who I am and what has been happening in my life.  I left a lot out, but we have plenty more blog posts to come where I will weave in my life's story for sure.

I am working hard getting classes scheduled around town and if you are interested in coaching, feel free to contact me.  I LOVE MY NEW JOB!  And I can draw benzene rings if I feel like it, but I don't have to deal with the rest of the boring corporate chemical industry BS.  I can focus on the things I enjoy - plant based food, Blues music, and a healthy dose of spirituality.

Namaste my friends.

Today is the day I launched the Facebook page for Jennifer Parsley Nutritional Healing, removed all of the 'Coming Soon' information and polished up the website, linked up all of my social media, and am ready to rock & roll with plant based nutrition instruction and coaching.  Very exciting stuff!

I am going to keep this post short because I am also testing how my blog posts flow to all of my other sites - Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn for now.  Fingers crossed, I am no expert on all of this yet, but giving it a whirl, I will learn as I go... as will happen with so many things on this fun new adventure of starting a business based on my passions in life.