Elderberry-Lemon Gummies And More

It is time to prepare ourselves for the "flu season". I love Autumn, love the colours, the crisp air, candles, apple cider, warm woolly socks etc. but, I really detest the snotty noses, followed by the sinus infections and everything else. I HATE with a passion. I don't take my health for granted, or at least I don't think I do, so please please could we just dodge the crap this year??? Probably not, since we do live in a fallen world with disease and curses, and as much as anyone wants to argue that you can dodge sickness and disease with a well around plant based diet, well you just can't. SO, what exactly am I going to do about it?

I have this grand war plan to be as alert as I can with immunity boosting, cootie fighting strategies - which I will list down soon- but as fallible as I am, I'll probably start strong like a commit, lose my focus in a week or so into it and face-plant into the midst of a slimy snot fest. Just from experience, that's all. 

The 10 (ten seems to be a reasonably stupid number to overwhelm us all) Ways You Can Fight The Slimy Snot Fest:

1. Be the hero of your family, cook a batch of Elderberry-Lemon gummies and convince your family to eat them. My girls and personally I think they taste alright, but my boys are not so sure. I'm working on it! (recipe at the bottom)
   
2. Diffuse doTERRA's OnGuard essential oil around the house. This virus/bug fighting killing machine is feisty! I usually lather up OnGuard with coconut oil the bottom of our feet and massage it on around their lymph nodes too. Today I put OnGuard in a capsule with a few other oils (Oregano, Melaleuca and Ginger) and ingested it. Wowza!
   
   www.mydoterra.com/rosecathy
3. Start your day with a "flu-fighting" smoothie. I use, spinach, avocado, frozen berries, vitamin-C powder, Greek yoghurt, orange juice, probiotics, powdered greens etc. with some extracts and other goodies, whatever I can find! I once blogged about it, http://holytempleunderrenovation.blogspot.ca/2012/04/morning-smoothie.html AND http://holytempleunderrenovation.blogspot.ca/2011/09/update-and-super-healthy-morning.html Notice, the latter is "super healthy" lol
4. Avoid sugar. I can't go into detail.. well I could... but, I'm just too lazy to. Avoid sugar! Trim Healthy Mama Plan has MANY MANY recipes to choose from, and all are sugar-free! Google it! (Affiliated Link) being "pumpkin spice everything-season", I don't want to NOT eat these yummy goodies... I want it all!
5. If you can afford it, get a Meyer's Cocktail done. Meyer's Cocktail is a highly concentrated vitamin and mineral IV administrated by your healthcare practitioner. In my case, this would be my Naturapathic Dr. down the road. *super-excited!*
6. Commit to your high quality supplements. I had my Naturapathic Dr. go through my supplements and point out to the ones I was wasting my time and money on. Thankfully, there weren't too many that were poor quality. She pointed out that my probiotics then, consisted mostly from potato starch and less from the actual probiotics... umm ok! Check them out, and commit to taking them.
7. THM (Trim Healthy Mama) have a few "all day sippers" that are very much so immunity boosting drinks! My favourites are the Good Girl Moonshine, Earth's Milk and Singing Canary. Basically drink plenty of water too! Infused or steeped, drink it.
   
   
8. Make sure you get enough sleep. Maybe a bit more than enough. I'm guessing with the amount of cooties we need to fight off, it wouldn't hurt to ease off from other areas where we put our bodies under so much stress. Lack of sleep is one, diet is another etc.
9. If you're a woman, make love to your husband! You're probably wondering how on earth this would be helpful and whether my husband paid me to write that in here?? Well, no he didn't bribe me and he is probably very ecstatic about "number 9" which he might hold me to every evening...*sigh*... ANYWAY, the reasons are plenty, here's a teaser -
   
   "Love Your Husband Love Yourself -Jennifer Flanders"
10. I would say, hit the gym.... but, with so many cooties floating around, I recommend working-out outdoors. If the weather permits it, go for a run, walk, "freeletics", Pilates outdoors...

WHEW! There's 10 ways to "Kung-Fu" those viruses and bugs. Hope these help!

What do you do to prep for the "flu-season"? Comment below!

Elderberry-Lemon Gummies

Ingredients:

• 1C dried elderberries
• 8 drops doTERRA Lemon EO
• 4C water
• 6T Gentle sweet or 3T Sweet Blend -taste test and tweak it to your own liking
• 1t cinnamon
• 1/2t cherry extract
• 1/2t vanilla
• 6,000mg vitamin C powder (optional)
• 12T Gelatin

Method:

1. Simmer elderberries, cinnamon, and sweetener  on low heat with 3C water for about 30minutes.
2. Strain the water into another pan and discard the berries (careful you don't do this the other way around!)
3. Add the remaining water (or more) to make 4C of liquid in total. Let cool down.
4. Turn on the heat to medium-low and add the extracts, Lemon essential oil and vitamin-C. Slowly sprinkle in the gelatin as the mixture warms up and whisk until dissolved. 
5. Heat up, but do not to boiling, then pour it into a glass baking dish or molds. 
6. Store in the fridge until set and cut into squares. 

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Soup For The Soul

 Broth:

• 1-2 litres of water
• 1 T shaoshing rice wine
• 1T dark soy sauce (for colour)
• 1T light soy sauce (for saltiness)
• 1/2 beef broth cube for flavour
• 2 garlic cloves, crushed
• 2T fresh ginger, grated
• pepper to taste

 Soup Filling:

• handful of mushrooms, enoki or other, quartered
• head of broccoli sliced
• handful of puffed tofu, quartered
• hotdogs, sliced (for the kids, you know... :))
• Korean fish cake, 1 sheet, sliced
• handful of baby kale
• spring onion, sliced
• Taiwanese Noodles, optional

Bring everything to boil and simmer for 20 minutes. Remove from heat, throw in the greens, and cover for 5 more minutes. Broccoli should be crunchy and the kale wilted.

What's your favourite soup?

More recipes HERE

Things That Help Me Through a Cold

I want to share with you the things that help me ride out the colds I get.

If I have not been smart enough to take the time and repell them, then this is what I come to. You can read my post on (here) about how to repel the bug!

Let me list them. (For a minor cold)

1. (I swear by this) Neti Pot. I use this 2-3x a day to rinse out my sinuses, and find extreme relief from it. Once you get the hang of it, you won't feel any discomfort whatsoever. I would use this on my kids too, that's how safe it is! More on Neti Pots (here). However, I prefer the Finnish Design best, called the "Sarvikuono" (Rhino).
2. Vitamin- C. I pretty much "O.D" on this. I dissolve the tablets or empty the capsules into my drinking water. I use about 4000-7000 mg a day, untill the cold has passed and then I go down to 1000-2000 a day.
3. Water. Drink a ton of it. 2-4 liters a day. I flush out the toxins and help my cells to work better. Keeping hydrated is important for fighting the bug and keeping the cold short.
4. Peppermint Oil. I usually get "head colds". They affect my top sinuses and give me headaches. I don't like taking Tylenol unless I "have to". I find that peppermint oil rubbed on aching areas help 100%!
5. Hydro-Therapy. Take a hot bath or shower untill you feel sweat pearls on your forhead. While you are in the shower/bath, have cotton socks soaking in COLD water. Come out of the bath, drain the socks and put them on. (Yes, feels awful but bare with me). Put wool socks over your feet. Get dressed into "heavy clothes" such as a sweater, and comfortable trousers. Get into bed, cover your self with warm blankets and go to sleep. You have now kick started your kidneys and liver into super mode and will sweat loads during the night. Your body produces heat to dry the cold wet socks. Do not remove your blanket even if you feel uncomfortable with the heat. You'll feel a hundred times better in the morning.
6. A balloon. Apparently playing with a balloon makes you forget you have a cold, according to my 9month old daughter.

 For a heavy cold, add these as well as the ones above:

1. Ginger. Juice fresh ginger and gurgle with honey and swallow. Ginger is potent, and can  will cause a burning sensation. It is very good for soar throats as it works well for mucus membranes. It is antiviral, antibacterial and anti-imflammatory. One piece of ginger root juiced is enough for a day or two. It's that potent!
2. Garlic. Cut cloves into swallowable pieces. Throughout the day swallow 4-6 cloves of garlic (cut!) with water. Garlic cleans out your blood and has all the above properties as ginger does.
3. Tea. Keep sipping tea! Boil water, add sage, let it simmer and drink it throughout the day. You can add raw unpasteurized honey only after it cools down a bit, else it doesn't add positively to your healing.
4. Become vegetarian and don't eat much cooked food. Putting cooked food down your throat gives your body extra work, especially if it's meat. Your poor body has to give up it's disease fighting enzymes to chop down food that it doesn't need at that time. All the energy goes into healing your body. Pretty smart body you got! Fresh veggies and fruit have their own enzymes and don't take much if any energy away from the healing process.
5. Echinacea and other medicinal herbs. Go to your local health food shop and buy them all! You WILL find great relief from them and add to your health for the future. My personal favourites are

• Oregano Oil
• Grapeseed Extract
• Echinacea
• Bronchosan
• Esberitox  click for info

Last but NOT least: PRAYER and SLEEEEEEEEEEP! Go to your Creator and ask Him to give you the strength to persevere and quick healing. Sweet dreams!

Hope this helps!