Karen Knowler * The Raw Food Coach

Successfully Raw NYC - And More! Part 2

Part 2 of my NY weekend re-telling...

YAAAWWWWNNNNN... On Sunday morning I had a nice long lay in. A 3:30am bedtime and a very long few days prior certainly warranted it! And the bed was sooo good!

Penni and I had already agreed that we’d spend the day together as Penni was to fly back to Tulsa later that day and I was getting up at 4am the next morning to get my cab to JFK. So, after stretching out and having a lovely refreshing shower it was very much a case of - Let’s go!

Our travels took us first to Pure Juice and Takeaway; my second visit. I was so craving a green juice and a coconut water that I had both :) One big glass of each. Yum. And I tried some little cookie dough ball type things (I’m sure the real name is much more glamorous!), and although they were tasty I realised by this point that I was so craving fresh fruit and salad that I just couldn’t take one more “mock” anything!

We sat in the window and chatted away. Penni was well into her juice feast – about day 33 or more - and so was more than happy to slurp away! It was so nice to sit there like old friends (even though we'd only known each other about 36 hours!) and share so much about ourselves and our lives and feel so blissfully content. Friendships really are priceless and yet I have not made as much time for them, or family, over the past few years, not always finding it easy to find "my people", especially into raw. So finding Penni and others had been yet another wonderful aspect to the weekend that I had not predicted.

In many ways I found myself wishing I was also juice feasting; sometimes I wish I didn't have to think about food (totally ironically it has become such a small part of my own life!), and I could feel and see the benefits of juice feasting in both Penni and Philip, which certainly got me thinking...

Successfully Raw NYC - And More! Part 1

I've been back from New York for just two days, and still really taking in the enormity of what happened. Reading other people's blog posts about the event has been heart-warming. It really was incredible and I am so so happy to have been a part of it.

I typed up my New York trip notes on the plane home to England on Monday night. I got half way through and then my battery died. So part 1 comes today and part 2 later this week, stay tuned!

My trip to New York began early last Friday morning UK time. Once on the train to London Stansted I immediately met “interesting person #1” who came dashing onto the train having almost missed it. Without any prompting from me he proceeded to share with me how he’s a film set designer, has worked on all the Star Wars films and every year travels to Egypt to study hieroglyphics. And so my journey began. I knew this was a taste of things to come!

One hour later safely at the airport, I was queueing to check in when who should step into line behind me but a couple who live on the same road as me! Quite unbelievable, especially considering how few houses there are where I live! Already it was becoming clear that this was to be a serendipitous journey.

Once on board the plane bound for NY, I got chatting to the woman next to me. In actual fact originally I had been placed in the seat behind her, but as a husband and wife had been accidentally split by the airport staff I gave up my seat to the wife, we swapped places and I found myself sitting next to a lovely lady from Belgravia, London who just happened to have been in and out of raw foods for the past few years!

We got chatting, she took my card, and while reading her copy of Red magazine she found a small feature about raw chocolate c/o rawintent.co.uk which she promptly ripped out for future reference and will no doubt be purchasing from. Well it just kept flowing!

Once at NY, it was a very straightforward journey through. For the first time ever I didn’t get asked “purpose of visit”, I just cruised through passport control and out to the other side where the lovely, wonderful, truly gem of a guy Philip McCluskey was waiting for me.

Love, Love, Love

Valentine's Day:

No of course I don't fall for all that mainstream nonsense (actually I do, big time.. I'm a libran!)

I am writing this the night before... hoping that some flowers will fall on my doorstep tomorrow. Someone... anyone? hehe

Actually, someone loves me (and I love them too!) I just found out that Heidi and JS of Raw Food Right Now have nominated me as one of their favourite Inspirational Bloggers : )

And here's my badge to prove it!

Read more about what this is all about here and the lovely words they wrote here... too bashful to print them here : )

And thanks Heidi and JS I think you're pretty inspirational too... especially Heidi's juice fast that is currently just over half way. You go girl! (And you look fab!)

Happy Valentine's everyone. May your day be filled with blooms of all shapes, sizes and colours, even if not in the literal sense :)

Excuse Me, Have You Got ID?

Saturday night, out on the town with Fiona (part of my self-care for 2008 is going dancing at least once every six weeks) and we were just about to step into a bar when a black suited arm swooped out to stop me walking through:

"Can I see your ID please?" said the guy on the door.

I gave him probably the most quizzical look he has ever seen; a mixture between "is this a wind-up?" and "you can't be serious???"

"But I'm 35!" I said looking incredulously at Fiona who HAD got through and is 27. "I don't carry ID at 35!"

I can't remember what was said next, but suffice to say I did get let in :)

We had a fun night and I boogied in my rather beautiful 5" heels (don't ask me how, just trust me... I even walk round the house on tiptoe!)

But you could say that I was on a bit of a teenage high all night!!

Raw food de-ageing... guess I'll be asked what school I go to this time next year!

PS: Photo is me aged 22... I was eating mostly raw then - and very glad I am too!

You Asked! ~ My Office!

A couple of weekends ago I blogged about my big office switch - from biggest room in the house to a half-the-former-size one - for a reason: FOCUS. I also mentioned that I had painted my dining room purple! Do we spot a theme...?

Sooo many people have asked me "when are we going to see pictures of your office then?" (and dining room too). Well, I am so in love with my office space (sad but true!) I took some photos tonight and here they are.... Dining room ones may follow : )

Hmmm, I wonder what conclusions you will draw from what you see and whether they will be accurate?!

My Sparkly Weekend

It's been quite the weekend.

Christmas lights, Santa and fair...

Visiting friends...

Choosing paint and painting my dining room (with a lot of help, thank you Robin :) ...

Swapping my bedroom and office around (no mean feat, and I've strained my back lifting and carrying a desk from one room to the other single-handed... Do it every time. Duh!)...

Putting up the Christmas tree with Luke - it looks beautiful...

Visiting Santa again at Church Farm, a beautiful farm about 30 mins away with the most wonderful gift shop. I bought a fantastic free-standing decorative Santa and some other lovely stuff for my newly decorated home...

I sold out on my Best Raw Self Weekend and 5 out of 9 tickets have already gone on the Christmas Dinner on 22nd.

* * * * *

I mentioned in Friday's eZine that I have chosen to paint my dining room purple. This is symbolic as much as it is about aesthetics. I decided not to move out and instead to revamp and this was the start. And it was more than simply "new colour, new start", it was as much about the colour itself as the fact it was new paint, and symbolic of me giving myself permission to show up even more as myself than I have previously, especially in my home.

As the paint went on (deep purple BTW - not a "safe" flowery mauve!) for a moment I was quite worried. What if it looks too dark? What if the old colour was better? What if it looks too over the top and people walk in and go "OMG!!"?

What I Eat Now...

Further to my recent blog about how I lost and GAINED weight on raw food (depending on what raw foods I ate), I've been asked a number of times, so what do you eat NOW?

As mentioned, I had to type this information up for Stella magazine for the feature coming out on 11th November, so here follows where I'm at with my diet right now... BUT... bear in mind that it changes ongoingly, and what I eat this week may not be true for next!

Also, details of the exercise I do in a week as this was the other question asked of me so that's here too...

My (Kind Of) Raw Before And After

I've never really done much of a "before and after" thing before (I wanted to but have thrown out all of my old pre-raw photos as I disliked them so much!!), but I thought it high time I did what I could to show my own raw transformation in pictures as best as I can.

The good news is I have found these rather "lovely" blasts from the past, the not-so-good news is that I was eating mostly/all raw food on ALL FOUR of the photos and not just the right-hand-side ones!!!

As per my last post, the message in this madness is to show that you can do raw food "wrong" OR, at least, you can hold excess weight even when you eat the good stuff.

For me it was a combination of eating too much sugary fruit, too much fat (lots of nuts and seeds), very little green stuff, eating for the taste and NOT hunger AND I also had issues around losing weight, which is why I now specialise in helping women with body issues.

All these things combined made for "wobbly raw girl" : ) In fact I was once asked (not very politely!) if I was lying when I said I ate all raw food as she was so surprised by my rotundness!!!

Today, I am pleased to say, after keeping faith in raw and my body's ability to find its natural shape and size given time and TLC, I am the smallest dress size I have ever been in my adult life - and yet ironically I don't WEIGH the least! In fact I weigh about 10lbs MORE than I did when I first got into raw foods c. 1993/1994 and then I was a dress size 9 (UK). Today I am a size 6-8 depending on what I wear (for US readers that's size 2-4), and yet am somewhere around 9 stone (126 lbs)... I'm probably a bit less but don't like scales!

I found out through experience that you can hold more muscle and tone in a slightly heavier body, as it's all about how clean you are inside. So, in those earlier days I may have weighed less (114lbs) BUT I was actually bigger in volume! And that volume was, I found out in time, largely down to water/salt retention - I was all plumped up!

And one day in Seattle it all came flooding out - and how! ... but that's for another time!

Raw transformations... go figure ; )

What A Week...

I haven't been blogging as regularly as often this past week or two, mainly because I have been busy with the 30 Days To Raw Group, have run a fair few events, have been coaching a LOT 1:2:1 and also I'm still on catch up from June as I was out of the office for half of it! (Training and holiday). I did write a great article for the next Get Fresh! though, but you'll have to wait til September to see it!

But the past week has been a whirlwind of more external personal activity as I am in the process of yet another "life upgrade" to complement my diet and exercise upgrade, and so I wanted to share an update and some of my joy with you ~ if you'll let me ; ) - Oh and there is a lovely free recipe too!

1) On Tuesday I took a day off to be with my son Luke. In September he starts "big school" (well it is to him!) and he will turn five years old shortly after, so am making the most of this time with him before I cannot whisk him away when I feel like it. We are really making the most of this sunny weather and getting out and about as much as we can... he is such a joy and so full of life and energy he really is an inspiration (albeit a cheeky monkey!). This picture is of him as Joseph in last year's nativity play at pre-school. I know I'm biased, but really, what a cutie! I never stop kissing and munching him...

2) Went to see G4 live at Newmarket racecourse on Tuesday. It was an evening event, open air, and the weather - thank goodness - was lovely. I sat/stood outside in a sleeveless dress all night til they finished at 10pm and was only "lightly chilled" at that point. I even had a bit of a boogie to one of their more up-tempo songs! They are officially splitting up in the next few weeks after three years together, so that gave me the final push I needed to see them while I still could and it was so worth it. Look out for one of their support acts RyanDan in the future. They are identical twin brothers who had a truly incredible stage presence, not to mention amazing voices - they're from Canada and preparing for their big September launch worldwide. They really are something else.

A Holiday In The Sun

It's just gone midnight and I'm putting the final touches to my packing... In just a very few hours I will be off to the airport with Luke (my son, 4) and we'll be jetting off to Marbella for a few days.

No small deal actually as it's been at least 9 years since I had a 100% work-free time away - i.e. a real holiday, and Luke has also never really had a "proper" holiday. So you can bet that we are both getting very excited.

What I'm most looking forward to is the sun, sand and swimming... and a few good books and the opportunity to people watch and make new friends. I love seeing what fate delivers : ) You just never know...

And here's the weird bit! I've been advised that it's not easy to get Internet access where I'm staying which means that I'm going to likely be email and web free for a week, which is both exciting and scary all at once! I don't think I have been email free for more than a couple of days for years! Yikes! (This means that depending on what happens once I get there there may be no eZine this week).

So I'm writing now just to explain my soon-to-be absence and also to let you know that as far as food goes I'm going to very much "suck it and see". There's hardly any room left in my suitcase with 2 sets of clothes so all I've managed to fit in is 2 packets of nori, 1 tub of de-hulled hemp seeds, 1 pack Medjool dates, some Brazil nuts and almonds and a 4 pack of avocados! That's really it - and we are self-catering. I shall report back on both the holiday and the way the food went, because at this point in time (i.e. with no clue whatsoever about what food is available), anything can happen!

See you next week!