The Top 5 Benefits to Drinking Water

Drinking water is essential to enabling the proper functions within the human body.  All the way down to the cells in our bodies, we require sufficient and constant replacement of fluids (water).  You may have heard some people say it is better to drink hot water, or it is better to drink cold water.  So who is correct?  BOTH arguments are solid.  The truth is, both hot water and cold water have their own list of benefits.

My daughter Faith. She LOVES water be it for drinking or playing in/with.

Top 5 Benefits to Drinking HOT Water

1. Promote easier Digestion. Warm water may help speed the process of breaking foods down in your stomach much faster than without.  Speedier breakdown gives the digestive system a break.
2. Remove Toxins from the Blood/Lymph systems.  Have you ever started sweating after drinking hot tea or coffee? Guess what? Drinking liquids that are hotter than 98.6 degrees causes the body temperature to rise. In the body's attempt for homeostasis, it will sweat to maintain the proper temperature. Sweating releases toxins from the blood and lymphatic systems. Tada!
3. Brings about a sense of relaxation. Warm water can be soothing whether inside the body or outside of the body (bath).  Drinking warm water may stimulate pleasure centers in the brain and/or a general sense of comfort and well-being.
4. Improves the Stamina of the body.  Regular consumption of warm water helps to cleanse the major body systems of toxins, thus allowing for optimum functionality. 
5. Medium to introduce teas to the body.  Brewed Teas of specific types can improve the body's ability to fight off infection, and even cancer.

Top 5 Benefits to Drinking Cold Water

1. You burn more Calories just by drinking ice water than you do by drinking warm. The typical amount of Calories burned simply by drinking 8-8oz glasses of ice water is 70/day. 
2. More easily ingested and so you are likely to drink more of it, and get your 8-8 oz glasses every day.
3. It is absorbed into the body faster than warm water because the body wants to warm it up to body temperature.  So it hydrates tissues faster than hot/warm water.
4. Because cold water tricks the individual into believing it is cooling their body on a hot day, they are more likely to drink more water, and decrease the chance of dehydration.
5. Cold water in large quantities gives a sense of fullness in the stomach and can help reduce food cravings.  

How To Save Time and Cook for Your Family

If you've already started making your meal plan for the week, and shopping accordingly. Here is your next step to save time.

Create a digital cookbook of all of your favorite recipes.  You can do this on your smartphone, on your computer, on your iPad or any other digital device.  Below I will discuss some of the ways to organize your cookbook, primarily on a Netbook, but I will touch on other mediums.

A reader of mine, who also happens to be my step mother Betty Vondran, expounded on something that is critical to the money saving aspect of meal planning.  LOOK AT THE CIRCULARS before you go shopping.  If you are aware of the deals on meats for example, you will be better prepared to create your meals based on those sales.  If you already have a freezer stocked with meat (hunter) you can still benefit from checking the circulars for vegetables and other produce.

To start your cookbook, you will need:

• Either digital copies of, printouts of, or pictures of your recipes.  Certainly you can also type them up in a word processor, but screenshots and pictures are quick and easy to edit and insert
• A digital platform such as a Netbook (mini laptop), a Laptop, a Smart Phone, or other internet ready device.
• Time

For computer style Digital Cookbook we will stick with the simple Microsoft Word rather than Publisher.  However, if you know Publisher well, feel free to apply the methods listed herein, and add your own flare.

Create a Title Page.  Remember that this is YOUR personal cookbook, so give it a fun name!  Next, choose your organization style.  You might choose to organize them by meat, or by meal time, or by cooking style.  No matter what you choose, make it simple for yourself.

Using the Headings settings available in Microsoft Office 2010 Word will make creating a hyperlink table of contents MUCH EASIER and faster.

I would organize my meals in order of meal type, then create subcategories for the main ingredient (usually meat).  For example, my Setup might look something like:

Breakfast
>Shakes
>Cereals
>Sausage
>Bacon
>Other
Snacks
>Shakes
>Vegetables
>Sweets
>Proteins
>Dairy
Lunch
>Chicken
>Seafood
>Pastas
>Venison
>Tofu
Dinner
>Chicken
>Seafood
>Venison
>Pork
>Tofu
>Pasta

You will want to create these headings first.  So, open up a new blank document.  Create your title page.  Hit Enter and insert a page break.  Hit enter until you get to a new page and insert another page break.  This leaves space for your table of contents.

Next use the Heading 1 setting for your MAIN categories.  Use Heading 2 for your subcategories.  Within each categorie begin "inserting" your pictures of your recipes, do not paste them.  If you are typing them out, do so in the same space.  Rinse and repeat until you have all of your recipes inserted into their specified places.

Create your table of contents:
Hit Ctrl+Home to get back to the top of the document.  Click your mouse on the blank page between your title page and your cookbook contents.  Click the "References" tab. Choose either Automatic Table of Contents 1 or 2.  If you have used the "Headings" in word, this will auto-generate your table of contents, and make accessing your recipes that much faster.

Always save your document when you add more recipes.  If you add a heading to the document after you've created the Table of contents, simply click on the TOC, and hit F9. This will update the TOC with your new headings.

Another simple way to create a cookbook is to create a Main Folder, and insert a series of subfolders in your documents folder on your computer.

For Smart Phones, iPads, and other internet ready platforms, To-do List apps are great for this style of recipes.  Screenshot apps are great for quick captures of recipes found while surfing the web on your phone.  I personally prefer the Netbook/Laptop for cookbooks because The print is larger, and I can store more information.

Hopefully this HOW-TO has helped and/or inspired you to keep a good record of your meals for easy access.  And as a final note, maybe you want to create a book based on How quickly the meal can be prepared, or if it is a "set it and forget it" slow cooker recipe.

Happy organizing.  A little hard work now creates time saving later on.  Remember that.

Cheers!
Lisa "Kingslayer" Rebaglia

Save Money Every Week

We've all been there.  You are running low on money, the bills are piling up, and you are so stressed out you don't know what to do!  Well first and foremost, you need to take action.  Fear and stress come from inactivity.  So, look at your expenses and look at your income and begin making a budget.

In the interim, this is a great weekly money saving tactic:  Make a meal plan.  Yes, it is really simple.  Grocery shopping is something that you must do, because you have to eat to survive.  If you are one of the millions of fast food patrons in the country, you should consider stopping that habit, for more than just your budget.

Think about it this way.... You spend $6.00 (or more) on ONE combo meal.  That $6.00 could have bought you Milk, cereal, yogurt, and eggs.  Hello breakfast for the family.  Depending on where you shop for groceries, $6.00 can go a LONG way.  You are not getting your money's worth when you eat at restaurants, period.  So, make it a once a month thing until your finances are in order.  Back to the meal plan.

You should sit down with either your Smart Phone or a paper and pen, and begin writing out the days of the week.  Next, assess your eating patterns.  Do you eat 5 times per day (Breakfast, Snack, Lunch, Snack, Dinner), or 3 times per day (Breakfast, Lunch, Dinner)?  When you have this determined, write the first letter of the meal below each day.  So, under Monday, you'll write (example shown is for the 5 meal plan):
B:
Sn1:
L:
Sn2:
D:

You will then write down what you plan to eat for each day for the next 7 days.  This is very simple to do.  If you are trying to eat healthfully, there are many sites out there that help you create meal plans and even create grocery lists for you.  You may opt to do recipe searches instead, and create your OWN meals.

Relatively inexpensive snack options are baby carrots and celery.  These foods are not only good for your body, but also good for your wallet.  A single celery bunch can last you nearly the entire week if you cut it up into celery sticks and seal it in little baggies.

Creating a meal plan based grocery list will keep you focused on buying only what you need versus what you "want".  Of course things like toilet paper, toothpaste, and the like are always needed, so make sure you put those on the list, but nothing extra.  Hold yourself accountable for your spending.  Soon, you'll start bragging about how much money you saved while shopping.

As always I suggest stores such as Aldi, and Compare foods.  These stores do not have all of the bells and whistles of other stores, nor do they have baggers.  You bring your own bags and you bag your own groceries.  The stores limit personnel and overhead so they can pass those savings along to you, the customer.  So, the next time your are out at Harris Teeter, drinking your latte from the in-store coffee shop, and paying $4.50 for a single loaf of bread, you'll know why you are paying so much... it's the fancy extras.

Meal planning not only saves you money every week, it saves you time. You can pre-pack meals for the week because you know what you are having.  You can pre-make and seal dinners so you can simply reheat it in the microwave.

For more help on meal plan creation checkout these sites:
www.fitfuture.biz (Click Join to become a club member and reap the benefits)
http://www.100daysofrealfood.com/our-free-meal-plans/

If you have any questions, please leave them below in the comments section, or contact me via facebook or twitter.
Facebook: www.facebook.com/Lisa.Kingslayer
Twitter: @LisaKingslayer