Health Diary Week 96: Quality Family Time

Image: Elephant family (JL G, Pixabay)

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Hi, welcome to another weekly instalment of what’s on my plate: health updates, meal creations and smile-provoking experiences. I’m still trying to catch up with posting, but I keep getting delayed by my new work life and socialising (I can’t complain)…

Staff Wellbeing Hub Admin: Week Three

This was my third week in my new admin role, but also my last week on-site at the hospital before being based at home for the foreseeable future. I will miss the camaraderie of working directly with my job share, Lorraine. And while I won’t miss the early morning public transport commute, I will miss the walking part – I need to factor a walk into my working days.

Exercise: Walking

Talking about walking, my current physical activity is mostly limited to walking. I completed 320 minutes (over five hours) and was pleased to scrape the UK’s government recommendation for 150 minutes moderate exercise per week, in the form of brisk walking:

Image: My Active 10 walks and rewards for Week 96

My Low(ish) Histamine Meals

It’s been a while since I’ve shared meals I’ve prepared, so I thought I’d show you some of this week’s meals I made to substitute those the rest of my family were eating. My food choices are quite limited on this low histamine diet, although thankfully my options are slowly increasing…

Pasta, salad and garlic pitta:

I enjoyed my dinner of gluten free vegetable pasta (yellow bell pepper, courgette, sweetcorn, sweet white onion, garlic, chia seeds, B12 yeast flakes, turmeric, dried herbs and cold pressed rapeseed oil), served with a side salad (mixed leaves, red onion and cucumber) and a garlic pitta pocket – tasty:

Image: Pasta served with a salad & garlic pitta pocket

Vegetable & pistachio rice mix:

This vegetable brown and white rice dinner actually contained most of the same ingredients as the above pasta, except the pasta was swapped out for rice, and I added some chopped pistachios:

Image: Vegetable and pistachio rice mix

My tasty salad:

I love a salad. My go-to low histamine salad contains mixed leaves, spring onion, cucumber, radishes, beetroot, chia seeds and cold-pressed rapeseed oil. Here I took a risk and added pre-prepared roasted bell pepper and artichoke hearts. Also, I always accompany the leaves mix with a potato salad of steamed potatoes, hemp seeds, dried Italian herbs, turmeric, sweet paprika, vegan mayo (a teaspoon) and cold-pressed flax oil. Always satisfying:

Image: My tasty salad

Cheesy Nachos:

My end of the working week meal was indulgent cheesy nachos. I topped mine with coconut-based cheese (an occasional indulgence, as it is so high in saturated fat), roasted bell pepper, artichoke hearts, red onion, dried herbs and sweet paprika:

Image: Cheesy nachos

Positive Thinking: What Made Watson Smile

And of course, I couldn’t leave without sharing a couple of smile-provokers…

Family guests:

Kerry, my cousin-in-law (well near enough) and three of the children (two I hadn’t met before) stayed with us for a few days. It was great getting to know Kerry better and having time with the kids, albeit I was shattered by Thursday afternoon. I did very much enjoy my time with them though:

Image: Baby Eric

Memory lane – The shell house:

On one of our walks, Mum and I found this minature stone town in someone’s front garden. One of the neighbours told us it was built over fifty years ago and was far more impressive back then. What I loved most about this little scene was that it brought back happy memories of my grandparents taking my sister and I to see the Shell House near Bournemouth when we stayed with them – I was always excited to go there:

Image: Minature stone town

I hope you enjoyed this week’s ‘What’s on Watson’s Plate’. Please feel free to follow my bite-sized updates on Instagram or Facebook. See you next week for another catch up.

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More from What’s on Watson’s Plate

• Week 95: Bittersweet
• Week 94: Believe in Yourself
• Week 93: Catching Up
• Week 92: A Surreal Week
• Week 91: Look Up