Weight Lost!

I've had many people ask me for this information lately, so I'm posting it here. I've recently lost 90+ (99 lbs as of June 11, 2010) pounds, since last June actually. I'm going to post how I did this as concisely as possible:

About a year ago I came across a book by Gary Taubes called "Good Calories, Bad Calories". It was 468 pages of amazing information and here is what I gleaned from it. Please do read it yourself, it is well worth the time and effort.

People are not fat because they eat fat, they're fat because they eat carbohydrates. Carbohydrates cause your body to produce insulin and insulin is what is responsible for putting the fat that you eat, and converted sugars, into fat tissues making a body fat. So, no insulin production, no deposition of fat into cells! The body doesn't need glucose to run on and neither does the brain. The liver can convert fats and proteins just fine and make ketones which is a more efficient way for the body to work And the brain to function. I've been living this way since last June and have never been healthier.

Here is a list-synopsis of my story:

Before:

• I weighted more than 250 pounds.
• Heart palpitations
  
• Terrible swelling in my hands, feet and ankles.
• Such high blood pressure the Dr. wanted to medicate me immediately
• Always totally exhausted
• My diet - Low fat, Low calorie!
• I was Always hungry!
  
• Bowel issues
• Poor eyesight
• Bumpy terribly dry itchy skin prone to blackheads
• Arthritis-like troubles - couldn't even bend over without a great deal of pain in my lower back, achy joints, had to use a railing to go down stairs
  
• Easily out of breath
• Intolerable PMS and periods
• My brain was always foggy
• Very negative for my job and not great for my marriage
• Size 2x - and my clothes were tight.
  

After:

• I now weigh 155 pounds and am continuing to loose weight
• My blood pressure is below normal (this dropped immediately upon elimination of carbs and has continued to improve)
• No Swelling whatsoever - this also improved greatly within the first two weeks of eliminating carbs and continued fairly rapidly and was completely gone withing two months
• No heart palpitations
• More energy than I know what to do with (I also take vitamin D - 20,000 units per day ( not all at once) which helps this immensely as well.
• I'm Never hungry
• Improved eyesight - went for new glasses yesterday in fact and needed a weaker prescription.
• PMS has all but disappeared
  
• No joint aches at all - I'm amazingly flexible - I Never would have believed it if someone had told me this would be a result
• I look forward to exercise and am training myself to run - breathing's easy!
• My skin is much smoother, blackheads don't reoccur, and much less dry and not itchy at all
• Much happier bowels
• I can think clearly and focus for long periods of time
• Diet - high fat, medium protein and between 5 - 15 grams of carbs per day - 20 max on a bad day
• Far more efficient and effective on my job as a scenic artist and of course wonderful for my marriage : 0 )
• I only focus on low carbs, I don't ever count calories, don't portion my food, eat when I need to or want to and feel satisfied
• Size medium and my clothes are very loose! Wearing some size "small clothes" : 0 )
  

In short - all of the bad stuff in the first list has completely disappeared! Not just improved or somewhat gotten better, - GONE!

So if you're interested in this here are two more lists -

DO NOT EAT:

• No sugar of any kind!
• NO High Fructose Corn Syrup!
  
• No bread
• No corn products at all
• No potatoes
• No low fat milk, yogurt, cheeses etc
• No low fat salad dressings
• No chips, candy, popcorn or whatever other carbohydrate finds its way into your diet
• No juice of any kind
• No bananas, apples (at least at first for the apples, until goal weight is reached)
• No pasta
  

DO EAT:

• Cheeses - sharp, medium, mild, cream cheese, brie - No cottage cheese
  
• Use only real butter and high quality olive oil for cooking and eating
• Meats - chicken, beef, pork, bacon, turkey, eggs, sardines packed in olive oil etc
• Low carb fruits and veggies like broccoli, cauliflower, squashes, avocado, strawberries, pears, blueberries, raspberries. Veggies should be fresh and raw or steamed al dente to retain nutrients. Avoid micro-waving. Also raw garlic, onions. Nothing canned.
  
• Use Half and Half for milk - yes I drink small cups of Half and Half for milk - it's very rich obviously and I use it in my coffee etc
• Eat whole milk organic yogurt (Stoneyfield Farm) sweetened with Stevia (a plant derivative sweetener with no brain altering chemicals and no glycemic index - btw blue agave is very high fructose the way it is processed and should not be used), then flavored with the berries mentioned above, cinnamon, a few drops of a high quality extract like lemon etc.
• Nuts - all of them except cashews and I even eat them in my mixed nuts. Peanuts may be avoided as many people are allergic to them and the ratio of good oils to bad oils in them is about 50/50.
  
• Chocolate - Green & Black makes a dark bar that is 86 percent cocoa that is incredible, also Lindt 90% Cocoa Chocolate, very good - we have this sometimes on movie night
• Olives, onions, garlic, various hot peppers
• Water - drink pure, fluoride-free water all day long
  

So - compared with what I'd been through before trying to get fit and loose weight, yea, this was easy! Again - I'm never hungry! Sacrifices - yes - you must make a choice! No Panera pastries, Dunkin's doughnuts, popcorn, biscuits (my personal favorite and what I miss the most), mashed potatoes, catsup (though you can make your own easily enough and season it how you like) etc. All that sweet tasty stuff is just delicious poison....

Also - Exercise! - again - you must make a choice to be healthy and feel great and change a few things and I'm finding exercise a total pleasure on this "diet"! Moderate and regular - put your mp3 player on and dance or walk - your body will respond! Enjoy it - it is Not an option - think of it like breathing!

A few more things to keep in mind - the food pyramid is upside down! Turn it over and you'll have a much better idea of how you should eat. Carbs/sugars are addicting - literally. Salt content is not as much of a big deal if you're not eating carbs.

Forget about calories, only count carbs and keep it under 20 grams per day

Avoid eating right before bed, an hour or so before...

Lastly - One of the things Mr. Taubes discuses in his book is that even for people who are not overweight, eating carbs is not good. Though a continuously elevated - rising and lowering of insulin levels does Not in itself cause cancer or Alzheimer's, he states there is evidence that running off of glucose does prevent or block your brain's natural ability to regulate mechanisms that help your body to naturally prevent these things.

Finally - I leave you with my new pizza recipe because I could not live without pizza! Instead of bread crust I use the huge portabella mushroom caps brushed with olive oil and turned upside down. Then drain your store-bought pizza sauce (be sure and check for high fructose corn syrup and sugars in the sauce) well through cheese cloth laid in a colander so the sauce is very stiff because the mushroom caps have liquid in them too. Put the sauce into the caps and bake them for a bit - I always make mine on my Weber grill, so not sure what the oven time/temp would be. Then after the mushroom cap has softened up a bit add your toppings (including pepperoni - we're very fortunate to have a local smoke house, Oscar's that makes pepperoni with minimal nitrites) and cheeses, spices etc - then bake/broil again until the cheeses are melted. Delicious - my three children love it!

A note about children - we all do eat the same way (my wonderful husband has lost 40+ pounds), but I provide really whole grains for them. They have old fashioned oatmeal with cream and butter on it for breakfast to be sure they're getting enough fat into their cells to stay at an ideal body weight. They also have more yogurt and higher carb fruits than I do like oranges and apples and occasionally a very hearty whole grain brown rice or mix of brown rices with butter on it, chick peas warm with butter and spices or in a salad with olive oil.

Your Dr. will probably not agree with what I've written here. Mr. Taubes addresses this in his book as well. But I am conveying here to you my own experience. Please email me with any questions or for references at joannehop@gmail.com.

Very lastly -really - I don't believe for a minute it was a coincidence that I was reading "Good Calories, Bad Calories" at the same time that I was diagnosed with such high blood pressure. God has his hand in all of my life as I belong to him and I thank and praise Him for giving me the answers before I knew I needed them!

Cup 'O' Jo no. 7

I'm starting to include more of where my coffee cups live in my little paintings. Thought it would be nice to see their surroundings.

Next Cup - Number 6

The little red cup arrived yesterday - just sweet - great color, so that will be making it's debut one of these days.

Fifth Cup -

Like a faithful dog - my coffee hangin' there with me as I paint on the floor.

Cup No. 4

I painted this one very quickly using left over paints from another effort. Lots of painting ahead today. I've set up a new still life - no coffee cup in it. Also picked up several jars of canned foods at the grocery yesterday - gorgeous hot peppers in yellows and reds and greens, pickles, and huge olives.
I also stopped at the local thrift store and found a set of peachy colored napkins to use as grounds in still lifes - a quarter a piece - I love thrift stores! : 0 )

Third Cup 'O' Jo

Here's my third painted cup of coffee.

Since I spent the last couple posts discussing color, I'll add this little note. Inconsequential really, but - now I generally Love Sennelier paints, both oils and watercolors. Just out of curiosity I tried their Burnt Sienna and the color is just fine, vibrant, creamy - lovely - However..... it smells like motor oil. It smells so bad I won't use it in my studio, I'm saving it for plein aire work - outside....

I Love their Ultramarine Blue which I mentioned in the list - it's just a hair redder than most other brands - gorgeous! The Cobalt Turquoise is also gorgeous - it has no white pigment in it and is super versatile. The Titanium White is also super thick and rich and I sometimes use their Cad. Yellow Pale - intense and glorious.... And all the rest of those colors smell like oil paint - the way they should....

Anyway - just a note on paint....

Lemon Yellow Still Life

Another way that I like to use color is to pick, for example, one red and one blue and then use a range of tube colors for the third in the triad - yellow in the painting above. The palette for this one is Burnt Sienna for red, Sennelier Cobalt Turquoise blue, and then a range of yellows - Cad. Lemon, Cad. Yellow, Winsor Yellow mostly with a bit of Naples Yellow, Yellow Ochre, and Cad. Yellow Deep. I also love to use one blue, one yellow and then a bunch of reds as in "Snuggle Buddies" from four posts ago.

Working this way allows the color I'm using so much of from different tubes, yellow in this example, to intimate and suggest many other colors in the spectrum that aren't blatantly there. I call this particular color - whichever one it is, red, yellow, or blue, my "spectral" color.

My Color Palette

A while back I mentioned that some artist friends had asked me about my choice of colors and I'm finally getting to it...... It's a rainy, very gray morning here so I have a great cup of coffee - which I may paint when I'm finished with my post, Pandora playing Baroque - and so I proceed....

So - firstly - when choosing colors I consider:

• Permanence
• Brilliance
• Transparency

Usually in the better manufacturers the above go hand in hand to some degree. Winsor & Newton even makes a transparent white which I employ periodically.

The manufacturers I prefer are - about 50/50 Old Holland and Winsor & Newton, then Sennelier and lastly Holbein. A note about Old Holland in their defense - I've heard and read some negative about being over priced etc. Well, they are expensive, no doubt, but I also find the intense concentration usually causes them to last 2 - 3 times as long as a comparable color of anything else and some of their colors just can't be matched in brilliance like Cad. Red Scarlet and Cobalt Turquoise Light. So in the list below of specific pigments I name the manufacturer because for my tastes and uses it's the most brilliant, useful color in that pigment range.
I will add that my own testing, while extensive, is not exhaustive, so it continues and I welcome comments about other colors in other manufacturers etc....

• Permanent Rose - W&N
• Quinacridone Magenta - W&N
• Permanent Alizarin Crimson - W&N
• Cadmium Red Light - OH
• Cadmium Scarlet - OH
• Scheveningen Orange - OH
• Indian Yellow - W&N
• Cadmium Yellow - W&N
• Cadmium Yellow Lemon - Holbein
• Cobalt Turquoise Lt. - OH
• Viridian - W&N
  
• Phthalo Blue - OH
• French Ultramarine - Sennelier - slightly more red than other brands.
  
• Bright Violet - OH
• Burnt Sienna - W&N
• Burnt Umber - OH
• Transparent Maroon - W&N
• OH Yellow Brown - OH
• Red Oxide - OH
• Titanium White - OH usually and Sennelier
• Transparent White - W&N
  

You can see those colors and some comparisons on the chart above. I make and remake these charts based on new information and sometimes a new color I'm interested in trying.

I Never use all of these colors on a palette at once. I usually use a limited palette, a red, yellow, and blue and like to mix even my browns ahead instead of just squeezing out some Burnt Sienna (though I do love W&N Bt Sienna), or Umber. You also see quite a few greens, earth reds, and browns that are not listed - I rarely use them for my own work, but keep them on hand for illustration/work/ faux finish purposes and some of them I try and then reject. I much prefer to mix my secondaries. I do use black sometimes - OH Mars black or I find Gamblin Chromatic Black useful, but again, like to mix my blacks too.

When testing your own colors, be sure to view the mass tone comparisons up close, and from about 10 feet away and look at how they compare when painted thinly - not with extra medium, just pulled out very very thinly on your canvas and then what happens when white is added...

I have three containers, one with the names of my reds on small scraps of paper, one with the blues and then of course the yellows. Once in a while I just reach in and pick one from each and see what comes from them as a limited palette - fun and interesting.

My watercolor palette is pretty much the same with the same colors from the same manufacturers with a few exceptions. I love Sennelier Cerulean Blue in watercolor, the W&N Cobalt Turquoise Lt, W&N Gold Ochre and Daniel Smith Quinacridone Burnt Orange etc.

Hopefully this is helpful - I'm more than happy to answer questions if I can or start a dialogue on color so fee free to email me.

Happy painting....

Next Cup...

Here's the next in my series.... I'm so excited, I found a screaming red antique enameled coffee cup, white on the inside, on Etsy - quite reasonable too. Very much looking forward to painting it! Should be here by the end of the week : 0 )

Cups 'O' Jo

I've begun a new series of small paintings that I'm calling "Cups 'O' Jo". These are sort of self portraits through Java. They're my cups of coffee that I'm drinking while I'm working or reading or whatever. I don't set them up as still lifes, they're just "found" and painted as is.

If it isn't obvious, I Love coffee - usually light with Stevia in it. Stevia is wonderful stuff for anyone interested. It is a sweetener derived from a plant - no sugar in it and no terrible brain-altering chemicals and it has no glycemic index - but it is very sweet. One packet is the equivalent of two teaspoons of sugar. We find it at Wal-Mart - "Nature Made" I think makes it.

Anyway I do love coffee - light, sometimes sweet, always strong, sometimes with a shot of espresso when available, occasionally flavored - lightly with cinnamon or chocolate or hazelnut..... My husband will come in to my studio with a cup or ask me to come join him for one and it always lifts my heart - the effect never wears off. We chat and enjoy the coffee..... So it's a small but big part of my life I share here and I'm thoroughly enjoying painting them as well as drinking them. : 0 )

This series can also be found on my web site under the title of this post, "Cups 'O' Joe"

Snuggle Buddies

After my whole discussion about whites, there's almost none in this little painting - only in the highlights. The rest of the lights are a combination of using the paint transparently on a white oil ground and the use of Cadmium Lemon Yellow.

Old Holland Paint

This post actually has nothing to do with the above painting from Rockewell Falls, under the bridge in Hadley, NY.

A couple of posts ago I was lamenting the yellowing of the Zinc white in the Old Holland brand of oil paint.
Well - I went to the OH web site and contacted the people who speak English there and sent them a scan, describing my disappointment. I've loved OH paint forever! I was heartbroken.

They took my issues directly to their master paint fellow in their factory and he had the answer immediately. Within 24 hours my questions had been answered, my problems solved - and I'm so very relieved!

It turns out that the pigments in linseed binder -paint- they make are meant to be in light. The first question he asked me was, "Was I by any chance storing them in the dark?" And - yes - I had been. The samples in question had been stored in complete darkness for years.

So I put tape over half of the yellowed sample that I'd sent to them and then taped the whole page in a south facing window for maximum light exposure. It's been there now for a month and the swatch has indeed begun to get back to where it was when I made it - a beautiful pure white. The titanium which had also yellowed is almost pure white again, the zinc I think is about half way there. The paintings I had stored are also returning to their original state. Yea!!!

My complete faith in Old Holland paints has been more than completely restored and I'd recommend them to anyone serious about color. At first they may take some getting used to because the color is so saturated and so pure that it needs to be applied more thinly than some other brands. But it is so gorgeous it is more than worth the trouble!

Speaking of paint, I've had a couple of artist friends of mine ask me recently about my pigments and choice of paints. So in my next post I'm going to write about brands, pigments, colors I use and don't use and why and how I came to those decisions. So - stay tuned..... : 0 )

Model Sketch

This sketch was from a couple of weeks ago. Not a true likeness of the model, but still recognizable as a female of the human race.... lol. Just keep painting, just keep painting.....

Red Tin

I'm so loving red - I get this way in the middle of February - half starved for bright colors. This little painting, 3 x 3 inches is in my Etsy shop.

Darn, Eggs...

Ahhhhhhhhhh - working from life is feeling so wonderful - like scratching an itch... More to come : 0 )

Life Drawing, Painting - Resisting -

My internal commitment to working from life has been refreshingly liberating for me. Funny - nothing's really changed, just had to come to that realization, though the choice has always been there.

I did this sketch last Monday night. Great to be working from the model again too and to work along side some super talented artists!

I also continue with drawing, my color studies, reading..... Another awesome John Berger book - "From A to X, A Story in Letters". A truly incredible book, story - it's art, poetry, resistance, beauty - can't recommend it enough!

Brrrrrr...... and Digging Deep -

Yesterday morning it was 15 degrees Below Zero here - uhhhhhhh - teeeeth chattttttering!!!! This morning, only 5 below - finally some global warming.....

Anyway - Been in a bit of a funk here - Haiti and some deaths of acquaintances etc... So very much sadness and heaviness of heart!

I've been taking this time to dig deep, doing lots of reading. One of the books I'm reading through for the second time in two weeks actually is "The Shape of a Pocket" by John Berger. I found it in the National Gallery bookstore; I've read some of his other works and this one practically jumped off the shelf at me.

It is truly a remarkable book; a collection of essays speaking to painting as an act of resistance. The second essay, "Steps Towards a Small Theory of the Visible" is one of the best pieces on art and painting I've ever come across. I highly recommend it to anyone asking questions of themselves and the world and paint and the visual!

I've been doing a lot of writing as well lately, trying to figure things out.... about painting .... why I must paint, what I want to paint and I've been feeling a certain meaninglessness about the whole thing - not a depression exactly, but a grasping, a remembering..... And I've come to many conclusions, but one of particular significance is that the state of the world and the state of the world as portrayed by the media, the economy etc... is supposed to effect a state of hollow, shallow, confused meaninglessness.

Now - I don't have a TV, so I have to make a very concerted effort to view one generally. While I was in MD, there was a TV in my room and I was appalled at the degradation that's taken place in the 12 or so years since I've had one. I turned on the tube twice, to try to find something interesting to watch (beside the weather channel or Fox News - Ugh!) Both times the scenes opened with a dead body; the first of a little black girl and the second of a pretty red-head who'd been bludgeoned to death in a bathtub. Wow - what I've been missing! Man! Between that and the news............... what can even be said -

Anyway - the point is, and one of the many poignant points of Berger's book is that the prostitution, (my word, not his) of images, cheap, in your face, over the top, and consumerism driven, -billions of them relentlessly barraging people, contributes immensely to the meaninglessness of them and a seemingly cheapening and devaluing of life. I see this in much of the contemporary paintings I've perused of late. Many of them I even love, they're beautiful, but what do they mean??? All these gazillions of images make paintings harder to see.

This has brought me to a necessary and impassioned conclusion for my own work here. For the time being, I'm only going to work from life! For thousands of years this has been the way artists functioned. I feel a bit of a death in a way these days, trying to make a painting from a digital image. Painting for me is about reciprocity, action - reaction, energy, and the precious use of my binocular vision that becomes neutered by both the flatness and limited color of a photograph.

So I am resisting - painting from life, insisting that painting and the richness of family and friends, relationships, walks in the woods, striving, changing, improvings, giving a damn and looking for God's will all do have exquisite and indelible meaning!!!

George Bellows - The Lone Tenement

I saw this remarkable painting in the National Gallery of Art. I made several trips there while I was working in MD. It is just an incredible painting - very approximately -it's 3 x 4 feet. This reproduction is really pretty accurate coloristically. I see it as painting at its best - real paint, light, content, design - the artist both disappears and is everything in it at the same time!

Well - been back for a week here - have indeed been neglecting posting, but not working. I've hoed out my studio - ahhhhhhhh.................. Been drawing, painting, making color studies, writing and thinking about gearing up for spring.

I was also extremely fortunate - in this economy - to be able to order some much needed supplies this last week - including a new color - Sennelier Cobalt Turqoise - can't wait to see it in person.

I've been using almost exclusively Old Holland and Winsor & Newton. Well I've had some serious yellowing issues with the Old Holland - particularly zinc and Titanium whites and I'm bitterly disappointed about that! Fortunately most of the paintings I've sold over the last two years have been watercolors.

Anyway - I've been doing some research and am switching out most of my Old Holland colors for Sennelier - the French Ultramarine Deep is awesome, I'm using their Titanium white etc.... I'll stick with the Old Holland reds I use - Cadmium Scarlet and Cad Red Light - they seem to be unaffected.

Later - And Happy Painting -

Butter Dish - Knife Painting

Another knife painting - no medium....

Been doing 10 - 12 hour days - And - unbelievably, forgot my white paint - nowhere there to buy another tube either - --- ugh.... Did do some drawing though. Also got to the National Gallery - incredible beyond words!!! The botanical gardens were also truly amazing. I plan on going back if at all possible.

So great to be home - be with my little crew, rest, quiet, great food, no rushing around, paint... ahhhhhhh.........

Heading back out tomorrow for another week or so - with my white paint all packed -
Later - : 0 )

Plein Air Snack

Well - here's my first minimalist oil. Minimalist not in style, but in means. As I stated in a previous post, I'm traveling for work shortly and don't want to stop painting with oils. So - I asked my self - Self??? how little can I get away with?? What is the absolute minimum I need to make an oil picture??

Okay - paint, palette, surface, and something to put it on with - 4 things, absolute minimum! Though I may at some point try it without palette - just put the paint on the board and rearrange it like a funky puzzle - will have to be in a mood for that. Now I've added a pencil - 'cause pencils are small, and a rag for wiping my knife - but that's it.

Paint - I take 4 tubes - a red, yellow, blue, and white - small tubes
Surface - Small pieces of board or matt board appropriately coated - from 3 x 5 to 5 x 5 inches.
Implement - One palette knife.
Palette - Small disposable paper palette.

I hold the little painting with my left hand - and the rag at the same time. A little awkward at first, but gettin' used to it. A very quick pencil sketch and then just palette knife work. Set the palette where ever possible and go for it!

This does change a bit the way I work. I'm spoiled by my pochade box - having my paint right there at the right height, right in front of me, but this is about just keeping going no matter now little space I have....

I'll post some more as they come along. They do take longer to dry because the paint is a bit thicker in places. Am considering adding a very small jar of Galkyd or using an alkyd white to improve this aspect. I also have to be able to carry the little painting somewhere where it can dry safely when I'm done. It's all about persevering to grow in spite of and with limitations!

Oh - I also stick a plastic grocery bag in my pocket for the rag and palette when I'm done - No littering!

So far I'm really liking working this way. Will let you know how I make out.