#february daily paleo 2014

[sarahunfiltered-blog1]

My Diet/Fitness/Nutrition Journey Thus Far

Most of the memories I have of life growing up revolve mostly around food. I remember growing up and all we’d eat was Sonic, Dairy Queen, Whataburger, McDonald’s, Taco Bell, Wendy’s, you name it, I ate it. I could still to this day probably tell you my order from each place. I was raised on Hamburger Helper, Ramen noodles, Rice a Roni, canned and boxed everything, candy and soda. 

I remember when I was around maaaaaybe 12-13 and my mom doing a diet that may have been slim quick or something along the lines of you eat chicken and veggies, take these pills and do some sort of workout. I had a really bad sweet tooth (still do) as a kid and I started to gain weight and at 13 I was 165lbs, so my mom included me into her diet routine and I would eat the chicken and veggies, rice cakes, a tbsp of coconut oil and would chew sugar gum and we’d walk between the stop signs on the street we lived on and I’d do her workouts with her. I remember watching my brothers and sisters eating candy while I ate my caramel rice cakes because I was the bigger one of all of them, so for the longest time I was just the fat tomboy of a girl that would stare at herself in the mirror and look at how big my butt was at 13 and hating it and my stomach to stuck out and my fat face. I remember I used to grab my stomach and cry and scream about how much I hated it. If only I were skinny I’d be enough. I would sneak and binge on sweets, it was my comfort, it was there for me and it made me feel better

When I got my period and more of my hormones kicked in I lost a lot of weight. I want to say I got down to 125 when I was around 14-15 and I wouldn’t eat because I was extremely depressed. My sweet tooth was still there, but I wouldn’t eat because I thought eating would make me fat, so I wouldn’t and when I did it was minimal. I ate a lot of 100 calorie snacks, drank juice like V8 because I thought it was healthy, diet coke because it was diet and wouldn’t make me fat. When I was 16 I started working at Target and they have a Pizza Hut Cafe and almost every shift I would go pick up there bread sticks and a diet Pepsi and that would be my lunch (the thought of that now literally makes me cringe). I went to a bible college from 17-almost 18 and ate Ramen noodles and whatever shit food they served while I was there, but I didn’t know any different so I just ate it. I was still pretty skinny because ya know I was 15-17 and you can eat like shit and still be a twig.

When I turned 18 and moved out of my parents house my diet didn’t suuuuper change. I was still living a hardcore Taco Bell and Pizza Hut bread sticks and diet coke life style because I was living on my own, broke as a joke and ate the food I was used to eating, but then I gained probably 30lbs easily within a short amount of time (surprise surprise). I had spent my whole time as a teenager not wanting to be the fat kid and here I was back at 165lbs... wtf. I didn’t really know how to cook, didn’t have money for groceries, refused to apply for food stamps, so I just thought starting to workout would cure all my problems. Well, it didn’t long story short. I mean why didn’t working out and running for an hour THEN going eat Taco Bell work? I was working out, right? HA.

I remember scrolling Pinterest when I discovered it and finding the “Military Diet” and giving that a go. You basically don’t eat anything for 3 days and could apparently lose 10lbs. I wanted to DIE during that diet. I made it the first time around and lost 5lbs, then gave it another go and didn’t make it 2 days and stopped by Taco Bell on my way home from work and binged on that. So my diet search continued... One of my coworkers at the time started using My Fitness Pal to track her calories and she was losing weight like crazy, so I obviously I needed to give it a go and the weight just started falling fall. I went from 165lbs to 125lbs within a matter a months. I didn’t work out, I just ate less than 1,500 calories a day, cold turkey stopped eating candy, drinking soft drinks and unfortunately my Pizza Hut bread sticks. Everything was going GREAT. When I wanted to go down to the next lbs and I was 0.2 from it I would pop a few laxatives the night before and then would weight myself the next morning after shitting my brains out, but I HAD to lose that 0.2lbs.. just had to. I became overly obsessed with counting calories and eating lean cuisines and and 100 calories snacks and drinking Naked juice and weighing myself DAILY and measuring every single little thing I ate and would legit cry if I went over my calories. Funny, not so funny story. One weekend I was headed to my mom’s and had already eaten all of my calories for the day, but was staaaaaaaarving, so I stopped by Jimmy John’s and ate a sandwich that was 800ish calories, which put me 800ish calories over what I was “allowed” to eat, so you bet your ass I drug all of my brother and sisters and mom to a walking trail and walked/ran until I burned off the entire sandwich because I wouldn’t sleep peaceful knowing what I did by eating that sandwich. It was bad, just so bad. I remember the day I hit a breaking point and just wanted some damn chocolate chop cookies, but didn’t have the calories saved for it, but I binged on them anyways and cried in Michael’s arms over what I did and he was telling me it was fiiiiiiine and all the sweet things he could, but it wasn’t to me in that moment, but in that moment I just knew I needed to stop all of this, so I did. I feel like I remember just deleting the app off my phone and being done with it. I was 20 at this point and working a standing job.

Beginning in February of 2014 I started a corporate sitting job, so I didn’t have access to Starbucks or a grocery store on my breaks like I did working at Target, so I had to start bringing my lunches and snacks and to top it all off I was sitting. As you could maybe imagine I started gaining weight from being stagnant and snacking ALL day at my desk (#teamnutrigrain). I put on a good 20lbs within the first couple of months. So I started going for walks on my breaks, eating a lean cuisine a day, eating more fresh fruits and veggies, almonds, and limited my snacking to only in the afternoons and that kind of helped and worked for me for a long time and I stayed at a healthy maybe 140ish lbs and that worked for me because I was still skinny. All about that skinny life because skinny = healthy, right? Well, I thought so. 

I turned 21 and didn’t go crrazzzyy drinking, but I drank moscato and margarita’s often enough and still was all about my Friday candy binge. I was also drinking up to 3 cups of coffee a day at work and just couldn’t figure out why I was sweating and so anxious all the time. I genuinely thought it was from work when in reality I was just pumping myself with coffee after coffee after coffee day in and day out (I’ve learned since my lesson since then). I went through a phase of HIIT workout and running, but that faded really quick, but I really enjoyed hiking when I gave it a go, still do. Along with yoga which I am planning to make a goal of starting a practice in 2018. 

Around the time I turned 22-23 my older sister, Meghann, had a baby and really educated herself around living a more holistic lifestyle and it really intrigued me and around that time I had discovered podcasts and I realized how much processed foods aren’t the best choice and what I could do as an alternative way of going about eating, so I stopped lean cuisine’s (haven’t had one since), milk and yogurt along with limiting candy and processed snacks. I completely cleaned my desk out at work from all the sugar filled granola bars and whatever else I had in there and started to work with that. I shortly thereafter learned about one of the best ways of going about what to eat/not eat is if it didn’t come from the earth and/or has a label on it to think twice before eating it and READ the back of the label if you do. This is still newer-ish to me to do and I’m currently learning about all things nutrition, and how the mind, body and spirit all work together and you can’t have one fully without the other.

 As of now I don’t drink dairy milk, I limit cheese but still love it, I grocery shop once a week and buy as much organic produce as possible, I am still working on the meat switch when it comes to buying organic meat (not quite there yet), I cold turkey stopped eating candy and have found organic, non high fructose corn syrup filled alternatives when I have a sweet tooth, I haven’t been drinking alcohol much the last 2 months or so (don’t have a legit reasoning behind it, just doesn’t sound good), I am really into cooking paleo, vegan, Whole30 friendly foods because it coincides with my eating from the earth method I live by and when I want Whataburger breakfast on a Friday or a taco with a flour tortilla or a real homemade chocolate chip cookie I happily will eat it because I do not believe in living a restricted lifestyle. My entire life leading up to recently whether it was mentally, spiritually or physically has been restricted and I’m not OK with it because it’s limiting and keeps me in a box. I’m a believer in the energy you put into something is negative the outcome will be negative, so if I’m to sit here and say “this is cookie is SO bad for me. OMG. I am going to gain 10lbs.” Well, I’m asking for it to happen, versus eating the cookie cause I want the damn cookie and loving every bit. They doesn’t mean I sit there and eat 12, it just means my mindset around food was so terrible for so long and I know what it did to me mentally that is not worth it for me to be negative about it. I am content and happy with where I am out now, I don’t even care to weigh myself anymore, I don’t body shame myself anymore, I don’t calorie count, I don’t binge, I don’t use food as a reward system, I just educate myself around it, listen to my body and see how it feels and go from there. My anxiety has lessened, I sleep so much better, I feel so peaceful inside and out, and my skin has completely cleared up (I’ll talk about my skincare routine future post).  It’s been a long, ongoing journey, but I am thankful for the million and 2 podcasts I’ve listened to, my sister and everyone else along the way to get me to where I am today and I am excited to continue to learn and grow and now have a place to share all the info I am taking in and it maybe help someone else. :)

- Sarah xo

[noelmu]

WEEK IN REVIEW 9/17/17-9/23/17

Last week I posted a picture of the donuts I ate on my first morning at this year’s Toronto International Film Festival. This week I’ll post my last TIFF breakfast: a Nutella croissant and an Americano at a terrific Italian espresso bar. Consider this the illustration for my second The Week TIFF report, linked to below.

I fear I indulged a bit too much in Toronto this year, which wouldn’t be that big of a deal, except that I’m in the middle of what I count is the fourth-and-a-half-th big weight-loss push I’ve attempted in my life. The numbers below are based largely and memory and may not be accurate, but here’s a rough tally:

1. About halfway through my college years, my metabolism pretty much conked out on me, and I found that all the pizzas, wings, and cookies I was eating on a near-daily basis were heading straight to my waistline. By the time I graduated in 1992, I’d ballooned up to around 230. During the summer that followed, one day I stepped on a coin-operated scale in the mall where I worked at the time, and after I typed in all my data, the scale suggested a daily allowance of calories (and, more importantly, calories from fat) that I could consume to lose weight in a reasonable way. I followed that plan diligently, even after I moved back in with my parents in Nashville, and in about six months got down to around 190. After losing all that weight I took a trip back to Athens, and just happened to run into Donna, who at the time was really more a casual acquaintance than a friend. She later told me that she was impressed with how good I looked after my diet, which is why she asked me to lunch that day. The rest as they say is history.

2. By 1993, Donna was in Virginia working on her doctorate, and thanks to working in restaurants and having lots of pocket-money, I was over-eating again. By the time I moved up to Virginia in 1995, I’d started getting heavy, and when we got married in 1996, I weighed as much as I ever have: around 235. Not long after that, I started having some health problems, suffering bouts of vertigo and persistent reflux. Taking advantage of the health plan at the corporate job I was working at the time, I started getting regular checkups, and under doctor’s orders started developing an exercise plan built around taking long walks, multiple times a day. We moved from Virginia to Arkansas in 1999, and when I carried Donna across the threshold of our new house, I was back down to around 190. I kept losing weight over the next two years, getting down below 180 around the time Archer was born in 2001.

3. After Cady Gray was born in 2004, my weight started creeping up again. In 2010, when I turned 40, I promised Donna I’d get back to going to the doctor regularly. When I stepped on the scale for the first time in a long while in February of 2011, I weighed 225. More alarmingly, my blood-work showed that I was pre-diabetic. I started logging my calories, and got back to taking walks; but the most important choice I made back then was to try the high-protein/low-carb “primal” diet. I want to make clear that I don’t really recommend anyone else go paleo/primal, because I don’t think it’s sustainable long-term. (At least it wasn't for me.) But I can’t deny that I leaned-out fast. My the end of 2011, I was down to about 185. The next year, I dipped below 180 again, and looked crazy-thin. I actually have a sort of “before and after” pic, from two different A.V. Club videos I participated in, in the consecutive Decembers of 2010 and 2011:

3.5. I started slacking on the primal diet by the end of 2012, and even with a FitBit monitoring my steps, I started walking less and snacking more -- both choices exacerbated by some stressful transitions in my professional life. The gain this time was slow, but steady, such that I was pushing 200 again in the fall of 2014... right before I lost my job. Choosing to turn a crisis into an opportunity, I recommitted to diet and exercise, and got back down into the mid-190s for a while. But then I started getting a lot more freelance assignments, I walked a lot less, and I missed one of my yearly doctor appointments. I stopped stepping on the scale after I noticed I was over 200 again, and I stopped logging my food. The recommit was short-lived.

4.5. So here we are now. Earlier this year I went back to the doctor, and was pleased to see that I wasn’t as heavy as I was afraid I was. I weighed in at 215, and my blood-work was fine. At the start of the summer, I replaced my FitBit with an Apple Watch and started counting calories again. My goal was to get below 200 before TIFF. On the Sunday before I left, I was at 200 exactly.

I only weigh myself weekly, and I chose not to step on the scale last week. Tomorrow will be a big day then. I’m hoping I’ll be hovering around or even below 200. If not, I’ll have to try harder. After all, I’ve done it before.

The A.V. Club Movie Review: Thirst Street puts a smart stalker spin on  ’70s-style European erotica

The Los Angeles Times Movie Review: The Houses October Built 2 revisits effective mix of found-footage horror and haunted houses Movie Review: Thriller Happy Hunting has a bloody good time taking aim at societal hypocrisy

Vulture TV Review: The Good Place Season 2 Premiere: Starting Over (And Over)

The Week The Toronto film festival concludes with raw truths and unexpected beauties

[cristinajourdanqp]

Healing Food, For Me, Is the Answer To a Stable and Fulfilling Life

It’s Friday, everyone! And that means another Primal Blueprint Real Life Story from a Mark’s Daily Apple reader. If you have your own success story and would like to share it with me and the Mark’s Daily Apple community please contact me here. I’ll continue to publish these each Friday as long as they keep coming in. Thank you for reading!

Today I’d like to give my own introduction for our success story. She’s a former Mark’s Daily Apple success story (you can read her original story here). But she’s also a successful entrepreneur within the natural food and paleo space. I’m happy she’s shared an update to her personal journey and her business venture, and I’m excited that she’s also offering a giveaway for our community. Thanks for stopping by today, everybody. Enjoy!

My conscious-food lifestyle continues to be the backbone of my life (see my original post for more details about my journey to get here). After being in an ill-state of health until I was 21, I became passionate about healing my body, mind and spirit through food. What started off as a commitment to being gluten-free eventually evolved into me adopting the primal, paleo-inspired lifestyle around the age of 23. I experienced such a dramatic transformation in my health as a result of my dietary changes that everything in my life shifted. I was pursuing teaching yoga professionally, and as a result of my health transformation, my career ambitions pivoted and led me to open my own business, Picnik, in 2013.

Picnik was (and continues to be) a passion project for me to bring real food to the masses. I opened my first location in a reclaimed shipping container in Austin, TX. The original name, Pressed & Squeezed, transformed into Picnik when I’d show friends the location I found for our trailer. We were perched on the top of a giant, grassy hill in the middle of a bustling street called South Lamar. Every time I’d show friends and family the location, they would declare “this is the perfect place for a picnic.” To me, I considered that a divine sign and took the initiative to change the name. Hallelujah for that, because it has shaped our vibe and our culture tremendously over the years.

Building Picnik was no easy feat. In 2013, when we opened our doors, the consciousness around the paleo and high-fat movement was minimal. We had grab and go lunch items, breakfast pastries and a delicious coffee menu, but we made every item on our menu with a unique, health-promoting flare. Our coffee menu was incredibly innovative. We used coffee as the backbone for a specialty drinks menu that had a base of high-quality fats, conscious proteins and superfood add-in’s that amplified the nutrition. We wanted these drinks to taste just like what you would expect from a traditional coffee shop, just made with better ingredients. We had a very unique position in the marketplace for many reasons, but our drinks became a standout, as they functioned like a protein shake, an energy drink and a latte in one.

Convincing customers to try our coffee was challenging in the beginning. For the first year of business, I’d stand behind the cash register every day giving away free drinks and begging customers to ‘just give it a try.’ Although it wasn’t easy, I was able to get many people to approach our menu with an open mind, and many of the customers I helped transition to Picnik’s coffee during that time remain our regulars to this day. Once people would try what we had to offer, we’d often see them every morning. It was inspiring to see how people related to our products and how we were making a palpable difference in the way our customers felt every day.

At the start of 2014, things started to really heat up for Picnik.  The awareness and acceptance around high-quality fats shifted (Hello! Butter was on the cover of Time Magazine). As a result, customers began coming to Picnik with enthusiasm and an open mind. Our traffic was so heavy that we eventually opened a new, larger infrastructure on South Lamar in 2016 and, shortly thereafter, a full-service, all-day concept in our first brick and mortar location on Burnet Road in August 2016. All the while, we had been working on how to package our coffee since 2014 because it had become so high in demand. We knew how great it made our customers feel, and we wanted to reach the hands (and mouths) of our customers outside of Austin. Although it took three years of development work, in 2017 we launched our first three ready-to-drink coffees for grocery. Our first production run of our Cappuccino, Dirty Chai and Mocha was in February of 2017. By May, three months later, we were being sold in all Whole Foods Market’s nationwide.  Talk about 0-100!

Fast forward to this point, June 2018, we now have four locations. We have two food trucks and one restaurant in Austin, TX, as well as our first coffee and beverage kiosk in Whole Foods Market 365 in Upland, CA. In addition, we have four products being sold nationwide in independent retailers and grocery, with many more products on the way. It’s been an incredible ride, and I know it is just getting started.

As I’ve settled into a conscious-food lifestyle, I’ve continued to refine and identify what works for me. My GI problems have dramatically improved as a result of a relatively consistent healthy lifestyle combined with high doses of Magnesium and Probiotics. I did, however, continue to experience histamine reactions and skin problems, even on a paleo-inspired diet. As a result, I explored several adjustments to my lifestyle over the last few years. When I was in the thick of my healing, I was committed to the GAPS diet, essentially a healing protocol that aligns with the primal lifestyle, but it omits all starches, sugars (besides honey), legumes and some forms of dairy. It is a strict elimination protocol that focuses on bone broth and really transformed my health.  As an ex-vegan, however, I sometimes became overwhelmed on GAPS with the quantity of meat I was consuming, so I pivoted and explored a more plant-based healing protocol that focused on high-quantities of fruit as well as eliminated certain inflammatory foods.

After pursuing GAPS and my plant-based, fruit-heavy diet, I ended up feeling strong and stable with my health and I began reacting less and less to food. This stability allowed me some more food-freedom and gave me the opportunity to re-experience eating foods that I had 100% eliminated in the past. As someone who had been gluten-free for over 10 years, I was able to final enjoy croissants, my favorite food, without reaction, as long as I consumed them in moderation. Moderation, however, is the key word. I definitely went off the handle a bit during this time, loving my new food-freedom, and ended up on a glorious grain and gluten-bender, regularly re-exploring a food group that had been abolished for me for so long. Although I am very happy with my progress, I still have to remain diligent and careful. If I eat grains and other starches regularly, I end up with histamine problems, brain fog, weight gain and inflammation.

In the end, I’ve re-settled back into a GAPS and primal inspired diet that focuses on meats, fish, fruits, low starch vegetables, nuts, seeds and full-fat dairy. This is my default ‘zero’ and allows me to stay in a stable place physically, mentally and emotionally. I’m happy in life, work and business, and I love knowing that healing food, for me, is always the answer to a stable and fulfilling life.

All the best,

Naomi Seifter, Piknic

Now For the Giveaway…

WIN A MONTH OF BUTTER COFFEE!

We’ll pick 3 winners to receive:

A one-month supply of butter coffee, which would include the following for three winners: (1) 6-pack of Cappuccino Butter Coffee (1) 6-pack of Mocha Butter Coffee (1) 6-pack of Dirty Chai Butter Coffee (1) 32 fl oz Butter Coffee Creamer

Just visit the Mark’s Daily Apple Instagram page for more info on how to enter and win!

Want to make fat loss easier? Try the Definitive Guide for Troubleshooting Weight Loss for free here.

[watsonrodriquezie]

Healing Food, For Me, Is the Answer To a Stable and Fulfilling Life

It’s Friday, everyone! And that means another Primal Blueprint Real Life Story from a Mark’s Daily Apple reader. If you have your own success story and would like to share it with me and the Mark’s Daily Apple community please contact me here. I’ll continue to publish these each Friday as long as they keep coming in. Thank you for reading!

Today I’d like to give my own introduction for our success story. She’s a former Mark’s Daily Apple success story (you can read her original story here). But she’s also a successful entrepreneur within the natural food and paleo space. I’m happy she’s shared an update to her personal journey and her business venture, and I’m excited that she’s also offering a giveaway for our community. Thanks for stopping by today, everybody. Enjoy!

My conscious-food lifestyle continues to be the backbone of my life (see my original post for more details about my journey to get here). After being in an ill-state of health until I was 21, I became passionate about healing my body, mind and spirit through food. What started off as a commitment to being gluten-free eventually evolved into me adopting the primal, paleo-inspired lifestyle around the age of 23. I experienced such a dramatic transformation in my health as a result of my dietary changes that everything in my life shifted. I was pursuing teaching yoga professionally, and as a result of my health transformation, my career ambitions pivoted and led me to open my own business, Picnik, in 2013.

Picnik was (and continues to be) a passion project for me to bring real food to the masses. I opened my first location in a reclaimed shipping container in Austin, TX. The original name, Pressed & Squeezed, transformed into Picnik when I’d show friends the location I found for our trailer. We were perched on the top of a giant, grassy hill in the middle of a bustling street called South Lamar. Every time I’d show friends and family the location, they would declare “this is the perfect place for a picnic.” To me, I considered that a divine sign and took the initiative to change the name. Hallelujah for that, because it has shaped our vibe and our culture tremendously over the years.

Building Picnik was no easy feat. In 2013, when we opened our doors, the consciousness around the paleo and high-fat movement was minimal. We had grab and go lunch items, breakfast pastries and a delicious coffee menu, but we made every item on our menu with a unique, health-promoting flare. Our coffee menu was incredibly innovative. We used coffee as the backbone for a specialty drinks menu that had a base of high-quality fats, conscious proteins and superfood add-in’s that amplified the nutrition. We wanted these drinks to taste just like what you would expect from a traditional coffee shop, just made with better ingredients. We had a very unique position in the marketplace for many reasons, but our drinks became a standout, as they functioned like a protein shake, an energy drink and a latte in one.

Convincing customers to try our coffee was challenging in the beginning. For the first year of business, I’d stand behind the cash register every day giving away free drinks and begging customers to ‘just give it a try.’ Although it wasn’t easy, I was able to get many people to approach our menu with an open mind, and many of the customers I helped transition to Picnik’s coffee during that time remain our regulars to this day. Once people would try what we had to offer, we’d often see them every morning. It was inspiring to see how people related to our products and how we were making a palpable difference in the way our customers felt every day.

At the start of 2014, things started to really heat up for Picnik.  The awareness and acceptance around high-quality fats shifted (Hello! Butter was on the cover of Time Magazine). As a result, customers began coming to Picnik with enthusiasm and an open mind. Our traffic was so heavy that we eventually opened a new, larger infrastructure on South Lamar in 2016 and, shortly thereafter, a full-service, all-day concept in our first brick and mortar location on Burnet Road in August 2016. All the while, we had been working on how to package our coffee since 2014 because it had become so high in demand. We knew how great it made our customers feel, and we wanted to reach the hands (and mouths) of our customers outside of Austin. Although it took three years of development work, in 2017 we launched our first three ready-to-drink coffees for grocery. Our first production run of our Cappuccino, Dirty Chai and Mocha was in February of 2017. By May, three months later, we were being sold in all Whole Foods Market’s nationwide.  Talk about 0-100!

Fast forward to this point, June 2018, we now have four locations. We have two food trucks and one restaurant in Austin, TX, as well as our first coffee and beverage kiosk in Whole Foods Market 365 in Upland, CA. In addition, we have four products being sold nationwide in independent retailers and grocery, with many more products on the way. It’s been an incredible ride, and I know it is just getting started.

As I’ve settled into a conscious-food lifestyle, I’ve continued to refine and identify what works for me. My GI problems have dramatically improved as a result of a relatively consistent healthy lifestyle combined with high doses of Magnesium and Probiotics. I did, however, continue to experience histamine reactions and skin problems, even on a paleo-inspired diet. As a result, I explored several adjustments to my lifestyle over the last few years. When I was in the thick of my healing, I was committed to the GAPS diet, essentially a healing protocol that aligns with the primal lifestyle, but it omits all starches, sugars (besides honey), legumes and some forms of dairy. It is a strict elimination protocol that focuses on bone broth and really transformed my health.  As an ex-vegan, however, I sometimes became overwhelmed on GAPS with the quantity of meat I was consuming, so I pivoted and explored a more plant-based healing protocol that focused on high-quantities of fruit as well as eliminated certain inflammatory foods.

After pursuing GAPS and my plant-based, fruit-heavy diet, I ended up feeling strong and stable with my health and I began reacting less and less to food. This stability allowed me some more food-freedom and gave me the opportunity to re-experience eating foods that I had 100% eliminated in the past. As someone who had been gluten-free for over 10 years, I was able to final enjoy croissants, my favorite food, without reaction, as long as I consumed them in moderation. Moderation, however, is the key word. I definitely went off the handle a bit during this time, loving my new food-freedom, and ended up on a glorious grain and gluten-bender, regularly re-exploring a food group that had been abolished for me for so long. Although I am very happy with my progress, I still have to remain diligent and careful. If I eat grains and other starches regularly, I end up with histamine problems, brain fog, weight gain and inflammation.

In the end, I’ve re-settled back into a GAPS and primal inspired diet that focuses on meats, fish, fruits, low starch vegetables, nuts, seeds and full-fat dairy. This is my default ‘zero’ and allows me to stay in a stable place physically, mentally and emotionally. I’m happy in life, work and business, and I love knowing that healing food, for me, is always the answer to a stable and fulfilling life.

All the best,

Naomi Seifter, Piknic

Now For the Giveaway…

WIN A MONTH OF BUTTER COFFEE!

We’ll pick 3 winners to receive:

A one-month supply of butter coffee, which would include the following for three winners: (1) 6-pack of Cappuccino Butter Coffee (1) 6-pack of Mocha Butter Coffee (1) 6-pack of Dirty Chai Butter Coffee (1) 32 fl oz Butter Coffee Creamer

Just visit the Mark’s Daily Apple Instagram page for more info on how to enter and win!

Want to make fat loss easier? Try the Definitive Guide for Troubleshooting Weight Loss for free here.

[fishermariawo]

I Married My Two Passions—Baking and Fitness—To Change My Life

It’s Friday, everyone! And that means another Primal Blueprint Real Life Story from a Mark’s Daily Apple reader. If you have your own success story and would like to share it with me and the Mark’s Daily Apple community please contact me here. I’ll continue to publish these each Friday as long as they keep coming in. Thank you for reading!

 After a “chubby childhood,” an eating-disorder ravaged adolescence, and then an up-and-down, yo-yo dieting young adulthood, I dedicated myself to finding a way to live healthfully and — most importantly—HAPPILY with who I am and to realize my inherent potential: physically and emotionally.

I have spent the last seventeen years working toward a state of health that is not only optimal but sustainable. I graduated with a degree in psychology, hoping to someday use it as a foundation to help other people who had struggled as I had.

Through it all, I have still battled the ups and downs of pounds lost and gained, the frustrations of injuries confining me to the couch, and the struggle to really “figure ‘it’ out”—what formula was I missing?  What pieces of the puzzle were eluding me, to finding that perfect balance of fitness and health and ultimate life satisfaction?

For me, a huge turning point came in late 2014, when I tried a Whole30 Challenge, completed it, and began a Paleo way of eating. When you hear that body composition is 80% diet, it is no joke (and I have the self-experimentation, documented in my blog, to back up that statement).

Fast forward a couple of years, and I find myself suffering yet ANOTHER running injury, feeling completely pitiful and depressed, when my now-husband hands me an issue of Outside Magazine containing an article about this guy called Mark Sisson. I glanced at it….left it on the counter for a few days….and then threw it into my bag to take to work and read when I had time.

I will admit, I was skeptical. I was a chronic cardio junkie, but what HAD been working really was NOT working for me anymore (and I was eating a whole food diet!). You mean I could train less? I needed to sleep more? More fat? (Aside: now, I knew that fat was not “bad”….but that Standard American Diet had been instilled into me from the youngest age, and while I now ate whole foods and really did eat a healthy diet, I still struggled with the “calories in, calories out” mentality.)

That was in the winter of 2016, and it still took me being laid up with a sprained ankle (ANOTHER running injury?!) to fully dig into The Primal Blueprint, order all of the books, and immerse myself in this incredible multitude of research and information. That was in July, and I became hooked. I was already a NASM-Certified Personal Trainer, and I had visions of getting my Fitness Nutrition Specialization, even though I was currently working a government job and not training any clients.

While I loved my government job—the job itself—the interpersonal dynamic was incredibly toxic (stress?!). In January or 2017, I decided to go for broke: I enrolled in the Primal Health Coaching Program AND my Fitness Nutrition Course and completed both by February. Little by little, I decided I was going to make a change and make this my career.

But bills need to be paid, and my husband and I had a hefty mortgage. So I labored away at my job, spending my down time developing my future business.

I finally launched my LLC in May of 2017, but it still did not really go anywhere. I had transformed my life and way of thinking, adopting the Primal lifestyle to a “T”: honoring sleep, managing stress, moving and exercising sensibly. I had so much knowledge and nowhere to put it!

Finally, on a warm, Sunday afternoon in June, I was destressing by baking a (traditional) graduation cake for a friend; I have always loved to bake, even if I do not eat the traditional fare anymore (a taste of ice cream cake once in a while is about all I can tolerate). My husband turned to me and said, “You are so good at this! You are such a great baker, and you LOVE it! Why don’t you try Paleo or Primal desserts?”

I rolled my eyes and said, “That’s too hard!”

But a seed was planted. I asked myself, “Why am I doing all of these sugar-laden (yet delicious) desserts for the people whom I want to help? I am enabling, not helping them…..and I DO love to bake….and even I don’t eat this stuff….hmmmmm….”??

A few weeks later, my husband deployed for a seven-month stint in Africa, and I decided to take that time to learn how to create Paleo and Primal sweet eats. My goal was to make things that were not merely “less unhealthy,” but were actually nutritious in themselves: provide nutrition in every bite; craft items from the ground up. And you know what? It was fun.

And I WAS good at it. In fact, it was so much fun, and I was SO good at it, that I took a leap of faith and quit my comfy-yet-stressful five-figure government job and launched a dessert line to go alongside my fitness company.

Within three months from picking up my first sack of almond flour, I had a full line of good-for-you goodies, and I was selling them to the hungry hoards in coffee shops around town. I was completing personal orders, and I was loving every minute—my worst day doing this job was not even remotely comparable to the very best day at my old job. I have done tastings and been able to talk to people not just about my desserts and way of eating, but also about my lifestyle, my goal to help those with a sweet tooth have something at hand that was not merely an empty-calorie sugar-bomb. I had a woman stop me while I was dropping off an order at a coffee shop in town and personally thank me for what I do: “You have no idea what this means to me. I have dietary intolerances that lead me to a Paleo lifestyle, but I sometimes miss a good Pumpkin Muffin. Thank you so very much for bringing ‘Paleo’ to us!” I was—AM—truly helping people, and I am also able to provide fitness and nutrition advice AND promote the Primal way of living as a whole.

My baking business is currently bigger than my fitness business, but I have kept both fires burning: I blog as much as possible on my fitness site (also see me on Facebook: BFit BodyFit) and still offer coaching and nutritional planning to anyone who needs it.

My mission has always been to help others. I love food. I love nutrition. I love fitness. But I had clients and friends who were trying to eat and live well—and especially those trying to adhere to a Primal or Paleo way of life—tell me that they struggled with desserts, and that they were “tired of fruit.” I have never wanted to “enable” a person who needs to address a sugar addiction, but I DO want to help those who fight to stay in line with their goals and ensure that EVERYTHING they put into their bodies is truly good for them.

Mark’s Daily Apple—and of course, Mark himself—inspired ME, a Paleo Personal Trainer, to step back, REALLY evaluate my life, and make a change for the better. I started to sleep more; I dialed back the cardio. My job was the most stressful thing in my life, to the point where I was physically ill quite a bit (side note: I have not been ill AT ALL since I quit that job). I took all of the knowledge I had gained from the Primal Blueprint, my other studies, and I married it with my two passions—baking and fitness—to change my life.

I now bring Paleo, Primal, Gluten-Free, and Vegan good-for-you sweet eats to the people of Alexandria, VA (and beyond—I do ship! Check out Brianne’s Blissful Bites on Facebook or email me at bri@briannesblissfulbites.com). I did this because I was inspired by Mark Sisson, who helped me step back and inventory my lifestyle beyond diet and movement.

[evolutionoftastitude]

New Post has been published on http://www.evsmanagement.ca/clients/evolution/2017/03/18/the-5-most-popular-diets-whats-good-whats-bad/

The 5 Most Popular Diets: What's Good, What's Bad?

These days, it seems like there’s a new diet for every letter of the alphabet. We pulled five of the most popular ones out of the mix to give you the pros and cons—and the bottom line—for each!

Ever suffer from “too much choice” syndrome when it comes to choosing a diet? It’s no wonder. From Atkins to Zone, and everything in between, there are lots of them to choose from! If you’re still looking for the perfect diet this year, your search is over.

Here’s our take on some of the most popular approaches.

The Whole30 Program®

If you’re concerned about skin conditions, allergies, gut disturbances, or symptoms of whole-body inflammation, this diet might be for you. The concept behind Whole30 is to eat whole foods for 30 days while completely avoiding off-limits foods such as sugar, grains, dairy, legumes, alcohol, MSG, sulfites, and any “fake” treats recreated from approved ingredients.[1]

For 30 days, you’ll focus on eating meat, seafood, eggs, lots of vegetables, some fruit, and plenty of good fats from fruits, oils, nuts, and seeds. You’ll avoid foods with ingredients you aren’t familiar with (or can’t pronounce) and choose whole foods without any “ingredients” except themselves.

Pros: You’ll be eating healthy, nutrient-dense foods. And by encouraging you to avoid that big trigger point—looking at the scale—Whole30 might reduce your stress level, too.

Cons: Sounds good, but what happens on day 31? The Whole30 Program creators suggest you eat a “Whole30-ish” diet after completing your first 30 days, but to expect sugars, grains, dairy, and more to creep back into your diet.

Bottom line: Without helping you develop sustainable eating habits, this approach falls easily into the big bucket of endless variations on the “30-day challenge” theme.

The Zone Diet®

This diet is all about putting your body into a physiological state that discourages inflammation—into the “Zone.” You know you’re in it when you get good scores on blood tests for triglycerides, arachidonic acid (EPA or omega fats) ratio, and hemoglobin A1C levels (average blood glucose levels for the past three months).

When you get in the Zone, you’ll be primed not only to fight inflammation but also to experience greater fat loss, enhanced exercise performance and cognitive function, and an increased state of wellness.[2]

The Zone Diet prioritizes food groups in the following order, from most to least important:

Vegetables

Fruits

Low-fat proteins

Monounsaturated fats

Grains and starches

The idea is to build each meal using one-third low-fat protein, two-thirds colorful vegetables and some fruit, and a “dash” of monounsaturated fats such as olive oil, avocado, or nuts.

Pros: Like Whole30, the Zone Diet focuses on nutrient-dense foods and uses healthy eating behaviors such as portion control, moderation, and eating every few hours. Unlike Whole30, no foods are off limits.

Cons: Some people criticize the Zone Diet for telling people to avoid grains and starches thought to cause inflammation, while encouraging them to eat other foods (papaya, mango, grapes, raisins, bananas, etc.) that are sometimes thought to increase inflammation.

Bottom line: General confusion about the role some carbohydrates may play in inflammation can make it hard for some people to choose the right foods to include in their Zone diet.

The Paleo Diet

A paleo diet is a moderate-protein, higher-fat, low-carbohydrate diet that attempts to mimic the diet of our omnivorous hunter-gatherer ancestors during the Paleolithic era. It’s based on eating naturally occurring food with little to no processing.

What You Can Eat

Proteins: A paleo diet includes a lot of lean and fatty grass-fed meats including poultry, red meat, pork, organ meats, and eggs, as well as seafood and fish. Whether you include dairy foods depends on how strict your paleo principles are (after all, no one was milking dairy animals 2.5 million years ago).

Carbohydrates: These are limited to fruits, vegetables, and tubers (potatoes, yams, taro root, jicama, and celery root). Grains such as rice and pasta, as well as beans and legumes, are excluded because they are processed foods.

Fats: You can eat unsaturated and saturated fats including nuts, seeds, natural oils (olive, coconut, avocado), butter, and avocados. No peanut butter allowed, though; technically speaking, peanuts are legumes.

Pros: Normally, no snacks are allowed when going paleo. But paleo eating has gotten so popular that “paleo-approved” snacks are now available, including protein shakes and bars, meal replacements, energy bars, and chips.

Cons: A super-low-carb approach can be tough. The most strenuous thing you do all day might be to get 300 grams of carbs from fruits, vegetables, and tubers alone! If you’re doing two-a-day training or workouts longer than 90 minutes, good luck with this one.

Bottom line: Many people have no problem adjusting to a paleo diet. Others struggle mightily because they have to omit bread and pasta—not to mention peanut butter. Overly restrictive diets often lead to increased cravings for and binging on forbidden foods.

The Ketogenic Diet

A keto diet is very high-fat, moderate-protein, very low-carbohydrate, and breaks down like this:

70-75 percent of calories from fat

15-20 percent of calories from protein

5-10 percent of calories from carbohydrate

The diet’s purpose is to get your body into ketosis, a state in which your body shifts its primary fuel source from glucose to fatty acids and ketone bodies. Your body (or, most bodies, I should say) has a nearly limitless supply of stored fats it can transform into energy-producing fatty acids and ketone bodies. Once you convince your body to essentially burn fat for energy, say hello to some major fat loss.

Pros: If you can get past the dreaded “keto flu” and survive the weeks it takes to enter ketosis, you’ll experience outstanding weight loss and a positive effect on your blood cholesterol and triglyceride levels.[3]

Cons: Getting past keto flu and into ketosis is hard. Why? Because of carbs. Eating even a small portion of carbs can knock you out of ketosis and put a giant “pause” on the benefits of this diet. And if you do knock yourself out of ketosis, it can take 3-5 days to get back into it.

Bottom line: Keto flu aside, a ketogenic diet may not give you the fuel you need to perform at your best.[4,5] If your goal is improving rep PRs, 1RMs, or sprint times, this diet may not be ideal for you.

Intermittent-Fasting Diet

Intermittent fasting (IF) is the process of intentionally fasting (going without calories) for a set amount of time, typically at least 16 hours. Fasting as a fat-loss tool has been shown to increase the body’s ability to break down fat, reduce body weight, and accelerate fat loss.[6,7] Note that you must be in a caloric deficit to reap these benefits.

To date, there have been many versions of IF, but the most popular approaches include:

LeanGains: 16 hours fasting, 8 hours feeding

Warrior Diet: 20 hours fasting, 4 hours feeding

Alternate-day fasting: 24 hours fasting, 24 hours feeding

Pros: Fasting can result in decreased body fat, improved blood cholesterol and triglyceride levels, and enhanced insulin sensitivity.[8,9] Plus, not having to think about what you’re going to eat next can reduce stress, and eating one giant meal a day can make you feel satisfied and fully satiated.

Cons: Long periods without nutrients, particularly protein, makes this a tough diet when you’re trying to optimize muscle growth. IF may also lead to unhealthy and probably unsustainable binge-eating behavior as you focus on just one meal to meet all of your daily calorie goals.

Bottom line: When taken to the extreme, IF might not be the best way to go if you’re very physically active. But it is possible to plan your daily meals so that you get all your nutrients by eating less often than the usual “three meals a day with snacks in between” approach.

References

The Whole30 Diet. Whole30. Accessed 17 February 2017. Retrieved from: http://whole30.com/whole30-program-rules/.

The Zone Diet. Zone: Evidence-Based Wellness. Accessed 17 February 19 2017. Retrieved from: http://www.zonediet.com/the-zone-diet/.

Brehm, B. J., Seeley, R. J., Daniels, S. R., & D’alessio, D. A. (2003). A randomized trial comparing a very low carbohydrate diet and a calorie-restricted low fat diet on body weight and cardiovascular risk factors in healthy women. The Journal of Clinical Endocrinology & Metabolism, 88(4), 1617-1623.

Paoli, A., Grimaldi, K., D’Agostino, D., Cenci, L., Moro, T., Bianco, A., & Palma, A. (2012). Ketogenic diet does not affect strength performance in elite artistic gymnasts. Journal of the International Society of Sports Nutrition, 9(1), 1.

Langfort, J., Zarzeczny, R., Pilis, W., Nazar, K., & Kaciuba-Uścitko, H. (1997). The effect of a low-carbohydrate diet on performance, hormonal and metabolic responses to a 30-s bout of supramaximal exercise. European journal of applied physiology and occupational physiology, 76(2), 128-133.

Varady, K. A., Bhutani, S., Church, E. C., & Klempel, M. C. (2009). Short-term modified alternate-day fasting: a novel dietary strategy for weight loss and cardioprotection in obese adults. The American journal of clinical nutrition, 90(5), 1138-1143.

Barnosky, A. R., Hoddy, K. K., Unterman, T. G., & Varady, K. A. (2014). Intermittent fasting vs daily calorie restriction for type 2 diabetes prevention: a review of human findings. Translational Research, 164(4), 302-311.

Heilbronn, L. K., Smith, S. R., Martin, C. K., Anton, S. D., & Ravussin, E. (2005). Alternate-day fasting in nonobese subjects: effects on body weight, body composition, and energy metabolism. The American Jjournal of Clinical Nutrition, 81(1), 69-73.

Klempel, M. C., Kroeger, C. M., & Varady, K. A. (2013). Alternate day fasting (ADF) with a high-fat diet produces similar weight loss and cardio-protection as ADF with a low-fat diet. Metabolism, 62(1), 137-143.

SOURCE:  https://www.bodybuilding.com/content/the-5-most-popular-diets-whats-good-whats-bad.html

[alphynix]

Daily Paleo Art Month #20: Schinderhannes

And we're finishing the month with one of my favorite groups of extinct animals -- the anomalocaridids! Schinderhannes here came from the Lower Devonian of Germany, about 407 million years ago -- and since all other known anomalocaridids were known from the mid-Cambrian, 100 million years earlier, its discovery hugely extended the group's temporal range.

Schinderhannes wasn't as large as some earlier anomalocaridids, only about 10cm long (4in), but it was certainly just as weird. The multiple swimming lobes of its older relatives were reduced to just a single pair of "flippers" behind the head and a smaller secondary pair on the 11th body segment, an oddly fishlike arrangement. Some studies have considered its anatomy to be an intermediate form between earlier anomalocaridids and the true arthropods, suggesting that arthropods may have descended from somewhere within this group.

[cristinajourdanqp]

I Married My Two Passions—Baking and Fitness—To Change My Life

It’s Friday, everyone! And that means another Primal Blueprint Real Life Story from a Mark’s Daily Apple reader. If you have your own success story and would like to share it with me and the Mark’s Daily Apple community please contact me here. I’ll continue to publish these each Friday as long as they keep coming in. Thank you for reading!

 After a “chubby childhood,” an eating-disorder ravaged adolescence, and then an up-and-down, yo-yo dieting young adulthood, I dedicated myself to finding a way to live healthfully and — most importantly—HAPPILY with who I am and to realize my inherent potential: physically and emotionally.

I have spent the last seventeen years working toward a state of health that is not only optimal but sustainable. I graduated with a degree in psychology, hoping to someday use it as a foundation to help other people who had struggled as I had.

Through it all, I have still battled the ups and downs of pounds lost and gained, the frustrations of injuries confining me to the couch, and the struggle to really “figure ‘it’ out”—what formula was I missing?  What pieces of the puzzle were eluding me, to finding that perfect balance of fitness and health and ultimate life satisfaction?

For me, a huge turning point came in late 2014, when I tried a Whole30 Challenge, completed it, and began a Paleo way of eating. When you hear that body composition is 80% diet, it is no joke (and I have the self-experimentation, documented in my blog, to back up that statement).

Fast forward a couple of years, and I find myself suffering yet ANOTHER running injury, feeling completely pitiful and depressed, when my now-husband hands me an issue of Outside Magazine containing an article about this guy called Mark Sisson. I glanced at it….left it on the counter for a few days….and then threw it into my bag to take to work and read when I had time.

I will admit, I was skeptical. I was a chronic cardio junkie, but what HAD been working really was NOT working for me anymore (and I was eating a whole food diet!). You mean I could train less? I needed to sleep more? More fat? (Aside: now, I knew that fat was not “bad”….but that Standard American Diet had been instilled into me from the youngest age, and while I now ate whole foods and really did eat a healthy diet, I still struggled with the “calories in, calories out” mentality.)

That was in the winter of 2016, and it still took me being laid up with a sprained ankle (ANOTHER running injury?!) to fully dig into The Primal Blueprint, order all of the books, and immerse myself in this incredible multitude of research and information. That was in July, and I became hooked. I was already a NASM-Certified Personal Trainer, and I had visions of getting my Fitness Nutrition Specialization, even though I was currently working a government job and not training any clients.

While I loved my government job—the job itself—the interpersonal dynamic was incredibly toxic (stress?!). In January or 2017, I decided to go for broke: I enrolled in the Primal Health Coaching Program AND my Fitness Nutrition Course and completed both by February. Little by little, I decided I was going to make a change and make this my career.

But bills need to be paid, and my husband and I had a hefty mortgage. So I labored away at my job, spending my down time developing my future business.

I finally launched my LLC in May of 2017, but it still did not really go anywhere. I had transformed my life and way of thinking, adopting the Primal lifestyle to a “T”: honoring sleep, managing stress, moving and exercising sensibly. I had so much knowledge and nowhere to put it!

Finally, on a warm, Sunday afternoon in June, I was destressing by baking a (traditional) graduation cake for a friend; I have always loved to bake, even if I do not eat the traditional fare anymore (a taste of ice cream cake once in a while is about all I can tolerate). My husband turned to me and said, “You are so good at this! You are such a great baker, and you LOVE it! Why don’t you try Paleo or Primal desserts?”

I rolled my eyes and said, “That’s too hard!”

But a seed was planted. I asked myself, “Why am I doing all of these sugar-laden (yet delicious) desserts for the people whom I want to help? I am enabling, not helping them…..and I DO love to bake….and even I don’t eat this stuff….hmmmmm….”??

A few weeks later, my husband deployed for a seven-month stint in Africa, and I decided to take that time to learn how to create Paleo and Primal sweet eats. My goal was to make things that were not merely “less unhealthy,” but were actually nutritious in themselves: provide nutrition in every bite; craft items from the ground up. And you know what? It was fun.

And I WAS good at it. In fact, it was so much fun, and I was SO good at it, that I took a leap of faith and quit my comfy-yet-stressful five-figure government job and launched a dessert line to go alongside my fitness company.

Within three months from picking up my first sack of almond flour, I had a full line of good-for-you goodies, and I was selling them to the hungry hoards in coffee shops around town. I was completing personal orders, and I was loving every minute—my worst day doing this job was not even remotely comparable to the very best day at my old job. I have done tastings and been able to talk to people not just about my desserts and way of eating, but also about my lifestyle, my goal to help those with a sweet tooth have something at hand that was not merely an empty-calorie sugar-bomb. I had a woman stop me while I was dropping off an order at a coffee shop in town and personally thank me for what I do: “You have no idea what this means to me. I have dietary intolerances that lead me to a Paleo lifestyle, but I sometimes miss a good Pumpkin Muffin. Thank you so very much for bringing ‘Paleo’ to us!” I was—AM—truly helping people, and I am also able to provide fitness and nutrition advice AND promote the Primal way of living as a whole.

My baking business is currently bigger than my fitness business, but I have kept both fires burning: I blog as much as possible on my fitness site (also see me on Facebook: BFit BodyFit) and still offer coaching and nutritional planning to anyone who needs it.

My mission has always been to help others. I love food. I love nutrition. I love fitness. But I had clients and friends who were trying to eat and live well—and especially those trying to adhere to a Primal or Paleo way of life—tell me that they struggled with desserts, and that they were “tired of fruit.” I have never wanted to “enable” a person who needs to address a sugar addiction, but I DO want to help those who fight to stay in line with their goals and ensure that EVERYTHING they put into their bodies is truly good for them.

Mark’s Daily Apple—and of course, Mark himself—inspired ME, a Paleo Personal Trainer, to step back, REALLY evaluate my life, and make a change for the better. I started to sleep more; I dialed back the cardio. My job was the most stressful thing in my life, to the point where I was physically ill quite a bit (side note: I have not been ill AT ALL since I quit that job). I took all of the knowledge I had gained from the Primal Blueprint, my other studies, and I married it with my two passions—baking and fitness—to change my life.

I now bring Paleo, Primal, Gluten-Free, and Vegan good-for-you sweet eats to the people of Alexandria, VA (and beyond—I do ship! Check out Brianne’s Blissful Bites on Facebook or email me at bri@briannesblissfulbites.com). I did this because I was inspired by Mark Sisson, who helped me step back and inventory my lifestyle beyond diet and movement.

[alphynix]

Daily Paleo Art Month #19: Odontochelys

Living around 220 million years ago in the Late Triassic of China, Odontochelys was the oldest known of all chelonians. About 40cm long (~16in), it lacked the beak and full armored carapace of its modern relatives, instead possessing a mouth full of teeth and only the plastron on its underside -- this was quite literally a "turtle in a half shell"!

The evolutionary history of turtles is rather murky, with little early fossil evidence to work with. They were traditionally classified as the last surviving group of anapsids based on the lack of temporal openings in their skulls, but more recent morphological and molecular studies have placed them firmly within the diapsids. Their exact relationships are still debated, with some scientists considering them to be related to the lepidosaurs (modern lizards, snakes, and tuataras), and others suggesting them to be very closely related to the archosaurs.

[alphynix]

Daily Paleo Art Month #18: Swartpuntia

We can't have a month of odd prehistoric creatures without touching on the ever-enigmatic Ediacaran biota, can we? This particular... thing... is Swartpuntia from the late Ediacaran period of Namibia and southwestern North America, about 546-542 million years ago. Up to 19cm in length (7.5in), it had somewhere between three and six leaf-shaped petaloids growing from a central stem.

Although it appears to form a taxonomic group with several other Ediacaran fossils, we still have very little clue just what any of these lifeforms were. Were they animals, algae, protists, fungi, microbial colonies? Or were they something else entirely, a strange stem group of early multicellular life that has no modern equivalent?

We just don't know.

[alphynix]

Daily Paleo Art Month #17: Diania

Living in the early Cambrian oceans around 520 million years ago, Diania is known from the Chinese Maotianshan Shales. It was a 6cm long (2.4in) member of the armored lobopodians, a group that also includes the bizarre Hallucigenia and modern velvet worms.

Diania had ten pairs of robust, spiny legs which appear to have been segmented and jointed -- a feature not seen before in any other lobopodians, and which may form an evolutionary link between them and the arthropods.

[alphynix]

Daily Paleo Art Month #16: Brochoadmones

Brochoadmones came from the Early Devonian of Canada, about 435-430 million years ago. Around 10cm long (4in), it was a type of "spiny shark" -- an extinct group that shared features with both bony and cartilaginous fish.

And it had a lot of extra fins. Six paired "finlets" running from below the gills to the pelvic fins, each consisting of a spine with a web of scaled skin. They look very much like what would be expected for multiple fins evolving from a lateral fin-fold (essentially a single elongated fin subdividing).

[alphynix]

Daily Paleo Art Month #15: Desmatosuchus

Desmatosuchus lived around 230 million years ago in the Late Triassic of Texas, USA. At 5m long (16'4") it was one of the largest of the aetosaurs, a group of crocodilian-like archosaurs which were very widespread and successful up until the Triassic-Jurassic mass extinction.

Aetosaurs were bulky herbivores with pig-like snouts, and very heavily armored bodies. Desmatosuchus had especially larges spikes over its shoulders, up to 45cm (18in) long, presumably as protection against predators.

[alphynix]

Daily Paleo Art Month #14: Synthetoceras

Synthetoceras was a 2m long (6'6") Late Miocene protoceratid from North America, living about 13-5 million years ago. Although superficially deer-like, the protoceratids weren't closely related to cervines -- in fact, their evolutionary relationships amongst the artiodactyls seem to still be unclear.

The most striking feature of the protoceratids were the males' horns, growing both above their eyes and on their nose. Some had a pair of nose horns -- but in others, like Synthetoceras here, the pair was fused into a single long horn that forked at the tip. Since females had either much smaller horns or none at all, it these features were probably used for sexual display or sparring over mates, similar to modern deer's antlers.

[alphynix]

Daily Paleo Art Month #13: Volchovia

This little creature came from the Middle Ordovician of Estonia and northwestern Russia, about 467 million years ago. Volchovia was a member of the ophiocistioids, a group of bizarre and poorly known tentacled echinoderms. This is another animal I don't have a reliable size estimate for, but it looks like it may have been around 7cm across (2.7in).

Ophiocistioids have anatomical traits that resemble both sea urchins and sea cucumbers, suggesting they were related to those two groups in some manner. They're still mysterious, however -- very little is known about how they lived or what role they played in their ancient ecosystems.

[alphynix]

Daily Paleo Art Month #12: Thylacosmilus

Living in Argentine, South America between 10 and 3 million years ago, Thylacosmilus wasn't a sabre-toothed cat but a sabre-toothed sparassodont, a type of carnivorous mammal that formed a sister group to the marsupials. Thylacosmilus was about the size of a modern jaguar, about 1.2m long (3.9ft), making it one of the largest known predators of all metatherians.

Sabre-teeth evolved completely independently in several different groups of mammals, suggesting that they were part of a very successful hunting strategy for those animals. Thylacosmilus is thought to have immobilized its prey with powerful forelimbs, then used precise deep bites into soft tissue to make the killing blows.