Bullet-Proofing Your Immune System

Rightsize Your Worries

Paleo vs. Vegan

Image Credit: Google

Recently, I had a good conversation with one of my sons’ teachers who was lamenting about how she has actually been gaining 10 pounds a year since she was 24, she’s now 30, and really feeling the effects of the weight gain.  Now, she’s made progress by signing up for crossfit classes, however, she seems to find a myriad of reasons to not go.    We then proceeded to discuss her eating habits which sounded reasonable eggs for breakfast, sometimes a skipped lunch, red meat and asparagus for dinner along with a minimum of 4 glasses of whole milk per day.   I love this teacher, and I want so badly to help her!!

What can I do for you? I can keep you accountable by asking, “did you go workout today”? But, I don’t want to be the world’s biggest nag, either.  I’ve shared how I eat, I’ve shared how she can get help through our paleo food specialist at CDR, and I’ve told her about Washington Produce……I feel like I’m talking to a brick wall.    She continues to be muddled in “well, how come they eat the same things I do and they are not gaining weight?”

Change comes with a decision.  You decide it’s time to improve your health, and you do it.  One small step at a time.  You could even access affordable health insurance in your quest to improve your health!   Switching from whole milk to no milk, adding lunches and lots of dark leafy greens to your daily regimen.  That sounds like a lot, but really, it is just about adding healthy foods and subtracting foods that are not so healthy.   Honestly, with a 100 pounds to lose, it’s going to START with food, not with exercise.

If you are one of these people struggling to lose weight or improve your health, here are some very valuable resources to check out:

Experience Life Magazine

Robb Wolf

Whole 9 Life

 

Encourage your child’s school to participate in National PE and Sport Week! Here are the resources along with lesson plans to check out.

Top of a pullover in my Merrell shoes! Love those things.

Today’s Destination was Muscle Beach in Santa Monica California.  A beach I had never been to and NOW have plans to visit often.  Although it is 90 minutes from our home with no traffic, it was so much fun that my kids are going to be asking to go back all the time, and we didn’t even swim.

The best part about this beach is that it’s free (after parking) and we played for hours.  There were pull-up bars, rings, balance beams, parallel bars of all sizes and varieties, ropes to climb and bars I don’t know what to call! In the background you can see Santa Monica Pier which offers carasel rides, fishing, Bubba Gump’s Fish House and lots of musicians along with some tourists (us).

Above is the rings that you can cross on one arm at a time- super fun.



The cool part of this type of destination with kids is that it offers something for both the grown-ups and the kids. I could have/would have played on the rings and bars until my hands tore and my kids would have too! Of course, we had to finish our day with a 2 mile scooter ride and me walking (oh yeah). I did learn how to do a mommy + kid scooter ride but this is very hard on the gluteus maximus muscle doing the work!

Yesterday, I had the amazing pleasure of visiting Whole Foods.  We live 60 miles from a Whole Foods so this is a treat!  My goal when entering the store was to score snacks and lunch for the kids and I for our road trip to the Skirball Cultural Center.   However, my time limit in a store such as this is still under 15 minutes as any longer, and I’d be completely broke and my kids would have convinced me to buy them every kind of food that passed their eyes…from nuts, to yogurt drinks, to Whale Tale Chips, to Macaroni Salad, to mini-pizza’s!  Oh, yeah, I did go broke and it took only 15 minutes!

I, luckily, did manage to grab some of these Almond Butter packets (not in chocolate), some mixed nuts, cooked chicken and broccoli!  Whole Foods has an awesome variety of cooked healthy foods from a Sushi bar, to Olive Bar, to a Vegan Bar, to a Bakery, to …you name it, they have it.  I think there is a coffee bar, too?! In addition to having rows and rows of organic, grass fed beef, and lots of organic produce and supplies.   It’s a pretty cool store, if you have one nearby?!

Anyway, about the Justin Almond Butter…ever heard of it?  I’d never tried, but, was interested in having a healthy, delicious fat to carry around and eat all by itself.   Can I just say, DELICIOUS?!  You can buy them in boxes via Amazon for around .81 a packet which is a bit cheaper than Whole Foods.   Having them around here (for me) anyway would get expensive and addicting because truly when there is anything really yummy in the house whether it’s cashews, dark chocolate, medjul dates or macadamia nuts–they are not long in the cupboard!  Reminds me of when I was a kid and I knew there were Twinkies in the house!! We’d sneak, lie and do anything to get that last Twinkie.

You can purchase Justin Almond butter on Amazon (link).

Or check out Justin’s Nut Butter products here. 

As always, it takes me a few days to switch over from work out of home mom to work at home mom and how it feels to always have something to do, whether it’s laundry, dishes or entertaining my boys, all the time.   Although, they have been mildly under the weather the last few days, they have by NO MEANS slowed down.   Up at 6:30AM and to bed at 8:30PM with very few “slow down” times during the day makes for a VERY busy mommy.

We’ve already had a camp-out.   We’ve planted our spring vegetables and now are currently planning our FREE or almost FREE trips to family friendly LA destinations – such as Noah’s Ark and Muscle Beach!  Also free in our area are the local hiking trails that have little to no now on them such as Forest Falls, White Water Preserve and Oak Glenn.  I can’t wait to get busy and stay active with my boys this week.

How will you spend your spring break?

Also, I love the girl time in the chair where I have 1.5 hours to chat with a girl on things that I don’t normally have time or energy to talk about.  Being a mommy doesn’t allow for lots of uninterrupted chat time.

Except, husband and boys don’t seem to appreciate my new hairdo and leave me with comments like “that color makes you look like a teenager”, or “your bangs look very banggggggy…”, or mom, did you get your hair done, “yes”, it looks “flippy” and he makes the motion of a fish.  Husband (yes, I love you) is famous for his particular type of comment, such as ________________(says nothing and walks out the door)!

I almost always like how I look when I leave the salon.  I also enjoy a compliment when I get home, anybody else?!

Check out Network Fitness for any and all mobility issues!

Check out CrossFit Endurance if you’re still an avid marathoner, triathlon or cyclist.

Check out Gymnastics WOD for information,  progressions and lots of well instructed videos on all gymnastic movements.

Check out CrossFit for demonstrations and video explanations of all the basic barbell lifts, medicine ball cleans and standards of movement.

Whole 9 Life for amazing resources on why certain foods are bad for you.  Also, check out the 603PTP  program they have written.  It’s rock solid in getting results, as I witnessed 20 pound PR’s in Deadlifts and Front Squat after following this program.

Finally, if you’re interested in competitive exercise, you can check out The Outlaw Way.  {be warned, these workouts are hard as hell and the coach is prolific with the f-word}.  Our affiliate is currently following the strength and conditioning portions of the workouts and we have already seen great results.

Any others, feel free to leave a link in the comments!

“This infomercial isn’t real, and neither are society’s standards of beauty”. JesseRosten

I thought this video was perfect! Check it out.

Thanks to Roni’s Weigh for sharing it.