Hello!

I feel like I am all over the place and slightly unorganized with my life right now with our move happening in one week, so I apologize in advance if this post (or any post for the next couple of weeks!) is a little random and all over the place 😉  Bare with me.  I am the type of person who thrives on some sort of routine and my whole routine is gone right now and won’t be established again until we are moved and settled in Denver, so I am doing my best to just go with the flow.

Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday of this week I was in Fort Wayne cleaning out some things in my childhood room and hanging out with my family and some friends.  It’s crazy to think that is the last time I will be home until Christmas!

Monday morning started out with an indoor cycling class.  I loved every second of it!

The instructor was actually a participant in my CXWORX classes.  In one of my last classes at the gym he mentioned he was teaching a class a couple of days a week and I knew I had to squeeze at least one in before we left town.  It was awesome!  He had an amazing playlist and lots of energy that made the workout great.

After indoor cycling, I came home to shower and enjoyed this delicious green smoothie.

This smoothie included:

• spinach, banana, carrot, peaches, almond milk, and Vega protein powder

I then hit the road up to Fort Wayne.

After spending the afternoon cleaning some things out of my parent’s house, Mom made a dinner that was a special request from me…

Salmon with homemade caesar salad, brown rice, and garden green beans.  Such a favorite!

Tuesday morning, I got up early to squeeze in a little workout and so I could review choreography notes for the new Bodypump.  I think I’ll be teaching a few tracks on Monday and I can’t wait!

After my workout session, I had a nice and easy bowl of oats with strawberries and banana.

Mom and I both worked through the morning.  I made piles of items to keep, items to donate, and items to sell.  Gosh I had a lot of stuff to get rid of, but it really did/does feel good to get rid of all the excess.

Before heading out for a day full of errands, Mom and I visited my brother for a delicious lunch.

Mom had a delicious pasta dish and I had an old favorite:  Casa salad and a new-to-me bean soup.  Yum!

We then ran all around town knocking every single thing off of my to-do list and it felt GOOD!

But a day of running around will make you tired and kind of hungry, so when we got home we went straight to the garden to pick a couple of veggies and got to work on dinner.

Can you tell mom is trying to use up all of her summer vegetables?

Dinner was fish with swiss chard (wasn’t quite sure how to cook it and it just turned out ok…any recommendations?), corn on the cob, cucumber salad, and summer squash. Yummy!

Then, mom baked some Zucchini Lemon Cookies while I responded to some e-mails.  No pictures, but they were good! Slightly cakey in texture with a refreshing lemon flavor 🙂

Wednesday, I met up with some girlfriends, went to the doctor for a checkup and then drove back to Indianapolis.

Dinner was a quick throw together meal that consisted of spaghetti squash, green beans, broccoli, zucchini, tempeh, and avocado.

It was really tasty, but definitely a random, throw-together type meal…which I feel like most of our meals for the next week or so will be like that since we are trying to clean out the fridge.

As I mentioned above, things are a little wacko for me right now…no schedule, trying to pack up our Indianapolis lives, feeling all sorts of emotions, saying goodbye to many friends, etc.  I feel it’s more important now than EVER that Brian and I stay on our A-game so we are healthy and feeling great.

Things I am going to focus on are:

• Eating fruits and vegetables every single day.
• Making the best/healthiest choice for me at the time (that includes mental health too!)
• Enjoying the process.
• Scheduling workouts into my day.
• Trying to limit the amount of stress I feel about the situation.  This is a GOOD thing and everything that needs to get done will get done.

A couple of weeks ago, when I hosted the Healthy Skoop giveaway, I asked:

What is your favorite way to get nutrients into your diet when you are super busy?

The response was amazing!  I wanted to share the responses with all of you for a little extra healthy inspiration, as I know we can all get busy and lose sight of our healthy habits but it’s never too late to jump back on the healthy-eating train 🙂

• Tessa–The easiest way for me to get extra nutrients in when I’m busy and on the go is to whip up a quick smoothie, which I usually have everything on hand for. I like to toss in some frozen fruit, a big handful of kale or spinach, chia seeds, cacao powder, maybe a little peanut butter & almond milk. Would love to try Skoop in my smoothies or oatmeal (love that ingredient list)!
• Stephanie–I love to make smoothies with spinach and chia seeds to get some extra nutrients.

• Taylor–I love smoothies in a pinch! or some granola 

• April–i love adding tons of vegetables to my eggs for extra nutrients
• Tera-Green smoothies or a bottled green juice in a pinch.
• Angie–I try to pack raw veggies in my lunches to snack on throughout the day instead of poor choices. I also load my smoothies with greens to get that extra kick!
• Laura–Smoothies! Super fast and you can get a solid serving of fruits, vegetables and protein all at once.
• Anastacia–My favorite way to sneak in nutrients when I’m busy is by putting them in my food. I have to pack my lunch for work and I also do a lot of meal prepping so I pack them in to whatever I’m making. I make a lot of stir fry, healthy casseroles, and salads chock full of veggies.
• Jaclyn–I’m all about veggie smoothies when busy. Greens, celery, cucumber, a fruit of some sort, and typically protein powder and chia or coconut oil.
• Nadya–smoothie or quinoa dish
• Brittney–Food prep is always my friend. I love throwing together big salads with lots of veggies and grilled chicken, tofu, or tuna!
• Hayley–I just snack on lots of veggies!
• Mary–I love using Swiss chard leaves for wraps in place of bread.
• Ginny–The Healthy Skoop sounds like a great way to get a quick and easy boost of nutrients. I typically go to smoothies. They are fairly fast and I can dump in a bunch of whatever fruits/veggies/greens I have on hand.
• Danielle-I like to keep fresh fruits and vegetables on hand for easy snacks!
• Amanda-I’ve been taking the alive multivitamins and eating lots of salads for lunch that I make the night before.

Lots of great tips!!! Thanks to everyone for all of your wonderful suggestions!

Now, it’s time for me to get back to packing 🙂

PS–don’t forget to enter my giveaway for $45 to Swanson Health Products!