An Early Summer? Update

It’s been a little cricket-y over here the past few weeks, hasn’t it? I’d say “I’ve been busy” – but I’m sure you’ve already gathered as much. I have to be honest – there haven’t been any fancy meals or new recipes coming out of my kitchen lately. And the ones that have been new, I haven’t taken the time to take photos of.

Instead of giving you the rundown of where I’ve been – I figured I’d show you a little bit of what I’ve been up to the past few weeks.

I completely refreshed my health coaching website – design, email offer and copy. It’s much more colorful and lively now – and more reflective of who I am as a coach and a person.

Filling my desk with a million notes – that will most likely be written then forgotten about. You can probably see that I’m a huge unorganized mess with my  zillion sticky notes. I always think I’ll come up with a way to be more organized and yet it never happens. This is what my desk looks like about 95% of the time so I’m pretty sure there’s no hope on that front. My sticky notes are probably just as scattered as my brain sometimes.

Concocting all sorts of delicious treats in my new Vitamix - a million smoothies, this healthy vegan chocolate “milk shake” (crazy delicious), cashew nacho cheese, and hummus. I should probably start writing some of these things down so I can share them on here..

Celebrating! (& A New Vitamix!)

Hello there. It’s been a few weeks since I last updated. I’ve been busy finishing up my health coach training program & celebrating! That’s right – I completed IIN and have been busy working on revisiting my website, creating a brand new program, and overhauling my email newsletters. It’s an exciting time that I’ve been trying to relish in – hence the grasshoppers here on the site. (I wrote a blog post on the 5 things I learned while training to become a health coach here!)

Last weekend, my husband wrangled up all our family and threw me a little surprise celebratory lunch at one of our favorite local restaurants. It was such a sweet and generous thing for him to do and I couldn’t be more grateful. Sure, I had an idea that something was coming up – he’s not that great of a liar (which isn’t a bad thing!), but it was a really special day for us to all get together and celebrate. I wish I had a few photos to share with you, but since it was a surprise, I didn’t bring my camera along.

During the lunch, Tyler presented me with a framed version of my certificate and a brand new Vitamix that everyone had chipped in for!! I was over the moon excited and promised everyone a green smoothie each and every time they came over. Only my sister got excited at that idea – haha! I spent the entire rest of the afternoon planted on the couch watching the Vitamix DVD, reading through each and every recipe in the cookbook that came with it, and even watching a QVC special where they were selling them, so I could see them demonstrate some of the features. I’m a complete nerd, but I was in heaven. It couldn’t have been a better day to cap off all the hard work from this past year.

On that note, I’ve used it every single day this week, creating smoothies, sauces and soups. Some have been random things thrown in and others have been meticulously followed recipes from other websites. I wanted to share with you what we created for dinner two nights ago that has become one of my absolute favorites instantly. As you may know, I’ve been (or at least tried to be) gluten-free and (mostly) dairy-free for quite a few months now. It hasn’t been the easiest and I struggle all. the. time. with wanting to just grab a plate of mac and cheese or dive in to ice cream to get my fix. Of course when I do, I get the side effects that I had been dealing with for a long time just about instantaneously – so I immediately regret it. But I’ve tried to be more diligent lately. And that’s where this recipe comes in.

Win Awesome Stuff & Help Save The Girls! (Raffling Off 3 Cool Prizes)

This week I’m taking a break from talking about food and sharing with you something I’ve been up to lately. I mentioned a few weeks ago that I’d be walking with my mom, sister and husband in the Susan G. Komen 3-Day Walk for breast cancer in Seattle this September. Well, we’ve been working diligently on our fundraising week after week and are slowly but surely gaining some traction.

We decided (after taking a cue from one of my favorite fellow bloggers, Cassie) to host a raffle online of some of our favorite things to say “Thanks!” to the folks who help us reach our goal to walk as a team of 4.

We’re raffling off 3 awesome prizes to anyone who donates between April 1st and May 18th – and it couldn’t be simpler. Here are the details:

Team Save The Girls Raffle

What: Raffle of 3 prizes:

• Keurig K65 Special Edition with Keurig My K-Cup Reusable Coffee Filter and 35 variety K-cup pack ($200 value!)
• Cuisinart Gourmet Griddler ($100 value!)
• Apple iPod Shuffle 2GB in Your Choice of Color ($50 value!)

Who: Anyone who donates to any one of our 4 pages (Stephanie, Jill, Rachael, or Tyler) will be entered to win.

When: April 1st, 2013 through May 18th. The raffle will end May 18th and winners will be notified and asked for their shipping address May 19th via email using the email provided with the donation.

How To Enter: Head on over to our Raffle Page to find out the details and find out how you can win one of these 3 prizes! (Note: minimum donation is only FIVE BUCKS!)

Please pin the image and share this on your Facebook page to help us spread the word!

Thank you all for your support!

Storytelling & Roasted Veggie Salad

Do you ever realize you’re just not that great at some things? I’ve had that realization lately about my ability to story-tell. I have been known to skip complete thoughts and sentences in the middle of re-enacting what has happened to me – assuming that if I say it in my head, others must be able to hear it.

Of course that makes me feel incredibly lucky to be a blogger – since I have the luxury of proof-reading, editing, and realizing when things sound a little off before hitting the ‘publish’ button.

This is probably also why I hate public speaking, being caught off-guard about certain topics, or generally meeting people for the first time. I’m a thinker – not a talker. And far from a story-teller. But that definitely doesn’t stop me from writing my heart out online or word-vomiting every once in a while when I find myself in many social situations.

I think I just let the cat out of the bag on how introverted I am. Woops.

Welp. I have a salad recipe to share with you. It’s not going to be an interesting story, but it will be a story nonetheless. Hey – count yourself one of the lucky ones getting a first-hand sneak peek in my non-ability to story tell.

New & Good Life Updates

This week has gone by terribly fast and slow at the same time. I have been busting my booty on a few new things to my health coaching practice, as well as making some necessary site updates… and thinking through some very confusing decisions.

I don’t have anything excitingly new to share this week – mostly just a few photos and “what I’ve been up-to’s.” As weird as it sounds, I spend most of my time that I’m getting things off my chest and out of my system on my health coaching Facebook page now. If you want to keep up with me more often (and see less of my random ramblings), come follow me there. I’m far more interesting and communicative than my once per week blog posts here. Well, isn’t that the best plug you’ve ever heard to continue reading someone’s blog?

Like I mentioned, I’ve been kicking things into high gear in the past few weeks working on two new offerings to my health coaching business. I’ll share them with you, since they so easily relate to what I come here to share with you each week.

The first one is a 7 Day Spring Detox. I’ve created a detox program that will help clear out your gut, liver, and give you a complete reset for the spring and summer months ahead. There are over 73 recipes included and a huge guide to how to detox your body effectively. If you’ve been thinking about a detox or a cleanse and didn’t want to just drink juice, I highly recommend this detox – the energy and lightness you’ll feel is pretty incredible! (not that I’m biased or anything). I also put together a week long blog series on detoxing a few weeks back called Detoxing 101 – lots of good info here if you’re into detoxing or wondering if you need one yourself.

The second thing I’ve been working on is a one-month meal plan. I’ve been keeping track of what my husband and I eat for a whole month and have gathered the recipes, shopping lists, and prep day task lists all in one place. I’m also including spotlight ingredients for each week’s recipes, so the ingredients that you might not be as familiar with are outlined and you know what to look for at the store and a list of what to do with leftovers (if you happen to have them). This is my first time doing anything like this, so I’m really curious to see what people think!

With both of those happening, there has been quite a lot of recipes to write and test out. Here are a few highlights:

I guess the last major “what’s going on with me” is that I’ve decided to do the Susan G. Komen 3-Day Walk for Breast Cancer. I’m not sure if I ever shared this on the blog, but last summer, my grandma was diagnosed with breast cancer on her 80th birthday. Luckily, they caught it early, she was in and out of surgery, then 6-weeks of radiation therapy, and is back to her old self. The entire process was only 3 months and I feel so blessed that her doctor was able to catch it and get her back to herself so quickly. I’m incredibly close to my grandma (and grandpa too) and don’t know what I’d do without her in my life.

I’ll be walking with my sister, mom, and husband and together we’re setting out to raise $9200!! Which is a LOOOOT of money to commit to, but I know that we’ll be able to do it. We’re planning to put together an online raffle in the coming few weeks, so be on the lookout for that – I have some really cool giveaway items in mind that I’m excited to share! Oh- and my husband put together this cute little website for our “team” – so come over and have a look at our bright shining faces and see how cute my grandma is (the photo was taken at her 80th birthday celebration at Salish Lodge in Snoqualmie, WA).