Whole30 Essentials

Whether it’s your first or tenth Whole30, preparation is key.  I’ve put together my list of Whole30 essentials that make it easy to shop and even easier to prepare meals and snacks.  I like to keep the staples on hand so when I come home hungry and just need to eat something, right that minute, I don’t have to cook something that takes forever and I don’t have to worry about it being complaint.

I have also included a produce cheat sheet as well as my favorite, no fuss, Whole30 recipes. For easy Whole3o shopping at Trader Joe’s, be sure to check out this previous blog post.

If you are totally unfamiliar with Whole30, pop over to this post to get the run down.  Essentially you are eating clean, whole foods and reading tons of ingredient labels. With that covered, here are my essentials.

Photo Worthy Cooking

Photo Worthy Cooking: A Blue Apron Review

I would say I am an OK home cook.  I have a few tricks up my sleeve and I can prepare a decent meal for myself. They are not usually photo worthy, and in a world where everyone is snapping pictures of their food, I needed some help in the visual department.

This is one of the many amazing advantages of a meal delivery service! We’ve all heard the commercials and seen the ads for Blue Apron so I decided to give them a shot. Do not be frightened of the “meals for 2” “subscription” or even the “cooking at home”.  Seriously, anyone can do this and as a single lady myself, the meals for 2 worked out great! Dinner tonight and lunch tomorrow!

21 Minute High-Intensity Full Body Workout!

I’m so excited to be a guest blogger for Lotus and Luna!  They asked me for my favorite, low on time workout, so of course I had to go with a full body, high-intensity workout! 🙂

Because I love to share – Here is the workout and a break down of all the moves in videos so you get in a quick sweat sesh too!  If you are pressed for time, this 21 minute high intensity workout will leave you with a beautiful, sweaty glow!  All you will need are dumbbells and a bench. Don’t have those? Improvise! You can use water bottles and a table or chair instead!

Check out my guest blog here, and while you’re over there, don’t forget to use promo code NIKKI20 for 20% any order! xo

Gym Chronicles: Treadmill HIIT Routine

I joined the gym to lift weights and work on my glutes, but while I’m there, one of my favorite things to do is HIIT on the treadmill! HIIT, or High Intensity Interval Training, is interval training where you alternate short bursts of less intense workouts with bursts of high intensity workouts.

I actually really look forward to doing this every week, which is great because looking forward to anything when it comes to exercise is something to jump on!

Gym Chronicles: Split Happens

One of the reasons I chose the gym I did, besides the no sign up fees, was location. There is one close to my office and one close to my home. My first trip to the location by my house was a weekday at lunch.

I’m lucky to be able to work from home one day a week and I go to the gym on my lunch those days. Having done my research in GREATER detail on what exact machines and exercises I want to do, I’m a little more confident in my second week at the gym. (Click Here to read about my first week)  I’ve got my glute workout planned out, got my gym gear on, and head out to the new location.

Eating Clean and Whole30

Clean Eating, or Eating Clean, is the new buzzword when it comes to healthy diets nowadays.  This is my take on it and what I mean when I say that’s how I eat *most of the time*.  I’ll also give you my thoughts on the Whole 30 program, where I first heard and learned about whole foods and clean eating.

You can learn about Whole30 from their website, where they conveniently break down the program into 8 steps.  But in my own words, Whole30 is a 30 day digestive reset for your system.  You remove all the processed foods and potentially inflammatory foods from your diet and only eat real, unprocessed foods from the approved food list.  Yes, there are some real foods on the list of do not eat items.  You can scour the site and find out why you shouldn’t eat them on whole30 but from all the researching I have done, the items are potentially inflammatory or harsh on your system.  So for the 30 days you’re on whole30, you don’t eat them and see how your body responds.

I first heard about Whole30 from an old coworkers Instagram post.  Just want to take a moment and acknowledge how influential Instagram has been on my journey to health! Instagram brought me Whole30 and Kayla Itsines! She and her boyfriend were doing ‘Whole30′ and I was looking to lose weight.  Her pictures of super healthy food were intriguing.  So I googled it and read up on program and decided to give this thing a try.  Yes, the no alcohol and sugar were going to be tough but I can do anything for 30 days!  

Gym Chronicles: Learning the Ropes

The adventures continue with my first week at the gym…

So I’ve joined the gym, scheduled my free personal training for the first day (click here to read that fiasco) and packed my bag the night before.  I’m all set! Or so I think…. Once I get to work, I realize I’ve forgotten both a towel and an armband.  No big deal, I can make due without the towel and armband for my first day.  Once I get to the gym however, I realize I’ve also forgotten a lock!  Soul Cycle was the last ‘gym’ type thing I had been to and they have locks for you built into the lockers. Oy!  

I change, shove my purse and bag into a locker that’s broken, hoping no one will use it and go ask the front desk if they happen to have loaner locks.  At this point, I am already wary of the gym in general, but I have goals and I was so excited to join the gym, I am not going to let this deter me!  The front desk doesn’t have a lock for me to borrow but the kind gentleman told me he would place my stuff behind the counter while I workout.  Better than nothing!

With my stuff secure and the trainer busy, I go and get in my pre-planned HIIT session on the treadmill while I wait for him.  Earlier in the week I had looked up glute workouts to do at the gym so I had a rough mental list of exercises I wanted to do that day.  Once I completed the HIIT workout and figured out my trainer was now unavailable, I set out to do the glute workouts.

Here’s where the fun begins…. I go to the leg press machine, I had done this in the high school weight room (some 12 years earlier!) and I didn’t remember it being too difficult to figure out.  I got this!  

#Kaylaversary One Year of BBG!

Today, on a #TransformationTuesday is my one year Kaylaversary! I’ve been doing BBG one year today and it’s the best decision I’ve ever made. As in my previous post, I have been a yo-yo dieter and workout girl for all my adult (and even teen) life.  When I came across Kayla Itsines from an internet search on motivational women in fitness to follow, I was immediately intrigued. I have always loved before and afters and this girls page was FILLED with them!

I watched and observed the BBG Community from a distance for awhile. I was in absolute awe of what these women were achieving, but I still doubted that it would work for me. I knew I could be healthier and in better shape, I had done it before!  But the results from this BBG program were above and beyond what I thought my body was capable of becoming. I bought the first guide, started it, and it was HARD!! I don’t think I have ever been so sore! I LOVED IT!! I committed myself to get in all 3 resistance workouts and at least 2 LISS days a week. I was really good about it for the first 4 weeks, taking pictures every 2 weeks along the way and never intending to post them to Instagram. 

About Me!

Like many girls and women I have been conscious of my body and what I thought it looked like compared to others for as long as I can remember. Also like many people, my story is a story of yo-yo dieting.

I grew up in a small farming town in Oregon and was active for most of my youth,playing basketball and volleyball; I was a cheerleader and even tried my hand at track in High School. However, I was always the chubbier one.