A Pursuit of Healthy

1. "Everything, Everything" by Nicola Yoon. I read this book in a day...yep a day. I don't think I've ever done that before. And it's not like it was only 100 pages, nope it was 350 pages! I could not put this book down. It's technically a young adult fiction novel, but I absolutely loved it. It's about an 18 year old girl with a mysterious illness that basically means she has to live in a "bubble". She never leaves her house for fear of getting sick. Then a boy moves in next door. Oh man! I just loved how the author wrote this book, it's full of drawings and cute little doodles and lists and it's just different. I loved it! Read it! So now I have finished 3 out of 40 books for the 2016 Reading Challenge! Here's what I've finished so far:

1. A book from the library: "Call the Midwife" by Jennifer Worth (I used this one up early because all of my books are from the library and I didn't want to cheat and leave that easy category for the end). Loved this one so much! 5 days to read. 4/5 stars.
2. A book you can finish in a day: "Everything, Everything" by Nicola Yoon. 1 day to read. 5/5.
3. A graphic novel: "Fun Home" by Alison Bechdel. So I learned from this that graphic novels are not my thing. It's just a giant comic book but instead of super heroes, it's like a normal novel. The topic was kind of depressing, and I basically raced through it to get it over with. 2 days to read. 2/5 stars.

3. Friends reruns. I've watched all episodes of Friends, I never missed an episode when it aired originally. I love this show! Now, with it all being on Netflix, it is so easy for me to just play them throughout the day, more for noise than anything else. And since I've been sick all week, I watched a few....or more then that. And got up to date with a few other shows. It's sad but here's what I watched this week, and don't judge, I was on the couch all week: Once Upon a Time (I love this show...cheesy? Yes. Addictive? Absolutely.), Criminal Minds (Again, love this show!), Call the Midwife (I had to get caught up to start the new season), Mind of a Chef (awesome Netflix docuseries about cooking, love!). I think that's it....I hope that's it.

4. Blue Bunny frozen yogurt. I love ice cream, and my mom absolutely loves ice cream! So I come by it honestly. I don't crave it all the time, but when I do I want to have something a smidge healthier than a peanut butter Oreo concrete from Culver's (oh man....so good!). So I tried the chocolate vanilla swirl frozen yogurt from Blue Bunny and am officially addicted! The flavor is excellent and at 110 calories in a 1/2 cup, I don't have to feel that bad about eating it.

5. Fleece-lined leggings. I'm kind of late to this party, but I bought a pair of fleece-lined leggings from Target right before Christmas and pretty much haven't taken them off since. They're so comfortable and warm and fuzzy! If you love leggings, but get cold in them like I do, you need to get a pair. Here are the leggings I bought.

6. New music! "Hide Away" by Daya. This song has been on repeat all week. It's just fun with a good beat and has been added to my workout playlist for whenever my lungs let me exercise again! Watch it here on Youtube.

Also, Coldplay's new song "Adventure of a Lifetime". I've loved Coldplay since I first heard them in middle school or high school. I don't care, make fun of me. Their music just gives me all the feels. Their newest song makes me want to dance. Check it out! Watch the video here on Youtube.

Sorry, everyone, for my lack of posting. By now I would've at least shared with you my meal plan for the week, and maybe a couple days late Friday Faves, but I've been sick since Saturday. It started as a nasty cold and now it's affecting my asthma, which really sucks! So I'm laying low, resting a lot (which is maddening to someone who is constantly doing something) and just being a couch potato hoping my immune system kicks into high gear soon! I'll be back to my normal self soon!

Easy Veggie Lo Mein

Prep Time: 10 min. | Total Time: 25 min. | Serves 4

Ingredients:
8 oz. lo mein noodles (I couldn't find any in my store so I just used normal spaghetti)
1 tbsp. olive oil
2 cloves garlic, minced
2 cups cremini mushrooms, sliced
1 red bell pepper, julienned
1 carrot, julienned
1/2 cup snow peas

For the sauce:
2 tbsp. soy sauce, or more to taste
2 tsp. sugar
1 tsp. sesame oil
1/2 tsp. ground ginger
1/2 tsp. Sriracha, or more to taste

Preparation Instructions:
In a small bowl, whisk together soy sauce, sugar, sesame oil, ground ginger, and Sriracha. Set this aside for later. In a large pot of salted boiling water, cook pasta according to package directions; strain really well.

Heat olive oil in a large skillet or wok over medium high heat. Add garlic, mushrooms, bell pepper and carrot and cook, stirring frequently, under tender. About 3-4 minutes. Stir in snow peas and cook another 2-3 minutes.

Stir in noodles and soy sauce mixture and gently toss to combine. I mean gently! I think I got soy sauce on my back splash. Serve immediately and pig out!

I really love Asian food. All kinds. Noodles, rice, meatballs, sushi...I don't care, I'll take it any way! One of the website's I look at a lot for recipes is Damn Delicious. All of her recipes are amazing but I really love her Asian recipes. These meatballs are excellent. I served them with vegetable lo mein (recipe to come) but would also be good with brown rice. Try them, you'll love them!

Hoisin Asian Meatballs

Prep Time: 15 min. | Cook Time: 15 min. | Makes ~18 meatballs

Ingredients:
1 lb. ground beef
1/2 tsp. salt
1 tsp. toasted sesame oil
1/2 cup Panko
1/4 tsp. ground ginger
1 large egg
2 cloves garlic, minced
3 green onions, thinly sliced, plus more for garnish
Sesame seeds, for garnish

For the sauce:
1/4 cup hoisin sauce
2 tbsp. rice vinegar
1 tbsp. soy sauce
1/2 tsp. toasted sesame oil
2 cloves garlic, minced
1/2 tsp. ground ginger

Preparation Instructions:
Preheat oven to 400 degrees. Line a baking sheet with parchment paper and set aside.

In a large bowl, combine ground beef, salt, sesame oil, Panko, ginger, egg, garlic and green onion.


Mix until well combined with a spoon, hands are better though! Roll the mixture into approximately 1 1/2-inch meatballs, making about 18-20 meatballs.

Place the meatballs onto the prepared baking sheet and bake for 12 minutes or until browned and cook through.

To make the hoisin sauce: Whisk together hoisin sauce, rice vinegar, soy sauce, sesame oil, garlic and ginger in a small bowl. When finished baking, serve meatballs immediately with hoisin sauce and garnished with sesame seeds and additional green onion. Enjoy!

Here is the meal plan for week 3! You'll notice, it's super simple. This is my first week of spring semester and I wanted to keep our meals easy and not try to do too much. A lot of our dinners are things that are easy for me just to whip up and don't require a recipe. Also, like usual, I planned all of our meals off of my pantry inventory so my grocery list was really small, success!

• apples
• onions
• garlic
• broccoli
• cucumber
• cherry tomatoes
• tilapia fillets
• Parmesan cheese
• milk
• Greek yogurt
• honey

I don't know about you, but I absolutely love sweet potato fries. If I'm at a restaurant getting a sandwich or a burger and sweet potatoes fries are an option... you can bet your sweet tush I'm getting them! I've tried them at home a few times and had trouble getting them perfectly crisp. I want to bake them, not fry them, so that they remain a healthy option. This recipe is good! It was super easy to make and the fries were nice and crispy right out of the oven. The seasoning mix is a smidge different, it's a combination of both cinnamon and cayenne (among other things), so if you're not sure you'd like it, you could easily simplify it down to just some sea salt and freshly ground black pepper and call it a day. They would still be amazing.

Crispy Baked Sweet Potato Fries

Spread out the fries in a single layer onto a parchment lined sheet pan. Make sure they're spread evenly and don't overlap. If you use 2 potatoes, you may need 2 pans. I halved this recipe for the two of us, and the 1 potato fit perfectly on 1 sheet pan. Bake for 30 minutes or until brown and crispy. You need to flip the fries halfway so that they bake evenly and crisp on both sides. Enjoy!


Our dinner was kind of an odd combo of foods...I normally wouldn't have fries with baked fish, but who cares! They're sweet potato fries! I'd eat them with anything!


Recipe adapted from With Food + Love

So obviously, as you can see by the title of this post, this was supposed to be posted on Friday....whoops! I had it all ready to go minus the pictures and then got busy over the weekend with a friend in town and doing things around the house and it just didn't happen. Sorry! I'm trying to start this new series where every Friday (or almost every Friday) I list a few of my favorite things at the moment. These will be both about nutrition and fitness and not, just to give you a better picture about me and things that I enjoy. And hopefully you'll hear of something new and try it and love it too! Here goes...

1. First and foremost, PB2. Do you use this amazing stuff? I heart it to so much! I started using it earlier this summer while I was going through my "12 Week Transformation" to jazz up my morning oatmeal and I just love it. I use it daily. It's almost become a condiment in our home. You can use it just like you would peanut butter, but it's dry. So if you want to use it as peanut butter in a sandwich or something, you would just add water. I add it to my oatmeal and plain Greek yogurt, but I have also baked with it (rice krispie treats, protein balls, etc). It's really versatile and delicious! If you haven't tried it, but love peanut butter and want to skip all the oils and sugars, you need to try PB2. Oh they have a chocolate PB2 too, it's equally yummy!



2. Yoga with Adriene. I started doing yoga semi-regularly last year and absolutely loved it. Eventually, I got so busy with my other workouts (ya know, after being on an elliptical for an hour, you just don't want to move anymore!) that my yoga practice was pushed aside. The first of the year, I started an online "Yoga Camp" through Yoga with Adriene and it's A-mazing! Every day for the month of January she posts a new video and each day has a new intention, like "I Accept...", "I Create..." etc. They're awesome. Most videos are 30-35 minutes and are the perfect amount of time to get me centered and relaxed and ready to take on my day. Not to mention, they work my body over! I definitely wouldn't call it a difficult practice as it's targeted to beginners, but I feel my muscles the day after and I can tell that I've done something to get stronger and more flexible. Click here for the link to her site, and give it a try! We all need a little relaxation and meditation in our lives!

3. Workflowy App. I don't know about you, but I am a definite list maker! I've got lists all over the place man! There is just something about making a to-do and then crossing those suckers off one by one that makes you feel good! Up until recently I have been a strict, old-fashioned write on paper list maker, but I downloaded the Workflowy app on my phone and it's awesome! There's nothing fancy about it, it's just for making lists. I put my grocery list on there so that I have it with me if I run to the store and inevitably can't remember that one specific thing I came for! The main thing I like about this app is that after you've completed something and checked it off, you can still see it if you want. I love to see the checked off things because it makes me feel accomplished! I tried another app and as soon as you finished something it just disappeared, no fun! Click here to learn more about Workflowy and see if it would help you!


4. Cliff Bars. Have you tried Cliff Bars?! I love them, especially the Crunch Cliff Bars. You will find them in my purse, and my backpack, and just about everywhere I am. I am one of those people with funky blood sugars. Mine can drop in a second and I get dizzy and light headed, and when I get hungry I almost instantly become hangry... ya know that so hungry you get grouchy. These help! I think they're delicious. They're good for you but don't taste like chalk, win win!



5. The new show I'm addicted to lately is "Call the Midwife", it's a PBS show similar to "Downton Abbey" (which I also love) and now you can find it on Netflix! I had never watched it on TV and just kind of stumbled upon it on Netflix and was immediately hooked! It's about nurse midwives who live and work through a convent of nuns who are also midwives, in the poor area of London called Poplar in the 1950s. The characters are amazing, the accents are amazing and the stories are just so great. In the world we live in where every time you turn on the TV you see horrible things, it's a nice show for me to turn on and just feel good. It's just very heartwarming and 9 times out of 10 I'm teary or crying at the end of the episode, but in a good way. Try it, I know you'll love it! I just finished the memoir it's based on by Jennifer Worth last night, and it was so good!

6. Popsugar's 2016 Reading Challenge! If you haven't noticed yet, I'm a reader. You don't grow up the daughter of a librarian and hate books. Reading is very important in my life. It's like home, and when I'm super stressed/nervous/anxious, you will often find me in the library just walking around. The library (and my kitchen) is my happy place. So last year I found this awesome reading challenge on the website, PopSugar. It was a list of 50 books all with different themes or genres or subjects and it was just a great way to get me out of my normal reading and trying something new. This years list is 40 books, which seems more doable as I only made it to about 20 last year, and the subjects are just as good! If you try it out let me know and find me on Goodreads, it's a website/app that I use to track what I've read, what I want to read and lets my friends and fellow bookworms know what I'm reading now and how I've liked other books. It's really great! Here's the reading challenge list:

I hope you're enjoying a nice relaxing day off (if you're lucky enough not to have to work). Spring semester for me officially starts tomorrow and I'm ready to get going! I like having the time off but I'm going a little stir crazy. Let me know if you love any of the things I listed today, or if there is something you think I'd like and should try, I'd love to hear from you! Have a great week!

Hey look! Another pancake recipe! And more bananas! I think I have a problem. I found this recipe a few years ago on a fitness blog that has become a favorite of mine, PBFingers. I've tried many of her recipes and she makes up some awesome circuit workouts, both on machines and off. So I encourage you to check her out.


These pancakes are so good and so simple, and only take 5 ingredients. You'll notice there is no flour or any binder like that, that's on purpose! Blending the oats with the cottage cheese and banana make a really great smooth batter. So don't be intimidated by the somewhat odd collection of ingredients. They do turn out wonderfully, I promise, so give 'em a try!

Banana Bread Protein Pancakes

Prep Time: 5 min. | Cook Time: 5 min. | Serves 1

Ingredients:
1/2 cup old fashioned oats (I've used quick oats and they turned out fine)
1/2 banana, mashed (save the other half for on top)
1/4 cup cottage cheese
1 egg
1/2 tsp. cinnamon

Preparation Instructions:
Spray a nonstick skillet or griddle pan with nonstick cooking spray and heat to medium heat.

Combine all ingredients in a food processor (Magic Bullet, Ninja, immersion blender, whatever you have) and blend until batter is relatively smooth and all the ingredients are fully mixed.

Pour batter onto the warm pan to form four medium-sized pancakes. Allow to cook until edges start to harden, about 3 minutes. Flip pancakes and allow to cook until batter is no longer runny, about 2 more minutes.

Top with syrup, cinnamon and banana slices and enjoy!

**Don't get worried if you're not a cottage cheese fan. The pieces are broken up by the food processor and you can't taste it at all in the finished pancakes. Also, my husband basically refused to try these for about a year because he said they "were gray"... I thought he was nuts. He finally did try them and loved them so much that he asks me specifically for them now.

Recipe adapted from PBFingers.

How are you all doing on your New Year fitness goals? Are you seeing any progress? Feeling better? I'm excited to hear! My eating has been really good. Sticking to my whole foods hasn't been too difficult and I'm already feeling a lot better. I don't feel heavy or bloated and my, ahem, system is getting back to normal (if ya know what I mean!). I'm working out more and starting to increase the intensity of my workouts. Yesterday, I did 30 minutes of intervals on the elliptical and worked up a nice sweat before I headed to the weight room and did a quick shoulder circuit. Here's what I did:

3 sets of 12 reps:
     - Lateral raises
     - Shoulder presses
     - Bicep curls
     - Front raises

3 sets of 12 reps:
     - Lat pulldown
     - Underhand cable pulldown

I'm feeling pretty sore today! I know women worry that lifting weights will make them bulky, but it won't! Strength training with weights will only accelerate your weight loss and tone your muscles. I love lifting, and lifting heavy! I especially love working on my shoulders, arms and back (leg day, however, can suck it!). Give this circuit a try!

I've also been doing yoga everyday. I follow Yoga with Adriene and love her videos on Youtube! She makes yoga really easy for beginners like me. Right now she has a a Yoga Camp and there's a new video every day for all of January. If you're never tried yoga before, or are intimidated by the idea of folding yourself into a pretzel, I really encourage you to try her videos. She simplifies the process and makes it all about you, what feels good, whatever level you're at. I do yoga because I'm a very anxious person. I can't shut my mind off...ever.. and yoga helps to stretch me out and actually relax without thinking of my to-do list or school stuff. It's amazing!

Today's recipe is a quick, easy one. I love to have homemade granola around to put in my yogurt. Also, I like to make it myself so I can control what's in it, especially the sugar content. This is a really basic recipe so feel free to add any other nuts, seeds or dried fruit you'd like. Here is everything you'll need:

Nut Butter Chia Granola

Prep: 5 min. | Total Time: 20 min.

Ingredients:
1/4 cup natural peanut butter (or almond, cashew or sunflower)
1/4 cup pure maple syrup
1/2 tsp. cinnamon
1/2 tsp. pure vanilla extract
2 cups old-fashioned oats
2 tbsp. chia seeds

Preparation Instructions:
Preheat oven to 325 degrees and line a baking sheet with parchment paper.

Combine the nut butter and maple syrup. You may need to heat it either in the microwave or on the stove top to melt the two ingredients together. Stir well. Add cinnamon, and vanilla to mixture and stir well.

Add oats and chia seeds to nut butter mixture and stir all together until the oats are coated. Spread oats on the baking sheet and bake for 8 minutes. Remove oats from the oven and stir around to prevent sticking. Bake for another 5 minutes. Remove oats from oven and let them cool completely. Enjoy!

Good Monday morning! I'm getting back on the sharing-my-meal-plan-wagon, because according to blog views, it's what you all want to see! Note: I'm calling this meal plan week 2 because it's the second full week of January, so if you're looking for week 1.... you won't find one, oops! So here is my meal plan document screenshot for this week:

• Boneless, skinless chicken breasts. When we were at Sam's over the weekend, their chicken breasts were only $1.77/lb. I can't buy them for that price at my grocery store, and when I can, I stock up. So we bought 2 large packages of chicken breasts, each were around $9. Not too shabby since we go through a LOT of chicken at our house. I bake one whole package of chicken during my Sunday meal prep and then repackage the other into foil packs of 2 breasts each. These chicken breasts are HUGE so when they're thawed and I'm ready to cook with them, I'll fillet them so that I have 4 pieces of chicken. 
• Sweet potatoes. Sam's sells 8 lb bags of sweet potatoes for only $6.48. I know that at our grocery store, they sell individual sweet potatoes and they're huge! So when I pay a certain amount per pound, the price can really get up there. I love buying them in a bag like this, because just like chicken, we use a lot of sweet potatoes. For this week, I roasted 4 sweet potatoes and that was just for our lunches, and I'll most likely have to make some more. We'll also have them for a couple of our dinners this week. And what we don't use this week, will just add to my pantry inventory for next week. 
• Avocados. I eat avocado every single morning with my egg for breakfast. And I love having them around as a good healthy fat to add to any meal or snack. They're great on sandwiches in place of mayo, and even add a great creaminess to smoothies. My local grocery stores sell avocados for a touch cheaper than Sam's, but every time I look through them, they are well past their peak ripeness so I don't like to buy them. The avocados that I buy in a bag from Sam's are only $4.97 for 6, and they are usually still pretty green so I don't feel like I have to use them all in 1-2 days.
• Ground turkey. I love to use ground turkey in place of ground beef, so I like to buy it in bulk at Sam's because it's more cost effective. The packages at Sam's come in 2 containers of 2.5 lbs each, so a total of 5 lbs. I split each of those packages into 2 (so about 1 1/4 lbs each) and wrap them in foil and freeze them. 
• Turkey bacon. My husband has turkey bacon every single day with his breakfast so buying one small package each week just doesn't make sense to me. I buy Oscar Mayer brand turkey bacon at Sam's Club and it comes with 3 packages and costs me only $5.98. My Hy-Vee has Jennie-O (which is honestly the brand I'd rather buy) but it's usually $3 per package. We leave one of the packages in the fridge and freeze the other two. These will usually last 2ish weeks. Sweet!
• Whole wheat tortillas. My husband likes these little snack wraps I make him that have hummus and diced green chilies in them, so I've started buying tortillas at Sam's Club because I figure if I'm going to be using at least 5 tortillas right off the bat during my Sunday meal prep, it doesn't really make much sense to buy the smaller expensive packages from my grocery store. This last trip to Sam's, in addition to the little bitty snack size low-carb tortillas, I also bought soft taco size whole wheat tortillas. These tortillas actually had ground flax seed in them and they have 5 grams of fiber and 8 grams of protein per tortilla! That's awesome!

Do you ever get those nasty mid-afternoon sugar cravings? The ones where you feel like a person in a Snickers commercial, where you're just going to beat someone up for some sugar. I had one of those yesterday, but instead of reaching for something I would for sure regret, I whipped up one of my absolute favorite smoothies.


I adapted this smoothie from Pioneer Woman's resolution smoothie. She adds honey, which I don't think it needs, and then I add in a splash of pomegranate juice. I especially like this smoothie at this time of year, when my body really craves something fresh. Here's everything you'll need:

Favorite Fruit Smoothie

Total Time: 5 min. | Serves 2 (try to stretch it into 4 servings to save on calories)

Ingredients:
1/2 cup frozen mango
1/2 cup frozen peaches
1/2 cup fresh pineapple
1/2 cup baby carrots
1/2 cup plain or vanilla Greek yogurt
1 ripe banana, peeled
1/2 cup orange juice
1/8 cup pomegranate juice

Preparation Instructions:
Put all ingredients into a blender and blend until completely smooth. Enjoy!

*You could use either fresh or frozen pineapple, but the taste would be a bit different. Also, use whatever flavor of Greek yogurt you like best, but I think either plain or vanilla tastes better. When I make this smoothie for myself, I really just toss in things without measuring, so play with it and see what you like best!

Nutrition Info: per serving
     Calories: 197
     Fat: 0 grams
     Sugar: 35 grams
     Protein: 6 grams
     Fiber: 4 grams
     Carbs: 46 grams

Is anyone else having problems figuring out what day of the week it is? I almost said Happy Friday! And then realized, nope it's just Thursday. Weird, weird week. I am finally home and getting back to my normal non-holiday routine with mountains of laundry to do and a very neglected, messy house. So cleaning, laundry, meal planning, grocery shopping, and putting Christmas decorations away are all on the agenda today...with my favorite show Fixer Upper on in the background. Sounds exciting, huh?! First I'm going to finish my coffee and do some yoga!

The post-holiday season can be a little discombobulating (I love that word!) for me. It feels like everything is on fast forward from the end of October through January 1 and then all of a sudden it just stops abruptly but leaves behind a big ole mess. This is always the time of year where I want to clean, organize and purge my life of unnecessary clutter and try to create as much order as I can. I start by simplifying our meals. I don't want to spend an hour cooking dinner when I've just torn apart my kitchen because my drawers are cluttered and driving me nuts! This is a super simple, inexpensive and quick meal you can whip up in no time but still feel good about putting something wholesome and healthy on the table.

Herbed Chicken, Orzo and Zucchini

Total Time: 20 minutes | Serves 4

Ingredients:
1 cup dried orzo
4 boneless, skinless chicken breasts
1 tsp. dried basil
3 tbsp. olive oil
2 medium zucchini, sliced
2 tbsp. red wine vinegar
Lemon wedges, optional

Preparation Instructions:
Prepare orzo according to the package directions and drain. Cover and keep warm.

Meanwhile, sprinkle chicken with basil and season with salt and ground black pepper. In a large skillet, heat 1 tablespoon of olive oil. Add the chicken and cook 12 minutes or until the chicken is no longer pink and juices run clear, turning once. Remove chicken from skillet. Add zucchini to the skillet and cook for 3 minutes or until tender-crisp.

In a small bowl, whisk together vinegar and remaining olive oil. Add the orzo and toss. Season with salt and pepper. Serve chicken with orzo, zucchini and fresh lemon wedges. Enjoy!

Nutrition Facts: per serving
   Calories: 390
   Fat: 12 grams
   Carbs: 35 grams
   Fiber: 3 grams
   Sugar: 3 grams
   Protein: 33 grams

Recipe adapted from here.

*Feel free to add more veggies if you want. Try a combo of zucchini, yellow squash and red onion. This would also be good with brown rice if you have that on hand. I've been using orzo more and more lately. I like it as an alternative to more traditional pastas like spaghetti or penne. It is a small pasta but feels more like rice when you eat it, so I find myself eating less. Maybe that's just my brain playing a trick on my stomach, but give it a try and see if it works for you!

Happy New Year! Well a little late, but it's my first post of 2016, so HAPPY NEW YEAR! I hope everyone had a safe and fun new year. I spent about a week in my hometown spending time with my family and friends, and getting a jump start on plans for my thesis (and future careers plan) and I'm coming into 2016 with so much energy and excitement for what the future holds! Now if only next December could get here quicker so I can graduate already!

I know that the majority of people make resolutions that deal with weight loss. I've never really been a resolution maker, I just felt like I set myself up for failure by making these grand resolutions. Most of the time resolutions dealing with weight loss are completely unrealistic and people get overwhelmed and/or disappointed by not seeing instant results and then give up. I would love to see everyone pledge to make small changes in their daily lives. Changes they know they can stick to. Changes that aren't so restrictive that they feel deprived of something. You want to be happy right? Well start there. Pledge to do something to make you happy! I saw this on New Years day that I agreed with 100%...

I love that, don't you?! So this year instead of setting out to "fix" something about myself, I am just setting out to create intentions, or goals, for myself. Here are mine....

1. Drink more water.
2. Move every single day. 
3. Take time every day away from all screens.
4. Read more. I LOVE to read and use the Goodreads app and I've made a goal to read at least 30 books this year, so I'm working to stick to it!

Reaching my goal of losing 10% of my total body fat, did wonders for my self-esteem. I went from a frumpy, unhappy girl and came out on the other side a confident, toned woman. I now feel like (and know!) I can do anything I set my mind to do! Trust me, if I can do this, so can you! Check out Hitch Fit's website and get inspired by all the amazing testimonials written by others who have gone through transformations, and you can read mine too. Here's the link. I would love to hear your goals for the new year and the progress you're making! And I'll keep you updated on how I'm doing!