February has been busier than I expected, what with a lot to do at the office (we’re hosting a conference this weekend!), the annual Fundrive event at the radio station I volunteer at, Mr. Science leaving town to do field work for a week… Somehow I’ve found myself with a lot of things to do in the evening that I hadn’t planned for – or I’ve just been plain exhausted! – which has prevented me from going to the gym. Or maybe, it hasn’t prevented me from going to the gym, but it hasn’t made the gym look super inviting, and it hasn’t been easy to go.

After about a week of not going to the gym or doing any exercise at all besides my usual walking to and from work, I decided I needed to find a backup plan for the days that the gym just isn’t going to work out (hehe! I like my fitness puns).

And since I love making lists so much, my backup plan was to create an Excel spreadsheet of a ton of different exercises! I color-coded them to separate arms, legs, core, cardio, gym classes and workout DVDs. I have the date listed across the top, so that I can see the entire month all at once. And that way I can punch in the number of reps or minutes that I do each exercise every day. It’s excellent!

Super badass.

When you can see all of the exercises laid out before you, it’s hard not to say, “okay, I’ll do 20 calf raises right now.” Ten minutes later you’re doing 20 bicycle crunches. Before the day is over, you can easily have pumped out 10 different exercises, and by that point you probably want to throw in some jumping jacks or other cardio. Yes: exercise can be this easy.

The other great thing that I rediscovered while creating my pretty spreadsheet is the workout DVD! Jillian Michaels is my favourite – especially her 30 Day Shred. A 20-minute crazy-intense workout? Yes please. It’s a nice way to start the morning.

If you decide to go the awesome Excel spreadsheet route, here’s a good tip: create a shortcut link to the document on your desktop. That way you see it as soon as you turn on the computer. No excuses!

What do you do when your gym visits are foiled?

Definitely watch the video if you are interested in how our society shapes our views on our bodies and our relationships with food, as well how advertising influences us (and children). Share your thoughts in the comments section below!

I really love this idea because it allows you to identify the things that you do which bring you down, waste your time or energy, and are in general just negative habits that ought to be broken. We might know that we have some bad habits, but if we write them down on a piece of paper, then we’re forced to actually think about them and figure out ways to break the habits.

Because that’s the next step. Once you’ve identified your bad habits, you have to take action to change those habits into good ones. But you can’t just snap your fingers and *decide* to change your ways! The best thing to do is to divide your list into two columns (feel free to colour-code!): in the first column, write down the specific bad habit (be as detailed as possible), and in the second column, write down a few ideas for how to overcome barriers with that habit. After all, we usually take up bad habits because they’re really easy to get trapped into. So it’s important to look at several ways in which we can overcome those hurdles.

The third step is to hang your list on the wall or tuck it in your day planner where you will see it every single day. This is necessary to make sure that you see it and remember to follow your ideas.

The fourth and final step is action. Writing a list isn’t much good if you don’t follow it! By keeping it in a prominent place and listing the ways that you can break the bad habits, you’ll be able to make some really good progress. I don’t think it’s necessary to tackle everything all at once, by the way – if you have a dozen bad habits listed, take it one bad habit at a time. Some will likely be easier to break than others. But you’ll feel great when you see all of the things that you have managed to improve in your daily life.

Do you have a Not-To-Do list? What’s on it? How do you go about breaking bad habits (or turning bad habits into good ones)? Share in the comments section below!

This logo is so clever - do you see the arrow between the E and the X?

Just a couple months ago I started my new job at a non-profit promoting food justice (I think I’ve mentioned before how much I love it, and no doubt this won’t be the last time ). Then, last week I found myself in a brainstorming session where we were planning a communication strategy – and pretty much an advertising campaign – and it occurred to me that I got my wish. I get to do some work in advertising! I get to apply my creativity and come up with super awesome campaigns!

…well, I must say, it is tough. It’s really challenging to get those creative juices flowing. But, at the same time, it’s just as exciting and fun and creative as I imagined it would be. Communications in advertising requires a completely different mindset. It’s like learning a brand new language. I have so much to learn (another bonus!).

One of the things that hit home for me last week was that the thing about advertising is it needs to be all about the target audience. What appeals to you might not appeal to your target audience. I’m very used to writing to a target audience (in my novels, on my blogs) that includes me, so it comes fairly naturally. But writing to a target audience that you aren’t quite a part of is another thing altogether. I think that once I understood that, I started to grasp the “language” of advertising a little better.

I adore our FLM logo! Courtesy of the super talented www.melodymorrissette.com.

And all of this brings me to a big question I want to ask YOU. The Food Label Movement (FLM) is getting an upgrade and a whole new lovely website design, which I’m really excited about (special shout-out thanks to Natural Healing Veterinary Care and the mother dear for their/her sponsorship!). We’re looking at website templates and trying to decide which one is perfect for the FLM website.

It would be awesome if you could head on over to the FLM site for 30 seconds to two minutes and then return here to leave a quick comment saying what your initial thoughts are of the website, what you would change to make it better, and what appeals or doesn’t appeal to you. Please help me out on this! You’ll get to be a part of my focus group AND you’ll get to have some input on the redesign of the FLM site It’s always nice to have a say and get a voice in this types of things. Thank you all!

1) Set a time limit for the computer. I write three personal blogs, plus I upkeep The Food Label Movement, and I occasionally have other freelance work to do. This means that if I let myself, I could easily spend several hours every evening on the computer. However, this is a bad idea. I spend 7 – 9 hours at the office at least four days a week, mostly in front of a computer, and the last thing I need is to stare at a computer when I get home in the evenings. Not only is it bad for the eyes and the brain, it also keeps your mind active, which makes it that much more difficult to fall asleep at night. Not cool! So, I either don’t turn my computer on at all in the evenings, or else I only turn it on to do very specific tasks if I’m on a deadline. And if that is the case, I try to make a point to not work on the computer after 8pm. It’s good to get a break from the computer.

2) Make lunch (and plan meals) the night before. Even if you wake up early in the morning instead of hitting the snooze button, your time is shot if you have to prepare your lunch. This is because it takes time to decide what to have, and then to get the ingredients together and put everything together and find containers to carry it and such. Before you know it, 20 minutes have flown by and you have 10 minutes left to shower and run out the door. That kind of stressful situation is a horrible way to start the day! Instead, take 15 minutes or half an hour every evening to plan your lunch, put it together, and also choose what your dinner will be. If you get the chance to plan your breakfast too, even better.

3) Spend time with your S.O. or family. This is one of my top ways for relaxing! If I’m stressed out about work or getting anxious about something, taking a few hours to just hang out with Mr. Science and talk, or play a game of Scrabble, always makes me feel much better and much more capable of taking on whatever was overwhelming me. Growing up, my family and I always ate dinner together, sitting down at the dining room table. It was great! We’d sometimes sit there for hours having long discussions and solving the problems of the world. It’s a really good way to unwind at the end of the day and to bond with one another, especially if you don’t get to see too much of each other, otherwise. Speaking of which, Mr. Science and I are spending lots of quality time together this weekend, since it’s his birthday weekend! Happy Birthday Mr. Science!

What are your weekday rules or habits to stay on top of things? Share in the comments section below!

Also, I’m a sucker when it comes to reading books about organizing and such, so I was excited to take it home with me last weekend to read it on my own. I figure that you can always apply your work life to your home life, and I knew I could get a lot out of it by reading it cover to cover.

I’m only on page 47 of 267, but I’ve already discovered some excellent tips and insights. Better yet, the book has made me think about some of the things that I do (without really thinking about it anymore) which keep me happily organized each week. They’re things I do on the weekend to prepare for the coming week (my organization skills aren’t nearly as good as the week goes on, which is what I’m hoping Regina Leeds can help me out with! But on the weekends, my organization habits really kick in).

Here are some of my Living in the Real World-style tips for organizing yourself every weekend in preparation for the upcoming week, even if you know that things might fall by the wayside as the week goes on:

1) Check all emails and clean out inbox. I have way too many subscriptions to things, plus my inbox gets cluttered daily by news releases and story pitches from people who want me to blog about their products, services, events or other news. Most of it gets deleted, but there are some things that interest me. However, I find that during the week it’s tough to set aside the time to go through each email and decide what to do with it. So, throughout the week I’ll tend to ignore all of those types of emails and then I’ll deal with them on the weekend. Sometimes this means setting aside 15 minutes to go through them; other times, it might take an hour. But if you start Monday fresh with no unanswered emails in your inbox, you’ll feel much better about it.

2) Write down a to-do list for the week. For example, my to-do list for this week included reading through another chapter in my nutrition program and completing the test, sewing up a hole in one of my sweaters, working on my novel and buying second-hand copies of The Lord of the Rings (it’s been way too long since I’ve read those books, and I figured Westwood would be proud that I’m re-reading them). That way you can do these little things when you find time in the morning or in the evenings, so by the end of the week you should have crossed off most of these little things!

3) Set aside three hours to do things you’ve been putting off. You know what I mean! Scrubbing the bathtub, fixing the printer, cleaning behind the stove, going through old storage bins to decide what to keep and what to toss… these are things that build up over days, weeks, months, and when we put them off, they build up in our minds, too. We’re much less stressed if we deal with these things than if we try to hide from them. You don’t have to tackle them all at once, but by making a list of “things to deal with,” and then crossing off a few things each weekend, you’ll be able to see your progress as time goes on. And the list will get shorter!

What do you do on the weekends to prepare yourself for the week ahead and to reduce stress? Share in the comments section below!

*Regina, you’re my new hero. Just saying.

I love being back at the gym! It’s so good to take cardio box, step and body sculpt classes again And one of the things that’s really helping is working on muscle recovery after the strenuous workout. Here are some ways to help your muscles recover so that you aren’t aching the day after:

1) Stretch before and after exercising. Stretching your muscles before and after exercising helps to loosen them up, avoid injury and become accustomed to the types of motions that you put them through during exercise. Even five minutes before and after exercising can greatly reduce your risk of injury and help you to be more limber while exercising, in addition to reducing soreness.

2) Take a walk afterwards. Walking is a very gentle form of exercise and it does so many amazing things for us. Taking a 10 – 20 minute walk after exercising gives you the chance to cool down, relax, let your muscles loosen and congratulate yourself for your hard work. I like to walk after I’ve done my five minutes of stretching.

3) Move around the day of and the day after. Being active throughout the day can really help limber up your muscles ahead of time and reduce soreness afterwards. This can be simply walking around the office at work or cleaning the house. I’m always amazed at how quickly the soreness will go away if you just start moving around the day after!

What are your tricks to recovering and rejuvenating after strenuous exercise? Share in the comments section below!

For a long time now I’ve been drinking smoothies that consist of water, leafy greens, frozen bananas, chia seeds and vanilla vegan protein powder. It tastes fantastic and I feel nourished and as though I’ve had a meal whenever I drink my smoothies, but I haven’t noticed the benefits that Boutenko talks about in her book of getting better sleep and clearer skin, curing ailments and so on and so forth.

I think that there are two main reasons for this. First, until the past month-ish, I wasn’t using organic leafy greens. This means that there could have been all kinds of pesticides going into my body, which certainly wouldn’t be that good for me. Ideally all the ingredients in green smoothies should be organic.

Second, I don’t think protein powder is the way to go. Don’t get me wrong, I’m all for making sure we get enough protein in our diets. But as a general rule we don’t really have a problem with getting adequate protein in North America. Also, even if you have a really good protein powder (like mine!), it still doesn’t do quite the same thing that naturally-occurring protein in whole food does.

So this week – and, in fact, for at least the next month! -  I’m going off of protein powder in my smoothies to focus more on whole food smoothies. As an example, on the weekend I made two whole foods smoothies:

Strawberry Banana

- 3 cups cold water (fill up a water jug in the morning, let it sit out on the counter all day uncovered, and then put it in the fridge – covered – right before you go to bed. This will get some of the chlorine out of the water by the following morning).

- Plenty of organic romaine lettuce.

- 1.5 frozen bananas.

- 1 cup frozen strawberries.

- 1 tbsp chia seeds.

Grapefruit Blueberry

- 3 cups cold water.

- Lots of organic spinach and organic green leaf lettuce.

- 1.5 frozen bananas.

- 3/4 cup frozen blueberries.

- 1/2 fresh grapefruit.

- 1 tbsp chia seeds.

For both smoothies, simply put all the ingredients in a blender and blend until really smooth. You want to leave it running for quite a while to ensure that everything is broken up, as this makes it easier for your body to absorb the nutrients (also it’s pretty gross to drink a green smoothie and then suddenly come across a big piece of lettuce. The unexpected texture isn’t very nice).

Chia seeds are awesome because they are a nutritional powerhouse and they really thicken up a smoothie. Definitely don’t skip them! I haven’t tried using flax seeds in place of chia seeds, but flax seeds might do the same type of thing.

Other additions that I plan on trying with my whole foods smoothies are goji berries and bee pollen. If you’re really adventurous, you could even add homegrown herbs or spices (I think I’ll hold off on that for the time being, though ).

You can add so much to smoothies! Just make sure that you keep organic (preferably local) dark leafy greens as the base. Start off with just a little bit and progressively add more and more until the bulk of the smoothie is leafy greens with just a little bit of fruit. Our taste buds adapt and change over time, so if you make the transition gradually, you’ll be able to consume huge quantities of leafy greens in your smoothies without even noticing it.

Green smoothies are a refreshing way to start the day by drinking them first thing in the morning. I also really like to drink them as a morning snack to keep my energy levels up right through until lunch time.

What do you put in your whole food smoothies?

January: Detox

The detox went really well the first couple weeks. Then after that my heart just wasn’t in it and I overate on weekends and let myself have non-detox foods. At one point I was down 7.5 lbs from the beginning of the month, only to gain back 3 lbs, for example. This month taught me that detoxes are better kept to a few days or a week at a time – for me, at least. A month was just a little bit too long for my liking. It’s hard to stay on track and motivated for a full month with something that’s more restrictive like a detox. But I also had a lot of fun with it when I wasn’t getting derailed: I loved my green smoothies and Mr. Science and I had fun trying out new recipes from her cookbook collection… although I expect he’s really looking forward to having more meat and dairy and such this coming month Which brings me to February.

February: Real Food

What exactly is “real food?” Well, it depends who you ask. For our purposes this month, we’re going to go with the general description available on the 100 Days of Real Food website: traditional, minimally-processed, whole foods. It gets a little tricky in some areas. Pasta is one that I’ve been thinking about: is it a real food? In the past I would have said no, because it’s been processed, but I think that there is a line between “real food” and “non-processed food,” the latter of which is much more stringent. So I’m going to say that the organic brown rice pasta we purchase with just one ingredient – brown rice – is allowed this month. I’ll also be having butter but not Earth Balance, homemade bread but not store-bought, honey but not cane sugar and so on. Real Food by Nina Planck is an excellent source of information on the subject of what constitutes real food.

I’m very excited about this next nutrition challenge. I think that the body will have a much more enjoyable time with it! Mr. Science and I are focusing on organic and local foods where we can find them; another key component to real foods.

Goals for this month

It’s going to be a busy month at the office since we have a major conference to prepare for at the end of the month, and in addition to that Mr. Science will be away on field work for a week, but I’d still like to make time for more exercise this month. I started going to the gym again last week and it felt wonderful! It’s nice to engage in strenuous exercise again.

My goals for this month include:

1) Go the gym at least twice each week. Ideally I’d like it to be closer to four times each week, but I go to the gym primarily for the classes, and I’m limited on which classes I can go to depending on the time of day that they’re at. Meetings or other commitments in the evening have the potential to occasionally get in the way of my scheduled gym times (and the morning classes start too late). So I’ll be aiming for four gym visits each week but I’ll be satisfied if I can only get there twice each week.

2) Lose 3 lbs and 2% body fat. As of yesterday morning, I was down 4.5 lbs from the beginning of January… so I didn’t quite make it to my goal of 6 lbs (or rather, I made it past that goal but then gained it back in an eating frenzy). But that taught me something: that I have to take weight loss slowly. I don’t think that 6 lbs a month is necessarily difficult to do, but if you restrict yourself too much, it’s going to cause problems. This month I’m allowed meat, dairy, more grains etc., so I think there’s much less of a chance that I’ll feel the need to overeat, since I won’t be depriving myself of a food group (instead I’ll be focusing more on portion sizes). If I can lose more than 3 lbs, awesome, but I don’t want to go crazy and lose 6 lbs the first two weeks and then gain back 5 lbs in the next two weeks. I’d much rather lose, maintain, and lose again than lose, gain, lose, gain.

Also, since I plan on visiting the gym more, I want to focus more on reducing body fat and building muscle this month rather than my overall weight. Because there isn’t much point in weight loss if you’re losing muscle! In January I went from 27.8% body fat to 26.3%, so I think that losing 2% body fat if I’m going to the gym regularly should be fairly reasonable.

That’s it! This month I just have the two goals. I realize that they may not sound very impressive, but it’s important to take things slow and succeed by taking baby steps, rather than jumping in too fast and feeling badly if we don’t make it to our goals. By taking it a little bit easier this month, I can build up so that in March I’ll be prepared to take on more!

Will you be participating in February’s one-month challenge of eating real food?

If you want to follow along and see what I’m eating each month, visit my Health Writer Eats food diary blog for a daily dose of the Ultimate Nutrition Challenge!