Month: January 2022

When it comes to grocery shopping, it can be one of the most daunting tasks of your week.

Whether you are shopping for yourself or an entire family,  it is hard to know how much or how little ingredients to purchase. It is hard to know if you should purchase meals already made that you know your family members will eat, or if you should purchase the ingredients to meal prep your own meals. Even worse, is that it is extremely difficult to stay on budget, yet still make good, healthy choices. 

Speaking of healthy choices and budget, I talk more about that here in an entire video about shopping on budget. I know it can be really hard to know what members of your family are willing to try and not willing to try. Finding recipes and finding ingredients that fit into your macros, yet fit into family needs can be a challenging task. But truly does it really have to be that way?? Do we really need to have all different kinds of exotic ingredients in our pantries to eat a healthy lifestyle? Do we need these very expensive non-gmo, dairy free, gluten free, sugar free, soy free ingredients to be considered a healthy pantry? Do we need these beautifully labeled highly manufactured foods/items to stay within our portions for our macro and micro nutrition?

The short answer is no. No, you don’t need anything fancy and expensive. You do not need to search every market in the industry for some crazy exotic ingredient you’ve never heard of and that you know your family wouldn’t even look at. You don’t need all the fancy factory produced items to build a healthy meal plan and create beautiful recipes.

The long answer really is, just eat real foods as close to the real sources as you can. You can create a lengthy grocery list of fruits, veggies, and meats, keeping you as close to the real food without needing to walk every aisle of the store looking for an ingredient you’ve never heard of. Your family and kiddos love apples and bananas? Sweet, buy a bunch – feed them, feed you. Your family and kiddos love chicken nuggets? Sweet, buy a bunch of chicken and make you both some healthy chicken nuggets. Your family and kiddos love chocolate milk? Sweet, choose the healthiest option you can.  Your kiddos are currently loving yogurts and go-gurts? Sweet, you get to have yogurts, too.  Your versions of the food items may not look the exact same as your kiddos and grandkids, but dang, it can get pretty darn close. 

When you create your shopping lists, there’s really no “wrong” way to structure your lists and needs. You can build your grocery list in order of the store, types of foods, categories of your macros, or based on your meal plan for the week. Or, you can shop sales first and go from there. There are so many correct, successful ways to build your grocery list. But the main, most important point I am trying to make here for you is to build your list as lengthy as you can of real foods: fruits, veggies, plant-based items, lean proteins, healthy dairy options.  Stick to the perimeters of the store in order to find your fruits and veggies in the produce areas, meats/cheeses in the deli areas, dairy/yogurt/tofu options in the cooler area and so forth. Avoid the aisles and inside of the store as much as you can.

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Furthermore, if you’re currently into macro-based foods as I teach you in our nutrition program, you’re going to love the grocery list I have created for you and structured around macronutrients that your body needs on a daily basis. If you need ideas of where the ingredients fall into your macros, as well as where they fall into the grocery store shopping experience, you’ll want to download this macro-based, budget-based grocery list. (PDF below) Spoiler alert: it’s already real foods that even your family and kiddos may eat. 🙂 

A list like this one goes hand in hand with recipes on my meal plans, meal prep party, and cookbook. Nothing too fancy, nothing crazy expensive. The items on this list are super basic on paper, and maybe even sound boring in written form. But, with recipes like shown on my blog, on my social media, or in my book, these items become beautiful meals, made out of love in the kitchen.  Speaking of in the kitchen, we should actually cook together and I can help you decide what you need at the store and how to use it. Be sure to think about the Meal Prep Party I am hosting on February 12th.

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If you do look at the grocery list/template above and you aren’t sure what meals you can even create, be sure to enroll in the Meal Prep Party this February put on by Heather Rose Health and Wellness and learn exactly how to turn items into full on meals.  Follow along with Heather’s Meal plans and cookbook to see that really, the recipes are basic of basic. Simple ingredients for amazing taste!

Just a week was the start of a brand new year, and we of course welcome 2022 with open arms. At the start of this new year, I was on a New Years Retreat zoom call with some of my favorite women. We were having conversations about goals, resolutions, re-starts and so many other things of similar nature.

And it dawned on me that just a small four letter word was really overwhelming for some people. GOAL. I am not talking about your typical new year’s resolution. I don’t do resolutions. I don’t push my friends, family, followers, or clients to do resolutions. However, I do like goals. I like goal-setting. I like goal mapping and goal planning. I enjoy planning out my own goals, as well as helping others. And, a new year right after a busy holiday season seems to be the perfect time to set and write-out goals. Notice, I said AND write-out goals. Because setting goals is just a dream until you sit down to focus, write, and follow through.

But yes, setting a GOAL is overwhelming. Should we set multiple? Should we focus on family goals? career goals? business goals? friendship goals? Self-care goals? Or, should we fall into the path of most of our country at the new year and focus on health goals?

It’s hard to think about. It’s difficult to determine. It’s overwhelming to decide. I hear ya.

In case you do relate to any of these above questions and challenging concepts, I do want to share the zoom call recording (video below) I did with my clients/friends in helping them set up goals. In our zoom, we started with a worksheet that led us through discussions (see photo of my worksheet above) of what we enjoy, who we enjoy, what we do for work, for fun, for enjoyment, for others, and for ourselves. We focused on our mindset towards these parts of our lives; are we happy and content with those categories or are we ready to move forward with bigger commitments and goals. Once we determined our mindset, we talked about gratitude and affirmations.

While reading just a short blog on goals may not feel like the most inspiring thing ever, having the video + worksheet may be a tool to keep in your back pocket. Watching this video may help you determine some small goals for 2022. I’d love for you to take a watch of this video below and use the blank worksheet attached.

If you made it this far and past the worksheet + video, thank you so much. Thanks for being here on this journey. If at any point you need help with your goals, focus, follow through – let’s chat.

And, to end with some fun and never leave you hanging, I’d LOVE to share my 2022 goals. As I said, goals can be set in categories. I usually do exactly that.

Marriage goal: just live daily in each other’s company. Bike, hike, and complete the Michigan Dalmac together this year – Josh as the cyclist, Heather as the lead crew guide. You can read about our experience doing this last year here.

Business goal: grow my business by 10% each quarter of the year, by doing what I love, sharing the fitness and foods that bring myself and my clients happiness and health. And, if you do ever want to join in on that fun, we invite you.

Running goals: to complete the Las Vegas Mt. Charleston Marathon in April, to complete the Bears Ears Ultra 50-miler SOLO in June, to complete the NeverSummer 100k in July.

Mantras: I can do anything for a day. Whether a tough day of work, teaching classes, talking with clients or a tough training day of 8+ running in the mountains, I can and I will do anything for a day.