3 Ways to Use Coconut Oil

If you don't have a container of coconut oil in your bathroom or kitchen (or both!), use this blog as your inspiration to buy some. You've probably read one of the many articles that have been published about the benefits, but as a quick reminder here are a few:

• Helps maintain a healthy heart
• Fights infections (including conditions like candida)
• Boosts immune system 
• Improves digestion
• Supports healthy skin and hair

Below are a few of the ways to consider using Coconut Oil:

1. Apply to your skin and hair.

Coconut oil is a great moisturizer for your skin. It's a more natural and affordable solution than many of the beauty products on the market today. I cover myself from head to toe in this delicious smelling oil. Note: I do not use on my face due to my current skin care regimen (wedding prep!) but I know plenty of people who do. 

2. Cook with it.

Coconut oil makes for a great cooking oil because it can withstand high heat. I use it for frying eggs, sautéing, or roasting. I now prefer the taste over olive oil (although we still have plenty of that in our house too). 

3. Eat it by the spoonful. Frequently. 

I also consume it raw by mixing it in my oatmeal and by adding it to my smoothies. 

Note: When purchasing coconut oil, make sure you buy organic, cold-pressed, unrefined coconut oil. There is great option in the Stay Beautiful Shop.

Quinoa is Queen

I LOVE Quinoa and I eat it almost daily. Below is a fun infographic by fabfitfun with everything you could possibly want to know about the health benefits of Quinoa. You may remember me discussing Magnesium in my last post. Well, this superfood provides 48% of our daily requirement of Magnesium! 

I'll be posting some of my favorite go-to Quinoa recipes for breakfast, lunch and dinner soon, but here's some to get you started from our friends at Love and Lemons. 

Post Yoga Routine

Believe it or not, we're more than halfway through the 200-hour yoga teacher training. Only three more weekends to go! Although this has been one of the hardest things I think I've ever done -- mentally, spiritually and physically -- I can't imagine my life any other way. Working full time, planning for a wedding (this October!) and making such a large time commitment has had it's challenges, but hey, like they say, "nothing good in life comes easy"...right?

One of the things that I don't think I was fully prepared for going into this type of training was the physical demands it would put on my body. Before I started this training, I had a routine in which I worked out four to five times a week doing various activities such as spin, bootcamp, barre class, biking and yoga. But at most, I was doing yoga two times week.

I'm here to tell you, that when you do anything repetitively, no matter how "good" it is for you, it will wear you down over time. We start each Saturday and Sunday in the studio with a 65-minute asana practice followed by various physical activities which include practice-teaching, adjustments, inversions, forward bending backward bending and balancing postures.

By the time I get home around 6:30pm, I'm BEAT! It took me a couple of weeks to figure a routine that would help me maintain my body, my energy levels and ensure I was getting a full eight hours of sleep but here's what my regimen looks like now:

1. First things, first. HYDRATE. I drink a ton of water throughout the day in my reusable Kleen Kanteen, but when I get home I add a pack of Ultima 8 oz of water and chug!
2. After hydrating, I fill the bath tub full of warm water and add Dr. Teal's Lavender Epsom Salt and SOAK... for at least 20 minutes (I use my iphone and set an alarm). 
3. As I'm draining the water out of the tub, I turn the shower on and I EXFOLIATE using these gloves -- this gets rid of dead and dull skin cells keeping your skin looking refreshed.
4. After bath time, I grab the tub of Coconut Oil and MOISTURIZE from head to toe. Slather it on the bottoms of your feet and put socks on for a few hours to lock in the oil.
5. Now fully relaxed, I pop a Magnesium SUPPLEMENT. Here are several articles that talk about the benefits of having enough of this in your life -- muscle recovery, keeping PMS and anxiety at bay and ensuring shut eye are a just a few of the reasons I take it.
6. After that, I put the tea kettle on and make comforting Chamomile TEA and treat myself to some DARK CHOCOLATE. Alter Eco Mint is my absolute favorite. 

Take these ideas and apply them to your life as needed. You don't need to be preparing for a marathon, doing a yoga teacher training or be an overly active person to benefit from taking time out to treat yourself to a little extra attention every now and then.

Conscious Box

Always a fan of the convenience and novelty of the delivery subscription box services, I signed up to trial a month of Conscious Box after a co-worker recommended it. Anyone who makes suggestions for helping me discover healthier choices is instantly a friend of mine. And I figured it was worth the $20 to see if this company would stand up to it's promises of sorting through hundreds of natural goods like snacks, beauty, and cleaning products and picking the best ones. 

Initially, I signed up for a one month delivery to see if I liked it.  I had a positive reaction when the first box arrived.  As you can see from the pictures, everything is beautifully packaged (I'm a sucker for thoughtful details) and they provide a description card that allows you to quickly scan all of the products included and details on why you might enjoy it.

The following items were included in my first box:

• Manitoba Harvest Hemp Hearts Raw Shelled Hemp Seeds

• Two Degrees Bar

• Zarbee's All-Natural Cough Syrup 

• Slumberland Snacks Sleep Squares 

• Mighty Leaf Organic Teas

• BumBoosa Bamboo Baby Wipes

• Numi Organics Savory Tea

• Bee Rescued Propolis Toothpaste

• Nordic Naturals Vitamin D3 Gummies

• Flora Flor-Essence Supplement

• Quit Tea

• MRM CRAM

• Nordic Naturals Omega-3 Pet

• Naked Wines $100 Wine Voucher 

With everything from tea to toothpaste I give them an A+ for variety. Although, being a health conscious person, I was familiar with several of these brands (Numi, Nordic Naturals, Manitoba Harvest and Mighty Leaf -- all great companies) so the discovery part was lacking for me. But I like receiving validation that I'm on the right path in my choices, so seeing consistencies always makes me happy. Being a subscriber to other delivery box services such as Birchbox, GoBites, Nature Box and Stitch Fix, I was also surprised to see that Conscious Box felt more like a gift bag at a nice event versus providing full-sized samples as most subscription boxes do. 

I'll leave you by saying the Two Degrees Bars were my favorite find -- delicious! And I readily put that $100 wine voucher to use at Naked Wines. Dave and I have opened two of the six bottles we ordered and they were both great!

Introducing Food Babe

I am constantly experimenting with most everything in life, trying to get a better understanding about anything that I put in or on my body and that are part of my environment. I love reading health and nutrition based books, such as "The China Study",  "Fast Food Nation" or anything by Michael Pollan. I flip through magazines looking for new trends, recipes or recommendations that will better my life and it's certainly not uncommon to find me offering my personal opinion to those friends or co-workers who ask about subject matters related to food, health and fitness. 

So you can imagine how thrilled I was several months ago when my chef friend, Kendra Peterson, aka "Drizzle Kitchen" (more on her later), introduced me to Vani Hari aka the "Food Babe." As I started scrolling through the pages on her site, I sighed with relief knowing that most of the habits I'd formed, products I was using and travel tips I had provided others were in line with everything she believes. 

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And more importantly, I could finally relax, knowing that Food Babe spends 100% of her time investigating what is in food. She doesn't just know the fluffy stuff...she digs into politics, the environment or whatever is making headlines. She's most knowledgeable about harmful ingredients in processed foods and how we can avoid them. Let Food Babe do the investigative work for you too and subscribe for her updates. 

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