I love to have mini muffins for the boys lunches and I LOVE to sneak veggies into them.  I created this recipe and both boys have told me that they are some of the best I have ever made!  I like to freeze them and pop them into their lunches.  This way I am not tempted to eat them all in one sitting, too!

Ingredient:

• 4 carrots
• 1 1/2 cups oats (I used gluten free)
• 1 cup of all natural, no sugar added applesauce
• 1 egg
• 1/2 c honey
• 2 tbsp coconut oil
• 1 tsp baking soda
• 1 tsp vanilla
• dash of salt, cinnamon, nutmeg, and clove

I chop the carrots in my Vitamin or blender.  Once the carrots are finely chopped, I add the rest of the ingredients and blend together.  Fill lightly greased (I use coconut oil spray) mini muffin pans about 3/4 full.  Bake at 350 for about 10-15 minutes.  Enjoy!

Here is a new Gonzales Family favorite.

Honey Lime Chicken Fajitas

3 tablespoons Liquid Aminos (gluten free and 1/2 the sodium of even low sodium soy sauce!)
2 tablespoons honey
1 tablespoon olive oil
juice of one lime
2 garlic cloves, minced
1/4 teaspoon of salt
1/4 teaspoon of pepper
1/2 teaspoon red pepper flakes, to taste
2 tablespoon cilantro
4 chicken breasts- cut into strips
sliced veggies- I prefer zucchini, but bell peppers, onions, etc would work

Make the marinade by adding the Aminos, honey, oil, lime juice, garlic, salt and pepper, red pepper flakes and cilantro in a bowl. Whisk together. Add the chicken and veggies to the marinade and let sit for at least 1 hour.

In a frying pan add the chicken and veggies and sauté until chicken is cooked.

Serve over rice or on tortillas. Enjoy!

Shhh…I have a secret.

I made the most delicious turkey meatballs tonight that not only did my family eat, but they enjoyed them and they were laced with veggies!

While I have become quite adventurous with trying new foods and especially vegetables, my family is not quite on board with the greens.

So I sneak them in where I can.

Tonight’s “4 Gonzales Thumbs Up” meal:

Turkey Zucchini Meatballs

1 lb of ground turkey
1/2 cup of shredded zucchini
1/4 cup grated fresh parmesan
1 tsp basil
1 tsp oregano
1/2 tsp salt
1/2 tsp pepper
1 bottle of your favorite tomato sauce

Shred the zucchini and then squeeze the liquid out (I used a nut milk bag). Combine turkey, zucchini, cheese and spices. Use hands to mix together and roll into small balls. I got 21 balls with this recipe. In a pan, brown the meatballs. I sprayed my pan with coconut oil, you could use a little olive oil instead. Once the meatballs are browned transfer them into your crockpot and top with sauce. Heat on high for 3 hours.

I served mine on fresh bread as meatball subs, but you could serve with any pasta or next time I will probably throw a spaghetti squash in the crockpot with the meat balls and call it a day!

Don’t worry so much about how you get there, but that you keep moving towards you goals.  Small changes grow into big results over time.  Keep moving forward!

This is true of pretty much everything in life. There are times you just want to give up. The road ahead or the task in front of you looks too daunting. You can do one of 3 things- give up, give in or give it your all!

One of the things that I have learned this past 7 months is if you don’t plan you don’t succeed!  When I try to wing it I often times just don’t hit my goals.  In my humble opinion this is very true of your meal plan.  You have to have a plan!  For me that means sitting down on Sunday and planning for my week.  This can look different for everyone but these are the basic steps that I take:

1. Create a menu for the week.  Minimally plan your dinners, but for best results plan the entire weeks meal- even snacks.
2. Now that you have a plan- look in your freezer, fridge, and pantry to see what you have on hand to make you planned meals
3. Make a list of what you need to make the meals and go shopping.  Shop only for what you need to create your meals!
4. Prep as much as you can.  For me that means I clean and dice, chop etc all my fruits and veggies.  I also will make up a pot of steel cut oats to have for breakfast for most of the week.  I will make a pot of brown rice or quinoa to use for lunches and sides with dinner.  I will boil eggs for snacks or lunches (depending on what  I have planned for the week).  I will make up ahead salads in a jar and yogurt parfaits for the kids.  This takes time, but the pay off is that we have things ready to grab and go all week long.

Here is my menu plan for this week.  Jaunuary Weekly Schedule-week 2

I am actually following my 5 Day Clean Eating menu with a group of new Challengers this week.  If you would like more information on this and to get a copy of this meal plan go to http://eepurl.com/bbbfbD

If like me you are looking for ways to not use prepackaged oatmeal full of artificial or suspect ingredients you may like this recipe!  I love that I do not add any sugar except for the natural sugars in the bananas.  I always have 2 eggs over easy with my serving of oats.  I make enough on Sunday or first thing Monday morning to have all week.

Peanut Butter Banana Steel Cut Oats

• 1/2 cup Steal Cut Oats, organic when possible
• 2 cups water or almond milk
• 2 bananas, chopped or mashed
• 4 tsp peanut butter

Follow the direction on your container of oats- this ratio of oats:liquids yields me five 1/2 cup servings.  Once you are simmering the oats that is when I stir in the bananas and peanut butter.  I chop my bananas- I like to have “chunks” of bananas in the finished product.

That’s it!  There are like a million ways to have you steel cut oats, but this is one of my favorites!

Why steel cut and quick oats?  Steel cut oats are less processed.  I also prefer the texture.  As long as you are not adding sugar and “junk” to your oats you should eat which ever one you prefer.

I am so glad that I finally tried spaghetti squash.  It is great way to enjoy the taste of pasta with out the carbs and in my house the major blood sugar spike!

A friend had pinned a version that you make in a crockpot and I was excited to finally try it out last night.  I also had a recipe for gluten free turkey meatballs that I wanted to adapt to my families picky pallet.  Well I am happy to report both recipes were a success and I will be adding this to my recipe rotation!

Crock Pot Spaghetti Squash

• 1 spaghetti squash
• your favorite jar of spaghetti sauce

That’s it!

Cut your spaghetti squash in half width wise.  Scoop out all the seeds and “strings”.  Place the 2 halves face down in the crock pot.  Now pour 1 jar of sauce into your crock pot.  I use Prego HeartSmart Traditional sauce.  I fully realize that there are probably better options out there, but it is all natural (no unrecognizable ingredient), it is gluten free and my kids like it.  We are a work in progress 😉  My squash was quite large so I cooked mine on high for about 6 hours.  Once your squash is soft, you will know it’s ready and can be shred.  Serve with sauce and meatballs.

Turkey Meatballs

• 1 lb. ground turkey breast
• 1 egg, beaten
• 1/2 tsp garlic powder
• 1/2 tsp basil
• 1/2 tsp oregano
• 1/2 tsp thyme
• 1/2 tsp sea salt
• 1/4-1/2 cup oats (I used gluten free and I went with 1/4 cup)

Heat oven to 350.  Combine all ingredients and roll into balls.  I got 15 meatballs from this.  Bake for 20 minutes, flipping the meatballs after 10 minutes.

Enjoy!

I made a vow to make it through the holidays with out gaining any weight this year.  I am happy to report I did that, but I still felt bloated and just not myself when it was all said and done.  Having a food intolerance (for me dairy) can do that to you!  So can those few extra cookies, cocktails and other cheats we all indulged in over the past 3 months.

Time to refresh!!

I have done this program before so I knew what to expect.  Here is a quick review of what I thought of the 3 days and who I would recommend this program to.

Day 1

I woke up and worked out as I usually would.  This program does have you at a calorie deficit so you may not be able to work out as you normally would, but I figured I could sneak this one in before my body knew what was about to happen!

• 5 am- wake up and workout- ChaLEAN Extreme Lean Circuit 1
• 6 am- drank 20 oz of water and had Vegan Chocolate Shakeology with frozen blueberries and water.
• 9 am- green tea
• 10 am- Fiber Sweep (digestive health drink) OK so people really hate this drink.  I don’t find it to be too bad.  Use VERY cold water, shake and drink it right away.  It reminds me of watered down lemonade.
• 11:30 (I was hungry by now!)- lunch.  I had the Vanilla Fresh blended with 1/2 a frozen banana,  water and cinnamon.  I had that with roasted broccoli.
• felt kinda hungry by 1:00- drank a ton of water and felt better
• 3:00 (waited as long as I could)- afternoon snack of celery and almond butter and a green tea
• 5:30- dinner.  Vanilla Fresh blended with water and ice with roasted asparagus with almonds

I drank a ton of water and therefore visited the rest room way more that usual.  I felt hungry in the afternoon, but nothing too bad.  I believe it was more of a mental thing.

Day 2

Today is my scheduled rest day, but I normally try to get a run in.  Today I opted to rest.

• 6:00 am– woke up and drank 20 oz of water
• 7:00 am- breakfast- Tropical Strawberry Shakeology blended with frozen pineapple and water
• 9:30- green tea
• 10:30- Fiber Sweep
• 12:00- lunch- I had the Vanilla Fresh blended with 1/2 a frozen banana,  water and cinnamon.  I had that with roasted broccoli.  What can I say, I am a creature of habit
• 3:00- carrots and almond butter
• 5:30- Vanilla Fresh blended with water, ice and pumpkin pie spice and a cucumber and tomato salad.

Felt much less hungry.  Drank a ton of water again.  I liked the salad but it was a little to lemony for me, but I would try it again with less lemon in the dressing next time.

Note to self- its probably not a great idea to bake banana bread muffins for the boys when you can’t have one…and they smell so good!!!

Day 3

Final Day!  I scheduled this as a day off too.  I had hoped to sneak in Pilates Fix but it just didn’t happen.  At this point I am excited to eat some oatmeal and eggs the next day, but am not feeling super deprived or hungry.

• 6:00 am- woke up and drank 20 oz of water
• 7:00 am- breakfast- Vegan Chocolate Shakeology bended with frozen blueberries and water
• 9:00- green tea
• 10:30- Fiber Sweep- although it is not horrible, I am glad to be done with this one!
• 11:30- lunch- Vanilla Fresh blended with frozen strawberries and water with roasted cauliflower.  See how I mixed it up a bit today!
• 2:00- celery with almond butter
• 5:30- Vanilla Fresh blended with water, ice and cinnamon and the spinach salad- this was by far the most filling dinner recipe.  I kept checking to makes sure I hadn’t measured wrong.  It was a surprisingly big salad!

I felt great on day 3.  I felt less bloated and just more back to my normal self.  I made the boys spaghetti squash and turkey meat balls.  It smelled divine in  my kitchen but I really didn’t feel like I was missing out.

Results

Over all the experience was pretty painless and I am pleased with the results. I actually lost 1.5 pounds, but my measurement stayed the same. I do feel like I lost a little of that “extra” from around my waist.  Realize that everyone is different and you aren’t necessarily going to lose pounds of fat in these 3 days.  It will mostly be fluids and toxins your body is holding on to.  The main reason I did this was to restart or refresh after the holidays and I feel just that- refreshed!  I also feel like this was a great way for me to focus on my water intake and I hope this kicked off a good habit for me with that.

I would recommend this to anyone:

• looking to refresh after some over indulging
• looking to change their eating habits and wants to kick it off with a bang!
• someone who feels like they have reached a plateau in their fitness/weight loss journey.  This will be a great way to shake things up for you!
• looking for a little extra something to get you ready for a special trip or event.

This is not a quick fix!!!  If you go back to bad eating habits after you finish the 3 day you will lose the result and quick!  Why put yourself through the 3 days (which are doable but not exactly fun) if you are going to undo all the good when you are done.

Here is the best part: the 3 Day Refresh is on sale this month!  You can get it for only $10 with the purchase of Shakeology.  Now is the time to get yourself back on track and start some lifelong healthy habits.

If you would like more information on the 3 Day Refresh go to http://eepurl.com/baZVnr

In 2015 I am going to be a better house cleaner!  Over that past 6 months I have learned so much about creating good habits and I plan to apply that knowledge to this somewhat bad habit that I have.

First things first…a cleaning schedule.

Over the past 6 months I have turned this I try to exercise and meal plan girl into a I do it every day, every week and I don’t even think about it kinda girl.  Why?  Because I scheduled it, I committed to doing it and I just did it.

So here it is.  My weekly cleaning schedule.  Nothing earth shattering or even unique about it, but I looked at what I need to accomplish and I created a schedule that will work for me.

Here are a few reasons that this will work for me, and for you if you commit to it.

1. It is my larger goal, A CLEAN HOUSE, broken down into bite size chunks.  I can accomplish these tasks in an hour or less so I will never get over whelmed.  If I stick to the schedule I will never have hours of work to do and I will always have a clean, all be it lived in, home.  My daily chore is in the morning because that work best with my schedule, but you can move yours to evening if you want.
2. I have put my cleaning tasks into morning and evening lists.  I have learned that we can not control what happens in our day.  For me it could be a sick kid, a trip to my son’s school to deal with any sort of Diabetes related issue, unplanned errands that may take the entire day.  For you it could be an extra project at work, an unplanned business trip, you name it, it could happen.  BUT if you work to book end your day with the same tasks you will at least start and end your day the way you want.  I have other non-cleaning tasks that I do every morning and night, too.  The most important things happen then, the rest can be made up on another day.

I also will not be the only person doing these tasks!  Just because it is on my list does not mean that it is all on me.  If the dishwasher gets unloaded by one of my sons tomorrow morning, all the better!

It takes 21 days to break/make a habit.  I am giving it all I have to making this cleaning schedule a habit in my house.  I have the plan, I am committed to making it work so I know I will be successful!