diet Archives - The Hockey Mom Fit Life

October 23, 2017January 8, 2020

Jus Cleanse Bandwagon

I admit it, after much consternation I jumped on the Jus cleanse bandwagon. After struggling to lose both the Norway and Hurricane Irma weight, I figured why not try it. I researched several cleanses. I quickly realized that I would need a cleanse with more than just juice if i was going to be successful. Fortunately, I found a cleanse on Groupon from a reputable company with tons of good reviews. It was reassuring to see numerous people write that they didn’t feel hungry or fatigued while on the cleanse.

Consequently, I bought a 3 day cleanse from Jus By Julie. The cleanse itself was came with nine juice and nine soups. The juices were Sweet Spin Juice (kale, spinach, pineapple, rice milk and mango), Spicy Pomegranate (think master cleanse with pomegranate), and Berry Chia. I enjoyed each of the juices including the Spicy Pomegranate. These juices are blended not cold pressed, so there is considerable pulp in some of them. I don’t mind pulp, but if you’re not a pulp person these juices probably aren’t for you.

In addition to the juices, the cleanse came with 9 different soups. There’s too many to name here, but some of my favorites were: split pea, carrot ginger, red lentil, coconut pumpkin bisque and the detox broth. Each of the soups, like the juices, is vegan, gluten free, kosher, non-GMO and dairy free. If you have sensitivities to any of the aforementioned items, this cleanse will be perfect for you. While the soups have no dairy, gluten or animal products, what they do have is a lot of good flavor. I was honestly impressed with the quality and flavor of all nine of the soups.

Was I hungry on the cleanse? Absolutely, but I’m always hungry. I could eat sixty four Thanksgiving dinners still be hungry. At the end of each night, I was hungry, but I wasn’t dying from hunger. In fact, I had expected to be much hungrier at the end of the day. From a calories perspective, it wasn’t super low calorie, which is good. I felt it kept my calories at a safe level without being too high or too low. Unquestionably, the most surprising aspect of the cleanse was how I felt on the cleanse. Surprisingly, the cleanse left me feeling energetic and amazing. While teaching Zumba on the cleanse, I felt great and full of energy. This was a truly pleasant surprise.

Confession time. The cleanse directions state that you’ are to give up solid foods and coffee creamer while on the program. I have no problem with the food, but admittedly I couldn’t give up my Dunkin. Nonetheless, the cleanse was still effective for me even as I continued to drink my cream laden coffee. I know there’s a cacophony of differing opinions on cleanses, which makes it difficult to truly evaluate their worth. However, at the end of the three days, I was down four pounds and feeling fantastic. It is definitely something I will buy again and something I’d recommend trying.

Where can you buy it? The best option is via Groupon as it sells it for $59 plus shipping vs. the list price of $125 on Jus By Julie’s website. They ship the juices and soup to you frozen at a cost of $20. Jus By Juile packs their products into a Styrofoam cooler with a generous amount of ice packs. I was impressed that the cleanse survived being delivered to sunny South Florida in the early October heat.

Groupon: click here
Jus by Julie: click here

Affiliate disclosure: Some of the links of this site are affiliate links, meaning at no additional cost to you, I will earning a commission if you click through and purchase.

September 21, 2017September 21, 2017

Mighty Musings

Who’s mightier than mighty mouse? This hockey mom with many mighty musings tonight. Oh where or where should I begin? I guess I’ll just tear off the band-aid and get right to my confession. I have to admit it’s a bit embarrassing and well don’t judge me.

My twitter bot is addicted to porn. Sorry Mom! Oh the horror! There’s definitely a flaw in the bot. My coding skills are not in any way shape or form mighty. How did this happen? I setup my bot to look for tweets and re-tweet them based on several key words. Apparently, twitter porn spammers are wise to the twitter bot game. Moreover, hockey mom is quite popular in the random words these spammers include in their tweets. Fortunately or should I say unfortunately, I discovered this when a follower of mine re-tweeted some spam porn. Consequently, I have to check my feed a couple times a day to make sure there’s no porn re-tweets sitting out there. I have to admit that I never through I’d have to sort through my twitter feed to block any porn I accidentally retweeted.

On to bigger and better things, no pun intended, the grocery situation in our household is reaching a Defcon 5 situation. We’ve been to the Publix and Target several times since Irmageddon left. Unfortunately, the shelves of perishables, the refrigerator cases, and the freezer cases have remained barren. At this point, I’m getting a bit desperate. Hopefully, BJ’s is fully stocked tomorrow. I need to get some groceries for the house before Goalielocks and I head to Tampa. Otherwise, the hubby, the mayor and Jake will be up a creek and hungry.

Tonight before I left for my run, we added a new pet to the family. Goalielocks caught a baby brown basilisk (a.k.a. the Jesus lizard.) When I first started running in late 2015, I never saw a basilisk. I would see our regular South Florida convocation of anoles, rock lizards and Geicos, I mean geckos. As it stands, now when I run I see several basilisks each run of varying sizes. Irresponsible pet owners who let their pets go in the wild are responsible for yet another invasive species let loose in the S. Florida. How fortunate am I that I am the benefactor of this irresponsibility with yet another pet in the house? I am so super fortunate. Once the boys name said lizard, I’ll share the name with the blogosphere.

In other news, tolls have resumed on the Florida Turnpike. I can’t believe I’m typing this, but thank God they’re back. Traffic on the turnpike has been unbearable since the suspension of tolls. All the people who cannot drive, don’t take care of their cars, and are blissfully unaware of the minimum speed limit had found their way from I-95 and onto the turnpike. My commute had been protracted by 15-20 minutes each way as a consequence of the increased traffic. Alas, the state has turned the tolls back on. In some small way, it seems like my world has returned to normalcy. Traffic still sucks, but at least it sucks less.

I’m in my first full week of detoxing from my Irmageddon see food eat food diet. It is patently unpleasant going from eating everything to eating nothing with carbs. I’m exaggerating of course, but not eating processed food is tough. The problem with hurricane food is that none of it is healthy. Nevertheless, I could have rationed my food better. Clearly, I should have anticipated the supply chain issues with the grocers and stockpiled some of the food I ate. Instead I ate like a bear preparing for the longest hibernation of its life. Thank God I live in Florida, there’s no hibernation and it’s always swimsuit season here. Sweet baby Jesus!

Oh I did some serious damage during Irma. On a positive note, I’m back to running on the regular. My girls and I ran another 3.7 miles tonight. Its still pretty hot here at night. I wanted to puke like 3 times courtesy of the heat and the fact I’m out of shape. Last week, I wanted to puke during the entirety of every run, so I’d say this is an improvement. Unlike the mad pooper of Colorado, neither my dogs nor I left any surprise packages in any yards, paths or swales. Your welcome.

Thankfully with laser focus on a healthy diet and back to normal exercise habits, results are following. Importantly, I need to make sure I stay on task with my diet and my exercise habits lest I have another Irmageddon type diet emergency on my hands.

We’re fortunate to have come through Irma unscathed, but others have not been as lucky. Both Irma and Maria battered the Caribbean islands severely. There are several organizations that are providing hurricane relief. I am including two links where you can provide assistance directly to Puerto Rico and another that will provide relief to all of the islands. To assist in Puerto Rico’s recovery: United for Puerto Rico The Miami Foundation is accepting donations to assist in the recovery in the islands including Antigua, Barbuda, the Virgin Islands and Puerto Rico. Miami Foundation There are a number of other charities involved in providing hurricane relief. Before you donate to any charity, please check them out on Charity Navigator.

mighty

June 13, 2017

Finding Balance

We all have an Achilles heel that can trip us up as we pursue our fitness and health goals. Sometimes, it is only a minor slip up that causes our healthy habits to start to taper off. If you’re like me, a cheat meal can easily converts into a cheat week.

So how do we stay the course without driving ourselves nutty?

Allow yourself latitude to miss a workout or eat a treat. It’s okay to not be perfect.
Don’t cut out whole food groups completely. Ditching carbs is certainly effective, but not practical long term.
Don’t give up everything you like. I can give up almost everything, but don’t make me give up or change my coffee!
Have a battle buddy. Together you can keep each other on track and disciplined.
Sign up for a race or event, so you have a milestone to work towards.
Practice yoga, it will reduce stress (and stress hormones) and help you avoid injury by keeping you flexible.

These are just a few tips you can use to taper off your unhealthy habits and convert them into healthy habits and on your way to a healthier lifestyle.

June 1, 2017June 1, 2017

A Harsh Reality of Adulting

One of the cruelest realities of adulting, by far, is portion control. Who knew that as a women as soon as you turned 25, your metabolism would start slowing to a crawl? That burger you could eat once eat without even thinking about soon gives you pause. The large plate of spaghetti you once ate, turned into a medium plate, at 30 it turned into a small plate and at 35 it turned into a plate of carbless noodles. Doesn’t that sound appetizing?

Seriously consider the portions you get at a restaurant. Some our 2-4 times the recommended serving size. Depending on the day and the discipline level, this may work for you. As one meal could turn into 3-4 meals that wouldn’t entirely kill your waistline. On a bad day, it could undo weeks of disciplined eating and hard work at the gym.

If you look at your diet and you’ve cut a lot of the junk out but still aren’t losing weight, take a look at your portions. Many of us eat pretty healthy, but portion control can trip you up. Even if you only eat healthy fats like almonds or avocados to excess, the end result will be the same. You’ll gain weight as your calorie intake exceeds the calorie intake. One of the best ways I have found to counter this is by tracking what I eat and holding myself accountable. My kitchen scale, measuring spoons and cups are my best friends in maintaining healthy portions.

May 28, 2017December 4, 2019

Infuse a Little Pineapple and Cut a Couple Calories

If you’re like me and you like the occasional cocktail or are a hockey mom and need a low calorie go to drink for hockey season. Here are a couple of ideas for you:

Vodka pineapple vs. Pineapple infused vodka

A vodka with pineapple juice will give you 182 calories with 28 gram of carbs. As a lighter alternative, you can substitute the pineapple juice for a pineapple infused vodka as a martini or on the rocks with or without soda water. This substitute is only 70 calories with 18 gram of carbs.

You can purchase the infused vodka as a flavor or you can infuse your own vodka. Since we live in Florida and grow pineapples in our backyard, we can make our own pineapple infused vodka. To do this you can use a 750 ml bottle of the vodka of your choice. I prefer Grey Goose, Ketel, Tito’s or Ciroc depending on what I’m using it for. Keep in mind, the smoother the vodka, the better the infusion will taste.

The pineapple will need to be cut up into chucks and placed into a carafe big enough to hold all of the pineapple and the vodka. Once the pineapple is in the carafe, pour in the vodka and let it sit in the fridge for 3-6 weeks. The longer is sits in the fridge, the stronger the infusion. Once the infusion period has ended, strain and serve cold.

Vodka mixed drinks vs. vodka sodas

The problem with mixed drinks, aside from their awesome taste, is that they’re often calorie and sugar laden. It does us no favors the morning after and does no favors to our waistline. Hockey season lasts from August to well June here in Florida, so drinking that many calories is not conducive to maintaining a healthy weight or lifestyle. Here are some examples:

Vodka with diet cranberry calories: 108 calories

Vodka cranberry calories: 182-210 depending on type of vodka and juice

Vodka with orange juice 193 calories

Fuzzy Navel: 253 calories

Here are some suggestions:

The hockey mom fit cocktail: 65 calories 16.3 carbs.

Pour one can of Peach/Pear LaCroix over ice, add one ounce of Peach Ciroc mix and garnish with slice of lime.

Other variations:

Cran-raspberry LaCroix served with Berry Ciroc or Goose/Ketel or Tito’s.

Orange LaCroix served with Peach Ciroc

Perrier served with Grey Goose and a slice of lime

Calories per 1 ounce of vodka used:

Ciroc: 65

Grey Goose: 69

Ketel One: 69

Tito’s: 60

Of course over indulging in vodka (as with anything else) with or without a mixer will pretty much derail any attempt to: live a fit life, maintain a healthy weight and maintain healthy relationships, so enjoy in moderation.