OneMileOneMeal

Awesomeness: It's Beiber Yoga!

Over at the Fitness and Health Blogger's Conference last week, @nomorebacon spoke to the audience about ways to do mash-ups to create fun content. One of his creations is Beginning Beiber Yoga.

Oh yes! It's Beiber Balance. In this brilliant clip, @nomorebacon demonstrates the zen of Beiber.

One Of The Many Reasons Why People Hate Vegetables And How To Fix That

I had dinner at a hotel restaurant last week and I ordered the vegan plate and this is what I got, a plate of steamed vegetables that had zero flavor because basically they boiled all the flavor away and didn't bother to add any kind of seasoning whatsoever.

This is a perfect example of why people start to hate vegetables because they associate it with this kind of bland unexciting experience. I don't blame you. My dish here tasted like "diet food." It's awful and gives veggies a bad rap!

Now let's take a look at vegetables from another perspective. This is my vegan plate at another dinner function, but this time at a Whole Foods.

On the plate is seasoned grilled sweet potatoes, tofu rolls wrapped in bok choy, a slice of pear and caramelized onions pizza on whole wheat crust, tempeh on top of polenta with roasted red peppers, and butter lettuce cups in a cucumber bowl drizzled with a Green Goddess dressing.

Here is a close-up of those butter lettuce cups which were my favorite of the evening. What is amazing about these cups is that it's basically just lettuce, tomato, radishes, purple cabbage, and cucumber, on their own nothing exciting...but how tantalizing do those veggies look now when arranged in a cup versus flat on a plate and boiled to death? This setup is way more fun and oh tasty!

This is one of the many reasons I love Whole Foods, they make vegetables look and taste exciting and fun. And Whole Foods isn't the only place that can make vegetables look fantastical. Check out some of the vegetarian and vegan places in town kind of like a vegetable field trip. You will be amazed at how good veggies can taste when made in simple yet creative ways.

The Glowy Giddy Fun At Our Aveda Summer Solutions Party

photo by @ElizabethHannan
 
Remember how Octavio at Aveda made me all glowy? Well last week, I invited everyone in Phoenix (seriously I did through Twitter) for a hosted Aveda Summer Solutions party at the Aveda store in Chandler Fashion mall with store manager Anna and her team, and what giddy glowy fun we had!

Let me show you a peek...

First, whenever you party with moi @skinnyjeans know that you will eat only the best because that is how I roll. I treated guests with these organic French chocolate dipped strawberries along with sparkling and still Voss water from Whole Foods Chandler. I got both milk and dark chocolate because beautiful people should eat beautiful treats when being pampered, yes? Why yes!

Everyone started out with a fabulous stress relieving massage like @FirefighterJoy here.

And check it out, I got some of the guys to come out! @SustainableKen is such a supportive friend. After the Aveda event, a bunch of us headed to his Gluten-Free Foodie event. Pampering and food is such a fabulous combo.

Here I am with a couple of my fun social media peeps here in Phoenix @Childhood and @LadySlomski after they finished with their treatments.

Octavio has magical hands! Actually, Anna's whole store team has magical hands. The crew over at the Chandler store was so incredibly friendly and helpful that I cannot recommend them enough. Go there! You will definitely leave that place with good vibes.

 

This is probably my most favorite picture. @saving4someday is taking a picture of me, taking a picture of them. Touche!

 

And one last group shot of glowy ladies with @Dragonflytweet, @Childhood, Lara, @saving4someday, and Kyle.

It was definitely a most fun event, and I must say everyone smelled so good as they left. What can I say I'm a sniffer lol! Oh lest I forget, big congrats to reader Sadie who won our Aveda Summer Solutions Damage Ready Giveaway. You can still score a free Aveda sample if you walk into any store in the U.S. by June 30 and say the secret code word: 11Summer.

I want to give special shots out to @ElizabethHannan, @ms_monette and @LocalLily for their support.

Thank you again to Aveda for all the fun and giving us a generous time of pampering!

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Open disclosure: Aveda is compensating me for this Summer Solutions 2011 promotion.

 

Meatless Monday Idea: Simple Kale Salad With Avocado and Heirloom Tomato

One of my favorite go-to-salads is this kale with avocado, onion, and tomato salad. Here's the recipe using cherry tomatoes, but you can get creative and use whatever kind of tomato you like. In the picture above, I used an heirloom. I'll sometimes add in walnuts too as a way to add protein and healthy fats.

Not only is this salad super easy and fast to make, it's nutrient dense as kale has one of the highest ANDI scores.

Humorous But True: One Of The Benefits of Working Out In The Morning

I love this quote because it's true for me. If I go workout in the morning before my brain is fully awake and functioning, my inner resistance monster cannot talk me out of working out. Sometimes it's good when the brain is asleep.

Healthier Burger: Grass Fed Bison Burger With Side of Sweet Potato Hash And Tuscan Kale

Burgers are an American past time and I believe you can have your burgers and skinny jeans too! Here is one of my favorite healthier burger options which I get at True Food Kitchen, one of my fave restaurants in Phoenix : Grass fed bison with arugula, grilled umami mushrooms and onions on a flax seed bun.

As a side option, True Food serves their signature Tuscan Kale salad or a sweet potato mash, or a combo of the two which I always get because kale and sweet potatoes are two of my favorite foods, and kale is a nutrient packed food. Consider a veggie as a side versus french fries the next time you get a burger.

Here's some of the health benefits of bison meat. The big thing to point out is that bison meat is a healthier option over beef mainly because bison is much lower in fat. For example, for a 3oz cut, bison has 2.4g of fat and lean beef has 10g of fat...significant difference! And bison burgers taste good. For me, I almost cannot tell the difference.

I Did It!! Today Completes The 112-Day Exercise Streak To Help End Childhood Obesity

This is the look of me completely ecstatic that I have completed 112 days in a row of exercising at least 1-mile per day. Woo-hoo! On my Daily Mile page, you can see screen shot proof of every workout I did.

I completed day 112 and this streak with my BFF @jenmyronuk on her birthday here in Boulder, CO at the Mesa trail at the Flat Iron Mountains. That's me doing my superstar pose!

There's great symbolism in me completing this streak with Jen in Boulder because besides celebrating her birthday and my streak completion, we are also celebrating her 2-year Boulderversary. Two years ago, I drove with her from California to her new home in Boulder.

When I got back home from that trip, I decided it was time for me to move (on) too, so I sold almost everything, packed up and moved to Phoenix in October to start a new chapter in my life in a new place. Moving to Phoenix was like a life reboot for me.

Here's a panorama of one of the views Jen and I experienced up on the Mesa trail. Being in the mountains felt very majestic and solid. Along with all the light and gorgeous blue skies, I could not have imagined a more perfect way to put a cap on this 112-day streak.

 

Thank you my dear friend for this day with you, and our moment of sharing sacred intentions with each other :-D

I started this journey on March 2 inspired by @bikerly and his 112-day streak, and added on the fund-raising part as a way to help highlight Action for Healthy Kids and their work to help kids get healthier through fitness and food programs...a perfect One Mile One Meal values complement.

The significant things that happened along this 112-day journey:

• I got in a bathing suit and into a pool....facing my fears of pools and bathing suits. (this was a huge deal.)

• I discovered barefoot running, and LOVE it! All my knee pain is gone...a wonderful miracle in my mind. I am now training to run my first 5K barefoot, well in Vibram Five Fingers that is.

• I did the 30 days of biking challenge in May....and I don't even own a bicycle! I mostly rode on a gymcycle and had a loaner beach cruiser here at my complex I live at. I did this challenge to help inspire people to try something new, and for me to meet new people and make friends. I was excited to be a part of team Loving the Bike, who btw won the team portion of the 30 days of biking. High-5!

• After watching Forks Over Knives, my body went vegan for 30 days. I say my body because I didn't have any part in that decision. The bod just decided one day it didn't want any meat. (I already avoid dairy and eggs because of allergies.) So, instead of fighting the body, I honored its needs. We ate lots of plants like salad in a bun! That vegan streak ended with a grass fed organic beef burger with arugula, porcini mushrooms and grilled sweet onions I made at home.

The streak has been completed and tomorrow, my toe (which has been a trooper and hanging on to finish this streak) and I shall rest. I will be speaking at the Fitness and Healthy Bloggers Conference this Friday, and am excited about going into this conference having this big accomplishment under my belt! This 112-day streak is the most significant exercise thing I've done in my life.

Thank you to everyone for supporting me along the way, and a HUGE thank you to all those who donated money to my fundraiser. I wanted to raise $1,000, and am at $200. If you could give up one pint of ice cream or even one hamburger this week, and donate that $5 you would have spent on the fun food for my Crowdrise Action For Healthy Kids fundraiser, that would be super awesome, Pretty Please!!

Thank you :-D

Meatless Monday: Sweet Potato and Avocado Salad With Asian Dressing and Three Bean Chili

If you live in Phoenix or come to visit, Nourish is a place we highly recommend especially for those with food allergies and intolerances, or those with specific food needs you normally won't find in restaurants because at Nourish they pretty much have good coverage for all the 8 major food allergens. There is plenty to eat there if you're like me with food allergies.

And better yet, those who can eat anything will find plenty to enjoy as well. Nourish serves some vibrant and very healthy foods. Say Hi to owner Kirsten! She is one of the friendliest people you'll ever meet.

On Saturday, for a special Gluten-Free luncheon organized by @SustainableKen, I noshed on my favorite sweet potato and avocado salad with their special Asian dressing which is soy and gluten free. You could easily make a simialr dish at home. Just cut up some avocados and a sweet potato that was boiled so it's slightly soft, and then mix in one of your favorite bottled Asian dressings.

Paired with the salad, I got the Three Bean chili made with black, red, and white beans. I enjoy the tomatoey flavor in this chili. The cool thing about Nourish's chili is that you can add on cheese and ground beef for those who want that. Gotta love multi-purpose foods!

Power Breakfast: Crunchy Sprouted Grain Cereal With Golden Flax, Blueberries and Bananas

The Ezekiel cereals by far are one of our favorites. Remember the Golden Flax with the organic raspberries and power trail mix we ate last time?

Today for breakfast, we had the same Ezekiel Golden Flax cereal but this time with organic blueberries and sliced bananas in rice milk. We got protein and antioxidants!

Could RunKeeper Become The Facebook of Fitness?

In the UK version of Wired, I read this article about their theory that RunKeeper could become the Facebook of fitness because the company has released an open API. Translation, folks are free to build app stuff around RunKeeper...the open API is one of the reasons why Facebook itself became so widely used.

So now, in your "fitness feed" you'll be able to aggregate all your health info in one place like health stats, check-ins, games etc. RunKeeper is calling it a "Health Graph." Interesting indeed.

One personal note, please, I beg of you developers, no Farmville or Bejeweled for fitness.

We're more than just stats

I totally agree with the article in that, "...fitness has become so much more than just recording how many calories you burn or how many miles you run."

And I am a huge fan of RunKeeper, I use it all the time as my pedometer for when I walk, run, bike outside. In fact, for my 112-day exercise streak, you can see many RunKeeper screenshots of some of my workouts on my Daily Mile page. I love the RunKeeper pedometer interface, and it's ease.

And speaking of communities, I use Daily Mile as my fitness community versus RunKeeper because I think the design of DailyMile is much brighter and fun than RunKeeper whose functions are very practical indeed, but whose design feels cold and unsocial to me. If Daily Mile came up with a cool pedometer for my iPhone, I'd be off RunKeeper all together...not hating, just saying.

What can I say Orange is perky and Blue (when it comes to health) reminds me of health insurance namely Blue Shield. But mind you, because I am a right-brainer, those things matter to me. I love data, I just don't like to see bar charts. I like to see infographics. Daily Mile just feels funner and more social to me.

I am scratching my head on how RunKeeper can be the Facebook of Fitness because where's the mindless fun and socialness? What's fun about looking at health stats? Where are the cute cats?

In fact, many of us avoid looking at our health stats...which isn't to say it's right, it's just a reality factor. Case in point, let's look at health issues in the U.S, they are getting worse not better especially ones directly tied to food and fitness - Diabetes and Obesity. You'd think that us looking at our health stats more would improve our health issues, but apparently not so much. How to help make significant change in health really keeps me up at night sometimes which is why I blog.

Back to being the Zuckerberg of Fitness

Let's be honest, most of go onto Facebook to kill time with our friends and spy on Ex's or try to rekindle old relationships or create new ones. It's mostly mindless fun which is why I bring up cute cats...pointless yet highly entertaining for some reason. And yeah, many will use Facebook for business and networking...but then we can go back to our personal page and do the fun stuff.

Emotionally, we go to Facebook to see pics of our family and friends in far away places of BBQs, weddings, and funny pictures of their pets. We talk about how we farted in the gym and how we think politicians need to keep it in their pants. Yes, we share important news and articles that will improve our lives, but then can quickly digress into a photo of, "So what do you think of my cute pedicure?"

Facebook let's you express a multitude of facets of your life, not just one.

I love my growing community on Daily Mile, but I don't linger as long there as longs as I linger on Facebook. On Daily Mile all we talk about is our workouts, and yeah even share some funny pics and stories of lost toe nails and blisters....ya know because only runners can understand the humor and glory in those injuries.

Don't get me wrong, I think niche communities are fantastic because you can connect with like minded and spirited folks, but to be the "Facebook" of a niche, well that's some grandiose ambition. The key for RunKeeper or any niche community for that matter to become bigger is factoring the fun and socialness, but more importantly the fun! Because hey, one can never put cute cat pics and videos in too many places :-D