Healthy Pasta Recipe and This Week's Meal Plan

Hey guys!   I know that I haven't blogged in a while.  I took a few minutes to step back, evaluate my goals and create a game plan for achieving my goals.  But I'm back!

The most difficult part of my health journey is, hands down, nutrition.  Working full time as a pharmacist in a fast paced setting that doesn’t allow for any downtime at work makes it difficult to stay on track with my nutrition goals of eating clean & healthy.  Most days at work, I’m struggling to even eat regularly!   

To make things as simple as possible, the first thing that I do is follow a simple nutrition plan and portion size solution.  This helps take all of the guesswork out of knowing how much I should be eating.  I know my nutrition goals for each day because I use the nutrition guides that are included with my Beachbody workout programs to calculate my targets.   I don’t count calories, but I do count the number of servings of each food group.  And I follow the portion size guidelines using my color coded containers because it’s so easy to overeat, even with healthy foods.  This concept works very well for me and the way I like to eat.

The second thing that I do to help make my nutrition as simple as possible each week is to make a meal plan.  Worrying about what we’re going to eat absolutely, in all honesty, stresses me out.  So making a meal plan each week, only stresses me out once (while I’m planning).  One day of stress is MUCH better than 7 days of added stress!  Right?!?

This week’s meal plan is above - this is week 3 of 21 Day Fix Extreme!   AND I just have to share a new recipe with you guys!  It’s whole grain penne pasta with chicken, mushrooms & spinach from Ellie Krieger!  If you don’t know her, you have to look her up.  She’s a nutritionist with simple, healthy, balanced recipes that the whole family will love!
Here's the link to this WONDERFUL recipe!
Whole Grain Penne with Chicken, Mushrooms and Spinach

P.S. For all of my 21 day Fixers (the nutrition plan that I follow), the portions for this recipe would be 1 red, 1 yellow, 1 green 

If you're curious about the nutrition plans that I follow or if you're ready to begin your OWN health journey, contact me below my completing this form:

Inches Lost and New Perspective Gained

Inches Lost and New Perspective Gained!

This past Tuesday I completed our 30 day Country Heat cardio dance workout program.  I’ll admit that I was skeptical when Beachbody released sneak peeks to us.  If you had told me that I would ever complete a cardio dance workout, I would have laughed in your face and told you that you so far off!  BUT I knew as a Coach, this program could be the perfect answer that some people needed to begin their journey into fitness and healthy eating.  I also knew that this program could potentially renew someone’s interest in fitness and help them get back on track with healthy eating.  So I knew that I needed to try this for myself!

SO I committed to completing the entire program, for 30 days and did not miss a single workout!  I also committed to getting my own nutrition back on track after a couple months during the summer of more travel than I had ever done!  Country Heat comes with a super simple and super effective portion and clean eating system that I knew would be perfect to get me back on track!  My clean eating had suffered a bit over the June & July!  I didn’t do too terribly bad during the trips, but I can always tell when I’m eating more foods that aren’t home cooked and when I’m eating more sugar than I’m accustomed to eating.  My pants were a little tight after the exciting 2 months.  My stomach is the first place that I see weight gain and I could definitely see the weight gain!

But even though I had committed to this dance cardio program…I was petrified!  I knew that I didn’t know how to dance…at all!  And I also knew that I post accountability videos on my social media pages, and I was scared for people to see me!  

Even through all of this, I committed, pressed play each day with all of the workouts and kept my nutrition in check.  I committed to eating clean 80% to 90% of the time and still allowed myself to have a few treats here and there.

Check out my week 1 review here

Each workout was SO much fun!  It didn’t feel like a workout at all!  It felt like I was actually relaxing, letting loose and enjoy myself.  And man oh man did I need these 30 days!  

So on to my results!  Over the 30 days of this program I ABSOLUTELY ENJOYED every second of the workouts – I had SO much fun dancing!  And even though I didn’t find the rhythm that I was hoping for, I DID relax more than I ever have during a workout!  I was perfect for me and this program came to me at the perfect time!  I needed it!

Here are my results – with clean eating about 85% of the time using portion control containers AND the dance workouts… I lost a total of 4 inches!  I lost 1 inch off my waist, 1 inch off my hips AND 1 inch of EACH of my thighs!  And I have new muscle definition in my legs!  How cool is that?!?!?  

AND my NEW PERSPECTIVE!  Working out CAN BE DIFFERENT FOR ALL of US! 

The BEST part of my results is the new perspective that I’ve gained.  Country Heat taught me how to relax, how to have fun and how to let loose during my workouts!  It also taught me that ANY of us CAN get a GREAT workout WITHOUT going extreme and without following a typical “workout” program!

No worries, I’m ready to share this program with you!  I’m here to answer any questions that you have about Country Heat!  

Email me at kristinratliffhealth@gmail.com OR complete the form below and I’ll be in touch!

My next online challenge & support group will begin September 26th – this is the perfect online community to grow stronger, get healthier and have fun while being surrounded my positive women on the same mission to be healthier!