News and Reviews
- Today is the first day of the “Baby Steps to Goals!” Challenge hosted by Julie over on the If You Have an Egg Facebook Group. Hop in any time, it’s not a competition with anyone but yourself!
- We have tiny cucumbers, yellow squash, zucchini, custard squash, green peppers, jalapenos and some giant but still green tomatoes…be prepared for veggie-palooza over the rest of the summer and let me know if there are any summer veggie recipes you’d like me to try!
- The “Buy 5” deal at Kroger this week includes my faves…Harvest Snaps® Bean Snaps, Pea Snaps, Red Lentil Snaps are all on sale this week for $1.99 per bag BUT! If you participate in the Buy 5 deal you will get an additional $1 off making them NINETY-NINE CENTS PER BAG! (Deal is good thru July 16th with a Kroger card)
Review Last Week: Last week was Chat #369 “The Secret to Keeping Up (or Breaking Up!) a Habit”
Why is it that if you want to stop doing something it’s all you can think about?
But what if you use that pesky background noise and use it for good?
Pro tips for keeping (or breaking up!) a habit:
Pro tips for getting out of a rut:
It’s All In Your Mind
The first thing you have to realize when either keeping up a wanted habit or getting rid of one, is that it’s all in your mind. Seriously.
A habit (good or bad) is simply a behavior that is so a part of you and has become such a part of your routine that you don’t even have to think about them. It is so second nature that the action you take just happens when it’s triggered because it’s firmly planted in your mind.
Something like switching off lights before you go to bed. You don’t have to write yourself a note or set a reminder on your phone to go around and do it. As a matter of fact it’s likely such an ingrained habit you don’t even realize you are doing it anymore!
Likewise, something like grabbing a snack before bed might be just as ingrained. You may not even realize you’re wandering the halls with that handful of pretzels or peanuts because that habit is also on auto pilot.
Breaking Up Is Easy To Do
Well it’s easy-er if you find a few ways to either modify the behavior or even throw a few obstacles in the way of doing it
As an example let’s say you have a habit of late night snacking before you start your lights off ingrained routine. Try this:
- Your brain is trained that switching off the lights = one last snack before you start. Try switching off all but the last one you need well ahead of bedtime
- Make a “kitchen closed” sign for yourself with a magnet in the middle. On one side add a saying or picture you love, on the other side literally write “kitchen is closed, find something else to do!” and flip it when you’ve cleaned up after your last planned meal
- Brush your teeth! I am living proof that there are few things that taste even remotely ok with minty fresh breath LOL
Protect and Preserve
When I was trying to decide if we should protect or preserve those good habits that are healthy AND helpful, I didn’t know which one was more appropriate for this situation. So I looked it up!
Is protect and preserve the same thing? Turns out they are not and they are 🙂
Preserve: To maintain and protect something, often a cultural or natural heritage site, in its original state, so as to prevent it from being destroyed or altered.
Protect: To safeguard or shield something from harm or damage, often with the aim of preserving its value or function
So if we have a good habit we want to keep up (cultivate, maintain, defend, safeguard) then we must figure out how to do just that! I for example want to protect or safeguard my Tuesday night in person meetings. In order to do that I support this habit by:
- Blocking off my schedule
- Making sure friends, family and even customers know I am not available on Tuesday nights
- Fill up my gas tank and put $11 in my wallet on Monday
- Leave my office by 4:30pm on Tuesdays to avoid any traffic delays
Your homework was #ProtectAndPreserve. Hopefully you thought of a habit or two that you either need to cultivate, maintain, defend, safeguard. Say that habit out loud and then list 3-4 things you will do to Protect AND Preserve that habit!
- Melisa and pals protect and preserve their Zumba sessions fiercely!
- Debbi preserves and protects her habit of using the most fresh or frozen veggies by preserving her leftovers!
- Marlene has a win win with meal planning. It helps keep her on track with her food AND financial budget!
Bravo, you did it!
This Week’s Topic: “Stuck In A Food Rut? This Will Help!”
When I was growing up we had the same meals for the same dinners on the same days…every week. I honestly couldn’t tell if my mom was excited or upset when our dad would come home on a random day and throw that schedule into a tizzy.
Sometimes knowing what you’re going to eat can be calming, soothing even. But if you find yourself getting bored with the same old same old it might be time to get out of that rut.
Pro tips for getting out of a rut:
Spice it up a bit
If you find yourself bored with the flavor of say salmon or chicken but you really do like them, try switching up your spices or grab some fresh herbs. I tend to get stuck on lemon pepper or asian spices on chicken, but I forget how nice fresh rosemary is on any poultry or pork!
There is a first time for everything
A couple of weeks ago my friend Kelsey introduced me to Custard Squash and I will never not eat that again. My newest find is watermelon radishes and I just planted another round of those beauties!
What new food can you try this week?
Prep Switch Up
A great way to change it up is just to change up your preparation of the food. I love watermelon, I mean looooove. I’ve eaten it plain, with balsamic vinegar, with other melon, with chicken salad. But one of the women in our Tuesday night group said she has started cubing some while she’s prepping a watermelon and freezing it. Freezing watermelon? I’ve never heard of such!
But hold on, then when she’s looking for something frozen and sweet she takes out a few cubes and crushes it up like a Watermelon Granita but for zero points. Um, prep switch up magic if you ask me!
This Week’s Homework: #PrepSwitchUpMagic
Your homework for this week is #PrepSwitchUpMagic. Hopefully you thought of a food that you love but are bored with. And then hopefully you thought of a way you could some prep switch up magic on! Now DO YOUR HOMEWORK because I promise there is someone who needs the idea you have already rattling around in your head. Whatever it is let us know, I promise your decision to participate this week will help you AND someone else! Then type it, snap it, share it however you like, and then tag me for your next cool badge!
Don’t forget to do your homework #PrepSwitchUpMagic and tag me when you share on social media!
- Tag @ifyouhaveanegg on Instagram
- Tag @ifyouhaveanegg on our Facebook Page
- Tag @Kelly Green Milligan in our Facebook Group
- Tag @ifyouhaveanegg on WW Connect
Extra Credit:
So we’ve been discussing getting out of a food rut, and I know I could cucumber myself to death! BUT! I decided to make something new for this week.
What is it? We will be pickling some of the delicious, yummy vegetables we’ve been growing in our garden!
As we discussed, Julie’s challenge in the group is to take baby steps. So I have decided that my first baby step is to learn how to quick pickle, and that’s what we’ll be doing!
My friend Kelsey quick pickled with white vinegar, table salt, real sugar, cold water, and China Jade cucumbers. She mixed them with onion, dill. coriander, red pepper flakes, and mustard seed. She adjusted the recipe a little bit, but they are still absolutely delicious!!!
We will be using 4 repurposed jars to quick pickle in the instant pot. They will have apple cider vinegar, fennel seed, coriander, whole peppercorn, truvia with monkfruit, and dill. We are going to make a few traditional pickle spears for Alyssa, some watermelon radishes and zucchinis in Casey’s (which will be sweet heat pickled with jalapenos!), and some watermelon radishes, zucchinis, and yellow squash to go in mine! The last one went a little crazy… it has tomatoes, cucumbers, custard squash, watermelon radish, some regular AND purple basil, ANDDDD some rosemary!
When they are ready, I bet they will be absolutely delicious!
Which one would you want to try? Let me know in the comments below!
Quick Links:
Don’t forget to celebrate your Bravos with our downloadable stickers!
Need to know where to get something I mentioned? Check out the recommendations section to get all my favorite goodies.
