While portion sizes don’t tell the whole story of good nutrition, it’s important to know the approximate portion sizes of different foods so that you’re not way off on your estimates (or nutritional goals). Here’s a handy way to use your hand for serving size suggestions.

One food that I highly recommend before, during, and after pregnancy is cod liver oil.  Not only is it a great source of Omega 3 fatty acids, which are great for break development, but it's a good source of Vitamin A and Vitamin D, both essential for pregnancy. 

Two sources I approve: Standard Process Cod Liver Oil and Green Pastures Fermented Cod Liver Oil

Vitamin A is critical for optimal genetic expression, bones, skin, eyes, mineral metabolism, hormones, mental stability, lung development, kidney health.  If it's lacking, organs may develop abnormally.  Vitamin A also protects against environmental damages like chemicals, toxins, estrogens, and pesticides.  While humans can convert carotenes from foods like leafy greens and orange veggies into vitamin A, this extra step/process may not be sufficient for the demands of pregnancy. 

The risk of Vitamin A toxicity is minimal as compared to the rewards. Essentially, risk comes in two mannors:...

Nutrition becomes one of the most important pieces of any pregnancy. All of the cells in the body are essentially grown from the nutrition we provide our bodies. Having a healthy base before getting pregnant, maintaining the essential nutrients during pregnancy to support healthy growth of the fetus, and continuing to supply those nutrients to the baby during breastfeeding is critical.

Having a clinical nutritionist in your back pocket is a great idea to ensure you're getting the nutrients needed via the foods you eat. Today, I just wanted to share two foods that you probably already have in your refrigerator, that you definitely don't want to skimp out on during this critical time of growth.

Pasture Raised Eggs

Here's why:

• The egg white contains protein.  Protein needs go way up during pregnancy, as proteins are the building blocks of our cells!
• The egg yolk is the powerhouse of nutrients. It supplies:
  • choline (for nervous system growth)
  • cholesterol (for hormonal...

In this video, I am going to share my advice on how many days of the week you should exercise. Note: every body is different.  Some bodies require more, and some require less.  You'll also hear folks say you only need to exercise 1x per week and others say you have to exercise every day. And guess what? There's also research to back up each of those statements. Below I'll share my balanced approach to determining the amount of exercise most folks would benefit from.

Here are my 4 stages of "how many days of exercise should I do."

Stage 1: Just move your body every day. If you can, walk, ride a bike, swim, dance, yoga, active play, etc. for 30 minutes every day. This can be something like "walk to the grocery store" instead of drive.  Just move.

Stage 2: Once you're moving your body daily, take 2 of those days and incorporate some sort of strength training. This doesn't have to scare you. It can literally be 10 minutes of strength training.  Just add in 10-30...

No matter what's going on in life, or how you feel on the inside, there is nothing stopping you from visualizing (or daydreaming). 

This visualization that I want to share with you is one that I practice often when I'm out for a run (but you can do it anytime, or for any type of workout).  

Start by picturing that perfect runner. Picture what they look like. What they are wearing. What they are feeling. What they are thinking. What they are listening to, etc. Go through as many of the details as you can. (Again, I'm using running as the example, but you can picture anything).  

When you're running, and feeling "off," or simply not energized, dragging, or dreading it, I want you to "step inside" that visualization of the perfect runner.  Imagine that that person IS you.  YOU are running as if you are the perfect vision. 

When you do that, take notice of how your posture changes. Does your running go from feeling like a struggle, to a little...

Hey Guys & Gals,

So, I just wanted to share a little exercise that you can to do help you reframe what your body feels or thinks when you hear "2020."  

I know I'm not alone when I say I've been struggling with my gratitude practice this year.  In fact, I've had so many days where I can't think of anything to be grateful for.  So, today, I wanted to share this little practice with you all, so that you can take a look back at your 2020 and create a list of (at least) 12 things (one per month) that you enjoyed and are grateful for experiencing. 

Here's how it works: 

1. Go back into your daily planner or calendar to look up what you were doing in January 2020.  Pick one thing that excites you; that you enjoyed.  It could be a trip you took, a project you started, a date you went on, etc.  Write it down in a list. It can be something big, or something small. There are no rules, just that it is something that excites you or that you are...

What comes first? The chicken? The egg? or stress?

Well, that's not the question I'm answering today, but I do have a fun story to share with you about eggs and how the color of your egg yolks can tell you a little bit about your chickens! 

When I first began getting eggs from "The Egg Lady" who has a farm with pasture raised eggs in Napa, I was hooked. They were bright orange yolks and tasted delicious.  Then, one week, we picked up the eggs and the yolks were yellow.  Hmm... Did the chickens eat something different? Different chicken eggs? What happened? 

So we asked The Egg Lady and here's what she said: When the eggs are more yellow, it means that the chickens (or what they were eating) were stressed.  So, it got me thinking.  When we eat foods that aren't grown via nature, or if we eat in a stressed out state, or if we are chronically stressed, is the same thing happening in our bodies? Are our bodies not able to work as efficiently to produce the...

If you're like me, and running is your cardio exercise of choice, you may find that your legs become a little imbalanced. (Running is a very linear-forward/backward movement).  The three exercise movements I am going to show you here help to build strength and balance for lateral movements (side to side movements that don't happen much in running). 

Watch my instruction below, and give the three exercises a try! You can simply do 1 round of each (10 repetitions of each), or you can repeat the circuit of all 3 for as many rounds as you'd like (or for as much time as you'd like!)

Exercise 1: Side Lunge Sit Slides
Exercise 2: Side Lunge to Balance
Exercise 3: Plie Pulse to Squeeze

Sugar isn’t the only culprit of dental problems. I bet you didn’t know about the one I’m going to share with you today! Listen in and learn how one “innocent” thing you may be doing, could be destroying your teeth (and so much more).

We all know that sugar isn't great for our teeth and can potentially cause dental issues down the road.   I'll give you a super brief description of why this happens, but then get into something that we all are probably doing that can be having just as great of an impact.

It's called mouth breathing. If you ever wake up with a dry mouth, you are mouth breathing! Listen in as I share why mouth breathing can really disrupt the biome of your mouth and lead to dental issues!

We dive DEEP into this in next month's TBP membership wellness lesson, but I wanted to share just a little info with you, so that you can begin to become aware if you're mouth vs. nose breathing.  

My takeaway: start nose breathing...

When your destination seems so out of reach and unattainable, the only way to get there is to "trust the trail" and keep making forward progress, even if it's one slow step at a time.