You know what’s really sad is that I haven’t posted my favorite healthy drink on here…get your act together Rachel! I’m pretty sure I posted it randomly in a weekend recap but it should have its own post entirely so here you are! Oh and happy Thursday! I’m a little all over the place today my friends (meh more like every day). Nothing new!

I’m going to revisit this post to write how and why this drink was created. I wanted to quickly hop on here real fast and provide the recipe along with some benefits before Ollie and Liv wake up from their nap! Please head back here later in the week to find out the “why” behind this drink…it’s actually a really awesome story! I just want to get this content out today because so many have been asking for the recipe! Here it goes!

What is this drink?

  • Mason Jar filled 3/4 with water
  • Half to a whole Apple
  • 1/4 tsp ground ginger – Some only sprinkle just a little ginger on top, totally fine!
  • 1 TBS lemon juice
  • 1 TBS Apple cider vinegar (Braags brand) – I add half a TBS extra occasionally
  • Sweet drops (or Truvia) adjust sweetness to your liking

*** Lately I have been making mine without the apple! Either because I am out or just do not feel like eating the apple afterward! This is totally up to you! Yes, if you are cutting up an apple to put in your drink I do recommend eating it after!

*** I do not recommend drinking this while pregnant or breastfeeding!

Benefits?

  • lowers cholesterol
  • aids in weight loss
  • boosts energy
  • improves nutrient absorption
  • my favorite is that it helps with hunger and overall to not overeat!

Happy Lively Juice making! Don’t forget to check this post again later in the week! I just added the essentials to make it. You will want to hear the full story of how this drink was born!

Bye friends!

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It’s me again!

Are you ready to find out how/why Lively juice came about? It’s hard for me to pick where to start off so this may be a rather long story…but it’s a good one!

I graduated with my nutrition degree – with a marketing minor – and did not want to work in the hospital. I even applied to a fast track nursing program in the fall (after graduation) because I thought there was no way anything would come of my blog or my degree. Keep in my mind this was when Lively Girl Fitness was not even a year old! I seriously thought I was such a screw up because I couldn’t figure out how to utilize my four-year college degree and follow my passion. A week before nursing school started, I called and said I would not be attending because my gut told me this year I needed to pursue personal training! Phew, that was a long breath. You still with me? Fast forward a few months and I am working full time as a personal trainer! This is the year I really started to figure out how to train my clients the most effectively and honestly what kind of clients I wanted to work with! How it worked is I paid rent at a gym so my clients could train there. The gym did not find my clients, I found my own! I loved this aspect because honestly I just wanted to work with other motivated people. I did not want my time wasted and I sure as heck did not want to waste anyone else’s time so this method worked perfectly for me.

In the beginning, my clientele consisted of all different types of people. Teenagers, college students, girls my age, men. You name it – I trained them! Want to know my absolute favorite clientele (and still to this day)? Want to know which clients always worked the hardest for me and always got the most epic results?

MOMS.

Yeah, that’s right my mom clients were straight up the hardest workers. Not only that, they were honest, they took me seriously, and listened to the nutritional advice I gave them. My mom clients, without a trace of doubt, always got the best results. Keep in mind I was 22 years old during this time. I wasn’t even engaged yet so this is not some biased post where I think moms are the hardest workers because I am a mom now. Heck no! I figured this out three years ago.

Here are some similarities that every single one of my mom clients had in common:

1.) They let themselves go nutrition and exercise wise because they felt selfish not focusing on their kids 100% of the time.

2.) They felt extreme mom guilt even hiring a personal trainer because (in their minds) that money should be spent on their children. Not only that but they felt guilty because the time they were training could be spent running errands or doing something for their children.

3.) They felt insecure in their bodies.

4.) The way they felt about their bodies affected their self-esteem greatly and even their relationships with others.

You know what’s really cool? They turned these insecurities and guilty feelings into motivation. If they were going to pay the money and take the time to spend on themselves they were going to SUCCEED. They were going to set a positive example for their families and failure simply wasn’t an option. In the beginning, it took a lot of convincing on my end to keep them training and inspired. But I mean I can only imagine what they were thinking as I told them they could change…

“What does this 22-year-old girl know about motherhood?”

“What does she know about mom guilt”

“She can’t fathom how limited taking time for myself truly is”

“How can she give me advice on how I need to take time for myself when she is not a mother?”

You know what, I didn’t. I had no clue and I look back and thank God they trusted in me to help them. I genuinely did not know how much they had to give up to meet me for those training sessions. I did not know how hard it was to stay on a meal plan when the rest of their family ate what they wanted. I had no freaking clue but these moms had faith in me! I’m so glad they did because their transformations were insanely awesome.

Fast forward another few months, and Matthew and I were engaged! Woohoo! I get to marry my soul mate! Now I had a huge urge to get in the best shape of my life! Not only that but my mom was also wanting to exercise more and eat healthily to look her best on the wedding day. I was still living at home and I became very aware of my moms eating habits. She is a mother of six children so to say she has little to no time for herself would be an understatement. My mom is the most selfless person I know and has given every piece of her heart to my five siblings and me. This realization hit me after training my first set of mom clients. Just by talking to them, seeing how much they love their own children and how they would literally do anything for them made me look at my own mom very differently.

Anywho ramble over back to the point…

My mom and I typically woke up around the same time every day and I started to observe how she ate. She almost always skipped breakfast and by lunchtime would be famished. She didn’t really prepare for the day food wise and would just eat whatever she could find as she went to work, ran errands, and helped out her kids/husband. I started to encourage her to eat breakfast. I told her it would help her from overeating later in the day and would speed up her metabolism if anything! Whenever I made myself something for breakfast I just started making double and we would eat together.

Then I got to thinking that she really needed something to snack on midday to avoid overeating. Something easy to throw together, tasty, nutritionally beneficial yet curbs the appetite. I had been researching apple cider vinegar because at the time because taking a shot of ACV was all the rave! I knew if I told her she needed to take a shot of apple cider vinegar it would be a flat out N.O. so I had to get more creative. I’ve heard of other people adding ACV to a glass of water along with some sweetener to make it more enjoyable and that’s kind of where it started. Slowly, we started adding more to it which is where the ginger and lemon juice came into play. Lastly, we added in the sliced up apple and made it our goal to eat the apple slices after we finished our drink. Usually, we would be full after drinking the entire mason jar but who is going to waste a perfectly good apple?! Not us! Plus, it really did prevent both of us from overeating.

Let’s be real, you just need to incorporate something new into your daily life to get EXCITED about leading a healthier lifestyle! It doesn’t have to be huge but the first step is making those little changes. You know what I mean? That was really the whole purpose of lively juice. To make a small healthy change and then continue to make more as the weeks went on. My mom started to consistently lose weight from having 1-2 Lively juices a day and eating 5-6 small meals. Oh, and she also hired me as her very own personal trainer! My aunt Cindy and my mom both trained with me which was a complete blast. We had two sessions a week at the gym where I focused solely on circuit training and then gave them workouts to do the other days of the week. Usually, it would be as simple as going on a walk-run followed by 3 sets of planks. Simple yet effective!

These are her results!!!

My mom dropped around 30 pounds and has kept it off ever since. She continues to have lively juice every day and eat clean! So that, my friends, is the story of Lively juice was inspired and came about (:

Thanks for stopping by the blog today!! Happy Thursday & Stay Lively!