The Ultimate Healthy Living Bundle is Here!

I am so excited that this bundle is finally available for you to purchase! I personally believe it is a no-brainer when you consider that the value of just the bonus products is far beyond the cost of the entire bundle!  That doesn't include the 86 ebooks and free mentorship from healthy living authors!

What's in the Bundle?

How Much Does the Bundle Cost?

Ultimate: Maximum; decisive; conclusive. The best or most extreme of its kind.

We wouldn't call it the “ultimate” bundle if it wasn't true.

As our hard-working team pulled together the Ultimate Healthy Living 2013 Bundle Sale, we had 3 basic goals: to put a comprehensive health library at your fingertips, to offer something for everyone, and to provide so much value for an itty-bitty price that it would be irresistible.

In a nutshell? This bundle is brimming with more than 80 ebook and ecourse resources, from authors and bloggers known as authorities in their fields.

For less than $30, you can pick up your own bundle complete with more than $800 of ebooks, $67 of interactive “coffee table conversations” with their authors, and $158 of products and services to help you on your way toward healthier living. That's over a $1,000 value!

I didn't want to overwhelm you with the HUMONGOUS list of everything that's included, but you can see it here.

And if you didn't watch my video yet where I share my heart about why I believe it is so worth it for you to invest in this bundle, you can watch it now.

 And now for the Giveaway!  Read all your new books in style with a Kindle Fire HD!  25 of the Healthy Living Authors have joined together to offer you this giveaway. Enter in the form below!

a Rafflecopter giveaway

How to Organize Your Laundry Room

How to organize your laundry room is one thing every homemaker must learn to keep a smoothly running home.

Organizing your laundry room can be a challenge. Between sorting clothes, setting up drying racks and ironing boards and organizing laundry detergent, you may find yourself pressed for space. There are great ways to organize your laundry room so that you get the most use out of your space.

Install Shelves

Installing shelves in your laundry room will give you added space above your washer and dryer. You can use this space to store bottles of detergents, irons and laundry baskets. You can find easy to install wire shelving at most home improvement stores.

Use Cabinets

If you have space in the corners of the room, you can install cabinets that will be handy for storing all of your laundry supplies. Laundry cabinets can free up floor space and give you room for folding and drying.

Use Space Saving Hampers

Using multiple hampers for your dirty clothing can take up space. Use a laundry organizer to sort your lights, darks and delicates. These sorters can be especially helpful if you have tiny children's socks that easily get lost in the wash. You can find stylish 3-bag laundry sorters for all of your clothing storage needs.

Install Ceiling Bars

You can stretch a tension rod across your laundry room and use it to hang wet clothing and other effects. These rods require no installation and are inexpensive. You can find them at your local home improvement store.

Keeping your laundry room organized doesn't have to be a chore. Find the best organization supplies today.

Mini Sloppy Joe Pizzas

Are your kids tired of peanut butter and jelly sandwiches? Here's quick and easy lunch for busy homeschool days that your kids will love – Mini Sloppy Joe Pizzas!

By using a little forethought, you will have all the ingredients already prepped for this by preparing extra when you make your family dinners.

You will need to prepare extra biscuits whenever you are making them and cook up some extra ground beef whenever that is a part of your dinner prep. Keep the biscuits and cooked beef in the fridge and pull them out to make this quick lunch.

 Instructions:

• Slice open several biscuits or use store-bought bread
• Mix cooked ground beef with a jar of spaghetti sauce and spread over biscuits
• Sprinkle with grated cheese (I prefer Cabot brand)
• Broil until  cheese is brown and bubbly
• (I added a slice of tomatillo to each of mine as you can see in the picture above. You can add whatever additional toppings you like.)

Psst…I have an entire Pinterest board called “Unique Lunch Ideas”, so be sure to follow me there!

5 Common Causes of Fatigue

Are you feeling fatigued day after day?  Perhaps you may laugh, thinking that it's normal to feel that way, but would you be happy to know that you don't have to feel exhausted all the time?  I understand that you work hard at your responsibilities, and being tired is a natural result of that.  Fatigue – being constantly, overwhelmingly exhausted – is not natural.

Healthy Eating 101: Where Do I Start?

Are you trying to make healthier changes to your eating habits, but just aren't sure where to start?  I know how you feel.  I've been there.

It's honestly been quite a long road since I started making changes.  And that's okay.  It may take a while for you too.  Don't sweat it.  Progress is still progress, and I'm happy for any that you make.

So…the big question:  “Where do I start???”

Many times when you begin reading information on food – what's good for you, what's bad for you, what will outright poison you – it can become overwhelming very quickly and you may want to quit before you even begin.  It's easy to say “This is too hard.  What's the use?”

You need to start out small.  Just choose one thing to research and come to your own conclusion.  This is one aspect you shouldn't skip.  If you haven't come to a certain conclusion on your own about eating/not eating a particular thing, you will quit eventually.  When you start feeling the pinch in your wallet, or when you start spending extra time in the kitchen making things from scratch, you will ask yourself, “Why am I doing this?  Oh yeah, because some crazy lady on a blog somewhere said it's good for me.”  That's not going to keep you going when things get tough.

Here's my recommendation for a good starting place:

Change one thing that you consume the most. 

Do you eat fast food a lot?  You probably already know that eating that kind of food is not good for your body, but if you need some more motivation to stop, start doing some research on that particular topic.  Before long you will be easily making the decision not to swing by for that hamburger.

Maybe you eat breakfast cereal like it's going out of style.  Did you know that even the “healthy” kinds are chock full of food additives (many of which are not even legal in other countries because of their detrimental effects on the human body)?  Start your research there.

Are PB&J's the normal lunch in your family?  Take a look at the ingredients in the bread, peanut butter, and jelly.  Research them.

Whatever it is that you find yourself feeding yourself and your family on a very regular basis is what you should focus on changing first.

What if I don't like what I find in my research and I know I need to change a particular area?  How do I change it?

First, you may be able to completely throw out a food from your diet altogether.  If you get rid of the packaged cookies and chips, you'll be forced to find something else to snack on.  Fruits and veggies, cheese or yogurt, or nuts can do the trick.

If a particular food is something you feel you can't live without, you can almost always replace it with a whole-food version of the same thing.

Fast-food burgers can be replaced with homemade.

Breakfast cereal can be replaced with homemade granola.

Peanut butter sandwiches can be made healthier with homemade bread, homemade peanut butter, and homemade jelly.  If that's just too much of the word homemade, and you're overwhelmed at the thought of doing all that, then see if you can search out a store-bought compromise.  (In our house, I buy a natural peanut butter without added ingredients, we do honey instead of jelly, and that only leaves me with the bread to make.  If I'm still feeling too overwhelmed to make the bread, we use apples to dip in the peanut butter, and *gasp!* sometimes I still buy store-bought bread as long as it contains no HFCS.  It's still not a perfectly healthy solution, but it's better than the alternative, and remember, this is all about finding a balance.  Don't overwhelm yourself.  Do what you can and don't get gray hair over what you can't do.

So, here's the recap from today:

1. Figure out the one thing that you and your family consume the most.

2. Research its effects on your health to solidify your decision to make changes.

3. Get rid of the offending food or find a whole-foods replacement.

That doesn't seem so hard, does it?  Now go get busy!

My Journey to Healthy Living

This is the story of my journey to healthy living.  The story is not complete yet, and it won't be until the day I die.  It is my goal to always be learning about what I can improve and making positive changes.

The steps in my journey have often been slow.  Other times I've felt as if things were moving way too quickly for me to keep up with it all.  That's why this is all about Finding the Balance.

I want to be as healthy as possible, but there are also demands on my time and on my tightly-stretched budget.  How do you stay healthy without feeling like your whole life is spent in the kitchen?  How do you purchase only the best ingredients when your budget says you must do otherwise?

My story will not be the same as your story.  Our circumstances are different; our budgets are different.  And once we think we have it all figured out, things change.  We get a raise and are finally able to put more money toward the food budget.  We lose a job and have to figure out how to eat as frugally as possible without feeding our family things that could damage their health.  Regardless of what your story looks like, I hope mine will inspire you to keep taking steps forward toward a healthier lifestyle!

If you've been reading here for a while, you may have read these posts in the past.  If not, here's my story in a nutshell:

• Part 1: Introduction
• Part 2: The Beginning
• Part 3: Those sneaky bad habits
• Part 4: A new strategy
• Part 5: A well-balanced plan
• Part 6: A big bump in the road
• Part 7: The conclusion

As I continue on this journey, I hope to bring you along and share new things as I learn them.  I strongly desire that I never make anyone feel guilty if they don't make the same exact choices I do.  And I hope I never give anyone the feeling that they have the right to look down on others' choices either.

Keep going forward – one step at a time!