Being married with kids has many advantages – you feel loved, safe and at times even pampered. However, marriage can make us feel strained, tired, exhausted and very often lacking energy to exercise or participate in any sport activities whatsoever.
I remember the times when my husband Alex and I dreamed of having a married life filled with travelling, healthy living, sport and regular exercise. Children would simply fit into our existing lifestyle, we thought.
Little did we know that having children and getting into the daily routine will at times make us feel a bit sluggish and tiresome.
Table of Contents
To Diet, Or Not to Diet? – Why I Choose Healthy Ways to Diet!
Honestly, speaking from a personal experience, this feeling of tiredness and exhaustion can make us all fall into the trap of lethargy. In order to break the vicious cycle, we try to become more inspired and creative and start searching for the life short-cuts and hacks to diets – the desire for breaking the family routine goes from replacing fast-food, bad eating habits and being ordinary couch potatoes to living a balanced life style with healthy diet and a lot of activities, with or without kids.
How often have you thought that you needed an urgent change in your lifestyle (and of course, you always start from the coming Monday, week, month?
Many times have you, I assume, just like me, planned to start living in healthy ways, promising yourself that you will make sure to implement a protein-based diet, with loads of vegetables and fruit and eventually get rid of all the belly fat!
On the other hand we all read so many articles offering us various types of diets – Hollywood diet, Atkins diet, UN diet, raw food diet, Dukan diet, Paleo diet and the list goes on….but personally, I am not really a type of a person who likes diets, I actually prefer to exercise instead! Sure I would love to burn some belly fat, who wouldn’t, but who is really that persistent and can follow the strict diets that, with the knife’s precision tell us how many proteins, veggies and fruits to take in order to burn all that excess fat?
I will not deny it , diets do have their pro’s and con’s – they make us look good when we lose weight, we feel lighter and more energized BUT we need to invest long-term time and energy which none of us have in the long run.
Despite all the good intentions and New Year’s resolutions we somehow always lack time or will to prepare fresh salads loaded with greens and proteins such as tuna, chicken or mushrooms.
Weight Loss Shakes & Smoothies – Small life changers
In the light of positive thinking and keeping up with own promises, my hubby Alex and I have recently decided that it has been enough! From now on, and this time for real, we are taking some serious measures to improve our lives – we have started making a practical simple list of how to live a healthy life:
- Combine protein foods with vegetables (meat, mushrooms, tuna salads – especially when preparing dinners)
- Introduce weight loss smoothies and protein diet shakes into your diet min. 3 times p.w.
- Introduce the “weekend-only-sweets” rule – bad habits die slowly so eat your favorite less healthy foods only in the weekend and not during the week or even better, replace your “sweet-tooth” cravings with the shakes and smoothies recipes given here below J
- Fry only shortly your fresh veggies (if you cannot eat a full raw food diet)
- Juice fruits and veggies regularly
- Exercise minimum twice a week
- Take family walks in the weekends
- Think positively
- Meditate
- Be grateful
As a part of the process, I started thinking of short cuts and balancing the daily obligations, chores and cooking as a part of the family care and introducing more raw food recipes and protein diet shakes and smoothies.
My Simple Weight-Loss Smoothies and Protein Shakes
Here are my simple 10 weight-loss smoothies and protein diet shakes to lose fat and perhaps start a new diet regime soon:
1. High Protein Walnut Shake
Ingredients:
- 4-5 pieces of walnuts
- 200 ml of yoghurt
- 1 tablespoon of granola powder
- 1 teaspoon of honey
- ¼ teaspoon of cinnamon
Preparation:
- Put the walnuts, yoghurt, cinnamon, honey and granola powder in the blender, blend all the ingredients and enjoy one of the tastiest protein shakes ever!
2. Banana & Vanilla Smoothie
Ingredients:
- 1 banana
- 3-4 dates
- 200 ml yoghurt
- 3-4 drops of vanilla extract
Preparation:
Put the banana, dried dates, yoghurt and the vanilla extract drops in the blender and pulse until you get a smooth consistence; add some ice cubes to your liking – such smoothies are fun for everyone!
3. Raspberry Rhapsody Smoothie
Ingredients:
- 100 gr of raspberries
- 1 sliced apple
- 150 ml water
- 1 tablespoon of lemon juice
Preparation:
Add all the ingredients together in the blender and pulse until you get a nice, smooth drink; this is one of the healthiest summer smoothies ever and will be a great benefit to your waistline.
4. Spring Tangerine Smoothie
Ingredients:
- 1 tangerine (without pits)
- 1 tablespoon of rasped coconut
- 1 tablespoon of pineapple juice (canned or even better, fresh)
- 200 ml water
Preparation:
Put all the ingredients into the blender and blend thoroughly; if you do not have tangerines, an orange will do the trick – when all mixed, simply say “Cheers”! And remember, such citrus-based weight loss smoothies are super fast fat burners!
5. Orange & Strawberry Smoothie
Ingredients:
- 2 oranges (without pits)
- 10-15 strawberries
- 1 tablespoon of lemon juice
- 200 ml water
Preparation:
Peel the oranges and remove the green parts from the strawberries; put them in the blender and add the lemon juice and the water; blend for 2-3 minutes and o a la! Yet another one of citrus-based weight loss smoothies that will melt your pounds away.
6. Summer Grape & Cucumber Shake
Ingredients:
- 20-30 grapes (seedless)
- 1 small cucumber
- ½ cup of pineapple chunks (any cup will do)
- 200 ml water
Preparation:
Peel off the cucumber (if you prefer, leave the green skin on, it is packed with nutritional values and will offer a plenty of water to your body) and dice it; put the cucumber dices and the grapes together with water and pineapple chunks into the blender; blend until it is all smooth and nice and drink in the morning before work or in the afternoon, to have yourself a quick energy boost! Both grapes and cucumbers are a perfect base for your weight loss smoothies and shakes.
7. Red Passion Shake
Ingredients:
- 1-2 smaller cups of forest fruit mix (strawberries, raspberries, blueberries)
- 3-4 drops of vanilla extract
- 200 ml yoghurt
- 1/2 of a banana
Preparation:
Peel the banana skin off and cut the banana in small pieces; mix all the ingredients together in the blender and pulse until you get a great read passion shake to fill you with energy and love for life! Fruits such as berries are recommendable for weight loss smoothies and shakes as they are an immense source of fiber and therefore are good for your weight control.
8. Green Grass Melon Shake
Ingredients:
- 200 gr melon chunks
- 1 apple
- 20 gr of baby spinach leaves
- 200 ml water
Preparation:
Cut the melon into small chunks, dice the apple and add to the melon, put the spinach leaves and water into the blender and mix it all into the sweet, green summer shake and enjoy.
9. Rainbow Twister Shake
Ingredients:
- 10-15 black currents
- 2 peaches
- 5-6 strawberries
- 200 ml yoghurt
Preparation:
Take all the fruit sorts and put them into the blender; add yoghurt (the fruit can be frozen in case that you cannot find it in your local stores); blend all into the summer fruit rainbow shake J. Our kid loves rainbow shakes J.
10. Watermelon Shake
Ingredients:
- 300-400 gr watermelon
- ½ cucumber
- 15o ml water
- ½ table spoon orange juice
- 1-2 fresh mint leaves
Preparation:
Cut the watermelon into dices and removed the seeds (you might want to leave the seeds in to get the benefits of an improved digestion and kidney relief); add the cucumber dices, orange juice and water into blender and pulse. For decoration and a fresh summery taste add the mint leaves and drink while lying back in your chair J. Summer fruit shakes are particularly refreshing and watermelons are good for hydration, digestion and are anti-inflamatory.
5 Tips for Making Home-Made Weight-loss Smoothies & Protein Shakes
I have already given you some ideas how to make fruit and vegetable shakes and smoothies with the hope that this will inspire some of you to start your own, tailor-made, belly-fat burning diet from tomorrow on!
If you stick to the following tips, you will give your diet smoothies and protein shakes home-made experience an extra twist:
- Put the liquid ingredients into the blender firstly
- Add the solid ingredients secondly
- Do not drink too quickly in order to make sure that the vitamins and minerals are taken into the blood stream slowly and subsequently can affect your digestive system in a positive way
- Use a straw when drinking citrus based smoothies (orange, lemon, tangerine etc.) to protect your teeth
- Select organic or local products (whenever possible)
- Do not forget that fruits such as pineapple, lemon, tangerine, watermelon are great fat burning super foods
- Organize occasionally smoothies & shakes party for your friends.
And to top it all, enjoy all the weight loss protein shakes and smoothies mentioned above imagining that you are somewhere on a Hawaii beach, sitting in your summer garden with your hubby, while the kids are already in bed, tight asleep. And do not forget to exercise later.
