Author: Hannah Lucio

I am a lifestyle blogger, homemaker and married to an amazing man. Marriage is not always easy, but it is so worth it. I love to ride bikes with the family, hike, workout, eat and explore recipes. I like to alter recipes so I can make it a bit healthier for our family. I absolutely love straight black coffee. My family means the world to me. My dream jobs are realtor, personal trainer, coordinator for church events and a bakery owner. Not all at once though.
Family, Food, pregnancy, Uncategorized, Women

Pizza night!

Hannah Lucio

Since our “vacation” ended on Sunday, we are getting back to our normal routine. Saving, saving and more saving. Pizza Fridays are one of the main things. Well….homemade pizza that is. I have been taking a break and we have been eating out and ordering pizza instead. It was a nice break but I have to be honest, I love making homemade stuff. It just tastes different and better, in my opinion. I had been experimenting with recipes for pizza and its been OK. But, I finally found my old recipe that I used to make in California. I used it tonight and was so thankful to be able to find it again. I absolutely love it and am going to share the recipe with you all.

Ingredients:

2 1/2 tsp (1 (.25 ounce) pack) Active dry yeast

1 tsp White sugar

1 cup Warm water

2 1/2 cups White flour

2 Tbsp Olive Oil

1 tsp Salt

1 tsp Garlic powder

 

Directions:

Preheat oven to 450 degrees

In medium bowl, dissolve yeast and sugar in warm water. Let it stand till creamy, about 10 minutes

Stir in flour, salt, garlic powder and oil. Beat until smooth. Let it rest for 5 minutes.

Turn dough out onto a lightly floured surface and pat or roll into a round. Transfer crust to a lightly greased pizza pan. Put in preheated oven for 10 minutes to get the bottom crust cooked a little bit.  Take out and put on your sauce and toppings. Bake in preheated oven for 10-20 more minutes until golden brown. Let pizza cool for 5 minutes before serving.

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Yummy!!

 

Enjoy and live simple

 

 

Family, Food, pregnancy, Uncategorized, Women

Healthier Onion Rings

Hannah Lucio

When you think of Onion rings you would normally think of a few things: Deep fried, fat and greasy. Well….I found a recipe of the fried version and made it healthier. Enjoy!

 

Ingredients:

1 large onion, cut into 1/4 inch slices (I used what we had and it was a very small onion)

1 1/4 Cup Whole wheat flour

1 tsp Baking Powder

1 tsp Salt

1 egg

1 cup milk, I used organic 2%

2 cups dried whole wheat bread crumbs: recipe below

Olive oil

 

Dried bread crumb directions:

I did not have dried bread crumbs already so I made my own. All I did was take 2 slices of whole wheat bread, took the crust off and baked it at 350 degrees for 4 minutes. Use your own judgment on how long to bake them. You want to make sure you can crumble the bread into small crumbs.

Directions:

  1. Heat oven to 350 degrees
  2. Separate the onion slices into rings, and set aside.
  3. In a small bowl, stir together flour, baking powder and salt.
  4. Dip the onion slices into the flour mixture until they are coated; set aside.
  5. Whisk the egg and milk into the flour mixture using a fork. Dip the floured rings into the batter to coat, then place on a wire rack to drain until batter stops dripping. (I placed parchment paper under the rack to make it easier to clean up.) Put the bread crumbs in a shallow bowl and spread out. Place one ring at a time into the crumbs, flip and coat the ring. Tap the ring as you remove it from the bowl. The bread coating should cling well. Repeat with the remaining rings.
  6. Lightly coat the bottom of the pan with olive oil. Place the rings on the pan side by side and drizzle olive oil over the rings.
  7. Bake at 350 degrees for 5 minutes, flip the rings and bake for 5 more minutes. I then turned the oven up to 425 degrees and baked for another 5 minutes. Bake until desired crispiness.

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They were so delicious! We will be making these more often 🙂

Enjoy and Live simple

 

 

 

 

Family, pregnancy, Uncategorized, Women

My favorite workout

Hannah Lucio

I am currently almost 17 weeks pregnant. I needed to step it up a bit since the first 3 months I took it easy. I believe that in the last week of doing this workout I have been able to manage my weight gain and burn fat at the same time.

Before you do any workouts (especially pregnant workouts) I highly suggest you check with your Dr. Especially if you did not workout before getting pregnant. I worked out a lot and was really active so I have not had any issues. Also, if you feel any pain or discomfort stop immediately! I am not a personal trainer but just sharing what I currently do.  So do this at your own discretion.

On to the workout. This is a superset workout and is fun for me.

What you need:

Treadmill or elliptical

Your own body weight.

How to do it:

Jogging(my favorite right now) or walk fast on the treadmill for 2 minutes.

Pause the treadmill

I get off the machine and do 12 lunges on each side.

I do 3 sets of 12(each leg)

Get back on the treadmill or elliptical and do 2 more minutes. Keep repeating until you finish your sets.

After 3 sets of lunges I switch to plie squats

After doing three sets of squats I finish it off with 5-10 minutes of jogging or walking fast on an incline of 1.

At the end of this workout you will have completed your lunges, plie squats and over 1 mile of cardio. This may not seem like much for a non-pregnant person, but it is a great pregnancy workout. Hope you try it an enjoy! I am not sure how long I can keep this up. But, since I am in the “glory” pregnancy months this is exciting for me. This is just one of my workouts at the moment but wanted to share this specific one. Ill share more later!

 

Live healthy, live simple!

Family, pregnancy, Uncategorized, Women

Update: 17 Weeks pregnant

Hannah Lucio

We have 22 weeks left till the due date.

Our baby is the size of a Turnip.

We find out the gender in 3 weeks! We are so excited!

I can feel flutters 🙂 That is one of the best feelings!

Cravings: None, sometimes I feel like ice cream but I do not have any. I instead have fruit or yogurt. The last pregnancy all I wanted was Mexican food HA

Sickness: None. I had all day sickness for the first 3 months but it stopped almost exactly on the 3 month marker.

Weight gain: 8 lbs in 17 weeks. I’m right on target and hope to not gain as much as last time. Someday’s I am really hungry and someday’s I am not.

Workouts: For the most part I feel great! I still workout 5-7 days a week, depending on our schedule. I try to do my yoga routine that I posted on here at least 3-4 times a week. And I do weight training 3-4 times a week. I am just trying to keep up the working out since that what I did before pregnancy.

Achievements: Last week our 2 year old became mamma milk free! We/I chose to breastfeed him for over 2 years because we did not immunize him. Dr. Sears recommendation was that if you choose not to immunize your child to breastfeed them for 2 years. He only has only had 2 small cold that lasted less than a week in his entire life. Thank The Lord! I think that breastfeeding is such an amazing gift for the child and their immune system. And many other reasons.

That is all for the update! I hope to update on our pregnancy every few weeks 🙂

 

Live Happy and Live Simple

Family, pregnancy, Uncategorized, Women

Looking for new running shoes?

Hannah Lucio

I just bought new running shoes and I had to share how great they are. When I went to the store I was not wanting to blow a lot of money on a pair of shoes, but I needed long lasting shoes. A few months ago me and my husband bought target running shoes. They fell apart not even a month later. So this time I wanted better shoes. I tried on a pair of shoes that were about $40 and they felt good. I was a bit curious if a higher dollar shoe would feel a lot different. So I found a pair of $170 shoes that were on sale for $109. I put on one shoe from the higher cost shoe and one from the lower cost shoe. I could tell the difference significantly. I could not believe how comfy and amazing. It felt like I was walking on comfy pillows. I was sold! I did not want to spend that kind of money, but again I need them to last. I have worn them two days in a row and I truly believe I made the best purchase. I am 17 weeks pregnant and completed a 20 minute jog/run with no issues. I know when I wear certain shoes (like Nike) they dig into my heals. These Asics do not, they are so comfy. I am an Asics girl for sure! If you are looking for a long lasting brand and comfy shoes, I highly recommend these Asics. Its a higher price shoe but it so worth it! They are Asics Gel-Kayano 21 Lite show running shoe. Here is the link and they are still on sale Asics Gel-Kayano 21 Lite. I absolutely love the color I bought but they also have other colors to choose from.  IMG_6770[1]   I had my husband get the same type but obviously a different color ha ha

 

Live comfy and live simple

Christmas, Food, Uncategorized, Women

Mulled Wine Sangria

Hannah Lucio

Another request this holiday season form the hubby was a holiday drink. When I found this recipe I thought this would be perfect to try.

Ingredients:

1 bottle of red wine, we used Cabernet Sauvignon

1/3 cup sugar

1/2 cup fresh orange juice

1 small orange, thinly sliced and cut in half

1 small bag of frozen strawberries

12 ounces of club soda

Combine the following ingredients in a double layer of cheesecloth. Gather edges of cheesecloth together, tie securely and set aside:

1 tsp Ground Cinnamon

1 tsp Ground Cloves

pinch of ground nutmeg

1/4 tsp whole cloves

1 cinnamon stick broken in half

 

Direction:

Combine 1 cup wine, sugar and cheesecloth,with ingredients in it, bring to a simmer. Cook 6 minutes. Remove from heat and cool. Remove the cheesecloth and discard. Pour mixture into a pitcher, add remaining 3 cups wine. Chill thoroughly. Add juice, strawberries, orange slices. I placed it all in the fridge for about an hour and then added the club soda right before serving.

 

 

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Enjoy and Live simple!

 

Christmas, Family, Food, Uncategorized, Women

Holiday Stove top Potpourri

Hannah Lucio

I was looking for some easy ways to make our house smell great this holiday season and I found one that I love. I make a different variety of it and today I made a similar version of what I will be doing tomorrow. This is what I added today-IMG_6719[1]

Ingredients:

1 sliced orange

1 Cup Cranberries

4 Cinnamon sticks

2 Sprigs of Rosemary

1 Tsp of whole cloves

1 Tsp ground Nutmeg

8 Cups Water

I combine all the ingredients in a pot and the heat to high until it boils. That activates the ingredients. Once it starts to boil I lower the heat to a simmer and let it fill the house with amazingness. Keep an eye out on the water and fill it up when you see that water level dropping.

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Tomorrow I will have the same ingredients that are listed above but I will add 1 sliced lemon and 2 tsp vanilla.

 

This is a great and natural way to have your house smell amazing.

 

Merry Christmas and live simple

 

 

Christmas, Family, Uncategorized, Women

Eggnog Smootie

Hannah Lucio

I had a few things that my husband wanted me to make this holiday season and an eggnog smoothie was one of them. I found a recipe that sounded good and gave it a try. Since we live in a state that sells hard alcohol at a separate store than the traditional grocery store, I didn’t put any in this. You can add some if you like. He loved it so I had to share! A few simple ingredients, all shown in the picture below  IMG_6716[1]

 

Eggnog smoothie:

2 cups Eggnog

1 Banana

1 cup Nonfat vanilla yogurt

1/3 cup 2% milk

2 cups of ice

pinch of nutmeg

pinch of cinnamon

Put it all in a blender and blend away. It came out great, smells great and according to my husband it tastes great. Since I am pregnant I cannot tell you how it tastes, maybe next year.  This is super easy, super simple and takes a few minutes to put together. Sounds great to me!

 

Enjoy and live simple!

Family, pregnancy, Uncategorized, Women

Pregnancy Yoga

Hannah Lucio

I just started my pregnancy yoga routine yesterday and absolutely love it. I was trying to find a yoga workout that I enjoy and finally found it. Since I am only 15 weeks pregnancy this workout so far is “easy”. I am trying harder this time to stay in shape this time around. Last pregnancy I was working 40 and a lot of over time. I also was so tired from work that I barely worked out. Plus I had a tougher time with foods, cravings and sensitive to smells. So far this time is completely different. Although I was able to drop the pregnancy weight fairly fast last time, I am going to try losing weight a little faster this time since it will be summer time 🙂 I am a fairly active person as is. I typically go to the gym 6 days a weeks but had to back off a bit in the first three months of pregnancy. Its an “awkward” pregnancy time for me. I am now feeling amazing and actually do not feel pregnant at all so I am taking advantage of it. When it is not to cold I walk to my husbands work for lunch and that is a good walk. Then I go to the gym after he gets off work. So adding this yoga routine is going to help me out significantly. When I found this yoga routine I noticed that the lady is not pregnant. On the bottom of the description for the position it tells you what to do if you are pregnant. Hope you try this out, pregnant or not. This is such a great routine!   Here is the link: Molly Sims Pregnancy Yoga link

 

Enjoy and Live Simple!

 

Christmas, Uncategorized

Christmas lights to avoid

Hannah Lucio

I purchased four boxes of the Philips Remains Lit Christmas lights yesterday. This is what they look like IMG_6653

I was thinking that this would be the best option for lights since we won’t have to worry about the lights going out. That’s at least what the box says. It says they remain lit even when; one light is out, loose, broken and/or missing.  Not so much…..We put the lights up and within 1 hour one of strands went out. We managed to find the light that caused the strand to go out. We changed the bulb out and it is ok now. Today we had the lights turned on for maybe an hour and saw that a different strand was out. IMG_6652 It is safe to say that the lights do not remain lit HAHA So much for what they claim. I highly recommend you choose different lights that actually stay lit, they are not worth the $8.99.

 

Merry Christmas and live simple!