Life [Comma] Etc

Jesus, please break my heart

Food Posts

I can vouch for the fact that dropping grains, dairy, and sugar from your diet seems pretty extreme... but so are the health benefits!

I've been Paleo and Paleo AIP since May 2012. I used this diet and lifestyle to slow down my Autoimmune thyroid disease, lose 60+ pounds, and improve my emotional health and mood year round. If you're curious about how YOU would feel on Paleo, click through these posts and leave me a comment!

Beautiful Beauty Products [Primally Pure Giveaway!]

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Primally Pure Logo

You know how I went all crunchy and swapped out our conventional mattress and cleaning products? Well, it’s not like I’d have higher standards for my house than my body, you know? So about two years ago I started the journey of ditching infertility-causing chemical products (you probably don’t want to know this about hair dye) and other unnatural things that we slather on our skins.

The result? No headaches, better skin, and lower toxicity in general. (That part’s harder to prove, but hey, I’m pregnant, and that wasn’t happening before, so I’ll take it!)

Anyway, ranting aside, one of the most beautiful product lines I’ve found is Primally Pure. Not only am I a sucker for their minimalist, modern branding (seriously, check out their Instagram), but the ingredients are crazy top-notch, and they smell better than anything I’ve ever owned.

Because I love it so much, I asked them to partner up for a giveaway, and that starts today! They carry a lot of amazing, relaxing products like bath salts and body butters, but today I’m going to focus on their lip balm and natural deodorant.

First up is a set of two Primally Pure lip balms!

I got to try the creamsicle flavor because it shipped to me with the seal broken, and it is seriously luxurious! It goes on a little thicker than other lip balms I’ve tried, but then it almost magically melts into your lips and feels airless. And with ingredients like beeswax, cocoa butter, and mango butter, it’s really not going to get much better than that! The winner will get to try out their peppermint and grapefruit flavors ($8 Value), and I am totally jealous!

Next up is my favorite Primally Pure product, the sensitive lemongrass deodorant!

Now, if you’re still using conventional deodorant, keep in mind there’s a transition process.  You won’t hop to natural deodorant without some detoxing side effects, but I promise they’re all worth it (especially, you know, since conventional deodorant has estrogenic effects and has been linked to cancer in clinical studies. No seriously.) That said, Primally Pure’s deodorant gets rave reviews, and I’m on board with all of them.

I requested the sensitive version of the deodorant for the giveaway because I’m one of those people who gets a rash from baking soda (a popular natural deodorant ingredient) if I use it too many days in a row. So, I use Kiss My Face Liquid Rock Lavender on a daily basis as a “maintenance deodorant,” and then the Primally Pure sensitive deodorant saves my life two or three times a week on special occasions when I know I’ll be moving a lot or around a lot of people.

It makes such a huge difference both in feeling fresh and smelling (if I do say so myself) pretty darn awesome, even when I get sweaty. (The Kiss My Face I’ll have to reapply or even wash my pits and reapply). So, the winner gets a full size tube of the Lemongrass Sensitive Deodorant ($12 Value).

Primally Pure Chapstick Giveaway - Life Comma Etc

So, which do you want to try? And what other natural lip balm and deodorant products have you tried?

Leave a comment to enter the giveaway, which ends next Friday, March 17th!

** Because I’ll be shipping it myself, I’ll have to be a little nationalistic and only offer this giveaway to people living in the contiguous United States. But you can definitely order from Primally Pure globally or from Hawaii if you’re lucky enough to live there! **

Our Paleo AIP Thanksgiving

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Paleo AIP Thanksgiving - Life Comma Etc

One of the joys of Paleo AIP living is bringing every freaking thing you plan to eat with you everywhere you go.

(Sarcasm much?)

But really, despite the generosity of our hosts or the good intentions of anyone who is willing and able to prepare food for me, I’m always pretty much afraid to eat what someone else has made for me because no one will suffer the consequences of a mistake but me (a dash of flour on a pan that wasn’t fully washed here, “just a touch” of some spice packet that may or may not have maltodextrin or gluten there). I just can’t be sure unless I know they’re as careful as I am, and I haven’t met that person yet.

But anyway, enough of a pity party. This injustice is more than made up for by the fact that everyone we visit and share meals with is so graceful and understanding. I’ve heard some horror stories about people not accepting a new diet or being super-offended when someone brings their own food, so it makes me five times more appreciative for the generous and loving family and friends we have that they don’t even blink when I pop out my tupperware and start munching — thank you guys!

We get by by bringing food for ourselves in a fun cooler and including some kind of treat we can look forward to. To that end, here’s what we packed for Thanksgiving this year:

Orange Cranberry Sauce from Cook Eat Paleo

Garlic & Artichoke Stuffed Chicken Breast from Popular Paleo

Cinnamon Plantain Chips (Storebought)

Vermont Real Jerky Sticks (Storebought)

GF/DF Pumpkin Pie from Wellness Mama

Egg Nog Tarts from Hail Merry (Storebought, unfortunately not online because they’re DELICIOUS — we get them at a local grocer)

What are you packing this year?

I’ve Been Everywhere, Man

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Hello, friends!

It’s been a while, so it’s time for a good old fashioned round-robin update… with especially excellent news to kick it off:

Life Comma Etc - Ive Been Everywhere

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  • We’re pregnant! And man, have I got a lot of spiritual blog posts to share about that. For now, we’re just really excited. I’m in my second trimester, and I’m grateful to God every day for it. And if you’re a freelance client, please know I plan to reach out and contact you directly before the end of the year, once I figure out my maternity leave plan :).
  • We moved, and then we moved again. Earlier this summer, we moved from our 1.5-bedroom apartment of 3 years to a townhouse. It…. did not work out. So, we moved back to our old complex to a 2-bedroom apartment. It’s glorious, and another thing I thank God for every day. I now realize how important environment is for my mental health, since I spend my working day here, too, and we feel really lucky to have been able to make that decision and in agreement to make it.

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  • Food is all crazy. My food journey is still evolving. Eating a Whole30 earlier this year brought my thyroid numbers into range for the first time in 5 years, which I believe God used to help us conceive right at the convergence of other emotional developments (more on this later). Crazy timing! But since then I’ve been eating Paleo + Cheese. In the pasts week it’s clear that cheese has got to go and I need to shift back into AIP to feel my best, so I’m in week 1 of no diary, then I’ll drop sugar and nuts and eggs and things, and then settle into AIP again. It’s really hard and stressful to feel so deprived while pregnant, but I just can’t argue with feeling nauseas most of the time.
  • I have to drink a gallon+ of water a day. And I’m not very thirsty most days. So, if anyone has any pregnancy-friendly tips to increase water consumption beyond the whole “spice up the water with tea and lemon” and “put a rubber band on your glass to count the glasses” and things like that, please let me know!

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  • We paid off our second car! Right in time to invest another $1000 in the first car, haha. But it’s really nice to have that $280 car payment slashed off our 1st-of-the-month budget. It’s not all good news though…
  • We’re back on credit. We haven’t used credit in five years, so this feels like a failure. There’s really no excuse — being stressed about the pregnancy, paying off our old lease, moving to a new place, and getting furniture put us in a position to think this was a good idea, and we went for it. It’s not the end of the world, and we’re about to re-group and get grounded again, but it’s important to me to be honest with myself (and you guys) that we’re not happy about our financial behavior lately. Don’t make our mistakes! But forgive yourself when you do!
  • The reason money things are in the “small” column is thanks to God. Much of the silence on the blog in the past year and a half is due to my deepening conversion to Catholicism.  Worrying less about the things that used to really keep me up at night (like money and my job) is one of the fruits of that work. I can’t wait to share more with you guys and shake things up!

That’s the haps with us. And thanks to a lot of spiritual progress and a lighter freelance work load, I feel the writing bug come back to bite me. Stay tuned for more regular posting, and, if you get a second, hit up the comments to let me know what you’ve been up to!

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Instagram

  • Thought I'd pop in with a blog giveaway! Click through on the Life [Comma] Etc link for a chance to win beautiful, natural, and DELICIOUS SMELLING products from @primallypure ! #paleo #giveaway #lemongrass #grapefruit #peppermint #essentialoils #natural #naturalbeauty

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