During the holidays, how many of you feel torn between the joy of spending time around the table with loved ones and the stress of how all that merriment might affect your clean lifestyle? As fit-minded women that spend most of the year totally committed to our gym schedules and clean diets, I think feeling conflicted at Thanksgiving is fairly normal. 

- By Kirstyn Brown, Nutrition Editor

Dave Bowden – Managing Editor 

If you are like me, you are always trying to find ways to introduce clean eating and exercise into your loved ones’ lives – in the most compassionate, non-judgmental way possible. Think about it this way: surprising someone with a gym membership can be interpreted in several ways, many of them not entirely positive.  

- Rachel Crocker, Fitness Editor

Give me a couple hours and I could easily spend it at a good health food store. Yep, I’m one of those, the Sunday stroller of the aisles, just there to browse and check out as many labels and items as I can. You could say I’m easily intrigued by the latest health foodie trend, so it was no surprise for me to discover hemp and be won over by its benefits.

How was my demeanor in the days leading up to my second fitness competition? In two words: stress-filled. 

I first forayed into the fitness competition world earlier this year with the UFE Spring Bash. With my family and friends cheering me on in the audience, and the rush of adrenaline pushing me to smile, flex and ignore the fact that 90 percent of my skin was exposed, I had a marvelous time.