Search Results for may (200)

Whole 30: Nuthin' But Real Food

Jonathan Longnecker / July 31, 2014

Guys and girls, I remember the first time it hit me that things were different.

I had my first desk job designing internal flyers for the local community college. Fresh out of school, working the 9-5, livin' the dream! And suddenly started gaining weight like a madman. Whatever little metabolism I had disappeared at the ripe old age of 21. Pretty sad, right?

Naturally, I got a gym membership and was able to get back in shape quickly, but the last 10 years have seen me ballon from 150 (yes, I was skinny) to nearly 230 the beginning of this year. Why? Well, lack of exercise for one. Starting a business and a family (4 kids in 6 years!) puts things like "going to the gym and eating healthy" on the back burner.

The crazy thing is I know how to exercise. I went through P90X at one point, had some great lifting routines at the gym and have lately been digging Diamond Dallas Page's Yoga program (seriously, it's a blast).

I've heard all the trendy food things, too. Eat 6 times a day! Buy these protein shakes and bars! Paleo! Organic! Dogfood! Wait-what? Here's the problem. I really like food. Like sometime between age 25 and now I turned into a total food snob. I don't know how it happened, but I get pissed if I have to pay 12 bucks for some completely average entree at Chili's. Also, many of these food diet fads are too extreme. Most of them are so hardcore it's nearly impossible to keep up with them for more than a week if you have kids or want to have any kind of life at all. Have you tried to eat 6 meals a day and not have your whole life revolve around it? It's exhausting.

Maybe we're making it too difficult. Maybe we should just get back to basics. Common sense, you know? People didn't used to be obese and overweight. Maybe our huge advances in scientific food manufacturing are actually making us overweight. Maybe God made all the food we ever needed back in Genesis and we're just screwing with it too much.

Around April of this year Ashley and I made a simple choice. We would stop eating refined sugar, wheat and dairy. We would only eat real foods like fruits, vegetables and meat. It sounds like some sort of culinary nightmare, I know.

But it's been incredible. And eye-opening. Personally, I've lost nearly 40 pounds in 4 months. I dropped 4 pants sizes. Most of my clothes are too big now.  And I didn't even exercise very often! That's just part of the story, though. I had no idea how much the sugars and chemicals coming from my food were affecting my energy, mental clarity and general gastrointestinal happiness. Flavors are multiplied 10x when you're not constantly bombarding your tastebuds with enough salt and sugar to  fill a gallon sized ziplock bag.

We also found out through the process that Ashley has some sort of gluten problem. All of her stomach pains magically disappeared when we started this, and a few quick tests confirmed that bread or wheat of any kind makes her miserable the rest of the day. Crazy, right?

So we've been on this track for nearly 4 months - with a little break in early July because we were in Portland for 4 days and, well, you have to break the rules a little when your in Portland - but we're going to be joining a ton of other people and re-committing to this idea of eating more naturally in the month of August. It's called Whole30 and it sounds like exactly what it is. Eat only whole foods for 30 days.

We've been planning and prepping here in the Longnecker household and can't wait to share some great new recipes - and let you know which ones sucked. If you feel like joining in, be sure to let us know in the comments!

Code:Rad - Ursa Major Super Natural Skincare Products

Jonathan Longnecker / June 11, 2014

I'll be honest - I probably shave about once a week. My poor razor blades don't last very long with the beating I give them. When I shave, I shaaaaave. You know it. But you know what I never even thought about? The shaving cream I use. Pretty sure I've ben using the same orange-lidded aerosol brand that I used the first time I shaved.

We've become pretty wholistic/eco-friendly/natural/hippie-dippie-whatever-you-want-to-call-it over the years, but it never occurred to me that my shaving cream was dangerous. Maybe it's cause I only shave once a week. But most guys shave pretty regularly. All that chemical stuff can't be good, right? Kind of makes sense when you think about it.

Thank goodness I ran across the radness of Ursa Major a month ago. First of all, nice name. Well played. Second of all there's a great story behind it - how the owner was having skin problems and started doing research on all the chemicals in modern-day men's skincare products. He was pretty horrified at what he found. And so he embarked on a quest to do something about it. Thus, Ursa Major was born. Super Natural Skincare products specifically for dudes.

Rawk. I'm all in. Let's see what they've got. First up, the essentials - Shaving Cream, Face Wash, Face Tonic and Face Balm:

Code:Rad - Cuppow Canning Jar Drinking Lids

Jonathan Longnecker / May 19, 2014

As a general rule, I don't curse. But when I feel the need to utter an expletive my go-to choice is "Ball Jar Lids!"

Maybe I should back up.

You see, my wife is obsessed with Ball Jars - (or Mason or canning jars - whatever you like). You know, the kind with two parts to the lid: the flat part with the seal and the metal ring. And many a time during dish washing I become overwhelmed with them and shout/mutter/scream "Oh Ball Jar Lids!!!!" in frustration. 

The glass jar I can handle. I like them. The lids - not so much. We keep everything in them. Any packaged food from the store gets put in them. Leftovers? You know it. Homemade grape juice? Check. And of course, we use them to drink out of. I bet you're wondering where I'm going with this.

"Hey, aren't you supposed to be telling me about some rad, mind blowing product?" I could argue that the humble Ball Jar in itself is a pretty mind blowing product, but I digress.

Cuppow! That's where I've been trying to go with this. Cuppow came up with a great idea for the canning jar obsessed family like ourselves. They got rid of the flat seal piece and replaced it with a drinking lid! Perfect for the kids. And the adults who like sippy cups. And really any time you'd like to take your glass jar without a lid in the car and not spill it.

Mother the Motherless Shirt Giveaway

Jonathan Longnecker / October 14, 2013

Hey everyone, good news! We are doing a shirt giveaway! Our "Mother the Motherless" adoption shirt not only spreads the word about the need for adoption, but it's also a ridiculously comfortable tri-blend fitted dolman t-shirt. You may not want to take it off! It's screen printed with environmentally friendly water-based ink, and packaged with love by the Longneckers.

There will be TWO lucky winners, friends. All you have to do is like our page on Facebook or pin an image of this shirt on Pinterest. Just find the promo widget below and follow the instructions. You get entered for each thing you do. We can't wait to give these shirts away and meet some new friends. What are you waiting for?

This promo has ended.

Designing our First Shirts

Jonathan Longnecker / May 14, 2013

About a year ago, Ashley and I started talking about how we could work on projects together. She had her sign, furniture and photography to keep her busy while I had my design, website and video jobs. With all that creating going on, surely there was an easy way for us to combine our powers, spend more time together, and make things we were passionate about, right? Turns out it's not that easy. Let's just say we spent a lot of dates brainstorming instead of hopelessly staring into each other's eyes.

Finally, we settled on a t-shirt company. Why? Because we both love t-shirts. The really comfortable ones that have awesome designs on them. We also loved the idea of creating a brand that stood for something. We didn't want to make shirts with random designs on them. We wanted to make shirts that said important things. Things that would make you think. Things that would help make us better. We also wanted to use some of the money we would make to help others. To live out the things our designs would say. For our launch we're partnering with Rice Bowls - a great organization that helps feed kids all over the world. Hopefully we can show our own kids where art, business and charity collide.

But hey, let's talk about the designs, right?!

One of our goals with this whole thing was to get back to creating with our hands. Or maybe that was my goal. I use the computer too much. Anyway, we wanted to be as analog as possible with the whole process so all of the designs you see for our first shirts came from sketches in my notebook.