Not our Average Sunday…

March 19, 2012 By Leanne Vogel June 11, 2015

Kevin and I headed into the city yesterday afternoon to attend the Calgary Health Show using a pair of tickets I won on Facebook. We generally spend our Sundays hanging out in our pj’s, having pancakes for lunch, maybe indulging in a light nap in the afternoon, and if we’re feeling up to it, bath time for the little one in the evening. But not this Sunday, no, no. We were off on a mission to check out new products, catch up with colleagues, and sample great food. And let’s be honest… in the end, it’s all about the food. There were a bit too many supplement focused booths for my taste, but I did manage to find some interesting things! Ones that peaked my interested included:

• mila miracle seed, a blend of chia seeds that are cold-proccessed and; due to the diversity of the seeds, allow for a higher nutrition content. Unfortunately they didn’t have any samples :(
• green tea extract, which was a great concept… until I read the ingredients. The thought behind the product is – extract all of the antioxidants from green tea and drop them into a to-go packet. Problem was they had ingredients like artificial flavor and sucralose.
• evestribe, a social networking site for women. The owner; Shelley, and her daughter, Jade were two lovely and amazing women that I instantly connected with.

The best product we came across were viabars, the tastiest organic oat bars we’ve ever had. These bars are naturally gluten-free, raw, locally made (just a hop, skip and a jump from my front door) and the owner; Christiane, is absolutely lovely! She knows her product inside and out, has planned for growth, and prides herself in quality, even if that means she can’t grow as fast as suppliers and grocers would like her to. And… her packaging is super colorful and fun. I know, that means little to some people, but I just feel good eating something that looks good. She had the cutest booth set up with glass domes housing each bar flavor in bite sized portions. I stood there and tried each of the nut-free flavors while we chatted about her business. To top it all off, she sent me home with 6 of her favorite bars to try out – coconut almond, berry coconut, almond-berry orange, coconut craving, black forest and cinnamon mochachino! Based on the taste test I performed yesterday, I’ve planned to save berry coconut for last. It was the most delicious, by far and the ingredients blew me away: pure oats, brown rice syrup, sunflower seeds, unrefined cane sugar, cranberries, crisp brown rice, coconut, flax, coconut oil, chia seeds, hemp seeds, vanilla extract, Himalayan rock salt. Himalayan rock salt in a store-bought, raw bar… a dream come true! I’m certain that you guys would love these bars just as much as we did. They’re only available in Planet Organic and a couple other health food stores in Alberta and Ontario. With the rate her company is growing, I have no doubt that you’ll see them in at your local health food store in the near future. Right before we left, I picked up the gift that came with my free tickets; a basket from my favorite gluten-free store in Calgary. Seriously, could this day get any better? The owners; Vicki and Pat, are hard working, passionate and just great people to be around. I’ve watched their company grow from a couple of products on the back shelf to a full-blown gluten-free grocer, complete with an online store. All in all, it was a great day filled with smiles, sunshine… and a couple s’mores. Gosh those graham crackers are to die for. What did you do this weekend? ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ I wanted to thank everyone that shared their stories and showed support on Saturday. Opening myself up to vulnerability was a challenging lesson to learn and even harder to put into words. Thank you for your comments, emails, and Facebook messages. Many of us have acknowledged that we have a hard time opening up to people, feeling that we’re worthy, and accepting our imperfections. But hey, at least we know we’re not alone for the ride :)

This entry was tagged: calgary