Blog Posts

Tips for Hosting Guests

It’s been a while since we last tackled the subject of hosting guests. So, let’s talk about that! Welcome back to the Liv Ahwatukee Blog, a resource for residents and non-residents alike of our apartment community in Phoenix, Arizona. As the summer season approaches, you’re probably expecting a visit or two from friends or relatives. We understand how much work goes into having people stay over — it’s not always easy! We’ve learned that the better prepared you are for such occasions, the better experience you’ll get out of it. Today, we hope we can help you prepare for the future with a few simple tips. When acting as host in your apartment, you probably want your friends to think you’ve got it all together and planned; the same probably goes for how much you want an effortless feel at your event or during their stay. Use these ideas to take away the stress and give you more time to spend with your loved ones! Don’t be afraid to learn from trial and error here; some guests feel most comfortable with clearly defined private space and others are okay with an air mattress in the living room. Put together a basket of useful items for your guests, and they will be pleased to find what they may need close at hand. These tips come from Randi Garrett Designs : “1) Comfy bedding. I like to have a supply of extra blankets and pillows in easy reach of the bed. That way, your guests can choose the pillow that is most comfortable for them, and add a blanket or two if they take a chill. “2) Lamp on the bedside table and some books or magazines for some nighttime reading. I don’t know about you, but when I’m traveling, I sometimes have trouble falling asleep in a strange bed. A good reading light and ready access to books or magazines helps guests have something to do should they have trouble falling asleep. “3) Water and a little ‘welcome’ treat on the nightstand. I like to add some bottled water, or a glass and carafe on the nightstand near the bed. There’s nothing worse than stumbling around in the dark in unfamiliar surroundings trying to find your water to a drink! The treat is just for fun – I like putting a little truffle or two on the nightstand to help my guests feel special.” What are your favorite ways to help your guests feel at home when they’re visiting? We’d love to hear your tips, so please share in the comments below.

Healthy Eating Hacks

Last week we shared a favorite new workout obsession: Parkour. This week, it’s only fitting that we keep with the healthy theme by sharing hacks for healthy eating. You might be thinking, “Not another blog about healthy eating...I can’t take it anymore!” Don’t worry. We at Liv Ahwatukee Apartments understand completely — maybe a little too well. Switching to a healthy lifestyle can be a difficult and often disappointing venture, and if you’re like us, you’ve fallen short of your “healthy diet goal” more than once. Maintaining a healthy lifestyle can be challenging and disheartening, but we think that the tips in today’s blog post will help lift your spirits. It all begins in your apartment. Before you start making changes, understand that you don’t have to be perfect to have a healthy diet. In fact, eating healthy does not require you to remove all the different foods that you enjoy — you don’t even have to change everything right at once. Doing so might set you up for failure. So if you’re going to start, start right! Here are a few key points to remember to get you moving in the right direction at a pace that’s fit for you, setting you up for success. Eat with others when possible. People tend to overeat when alone or in front of the television. Prepare your meals. By cooking your own meals you can be the boss of what goes into your food. Studies have shown that preparing your own meals will help you eat fewer calories, eliminate added or unnecessary sugar, and combat feelings of depression. Replace unhealthy foods. Cutting back on unhealthy foods can be difficult. Many people struggle with this because they don’t successfully replace those with healthy alternative foods. An example is to replace trans fats with healthy fats — goodbye fried chicken and hello grilled salmon! Drink a lot of water. Don’t mistake thirst for hunger. Staying well-hydrated is a great way to help you make good eating choices. When it’s all said and done, keep in mind how you feel after you eat. As you eat healthier food, you’ll start to feel better. This will help you make better conscious decisions about your daily food choices. We hope these tips help you move in the right direction when it comes to healthy eating. What suggestions do you have to help with eating healthy in your Phoenix, AZ apartment? Thanks for reading!

Parkour is Our New Workout Obsession

Picture this. You’re running from a hungry lion and only one thought is on your mind: “How do I get away from him before he eats me?” Before you have time to change thoughts you notice a table getting closer. Your thoughts race. You could go around the table, but why waste time? The lion will be that much closer. So instead, you jump over it, land, and keep running. There are more tables in the way and jumping takes a lot of energy, so you use a Kong Vault — diving forward over the obstacles and pushing off the tops with both hands while tucking in your legs. You’ve now passed over the obstacle just as quickly, but you’ve made the movement more efficient and saved energy. Behind you, the sound of the lion’s soft yet powerful roar fills the air, but you don’t look back. Instead, you run towards a rail, jumping over it as you place one arm down to propel your body sideways and guide its motion with your hand. You see a building with a low roof only thirteen feet high. You charge at it. Only a few feet away, you push off of the ground with your left foot and begin to run up the wall. Your body shoots up. You reach high with your hands and pull yourself over the top. You keep running along the rooftop and jump over a small gap. As you land, you notice the sound of silence. You’ve won. You’ve managed to outrun the lion. While Parkour is by no means a “new” exercise, it is something that we’re excited to add to our workout routine as the weather warms up. Parkour is first, moving from point A to point B in the fastest, most efficient way possible. Second, you are using your physical abilities and the surrounding environment to help get you through this path that you have chosen. As you saw from the example, the surrounding environment could be tables, bars, or even walls. You’re basically using your surroundings to your advantage. Check out this video on First 5 Beginner Parkour Moves to learn things like the basic roll, safety vault, wall run, turn vault, and precision jump. You can also check out Parkourpedia , an online resource to learn about Parkour, its history, and strength exercises. If you’re looking for an entertaining video about people who shouldn’t be doing Parkour, check out this clip from NBC’s show “The Office.” We invite you to switch up your exercise routine with basic Parkour movements. Get out of your Liv Ahwatukee apartment and explore Phoenix, AZ in a fun and exciting way. You don’t have to be training for your next obstacle course or be super fit to do well at Parkour. Just take a few simple steps and you’ll be moving smoothly and quickly to your next destination in no time.

It Pays — Literally! — to Save the Environment

This just in: It pays to be environmentally healthy! Our post on the Liv Ahwatukee Blog this week will provide reasonable ways that you can practice greener habits near your Phoenix, AZ apartment. We invite you to choose one of the following actions and implement it into your routine this year. Drive Less While you may have heard this time and time again, we can’t stress enough how beneficial it is for the environment to drive less and to use alternative forms of transportation. We know that many people rely on their cars to get to the important destinations in their lives, of course, so we aren’t suggesting you do something rash and give up using your car altogether unless you truly believe it will be the right choice for you. We are, however, suggesting you make the conscious decision to use your car a few times less each week and to take public transportation, to walk, to bike, or even to carpool instead. You’ll save on gas and your local air quality will be cleaner! Buy Second Hand When it comes to things like clothing, buying second hand is a great way to help out the planet. Clothing from a thrift store will cost you less. At the same time, you’re choosing to purchase something that has already been worn, which means that article of clothing didn’t have to be manufactured a second time in order for you to enjoy it. This may seem small, but on a large scale, buying second hand will help us reduce the unnecessary excess of energy used to make new clothes. You won’t even have to sacrifice fashion, either. Many vintage looks and vibes are coming back into style, so thrift shopping will help you curate a wardrobe that is unique and that still lets you serve all the looks! Thanks for reading today’s blog post. What do you do to simultaneously save money and the planet? Let us know in the comments below. We hope you have a great month! Visit us next week for more great content.

The Importance of Understanding Depression

Welcome back to the Liv Ahwatukee Apartments Blog. Today we’re reaching out to residents living in our Phoenix, AZ apartment community with a post about depression. While some people are enjoying the onset of spring, some people are struggling with depression. If you know — or think you might know — someone who deals with depression, it can be beneficial to try to understand what it’s like for them. We decided to turn to Reddit , an online community where people can post content such as links, text posts, and images. The more popular the comments in the post, the more points they receive. We found a Reddit thread where people have written about how to help someone understand what depression is like. If you have advice you’d like to share, please leave a comment below for our residents. Here are two of the most popular comments from the thread about understanding depression: “I always described it like cancer. You might get diagnosed when you're younger, but you can probably catch it early enough and fight it off. And you're safe for a while, but you know the possibility is there that it will return. Also, now that you know it's in your genes, you worry for your family. Your children. Maybe you decide not to have kids if you're young enough. This could be an easy decision or an excruciating one. But you have to make it.” “Imagine living in a cardboard box on the street, in the rain, starving to death...and being okay with that. That's how it often makes me feel. Like I have no motivation, total apathy and I just want to melt into the floor.” Taking the time to learn about depression and trying to understand what people are feeling is a great way to show mindfulness to people who face depression on a daily basis. You may even begin to understand why winter is not fulfilling for every person that you care about. Then let that understanding translate into empathy, kindness, and allyship throughout the entire year. Do you have any advice to offer? Share in the comments below.

What we can Learn from Bilbo Baggins

For many of us, our lives are not unlike the character Bilbo Baggins, sitting comfortable and safe within the walls of our apartment home, safe like in the Shire in Middle Earth as written by author J.R.R. Tolkien. Like this hobbit before his grand adventure, many of us are comfortable: we take afternoon drinks when we like, we stroll outside when we like, and we’ll get around to adventuring when we feel up to it. But life, as The Hobbit teaches us, is filled with unexpected adventures around corners that are often considered calm. Today the Liv Ahwatukee Apartments Blog invites you to consider your life as an adventure, one that’s filled with bad or unfortunate experiences (losing luggage, experiencing a broken heart, etc.) and good adventures (falling in love, traveling the world, etc.) to even things out. In today’s post, we share a few lessons learned from one hobbit to us, lessons that can help even the weakest person on their greatest adventure. Friendship is Important One of the strongest and most often repeated themes in The Hobbit is friendship. During Bilbo’s daring adventure, he is often surrounded by companions. Without these individuals, there were times when Bilbo could have died. In our lives, it is important to remember who our friends are and to stay true to them as they are to us. You may not need them now, but who knows when a mountain troll will come knocking on your door? Appearances can be Deceiving Bilbo was not the largest of hobbits, nor was he the most intimidating. Even when faced with great odds, he did not appear to be a threat. There were times when Gandalf was sure to think he could not be successful. Despite all this, Bilbo achieved what he set out to do because he kept moving forward. No matter the size of the adventure or the number of monsters that come barging through the hallways of life, remember that the physical size or appearance of a person is no measure of their heart, passion, and will to achieve victory. Opportunity may come Knocking We’re not always looking for adventure. Sometimes the opportunity comes at a most unexpected time. Remember to take chances in life. Have the courage to say “yes” and go on an adventure for yourself when the chance arrives. Whether your adventures happen in Phoenix, Arizona or somewhere else, we wish the best for you. Share your own lessons by leaving comments about your adventures below. We’d love to read about them!