Conflicting message?

Taking out the HFCS

I'm so glad our society is catching on to the fact that high fructose corn syrup (HFCS) is no good. Even better, food companies are starting to listen! I've noticed several products advertising that they are no longer using HFCS in their products or either they are making alternate products not using HFCS.

Hunt's Ketchup has completely removed HFCS. Since a lot of kids really like ketchup, this is a great thing and I hope other ketchup makers will follow their lead. Gatorade has also removed HFCS from their products. I see on their Web site that they also have a natural product available, but only available in select Whole Foods. I hope it catches on because I hate that they use artificial colors.

What products have you noticed making the switch?

No need for kid's menus - love this article!!

I get so annoyed with the kids' menus at most restaurants. All most offer are hot dogs/hamburgers, PB&J/grilled cheese, pizza, chicken nuggets, and maybe pasta. Restaurants are a great place to try new foods that you might not be able and/or willing to make at home, so why give kids such boring and unhealthy options? Eating out should be a fun adventure!

I came across this fabulous article from the New York Times that discusses this very issue.

If regular menu items are larger than your child can eat or more than you can afford, share a meal with your child or having siblings share with each other. You can also ask the manager if they'd be willing to make a smaller/cheaper portion of a regular menu item for your child. Give the little ones a chance to try new things!

Eating out with the kiddos

We don't go out to eat a lot for several reasons - I deal with food allergies, it is cheaper and usually healthier to eat at home, and I love to cook! Harper had her gymnastics recital last night, so we celebrated with dinner out, which was Pizza Hut. Not my first choice, but we made the best of it.

Harper tasting a lemon - priceless face! However, she did eat the whole thing.

Grayson showing his salad who's boss - all you can eat is right up his alley!

Carrots dipped in marinara? If you say so!

Punishing some hot wings (not fried!)

Happy campers! :)

Annoying commercial #10

This one is a doozy! Feed your kids sugary cereals and they will win awards!



Newsflash - there are tons of healthy ways to get the same nutrients added to these otherwise empty cereals.

WAY TOO BUSY!

What was I thinking, letting my son play baseball and soccer and my daughter play baseball and take gymnastics (all at the same time)? Have I lost my mind? Funny thing is, I wouldn't trade it for the world and neither would my kids. Remind me that I said that this time next year when we'll probably do it all over again. ;)

I haven't posted many pics of meals or recipes because we've been doing the bare minimum most nights lately. I get off work at 5:00, pick up the kids, get home around 5:30 and have to be at the ball field at 6:30 on most nights. Throw in homework, baths, and an 8:00 pm bedtime, and meals have to be quick! The crock pot has been my friend!

As my son gets older, he's excited to be able to do  more and more "grown up" things, like making food for himself. It has been very nice for me too - he can make sandwiches while I'm getting everything together to get out the door!

I hope to have more time for meal and recipe postings by mid June when things slow down for us. Summer cooking equals lots of grill time. YUM!

Need new ideas for school lunches?

I frequent a few different Web sites to get new and fresh ideas on what to pack Grayson for lunch. Everyone needs inspiration every now and then! Plus, there are plenty of good ideas for me for lunch too! Here a few of my favorites:

• Lunch Box Blog
• Lunchbox Limbo
• What's for lunch at our house
• another lunch

A lot of these moms use Bento-style lunch boxes for their meals, something I haven't delved into yet but plan to for my daughter (my son has a bigger appetite than those boxes allow!!) when she starts school in fall. Some of them have more time than I do to make the lunches super cute and creative (I wish I did!), but the idea is still the same - healthy, homemade food!

Great deal!

I LOVE these Rubbermaid Produce Saver containers. They make a huge difference in how long produce lasts in your fridge. They are on sale today at Amazon for $9.97 (free shipping with $25)! I think I may have to order some more!

My favorite place to go for advice

I have been a BIG fan of Dr. Sears since Grayson was a newborn. His books came highly recommended to me, and I still use them to this day. His Web site is also a great place to go to quickly get any kind of child health, nutrition, discipline, feeding,etc. questions answered.

Dr. Sears is not afraid to say what is truly best for children and why, and I appreciate that! He is a strong advocate for attachment parenting - including breastfeeding, co-sleeping, baby-wearing, and gentle discipline. He also believes strongly in the power of teaching good nutrition at an early age.

While there is no manual that is going to work for every issue for every family, Dr. Sears has been trusted in our home for many years now!

From the very beginning...

...there will be people who will try to negatively influence the eating habits of your kids!

Breast milk has always been and will always be the normal way to feed a baby. Biology and nature make that clear, if nothing else. Nursing for at least a year is best for baby AND mom, so don't be afraid or embarrassed to do what is best for everyone!

The dirty dozen and the clean fifteen

There has been a lot in the news the past couple of weeks about how pesticides effect our bodies with links to cancer and ADHD. It doesn't take a genius to know that chemicals that kill insects aren't good for humans (especially growing and developing children) to consume either. It might not kill us immediately, but it can't be good for our bodies. It is easy not to think about pesiticides if you aren't the one spraying them...they look clean at the grocery store, then you wash them again when you get home. Plus, no one really wants to worry about fruits and vegetables when there are so many other bad foods tempting us 24/7.

In my small town, organic produce can be hard to come by if you don't grow them yourself or purchase them from a local (trusted) grower. The grocery stores just don't carry a wide selection around here. To make shopping easier, gardening more practical, and to stretch your dollar, it is important to know which items you need to buy organic and which don't carry a huge risk.

The Dirty Dozen

• celery
• peaches
• strawberries
• apples
• domestic blueberries
• nectarines
• sweet bell peppers
• spinach, kale and collard greens
• cherries
• potatoes
• imported grapes
• lettuce

The Clean Fifteen

• onions
• avocados
• sweet corn
• pineapples
• mango
• sweet peas
• asparagus
• kiwi fruit
• cabbage
• eggplant
• cantaloupe
• watermelon
• grapefruit
• sweet potatoes
• sweet onions

If you have a hard time finding the right organic products at your grocery store, speak with the manager and ask if they can stock them. That is what I'm planning to do today! And don't forget to talk your local growers/famers' markets about how they raise their crops.

I heart Sesame Street!

Getting biblical

I believe that God expects us to take care of the bodies He gave us. When anyone gives you gift, the respectful thing to do is take care of it! God gave us the healthy foods we need to live naturally - fruits, vegetables, grains, and meats. Our society has gone out of its way to create unnatural foods - none of which are good for us or better for us than what God provided from the very first days of the Earth.

Genesis 1:29-30 :
And God said, Behold, I have given you every herb bearing seed, which is upon the face of all the earth, and every tree, in the which is the fruit of a tree yielding seed; to you it shall be for meat. And to every beast of the earth, and to every fowl of the air, and to every thing that creepeth upon the earth, wherein there is life, I have given every green herb for meat: and it was so.

1 Corinthians 6:19-20
Do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit, who is in you, whom you have received from God? You are not your own; you were bought at a price. Therefore honor God with your body.

Romans 12:2
Do not conform any longer to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God's will is—his good, pleasing and perfect will.

I go to a Southern Baptist church, and we are infamous for our gatherings and celebrations revolving around food, generally the unhealthy stuff. How do we get people to change their habits in the church? Should preachers be expected to lead by example and also spread this message? Something to think about.

My 100th post!

I've been blogging about what my kids are eating (and other food/health related topics) for about 4 months now, and this is my 100th post! I've had a great time doing this for many reasons.

1. I want to inspire, encourage, and assist all families in eating better, especially when it comes to their kids.
2. I believe good health is one the most important things you can give a child. You can hope, pray, and wish they will do all sorts of great things in their lives, but they won't be able to accomplish much if they aren't healthy.
3. I'm tired of my children being exposed to so many unhealthy situations, even with the education and example I provide at home.
4. I always have room for improvement myself, and this blog has encouraged me to get healthier myself and keep doing better by my kids. I certainly have to practice what I "preach"!
5. I love to write and was a journalism major in college. This has given me an outlet that I actually have time to do.
6. I can't do it alone, and I hope to drum up support for advocacy!

As always, I welcome your thoughts, opinions, and ideas! I average around 100-150 visits to the blog per day, and I truly appreciate your support!

My kids enjoying a healthy lunch yesterday while on a field trip to the zoo (turkey and low fat provolone on whole wheat bread, fresh strawberries, and pretzels). I was saddened to see what most of the other kids were eating - Lunchables, sugary "juice" boxes, potato chips, etc. A  healthy lunch is really no harder or more expensive to prepare than an unhealthy one. How do we do a better job of educating parents?

They said it, not me!

Here is a lovely beverage obviously marketed to kids that I saw at Food Lion yesterday. Hey, at least they aren't pretending to be something they aren't. I went to the Chubby web site and saw this gem... "Competitive pricing has been instrumental to the success of Chubby, positioning this premium quality brand as being affordable to children." Affordable to children? That is funny.

This has got to be a joke

My jaw literally dropped when I read that chocolate toddler formula is now available.  I seriously can't believe that any company is encouraging mothers to give their babies a "nutritional" beverage that has 19 grams of sugar in  7 oz!! I imagine a lot of one year olds will get this in a bottle...think of their teeth!

First of all, a toddler doesn't need formula. By the time a child is one year old, they should be getting their nutrients through solid food (eating just about anything an adult eats), and they are able to have regular milk and/or breast milk. If a child doesn't like or can't tolerate milk, there are plenty of other sources for calcium.

What habits are we teaching our children if we are giving them chocolate formula when they are one year old? What are we teaching them if we give up so young on giving them real food and let them drink their nutrients?

Taking it back old school

I love to see how advertising has changed over the years. If you can read the small print in this ad, it encourages moms to mix 7-Up with milk to get kids to drink their milk. Wow. Have we come very far since this?

Mmmmm....butter

Like any Paula Deen worshiping girl from the South, I sure do love some butter! There's nothing much better than a slice of fresh baked bread smothered in it. And I need real butter - not margarine (full of funky ingredients). To me, it tastes so much better and makes baked goods taste more authentic. The unfortunate part - butter is certainly not good for you...sigh. It also doesn't spread well unless you have it at room temperature or warm it up in the microwave first.

My solution? Land O' Lakes spreadable butter with olive oil. I do not claim this to be a product that you should indulge in regularly, but it is healthier than regular butter (45% less saturated fat), has more natural ingredients than margarine, and is easy to spread. They also make the same product with canola oil.

What butter products do you prefer?

How (some) chicken nuggets are made

I don't think anyone will claim that all chicken nuggets are made this way, but you can't be sure when you're eating out. Read the labels of what you're bringing into your home and ask questions at restaurants. Look for the term "mechanically separated" and stay far away from it! (Or better yet, don't serve processed chicken nuggets at all!)



The saddest part is that the kids still wanted to eat them. Our society is doing a horrible job of teaching children what real food is and how food effects our body, positively and negatively.

Confession

This post is more about me than my kids or how I feed them. I must confess, I have a TERRIBLE sweet tooth. I can seriously eat cookies or cake all day. The older I get, the worse it gets. I will go as far as to say it is an addiction. I work out 5 days a week and otherwise watch what I eat, but I have got to get rid of the excess sugar in my life. I shouldn't be eating anything I have to sneak to eat so my kids won't see me.

Starting today, I'm giving it up. I'm posting this for the world to see for accountability. I'm also posting this because my addiction is part of the reason I feed my kids the way I do. I don't want them to ever have to deal with a sugar addiction.

If you have any advice for me, I'm all ears!

This will make you think twice before giving your kids another hot dog!