Eating healthy is something we do better at, and then backslide at a bit, and then do good at again… sound familiar? Healthy to me, is something I define as: eating as many whole foods as possible, eliminating as many pre-packed and convenience food as possible, limiting sweets and indulging in them in moderation and using proper portion control.

It shouldn’t be that hard, right?

Well, it’s even a little bit easier now because Big Daddy is working out and lifting weights and wants to eat really healthy. Woohoo! Of course, that has it’s difficult points -working a picky eater into a healthy menu takes a little bit of finesse but I can handle it. And believe me, I am LOVING the new menu (hello more chicken, goodbye too much ground beef!)

For the kids, I’m adjusting their diets somewhat but not as extreme as ours because they’re not trying to work out and lose weight. So basically, I didn’t eliminate breakfast cereal entirely, but I did limit their options and I don’t fix that every morning. They wanted ice cream, so we compromised with mini ice cream sandwiches so that it’s a smaller portion. I won’t be buying ice cream every week, either.

Last weekend I went grocery shopping with our new healthy eating in mind and here’s just a little sample of the healthy things I bought for us to eat:

Chicken of course.
Solid white albacore tuna.
Lean lunch meat (for sandwich wraps mainly.)
And a little bit of very lean ground beef because we’re all crazy if we think Big Daddy is going to let it go completely. ;P
Dried beans
We already had farm fresh organic eggs.
All natural peanut butter
Turkey bacon

String cheese.
Mini Babybel Light – we wanted to try them. Good, but because of the cost, we’ll stick with string cheese.
Plain yogurt
Cottage Cheese
Feta cheese

Whole grain braid
Multi-grain and other higher fiber tortilla wraps
More wild rice was on the list but we forgot it! We’ll be picking up some more soon.
I also need to pick up some more Wasa crackers.

We already had a ton of fresh produce from the organic produce coop we’re in, but I also picked up some baby spinach, and green onions. Green onions are my favorite way to spice up scrambled eggs, cream cheese on a bagel-thin, sandwich wraps, etc.

So I’m curious.. is there anything you would add to the list? What is your favorite healthy food to buy?

Photo credit: Some rights reserved by Matter = Energy

You think I’m kidding, I’m not! A couple of years ago I weaned my family off the sugar and food coloring abundant dessertified forms of yogurt available on the store shelves. I say “weaned”.. truth is I just stopped buying it. Since then (except on rare occasions) we’ve only bought the large tubs of plain yogurt. We’ve even made our own!

It wasn’t hard, the kids made the switch easily. We still add a little bit of sugar and flavor, but the difference is that we are in control of the amounts, and there’s nothing else in there besides what we put in it. And you’d be amazed at how little sugar, or honey, or jam, or whatever, it takes to sweeten up the yogurt enough to get the kids to love it! We’ve mixed it with maple flavor and brown sugar, we’ve done vanilla and pumpkin pie spice. Get creative!

But I have a new reason to love plain yogurt because it’s FAT FREE and LADEN with protein. Practically dripping. We buy the Yoplait Fat Free Plain Yogurt in a 2lb container and with my ongoing exercise challenge, I’ve been paying more attention to the nutritional label to make sure I get enough protein, carbs, fat, etc, in my diet. I learned that I haven’t been getting quite enough protein in my diet. The challenge to add more protein without adding too much fat (short of supplements) can be a bit tricky because a lot of protein rich foods also have fat – milk, cheese, meat, eggs, etc. But not plain yogurt.

Check out these nutritional facts:

Yoplait Fat Free Plain Yogurt:

Serving Size: 1 cup / 227g Calories: 130 Calories from Fat: 0 Total Fat – Grams 0 % DV Fat 0 Saturated Fat – grams 0 % DV Saturated Fat 0 Trans Fat – grams 0 Cholesterol – mg 5 % DV Cholesterol 2 Sodium – mg 220 % DV Sodium 9 Potassium – mg 550 % DV Potassium 15 Total Carbohydrate – grams 19 %DV Carbohydrate 7 Dietary Fiber – grams 0 % DV Dietary Fiber 0 Sugars – grams 17 Protein – grams 15 % DV Protein 30 % DV Vitamin A 0 % DV Vitamin C 0 % DV Calcium 40 % DV Iron 0 % DV Vitamin D 0 % DV Thiamin 10 % DV Riboflavin 30 % DV Phosphorus 30 % DV Magnesium 8 Diet Exchanges 1-1/2 skim milk

Plain yogurt is my new “Go to” snack, especially when mixed with a tablespoon of Mackays Lemon Curd and a serving of thawed frozen raspberries. My mouth is watering just thinking about it! Oh, Yoplait Fat Free Plain Yogurt, I *heart* you!

Plain yogurt is helping me get enough protein while I’m working out, and it’s also allowing me to have tasty and healthy snacks that satisfy because I’m horrible about sticking to healthy diets if I don’t enjoy them. I firmly believe that’s an important key to develop a healthy eating habit that will stick.  I keep harping on the Yoplait Fat Free Plain Yogurt, because these are the nutritional facts for that brand. Other brands may not have the same numbers. I also specifically mentioned Mackays Lemon Curd for the same reason, it had the lowest calories and fat per serving. The important thing is to always check the label and choose the best option to meet your needs. In this case it was low fat and high protein. Yay protein!

Do you have any high protein foods that work for you?

This post has been submitted to Works for me Wednesday. Thanks, Kristen!

Nutritional information and images from the Yoplait website.

I shouldn’t be telling you about this… but I will, because winning a VitaMix Blender would be REALLY cool! The more people I tell, the more people who will enter and spoil my chances. But I’ll not be that greedy and I’ll give you a chance to win, too, because as I said – winning a VitaMix Blender would be REALLY cool. Right?!

So here’s the scoop:

Jessie Hawkins, founder of Vintage Remedies, is giving away a free Vitamix 5200 on her blog. Entry is simple and the drawing is random so you’ve got just as much chance to win as all the rest of us. Hop on over, check it out and see for yourself. =)

If you’ve never heard of the VitaMix (seriously?) you can learn more about it at their website to see why it is that you really want to enter to win one!

The season is upon us. Not the holiday season, the back to school season! The get back on our school schedule, pull out the new school books, stock up on school supplies and no more sleeping in late season.

Not that we ever sleep in late around here. Ahem.

Typically speaking we take the month of August off after having schooled for the whole remainder of the year. This year, however, we’re still going and we’re doing a bit of something during the month of August to help transition into the new school year.

Princess, Age 9.3

We’re using the 4th Grade Brain Quest Workbook to transition from our 3rd grade curriculum last year to the 4th & 5th grade curriculum for this year. At the beginning of September we’ll begin our new year with the following curriculum:

• Language Arts/Science/Bible: 5th Grade Switched on Schoolhouse
• Math: 4th Grade SOS
• History: The Mystery of History Vol 1; Where in the World is Carmen Sandiego, Treasures of Knowledge, Teacher Edition & My America (an A Beka Book similar to this one.)
  
• Handwriting: Proverbs from the Bible
• Other:
  • Clue Finders Math Ages 9-12
  • Clue Finders 4th Grade Adventures
  • Logical Journey of the Zoombinis Deluxe
  • Math Missions Grade 3-5

Drama Queen, Age 6.3

We’re using the 1st Grade Brain Quest Workbook to both review some of the first grade concepts she began last year and also, pick up where she left off and practice the new concepts. Once she really gets the hang of reading, she’ll be able to move on:

• Reading: McGuffey’s Eclectic Primer, Storybook Treasury of Dick and Jane and Friends, and various vintage readers and workbooks
• Handwriting: Proverbs from the Bible
• Grammar (as we get to it): First Language Lessons, Grades 1 and 2
• Math: Spectrum Math Grade 1 (Math U See Manipulatives for hands on)
  
• Science: Discovering God’s World, participate in experiments with Princess
• Other:
  • Health, Safety and Manners 1
    
  • History – TMOH, Carmen Sandiego & My America with Princess
  • DK Smart Steps First Grade
  • Now I’m Reading!
  • Dora’s Backpack Adventure and Lost City Adventure

Little Prince, Age 3.7

He also has a Brain Quest Workbook, Pre-K, and he’s doing some early pages out of that as his willingness and ability allows. Other than that his schooling will consist mainly of:

• Learning to write some letters and his name.
• Hands on play time with his blocks, animals and trains.
• Watching Sid the Science Kid, SuperWhy and WordWorld. (Yeah, I just put cartoons down as school curriculum – so what?)
• Playing his Caillou Thinking Skills and Caillou Alphabet games. I’d like to also get the Caillou Counting game.
• Trying to play his Blue’s Clues Kingergarten game.
• Keeping him from destroying school work by entertaining him with all of the above.

A lot of these have been given to us over the years, many of them have been passed down from child to child. Some of them I found on sale somewhere and many of them I hunted down specifically trying to find the best deal. I choose things based on how well they meet my goals for the child and often personal recommendations from friends but if it doesn’t work as well as I’d like or if I find something that looks better, we happily try something new next year. We’re very laid back that way. Well, when I say we, I mean “I.” My husband would prefer I was a little less laid back and so I’m working on that.

How is the upcoming year looking for you? How do you find and choose your curriculum? I’m interested to know.

This post is happily submitted to the NOT Back to School Blog Hop: Curriculum Week at Darcy’s My 3 Boybarians.

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I’m a snacker. We have a snack every afternoon at three, but it’s late at night after the kids go to bed that I get really snacky. Since I’m up late cleaning, I want to go ahead and have a snack but I want to make it smart.

Here’s a list of some of my favorite smarter snack choices:

• Yogurt – I buy plain yogurt and then flavor it myself with vanilla and a minimum amount of sugar substitute.
• 100 Calorie Snack-Packs – There are a lot of brands offering these now, I like Quaker Cinnamon Streusel Mini Delights and Chex Mix Chocolate Caramel. Feeds the sweet tooth with a limited amount of damage.
• Rice cakes – Yes, I eat those. Cinnamon Apple is good.
• Nuts, in the shell – I eat peanuts or pistachios. Buying them in the shell means you have to spend time de-shelling them in between each one, which means it isn’t as easy to eat as many. (Whereas you can grab a whole handful of peanuts out of a can and pop them in your mouth at once.) Nuts do contain fat, but it’s a healthy fat and they’re also a good source of protein and other vitamins.

As you can tell, I’m a carb snacker. I don’t mind fruits and veggies during the day but when I feel “snacky,” I prefer carbs all the way.

What do you snack on?

Fruits are packed with vitamins, generally contain fiber which is necessary for proper digestion, usually contain a lot of water (also necessary for proper digestion among other things,) are usually low in calories and fat and contain natural sugars for energy.

If you’re “Battling the Bulge” with me this October, here’s a little list of calories and weight watcher points for a variety of fruits. Keep this handy for easy tracking!

Fruit Calories & Points

Bing cherries – 1 cup = 88 calories w/ 2.7 grams of fiber = 1 point

peach – 1 medium = 42 calories w/ 2 grams of fiber = 1 point

grapes – 1 cup = 114 calories w/ 1 gram of fiber = 2 points

kiwi – 1 medium = 46 calories w/ 2 grams of fiber = 1 point

apples – 1 medium = 88 calories w/ 3 grams of fiber = 1 point

pears – 1 medium = 98 calories w/ 4 grams of fiber = 1 point

cantaloupe – 1 cup diced = 56 calories w/ 1 gram of fiber = 1 point

bananas – 1 lrg. = 125 calories w/ 3 grams of fiber = 2 points

blackberries – 1 cup = 75 calories w/ 7 grams of fiber = 1 point

grapefruit – 1 lrg. = 53 calories w/1 gram of fiber = 1 point

strawberries – 1 cup halved = 45 calories w/ 3.5 grams of fiber = 1 point

watermelon – 1 cup diced = 48 calories w/0 grams of fiber = 1 point

I found this list online and I’m pretty sure it’s correct, please let me know if you find discrepancies.

Also, check out this list from The Fruit Pages which has the nutritional info for even more fruits.