I created this blog so I can post my ideas, my motivation and my inspiration to choose healthier food options! Nutritiously well-fed! This along with activity that keeps us well-fit and overall fun life events. I always include my kids in my efforts of being well-fed and well-fit! However, as much as it can be a challenge for adults to choose better, healthier foods and to get going with a workout routine, getting kids to have healthy eating habits can be just as tricky!
I need to take more photos of the kid’s dinner plates, I don’t do it often because the kid’s plates are just not as pretty as the adult-version of my meals. However, everything I make for my own dinner I make for Nico and Kali. Generally, they eat the same as us. Kali is the best eater, she’ll take down everything and ask for more! This includes broccoli rabe, regular broccoli, pork and chicken and fish and she loves eggs! All kinds of eggs! And cheese… and yogurt… and sweet potatoes… and carrots…
Nico, he takes a little more effort. It’s interesting, because it’s not so much getting him to eat the healthy options I give him; he loves pork, used to really love ribs, eats the chicken meals I make as well as steak with baked potato, hard boiled eggs and enjoys black beans and peanut butter! Or an avocado with a spoon… and gloves.
He’s actually my little island boy, with his super blond hair and his favorite foods being shrimp, snow crab, cod fish and salmon!! When he was younger he loved salmon! My husband would take him out to dinner while I was away working for news12, and he’d order him an adult salmon meal. The kid had it good!
But, his appetite cravings and eating habits mirror that of most children… not to mention the child in most grown ups! He loves good healthy food and he eats most of the dinner I put in front of him, but he doesn’t eat hardly any of the vegetables and does have his junk food cravings! That’s where his unhealthy choices come in. He likes all the things I don’t ever eat (nor my husband). When I was a child, I had a terrible diet, terrible. I wasn’t so much of a chip or cracker girl as my sisters were, but I had a sweet tooth! My father had to go to all the places we would hang out at during the summer and show the person working the snack counter who I was and tell them “this little girl is to only have one candy bar a day”. That was actually being very generous; I don’t allow Sneaks have a candy bar a day! But, that was what I loved and if no one was there to stop me, my meals would consist of zagnuts, reese cups and maybe a greasy – but yummy – Northside Beach cheeseburger followed by a kitkat! Thinking of eating those candy bars today makes me want to throw up and then go for a super long run. I can’t tell you the last time I had just typical candy. As for chocolate, I only eat dark, 70% cocoa, dark chocolate. I like that bitter taste! Like coffee! People do change. Well, maybe just tastebuds…
So being a mom, I know I’m here to help him with better eating habits and limitations. He never has fast food, which the great thing about where we live is that we only have Dunkin Donuts and a Burger King. My babysitter took him to Burger King once. He threw it up when he got home telling me it hurt his stomach. I try to pack his lunch everyday because the school lunches, I haven’t seen them myself, but I doubt they’re the best choices available. However if he wants to buy, he’ll just go buy, it’s different from how it was when we went to school. He does hear my explanations and does his best to understand, saying “ok, I will eat healthy and no junk food but I don’t know what that is.”. He’ll then still go for odd orange cheese crackers or bagged muffins. I’ll pack a container of fresh cut fruit and he won’t touch it at school.
He’s a kid and I don’t want him to go on a sweet-tooth-processed-food-crazy-binge when he does get to have something unhealthy; kind of akin to the kids you knew who were raised very strict growing up… only for them to arrive at college to be an absolute drunken mess!!!!
So I try to do my best. He loves milk, and the great thing is we can get milk here from the local dairy farmers which seems to be a healthier choice than mass produced milk bought at the grocery. And it’s local!
And he does drink any drink fast! He always has, even his bottle as a baby, down in seconds! So I don’t buy can’t afford apple or fruit juice.
To help prevent him from having a sugar-overload snack attack on a daily basis, when we got to the grocery store I only allow him to choose one item. One. So if he wants to take home the bright neon orange cheese crackers with fake peanut butter or the bag of sugar banana muffins or a box sugar granola bars or those pringles chips with the chemical orange powder, I allow it, but he can only choose one, I’m not buying all of them. That way they’re not ALL in our pantry. And at home I can limit him. Plus, sometimes I’ll make my own versions of what he wants. So instead of having these…
I make these… sprouted wheat pumpkin muffins.
And by doing this, I feel like…
These muffins are super good, and so are the Superfood Energy Muffins I have made. He likes them! And because he is allowed to have some snacks and pizza and fun food every now and then, to him it’s nothing overly special, he doesn’t go crazy! He’ll save that snack option, like the muffin for school, or when he’s at a party he will be excited but can hold back “There’s cake? Yayyy!!! I’ll have it after we eat” So instead of him getting crazy and being like…
He’s more like this when he’s at a pizza party…
I do load up on fruit. All kinds of fruit, so when he comes in after school and is wanting a snack, I can offer him a banana or an apple or an orange or strawberries or blueberries. That helps. Especially in the summer when fruits are in season and so ripe and naturally sweet!
Although kids may want their snacks, I think they also want to be fit and feel good too! Look at my nephew Ashton working out and looking strong! That’s some #Fitspiration right there! He even made his own chart of eating healthy! I love the simplicity of it, “did I eat healthy today? Yes, Check!!”
Kids naturally love to go outside, keep busy just playing! And that’s always great!
And they like to always learn new things, not even realizing they’re getting a workout!
My sisters help their kids eat healthier too! Like making Roro a healthy smoothie!
And my other sister’s kids are good eaters just the same! Here’s Evelyn loving the pork meal her mom made!
When they’re good eaters you can add on more goodness! My sister’s protein pancakes with fresh strawberries! Kiddies love this! So much more healthier than IHOP!
And Jasper is a vegetable eater! That’s an achievement in itself! One of the biggest challenge is getting kids to eat their vegetables. He loves them!!! And he’s always a happy boy!
Obviously we all do what we can the best way we can.
And when the kids plates are clean and it was something healthy, I feel like this!
But trust me if it wasn’t that great of a food item healthy-wise, just keep trying! You have to know there could be some parenting choices that are worse!
