Posted by Julie Kinney on Fri, Jun 11, 2010 @ 08:24 AM
It's very interesting the way our children think. The question out of my 5 year old's mouth at every meal I serve is, "Mom, what is that good for?" He always wants to know what color fruit or vegetable is good for what body part or what it does in our bodies.
I can't blame him for being inquisitive and actually it puts a smile on my face to know that it matters that much to him. He recently got glasses this week, and the question that came was, "Why do I need glasses if I eat so many carrots?" This came from a day when I told him that orange vegetables were good for your eyes. We eat a variety of colors for this reason and my kids make sure that when we have one color for lunch, we have another color for dinner.
Here are some tips for you to help you teach your children about variety and help engage them in colors along with variety when it comes to your fruit and vegetable servings.
- Bring them to the grocery store with and have them pick a fruit or vegetable in every color from the rainbow.
- Have your child pick the colors you eat for each meal.
- Create fruit salads with variety of colors: fruit salads and vegetable salads.
I found this website that everyone with children should know about. It is Fruits and Veggies More Matters. It is great for tips on how to add variety with color to your diet, as well as information on what nutrients are in what colors. If you are struggling with variety, check out the color list and start eating from each category!
You will be surprised how that helps with your nutrition and aids in your weight loss!
Have a great weekend!
Julie
Posted by Alicia Leeds on Wed, May 20, 2009 @ 07:57 AM
I'm just about to take off for a drive across the country! I am really looking forward to the trip but worried about keeping up my healthy eating and exercise.
I've got the cooler packed and ready to go with apples and frozen blueberries, chobani yogurt, grapes, baby carrots and cold cooked potato wedges. So I've got the sweet, crunchy and salty covered. Also, packed some HMR Mexican Enchilladas (great over a salad), HMR Lasagna, HMR Chicken Pasta Parmesan, and HMR Cheese Ravioli - all of which are delicious at room temperature.
Using the HMR 70+ pudding will be an easy way to whip up breakfast and snacks - I can just stop and pick up a coffee cup, buy a bottle of water, stir and go.
I'll bring along a box of Kashi Go Lean Cereal to munch on or add to the yogurt and maybe a HMR Benefit Bar or two cut up in a baggie for a super sweet treat.
I've got a plan to stop every couple of hours for a ten minute walk (and will make sure this happens by drinking plenty of water!) so I can fit in all my PA in multiple short bouts.
It's a tough road out there when you're trying to manage your weight and health, but HMR makes it a little easier.
See you on the left coast!
Posted by Alicia Leeds on Sun, Apr 19, 2009 @ 11:56 AM
Mark Bittman is a food columnist for the New York Times. Here's how Mark found his way to fitness even while eating for a living...
A couple of years ago, I had the typical experience of every normal, middle-aged American guy. My doctor told me I had to lose weight and lower my cholesterol and blood sugar levels. In other words, take drugs or stop eating.
But since I eat and cook for a living, and because I wanted to avoid the drug thing, I needed a different route. As it happens, the fix is pretty straight-forward, and not only does it work - when the recession arrived, I was already eating on the cheap. It's just about making the right food choices.
But before you call me a nutritionist, think about this. The nuts-and-berries stories of our ancestors - the eating-turnips-and-cabbage-all-winter stories of our great grandparents - these aren't myths. Until recently, most people struggled to get enough calories to thrive. Meat was a feast food; sugar, a luxury; fat, a treasure. As we got smarter, we converted plant energy into high-calorie food that kept well. Things like cooking oil, meat, cheese and alcohol. And by the 20th century, we were doing that so efficiently that we started to eat in a way that makes us fat and unhealthy.
We now produce a billion animals like they were widgets; animals that produce 18 percent of all greenhouse gases. And we've ended up paying more for food that's bad for us than we do for what actually sustains us.
I'm not exactly a back-to-the-earth type, but it's clear that the key to avoiding the lifestyle diseases that plague many of us - even me! - is the same key to saving money on food: go to the source. Eat more plants, fewer animals, less processed foods. Easy to say, but tempted by delicious burgers, fries and hazelnut gelato at every turn, how to do?
For me the answer turned out to be simple: I began to eat plants and only plants. Vegetables and fruits, mostly. But beans and whole grains too, all day. At night, I reverted to the indulgent omnivore, and let myself eat the food I love most, but with a little restraint. I lost 30 pounds. My cholesterol and blood sugar went back to normal and my doctors love me. I go to the supermarket and spend half as much money for twice as much food. I have a smug smile on my face, because by an infinitesimal amount, I'm reducing the pace of global warming. And all by doing what my mother told me: I eat my vegetables.
Follow this link to hear Mark tell his story on NPR Weekend Edition, Sunday April 19, 2009:
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=103257424
Posted by Alicia Leeds on Tue, Apr 07, 2009 @ 12:23 PM
"How much heavier were you?" my Tuesday Ladies' Class wants to know.
Up 25 (and down 25) - A 50 pound swing. Today I'm right in the middle.
I tell my Tuesday Ladies about my recent trip to the grocery store - Ben and Jerry's on sale 2 for 5. Leslie and I choose 2 pints, put them in the cart. 160 calories a serving - 4 servings per container that's 640 calories for each pint of frozen yogurt. I know Leslie won't eat her whole container tonight - but I will eat mine - and then some of hers, too.
I'm turning the cart down the end of the aisle and coming up through the meat section. Looking at the pints in the cart. She choose Half Baked - some cookie dough and brownie yumminess and I choose Cherry Garcia. I love the deep dark semi sweet chocolate chips in the creamy sweet cherry yogurt - and I'll spoon a bit of the brownie stuff in, too.
It won't be enough. 800 calories of frozen yogurt and when it's over it won't be enough. I'll go to sleep wanting more and wishing I didn't eat it. I'll wake up feeling crummy.
25 pounds up and 25 pounds down. Here I am in the middle of the store, thinking about my Ben and Jerry's. I love frozen yogurt. I love them. And I deserve it. It's Sunday (or is it Saturday?) It's my day off. It's on sale and I never have it. I'll walk six miles tomorrow.
I already made it past the Reeses Peanut Butter Eggs. Probably the most perfect combination of textures and flavors to ever grace the candy aisle. They come in a six pack. 160 calories each. 960 calories of peanut butter eggs. They look SO good.
They only come around once a year and I already had one the other night. I would have had another one right away, except there wasn't another one, so I had some blueberries.
I turn the cart back down the ice cream aisle and put the Ben and Jerry's back. I put 4 bags of frozen blueberries (at $4.45 a pop) into my cart. For that money I could get 7 pints of Ben and Jerry's.
25 pounds up, 25 pounds down, and here I am in the middle with my bags of frozen blueberries. It's not about the weight, and it is. It's not about the calories, and it is. It's not about the frozen yogurt or the blueberries. It's not What I'm Hungry For.
It's what I choose to do. It's how I feel about myself. It's still unlearning the meaning of "treat". It's putting into practice what I know about health. It's accepting how I behave around food and learning better ways to be.
Right now, Shaw's brand frozen blueberries are my magic bullet. I can eat the whole bag. 210 Calories. I could eat 2 bags - 420 calories and still come out ahead. Shoot, I could eat 4 bags for about the same calories as the Ben and Jerry's. And I can eat! - but not 4 bags of frozen blueberries at one sitting.
That's the point. That's the point I try to make in class with my Tuesday Ladies.
My healthy weight is the result of trying to accept who I am, focusing on who I want to be, and making the healthy choices that will help me be better here and get there. My struggle with food is the weight I will have to keep learning how to carry.