[Ed Note: This is a guest post from Angelle of NourishMD.com.]
As a mom there are some things I feel so great about and other things I wish I did much better. You too, I'm sure.
I do a great job feeding my kids REAL food everyday. I am always working on getting better at the planning and prep part, which makes life so much easier when I do it. It also brings my food bill down. So, I'm springing into action (again). I’m back to scheduling the time to plan and prep for the week. I like to involve the whole family in some aspect of prepping the week’s food. My kids love to cook and when I'm organized it's so fun to get them into the kitchen with me. The life lessons are so rich. They learn more about REAL food and about how people who want to be healthy have to think ahead and have REAL food ready to go. They get to apply all the math they learn at school so they can stop asking me, "When am I ever going to need to know about fractions?"! They also learn how food feeds not only the body, but the spirit. I talk with them about making sure to include the most missing ingredient – vitamin L (Love) - into the meals and snacks they are helping with. It's so funny because often when we are eating together and I try to have them guess what ingredients are in the meal or snack, they always remind me that I added lots of vitamin L too!
Planning and prepping healthy meals and snacks can be stressful at times. Like everything else, 90% of the stress comes from our response to the situation. I’m always working on 'reframing' the planning and prepping and seeing it as a time to involve the kids more (again), and Mike too. We could easily make it a fun family time if we choose too. I recently heard a 14-year old chef on the radio who said he became passionate about cooking because he started cooking with his mom and dad everyday when he was really little and it was fun for the whole family. They chose to make it fun. We can make it fun, right?
My kids are 9, 9 and 11, so they are definitely old enough to do a lot in the kitchen. Some of the prepping they do (when I ask them to do it) includes:
· Making a big batch of trail mix.
· Washing and cutting vegetables.
· Baking whole grain cookies or muffins.
· Scrambling a dozen eggs for egg roll-ups.
· Cooking taco meat.
~Angelle
Some of what's on the Batten Family menu this week:
Breakfast: lightly poached eggs on a bed of spinach with avocado; Smoothies (of course); Overnight Pancakes, Taco Salad, Apple Cole Slaw w/ Turkey
Lunch: Taco Salad, Salmon Salad on Greens, Salsa Salad w/ quinoa, beans, cucumbers, tomatoes, cheese cubes and salsa, Apple Cole Slaw
Dinner: Roasted Chicken, Layered Bean Dip w/ Chef Jackie's Taco Seasoning, Michigan Chicken Salad
Snacks: Vegetables, Fruit Kabobs, Trail Mix, & Chocolate Coconut Raw Bars, Banana Bon Bons from our REAL Snack eBook
Angelle is a Holistic Health and Parenting Coach who helps parents navigate how to feed their families REAL food and solve health and parenting problems holistically. Along with Dr. Susan McCreadie, a holistic pediatrician, she shares her expertise and her own parenting journey at www.NourishMD.com. It’s not always pretty, but it’s always REAL!
