What is the point of eating that?

For the last 7 years, I have always fed our children as healthy as I possibly could.  They were, or currently are, breastfed beyong the normal recommendation.  They don't eat candy, cookies, ice cream, or processed junk.  However, I still ate it.  I had been eating it as long as I could remember and didn't see any point in changing.  I just knew that I wanted my kids to have a healthier lifestlye.  Who cared if I was filling up on empty calories?

Double Chocolate Zucchini Brownie

layered with a

Healthy Chocolate Chip Cookie

So about 2 months ago, I decided I wanted to lose the last of this baby weight from our 8 month old.  (Yes, I haven't blogged on here in that long!)  So with the help of MyFitnessPal, Pinterest, and a dear friend on the other side of the world, I started a new chapter.  It wasn't easy to cut 1,000 calories from my daily intake but we did it.  I picked up low calorie snacks to keep around and started looking for low calorie recipes.  I dropped almost 10 lbs in that first month.  However, it just didn't seem right.

Baby Spinach, Orange juice, Skim milk, Banana,

Frozen Tropical Fruit Smoothie

I got to looking at the ingredients on "low calorie" and "healthy" snacks & foods.  What on earth are half those things?!  Besides aspartame, high fructose corn syrup, and MSG (which we usually avoid anyway), there were things I had no idea what were.  What good is weightloss if your body isn't healhier because of it?  I decided that there was no point in eating something if it wasn't going to make my body stronger in the longrun.  No more empty calories here!  Well, at least not as many.  Dark chocolate chips are just too delicious and make recipes amazing.

Banana Peanut Butter Honey Ice Cream

Now I am making most of our snacks & meals from scratch.  Sure they may not be the lowest calorie, unless you only eat a small amount, but boy are they delicious and much healthier than their packaged friends.  I've even stopped buying our sons their packaged, healthy, organic snacks and have been attempting to make them from scratch.  Some attempts are more successful than others but at least I am giving it a shot.  Once the last of their packaged snacks are gone, they are stuck with what I fix!

 Failed Cereal Bars turned into Cereal Granola

All the foods pictured I made today.  They are all modified versions of other recipes.  Even "healthy" recipes often times have a lot of added oils or refined sugars.  I'm constantly looking for better versions of foods & recipes I'm already using.  It is a daunting task, but so worth it.  Finally, I am eating healthy with my kids and I love it.