Healthy Eating, My Way

So now we are reading labels and learning about our food. What do we do with all that information? We use it to make better choices, of course! But almost everything in the grocery store is full of unwanted additives and fillers you say! What are we to do?!

This is when you decide for yourself how much time and effort you are willing to devote to eating a healthy, well-balanced, real-food diet. I shoot for the 80/20 mark. That's 80% real, whole and healthy foods and 20% whatever. I attempt to keep that 20% as minimally processed as possible, but hey, who doesn't make a quick fast-food run every now and then? And by allowing yourself to not be 100% committed will make it way easier to stick to it. There is no guilt because there is no wagon to fall off of!

Mug Brownie Trial and Error

I do love me some Betty Crocker Warm Delights bowls. Mmmmmm..... And the husband loves brownies, but only when they are fresh from the oven. And he wants more than just that little bowl. He eats a few brownies, then I eat the rest of the pan over the next two (if even that) days. We're talking a 9x13 pan here. Not the little one. Nope. That would be just too easy.

So I saw this great idea that you could put brownie mix in a mug and add some water and you could have an instant brownie from the microwave. Well, yeah. That didn't work out so well.

Two of the three mugs there have been in the sink all day soaking trying to get the hardened mass of burnt sugar out of them. One of them still has the fork stuck in it! And the third, well, that was a darned good brownie from the microwave.

To eat, or not to eat.....

That is the question on almost everyone's mind these days. Whether they are on the latest fad diet or just trying to eat more real, whole foods, eaters are faced with this decision every day, at each and every meal.  One thing that brings me a little bit of inner peace, is educating myself and others on healthful eating. Now, I am not a Dietitian or Nutritionist nor have I been trained in any such thing. I am just a wife and mother of two looking to keep my family well nourished.

Let's just pause for a moment here and define "diet". Many people hear the word diet and assume it is some kind of crazy plan to lose weight. When I say diet, I am using it as a noun as defined in the dictionary: the kinds of food that a person, animal, or community habitually eats.

Whether you are looking to change your eating habits to lose weight or to just eat healthy, the first and most important step is to read. That's it.  You have to read those food labels. There are very few regulations as to what manufacturers are allowed to put on a food label. You cannot trust the front of the package. You have to read the nutritional information box and the ingredients. It may look good up there in the nutritional info, but the ingredients tell a whole other story.

Sensory Processing Disorder. What the?!

Earlier this year, our daughter was diagnosed as having a Sensory Processing Disorder. So we have been throwing ourselves into the world of Sensory Integration. I had no idea what any of this was. Not a clue. Slowly we have been mucking through various books, websites, thoughts, and everything in between to find out what we can about this so that we can help our Noodle to live a less frustrating life.

Her life is very frustrating for her since she cannot get enough sensory input to meet her needs. She has a Sensory Modulation Disorder with a sub-type of Sensory Seeking. Basically, her body's systems are not reading the sensory input that she receives so she craves more in order to satisfy those systems. So talking ends up being shouting as she tries to give her auditory system more input and she is constantly talking, singing or making noises. (We have not known silence in our house in at least 2 years now!) She has an uncontrollable urge to touch everything she encounters to add that extra sensory input about the item to her system. She still tends to put things in her mouth even at 5 years old.

At the same time, some of her systems get a bit overloaded and it causes a complete and utter catastrophic meltdown/freak out. This is mostly an auditory issue for her. So you can no longer make loud or unexpected noises in the house or it sets her off. She usually handles it okay if she has a warning and can leave the room first. Makes using a public restroom with the automatic flushing toilets a bit awkward since she is trying to race out of the stall and pull her pants up at the same time :) Lily has gotten very good at getting across the stall with her pants around her ankles before the toilet flush hits its peak!

We are not sure really where to go with this one. I have signed up for the Sensational Brain website and we are going to start using the recommendations from there for some occupational therapy for her at home next month (after we have finished moving). We will give her a few months to calm down from all the moving and schedule changing (preschool is over next month too!) and see how she is doing then.