Day 2 Update

Day 2 has gone pretty well.  Generally, when the hubs is out of town coaching, the kids and I hit up fast food for lunch and then sometimes we cook supper. ;)  For lunch today we had our planned egg salad sandwiches.  Then for snack I was going to do a combo of string cheese and strawberries THEN I got on Pinterest.  That place is great, but scary all at once. 

So we ended up NOT doing the string cheese/strawberries for snack.  Instead we had this glorious smoothie: 

Photo Source

Seriously they are great. Tomorrow we are going to try the Berry Banana ones on her website.  I was a little hesitant to try these because I do not have luck with smoothies, but I decided to go for it because the kids were hungry and these were seriously easy.  I have never thought to put oatmeal in my smoothies either! This would also make a fabulous breakfast! 

For supper since we had egg salad for lunch I'm planning on doing "muffin tins" for supper.  Yet, another idea from Pinterest idea. Instead of the planned egg "cupcakes."  I won't make that mistake again. While the kids love eggs, I think that is a little egg overkill. 

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Day 1

Today was only day 1 of the 28 day challenge.  Not as difficult as I thought, except for the fact that our supper ended up being pancakes.  I couldn't bring myself to pay 3.58 for a bag of half hard Texas toast today at the store.  So we improvised!  Can't believe we already had a snag in day 1, but we didn't give in and that is the important part.

Tomorrow is Day 2 and it is an eggy type of day.  I have egg salad sandwiches for lunch and egg "cupcakes" for supper.  I didn't plan that to well, so we may be trading one of the suppers meant for alter in the week with the egg cupcakes.  Oops.  I should have I paid more attention to that one as well.

I got most of my "prep" done.  er not really.  I thawed the hamburger, but forgot to cook it and I boiled the eggs, but forgot to salad them.  There is always tomorrow.  Also the fruit roll-ups that I was trying, didn't work out so well.  So I have one roll and am not trying again.  I hate the dehydrator and also hate the fact that it takes 8-10 hours to dehydrate.  Loud dehydrators bug me. 

The Wheat thins I will try tomorrow. Other then that I did buy a few snack-y items for the kids this week since mine weren't the greatest.  I also got a ton of fruit today, so hopefully that will last us the week.

Are you doing the 28 day challenge? What are your go to recipes in a crunch?

Menu Planning for 22-28th

Hello again!  It's only been a few days since I posted last.  How proud of me are you.  Anyway.

Here is what we are planning for our first 7 days of this challenge. I hope to update you a couple times a week to let you know how we are doing. Also if you have any easy fun recipes or snack ideas then pass them my way.

 

Sunday:
 Lunch: Pot Luck at church
Supper: Rest of the left-overs from last week

Monday:
Lunch: French toast bake with watermelon
Supper:  Egg Salad Sandwiches (for me and the kids, Jeff-leftovers)

Tuesday:
Lunch: BBQ Beef Sandwiches (Freezer meal)
Supper: Stuffed Taco Shells (The recipe I found makes 2 batches, 1 for supper and 1 for the freezer)

Wednesday:
Lunch: Leftover Taco Shells
Supper: Chimichanga's with Rice

Thursday:
Lunch: Leftover Chimi's
Supper: Crispy Chicken w/Bow-tie pasta

Friday:
Lunch: L.O. Chicken
Supper: Homemade Pizza with Cheesy bread-sticks

Saturday:
*Clean out the fridge day* any and all leftovers*  (if there aren't any we will do pancakes)

Snacks: Yes, the kids MUST have snacks. So here we go, we will be doing homemade fruit roll-ups, homemade wheat thins, and mozzarella bites
I also plan on trying this cobbler  one day.

How do I plan of making this all happen without cooking everyday.  Oh friends, how you doubt my awesome abilities. :)

Sunday is officially going to be my day of cooking/getting ready for the week day.  I usually do all of my grocery shopping this day anyway, so why not add in a few hours of prep as well.

TO DO SUNDAY:

Brown 3lbs of Hamburger (2lbs for taco shells, 1lb for chimi's) 

Boil Eggs

Make Wheat thins/fruit roll ups 

This week seems fairly easy for food prep. I did a lot of leftover lunches so hopefully that will take care of cooking twice a day!  Also some of these are new recipes so we will see!

Another Challenge?

I cannot believe it has been a whole month since I have last posted.  Where does the time go?  I definitely am not one of those "good" bloggers who blog 1-3 times a day!  I try, I have the best intentions, then a month goes by!

Anyway, on to the title of this post.  Another challenge is in our midst people! ;)  Yes, I sound so serious.  It's not that bad.  I hope not anyway.  After looking over our finances the last month I realized we ate out A LOT!!  That is saying a lot for us, because we do our fair share of eating out.  If I think it is to much then there is a problem.

With that being said.  The hubs and I have decided to go from 1 of his paychecks to the next with NO eating out.  That is 28 days of no fast food, no Arby-Q's, no Angela's fajita's, and no chicken nuggets.  For us eating out is more of a convenience thing.  We don't do it because we have to, we do it because we are tired and neither of us want to cook.  Our night meal is the equivalent to most people's lunch.  I generally make a healthy good home-cooked lunch.  That is our family meal.  I stay at home and the hubs works, so for us that just works.  So by the time supper comes around, I'm tired and the hubs doesn't get home until at least 6 most nights.

There will be a couple of days in there where we won't worry. For instance, the 21st we will both be out of town for various reasons, so we crossed that day out and then we are ending on the 19th since it is a Sunday.  So we are cutting out 2 days.  Not bad. 

For those of you saying this isn't a challenge, well, then you don't know me very well!  This will be more challenging for me then working out everyday or giving birth. So I may be a little dramatic, but I'm serious too. :)

So, watch for menu planning again and yummy recipes to come.  We start in T-Minus 3 days!

Could not be more proud...

This challenge has been just that, a challenge!! More so for Jeff and I then the kids.  They will really eat anything you put in front of them.  When explaining things to them you could tell they were a little weary of doing it, but yesterday I had my proud mama moment.

Our neighbor lady asked my kids if they wanted a snack, the came running to me and said can we?!  I said sure.  My oldest son said, well, mom what if it has sugar we will have to tell her no.  Will that hurt her feelings???  Luckily it was nothing with sugar, but for my kids to know and not want to accept that as a snack made me quite the proud mama. 

Are you and your family doing the challenge? How have things been going???

Breakfast Cookie

One of the blogs I follow is fitnessista.  She is gluten free, healthy eating, new mama.  She makes her own recipes and manages to come up with some pretty delish finds.  One thing I have done in the past is her breakfast cookie recipe.  It was perfect for me this summer when I was working because I would just take it with me and eat it during my morning rush.  It worked perfectly.

Now that we are working on cutting out sugar I have decided to bring this back.  For me at least. ;)  Yes, I realize I need to let me kiddo's enjoy the benefits, but for now, it's my little secret. 

The recipe for this is HERE.  It is right along the lines of the "real food" we've been trying to do.  The add in's can get tricky if you aren't paying attention.  I just made one and popped it in the refrigerator.  Mine included oats, 1/4 scoop protein powder, 1/2 banana, almond butter, milk, and a small squirt of honey.  I believe she used stevia and cinnamon, but I used a small dribble of honey.  hmm... In the morning I will top it with the left over strawberries or blueberries that we have.  In the past I have added in chocolate chips, but thought I better pass on those.  Also I usually put applesauce instead of the banana.  I'm feeling fiesty today so went with a banana.

If you try this let me know! I'm anxious to see what you add.  What do you do for an easy and healthy breakfast? 

Being aware...

Today marks another day eating "real foods."  Now while we have not gone 100% we are being incredibly conscious about what we are putting into our mouths. We have changed out about 1/2 of what is in our pantry to healthier no sugar versions.  Peanut-butter and Jelly were the first 2 things to go. I was actually surprised to see sugar in peanut-butter.

Luckily, my granola is still a big hit with the kids, and today they even added blueberries to it.  Major score with Jared! <3  He was definitely impressed.  Lunches were scheduled to be egg salad, but this preggo mama is not feeling it.  So today we are going to do some left overs that we have including chicken noodle soup and meatballs.  All made with "real foods."  Along with that we will have some apple slices and triscuits.  YES! You can have triscuits!  here are less then 5 ingredients and NO sugar.

Tonight we are having a ham and cheese braid along with salad.  The bread is ww and cheese approved!  Speaking on bread. I did make the honey whole wheat bread and it was great. Jared loved it, while the rest of us used up the rest of the bread.  In my opinion that is definitely one of those acquired tastes.  So, instead of going cold turkey with the bread, I'm going back a little and doing half and half until we get used to it. Perfect? No, but it's a start!

What are you doing this week to change your eating habits?!