I've Bought the Farm

Okay, not the whole farm, but a share of it. A tiny, tiny share, but it makes a big difference to my family! More about that in a minute.

Day 4 of no refined sugar, and I'm doing really well. I've had temptations all around and have avoided them all. I was out at a school and was offered cookies that I didn't take. I had sushi for lunch and decided not to eat the spicy tuna after seeing HFCS in the spicy sauce (!). I love spicy tuna, so that's huge. At a late meeting, I was offered cookies and other sweets for snacks, and I didn't eat them. I'm figuratively keeping my hands in my pockets, and I'm proud of myself. I've been feeling really good, too. No mid-afternoon sleepies. Now I just have to keep going.

In addition to kicking the sugar and drinking much more water(much, much water), we've been eating all whole foods for the last week. That's going really well. It's all been easy: buying the food and fixing the recipes really hasn't taken me more time. Plus, given that it's all so filling, I'm finding that I'm eating a little less. Tonight I made a gorgeous Corn and Kidney Bean Chili with a Lemon Chickpea salad (both from The Great American Detox Diet) and could barely eat half. It's so good, too!

Back to the farm thing, I've decided to try buying a box of fresh produce from a local farm every two weeks. I was able to get all the produce I needed from our local PCC market, but for quite a high price. Plus, not much of the food was local. Organic is my priority, but I'd like to do what I can to support our local farmers too. After a chat with a friend, I've narrowed it down to two: Full Circle Farm and Klesick Family Farm. Spud.com is an online service from which you can order organic produce as well as other groceries, but not enough of it was local for my taste. I might come back to that, though. I think of my two final choices, I'm going with Full Circle because they actually grow most of their own produce on site and I really like that. I'm going to order my first box this weekend, so we'll see how it goes! I don't get to choose the mix, but can tailor what we eat each week based on what's in the box. Also, because the market is so close, I can also supplement. Another piece is clicking into place!

Jamie Oliver's third "Food Revolution" is available now. He gets the high schoolers involved and it's just heartbreaking and uplifting at the same time. A must watch! Just be prepared to cry.

A Token of Hope

As you guys know, I'm enamored of Jamie Oliver's "Food Revolution", both as a TV show and as a mission. I am horrified at what we feed our children in our school lunches and at the dinner table; obesity and its related illnesses are a national epidemic and this is a root cause. We have to do something about this.

Today this article was posted on Edutopia: School Lunches Go Back to the Land and it just makes me giddy. Whole foods being served to kids in schools? Kids working on a farm? Recylcling and composting? Love it!

If they can do in Baltimore, why can't we do it here? Or there, wherever you are? We should be doing better for our kids and this gives me much hope.

Hey! I Resemble That Remark!

Our library is so cool! Today it sent me an email to let me know that one of my thousands of on-hold books had come in: The Great American Detox Diet by Alex Jamieson. (Thanks for the recommendation, Tia!) So, I went down the big hill to pick it up, and I'm already hooked.

Alex Jamieson is the fiancee of Morgan Spurlock of Supersize Me and was part of the documentary. After he complete the 30 days, gaining 24.5 pounds and 65 points of cholesterol(!), Alex helped him detox using the principles in this book. I've only read the first two chapters, but I'm already enjoying it. It's easy to read and has just the right amount of information. (I'm finding it really easy to get overwhelmed with this; there's just so much to know!)

In her introduction, she talks about her upbringing in Oregon on mostly organic and whole foods and how she really never paid attention to what she was eating or how it made her feel. It wasn't until she was a young adult and got into some bad eating habits that she noticed how the food she ate made her feel. Her skin changed, she got more bloated and had other intestinal problems, and she dealt with headaches and periods of depression. Morgan also felt much of the same in his shortened experiment with eating McDonald's for every meal.

As I was reading it, every word was resonating with me. After college, my now-husband and I moved in together and set up house. The problem was, I had no idea how to cook for two and ended up making mostly pastas, big casseroles, and pre-packaged convenience foods. I ended up gaining about 45 pounds in 4 years and just felt awful. I had headaches, intestinal problems, and had a 6-month or so period of dealing with depression. Sound familiar? I know now, absolutely, that what I was eating led me to that. It wasn't until I joined Weight Watchers and learned a new way of being that I started to feel more myself again.

Even now, when I'm eating much, much healthier than I did in those earlier days, I can definitely tell when my body isn't happy with what I've been eating. It is usually through my running that I notice it the most: I just feel sluggish and slow in those weeks that I've been eating crap. Doesn't mean I've changed much since noticing that, but at least I have a barometer of sorts.

Some interesting things I learned in the first chapters:
-Studies have been done that demonstrate the negative effects the Standard American Diet (SAD) has had on various cultures once it's been introduced. Literally, bone structures have changed and diseases have increased. No wonder we've created a generation that will have a shorten lifespan than their parents!
-The average American eats more than 50 pounds of food additives a year.
-Americans buy 50% of their food from only 10 companies.

I found a Facebook group on which people are discussing Jamie Oliver's Food Revolution. Numerous people like me have started blogs, one of which, Spoonfed, is really great. I've linked it to the right if you have some time. Those of you with kids might be especially interested.

I've also linked to my friend Sarah's blog, Food for Thought. She's a registered dietitian and posts some great recipes with review from her two children. I already want to try several of them!

The Trouble with Schedules

As I mentioned in my first post, one thing I'm worried about is fitting all this in our schedule as a family. Both Jeremy and I work 40 hours a week and we both run in the evenings. I do already cook at home most nights of the week, but I'm worried about the added time of cooking even more fresh foods and the added time for shopping. I'll definitely be trying to find ways to make this easier.

It hit home tonight one consequence of all of this juggling: Lauren is a huge fan of the convenience foods. She needs to eat around 6, which is right around when Jeremy gets home. Usually, one of us is going running in the evening and doesn't eat right away. So, what's happened is that I often feed Lauren before us, and she eats something different than we. I hate to even type this, but her range of foods is really small: pizza, fish sticks, nuggets, eggs, peanut butter and jelly. At first, she'd eat whatever we put in front of her, but now she requests these things. Not only requests, but refuses others. (In my defense, she always has a fruit and vegetable as well, and she always eats those.) Tonight, I made a gorgeous stir-fry and she refused to eat, calling it "yucky." I instantly had flashbacks of the kids on Jamie Oliver's show, the ones that eat pizza for breakfast. I've got to change things now for her before it's too late. Now, toddlers are notoriously picky and I don't expect that she's going to adore tofu and sprouts, but I can improve the range of things she eats and hopefully get her into trying new things.

I get Runner's World daily news in my email and they just sent me a link to the best foods for runners. I had no idea that green garlic existed!

Jamie Oliver's second Food Revolution show is available here. The part with the chicken nuggets was... just... blech.

He also posted a link to a list of the 10 sugariest 'health' foods. What's interesting was that I was going through the cupboards today, trying to prioritize what things I need to replace most. High on my list? Granola bars and cereal, just like on this list. I'm mostly concerned about the use of HFCS, but sugar content will be something I'm paying attention to.

Looking forward to heading to the store and doing some comparison shopping this week!

I've Gotten a Wild Hair...

On Facebook tonight, I saw a link to Jamie Oliver's TED talk about childhood obesity and starting a revolution in America for healthier eating, both in schools and at home. I then followed a link to Jamie's "Food Revolution" page based around this premise, which includes a TV show about this topic. His goal is to revolutionize how we eat in America, but his premise is simple: using whole, natural ingredients in our cooking. I was immediately inspired. I have a new goal: to do some learning about nutrition and tweak our family's diet to be healthier.

Now here's my asterisk, my caveat:
I think that, on the scale of things, we actually eat rather healthfully. I cook at home probably 6 out of the 7 nights a week and we pack our leftovers as lunches. I use actual fruits and vegetables in my cooking and I'm trying to teach Lauren to do the same. I plan our meals about a week and a half, two weeks in advance, and do all the shopping at once, so we don't eat on the run much. So, the good news is that we already have a lot of structures in place.

Now the obstacles:
-While I'm the one who does all of this (pretty) healthy shopping and cooking, I'm also kind of a bad influence. I love treats, especially chocolate, and I'm usually the one that decides to go out to eat for dinner. Not that these are bad things, necessarily, but I think I can do better and be more intentional with my decision-making.

-I've let Lauren's (my daughter's) toddler-ness pigeonhole her into some bad eating habits. She was a pretty adventurous baby as far as food was concerned, but she got a little pickier and I got a little busier and she eats chicken nuggets more than I'd like to admit. Again, not a bad thing necessarily, but when it's the one thing she requests while shunning fresher foods, I wonder about the path she's on.

-I work 40 hours a week and have a toddler. Add to that that I'm trying to run about 4 times a week and sleep 8 hours a night, and there's just not enough time. Like I said, I have many structures already in place, but doing more than I'm already doing is going to be a struggle. I'm going to have to get the most bang for my buck.

I'm a goal-oriented person, so here are my goals:
1. Learn more about nutrition and the business of food in the United States so that I can make better decisions for my family.
2. Change the way I purchase and prepare food to implement what I have learned.
3. Work to expand Lauren's diet to include fewer processed foods.
4. Find ways of fueling my body for running and life in general while still enjoying food.

Next steps:
1. Learn more about nutrition - I've placed several books on hold at the library. In the meantime, I'm going to finish Animal, Vegetable, Miracle by Barbara Kingsolver.
2. Brainstorm sources for healthier foods - I have some ideas, but I know there's more out there that I don't know about.
3. Invite other people on this journey. I need some accountability, and I want others to learn with me.

Well, that's it. I'm jumping off the diving board and into the deepend, and I really hope this makes some change for my family!


Here's the link for Jamie's TED talk:
http://www.ted.com/talks/lang/eng/jamie_oliver.html

Here's the link to the first episode of Jamie's show:
http://abc.go.com/watch/jamie-olivers-food-revolution/250784/254757/episode-101