Healthy Children

The one thing I wanted to accomplish on my lifestyle uproot was to make sure my children continued to live a healthy active life. This can be hard when you work full time, my husband works full time and well sometimes there is just not enough hours in the day. However, we have successfully done it!.

I have never been one to feed my kids junk food, unless it is a special treat. I have maybe let them have pop 5x in their 4 years of life and that's very rare thing and likely only over the last year. My kids ask for water or milk to drink over juices, and run like bats out of hell wherever they go. My mom always cooked us healthy meals with a warm vegetable, a salad, meat and a carbohydrate. However, it wasn't the healthy meals she fed us that made me fat.... It was the snacks she had in our house. We were the family that could have 10 snacks a day, they could be chips, sugary cereals, pop, chocolate, and all those fake fruit treats ( i.e. fruit by the foot) When I became a teenager, I chose those snacks all the time. I ate cookies for breakfast with a coke at school... I'd buy fries and gravy as a mid afternoon spare snack. I just ate like CRAP! I was very active but that didn't make up for all the crap I ate.

As an adult, it took me from 2000 to about 2003 to realize I was not only fatter.. ( size 24 now at this time) but I drank a case of full sugared pop on a weekly basis. I was at the point where I couldn't even handle owning a mirror. I completely changed how I ate when I started university and dropped down into a 18. Then I met my very lucky high metabolism husband, who didn't work out and ate whatever, whenever no problem diet.

Well needless to say... Back up to a size 24 I went. By the time we got married I was around the size 20-22 and to have kids I got myself down to a size 16.

Now back to healthy kids.... I refused to have my kids choose cheezies and juice for snacks. I didn't want my children to be overweight as kids and feel generally like crap all the time. I didn't want people ragging on them because of their weight and still don't.

I'm having wonderful success with this so far. They LOVE raw vegetables for the most part and beg for them at the store. A bag of snap peas or a cucumber doesn't last two days in our house. They would prefer cheese and crackers for a snack over cupcakes ( even when they ask for a cupcake they rarely eat it all, it's just to sweet)

Last night, Ainsley was going to her Zumba ( one of the many activities they have been in - soccer, swimming, mini chefs, and gymnastics as well) class and having an Easter party. We made small cupcakes and didn't opt to share a drink because cupcakes were sugary enough and there is a water fountain out the door. Ainsley came back to say she was thrilled with her party and someone brought mini carrots too! She however didn't really elaborate on the Coke that was brought to drink (which she never finished) nor on the over chocolate overload cupcakes covered in sprinkles.

To say the least when my kids through tantrums over snap peas, ask for cucumbers at supper when they don't see a salad and beg for carrots when I'm peeling them. I think I have done an alright job!

Scales.. OVERRATED

I once read a blog (or numerous times) http://www.rebirthfitness.co/throw-away-your-scale/ about not weighing myself.. Well now you know us women do covet a scale, it's like a piece of our world that validates who we are.This has been embedded in us from the point of entering junior high school and seems to be something that continues for years and years to come. We are always focused on that number.. how it makes us who we are. Even if we went to Scales Anonymous.. we would lie about the number there and go as far as saying we didn't step on a scale in the last week when we all know....We jumped on it at the gym.. or at our friends house in their bathroom.


In the last six weeks, the scale only shows I am down 8 lbs. Ok that's bizarre. I work out at the gym 1-2 days a week ( dependent on travel for work) and hit the trails running 2-3 days a week. I noticed that my size 20 jeans are way to big within an hour of wearing, my size 18 dress pants are all really baggy and my tight XL shirts are actually looking much better and not like I have had to pour myself into them.

So I'm down a total of 17 lbs ( and at the top of those 17 lbs I was barely fitting into my size 18 pants) and my scale has barely moved with the change to nutrition and increase to activity. However, I haven't fit comfortably into a size 16 since I before I was pregnant with my twins. I bought myself the first time ever a size 16 denim skirt and it fits fantastically! I also got myself into one of my favorite pairs of size 16 dress pants. One more inch to go and the other pair of size 16 pants will also fit me quite well.


6 weeks.. total of 17 lbs down in the year 2012 and into my size 16 pants.. When I got pregnant I was 15 lbs lighter than I am now, not near as active or strong and in the same pants I wear now.

Don't throw out your scale that will drive you nuts.. but measure your body for inches changed..measure your progress in a diary.. by increasing the weight at the gym and finding that running most of a 5 km without walking isn't as killer are previously... THOSE are the things that shows your change.. Not the scale!