Valentine’s Day Fiesta

I’m actually not a huge fan of Valentine’s Day. I feel it’s very commercialized. We weren’t really planning on doing anything but when my mom offered to babysit, we took advantage of it.

Tony took me out for sushi and he did buy me a gift. He bought me a very simple pair of diamond stud earrings. I really wanted a pair when we first got together, but then Ava came along and my priorities changed. It was very sweet that he remembered what I wanted. They are not flashy, which is perfect. Flashy is not me.

He then surprised me with a trip to Goodwill. Any time I get to go there without a toddler is awesome. Ava is my little BFF, but she’s a horrible Goodwill companion. Hopefully that will change one day.

I found some random things and then I spotted this!

Gorgeous turquoise Fiestaware! I’m obsessed if you can’t tell. I have a few pieces and it’s always awesome to find pieces at thrift stores.

It wasn’t this beautiful when I found it. It had a really horrible 1980s mauve floral arrangement coming out the top. I took it out as soon as I got home and forgot to take a picture. It was bad.

I now have this beautiful teapot to add to my collection. It is missing its lid. Hopefully I’ll find one on eBay.

Best Valentine’s Day EVER!

I’ve been away…

I’m sorry I’ve been away. A lot has happened in the past few months. Life has been scary, exciting, and blissfully happy lately.

You may recall me saying that I wasn’t sure what to do with this little piece of me. One morning I woke up and didn’t feel like writing anymore. I didn’t see the point.

After I converted the blog back to a WordPress-hosted blog, I didn’t really see the point. Why was I putting myself out there? Why was I letting this stress me out? Why do I care? I didn’t want to do it anymore, so I stopped.

I feel like I’ve gotten away from what I wanted this to be. I want readers, but I don’t want to write about things just to gain them. I really don’t care about being “Pinterest perfect” because honestly, it’s too much work. My time is more valuable than that.

So I decided to take a break. I was unsure if I’d come back or if the blog would just one day disappear.

Then life happened.

I was unhappy in Texas. As much as I thought I would love it, I didn’t. Tony could tell I was unhappy. We discussed moving back to Florida. We decided that he would start looking for a job there and to put it in God’s hands.

Two weeks later, Tony was laid off. It was sudden and unexpected. He was anticipating a promotion, not to be let go. This horrible blow to our family was actually a blessing. We decided to sell everything (again) and drive back to Florida. We prayed, a lot.

We moved back to Florida just before Thanksgiving. It was so wonderful to spend Thanksgiving with my family. We all crammed into my sister’ college apartment where I cooked an amazing meal from scratch. It was amazing.

So here we are. I feel happy where we’re at and excited for our future. We are home. That is something you can never replace. We are home with our family, our church, and our friends.

I think I’m ready to pick this back up again, but maybe in a slightly different way. Thanks for hanging in there with me.

Homemade Graham Crackers…

… Also known as “The Most Delicious Snack Ever”.

Yesterday, Ava came to me asking for crackers.  We were fresh out.  Zero.  Zilch.  None.  Not even something I could pass off as a cracker.  I had zero interest in walking (or driving) to the grocery store, only to buy processed junk crackers.

Homemade crackers it is!

I remembered that I picked up a book at the library.  This was actually the second time I check this book out.  That rarely happens.  I actually love this book so much, I think I’m going to buy a copy.  I very rarely buy books because I’m such a fan of borrowing them from the library.  The book, The Homemade Pantry: 101 Foods You Can Stop Buying and Start Making, is  so overly useful.  I’m in love!

Anyway… so off we went, making homemade graham crackers.  I try to be very patient when cooking with Ava.  I let her scoop, pour, and stir.  She loves to help.  Even though it is completely unimportant at her age, we talk all about the measurements and each ingredient as we add them.  She touches the flour and smells the cinnamon.

The dough for these crackers needs to rest in the refrigerator for at least 2 hours.  This perfectly fell during nap time.  When she woke up, I had just pulled the first batch of warm crackers from the oven.  She was beyond excited.  These little gems of cinnamon-sugar are too good not to share.  Next time (which will be soon), I think I will use some fun cookie cutters!

Whole Wheat Graham Crackers | Adapted from The Homemade Pantry

Makes 45-50 2×3 inch crackers

• 1 Cup White Whole Wheat Flour
• 3/4 Cup Whole Wheat Flour
• 1/2 Cup Rye Flour, plus more for dusting
• 1/2 TSP Salt
• 1/4 TSP Baking Soda
• 1/2 TSP Baking Powder
• 1-1/2 TSP Ground Cinnamon
• 1/4 Cup Packed Dark Brown Sugar (Make your own with raw sugar and molasses!)
• 3 TBSP Cold Butter, cut into small cubes
• 4 TBSP Coconut Butter
• 4 TBSP Honey (Local, if you can find it!)
• 2 TSP Vanilla Extract
• 1 TSP Raw Sugar

1. Combine the flours with the salt, baking soda, baking powder, 1 teaspoon of the cinnamon, and the brown sugar.  Mix well.  Add the butter and the shortening and mix until combined.
2. In a separate bowl, combine the honey and vanilla with 1/4 cup of cold water.  Stir until the honey is dissolved.  Slowly add the honey mixture to the flour mixture.  Form the dough into a bowl and wrap in waxed paper and refrigerate for at least 2 hours, and up to 3 days.  (She says you can freeze it at this point.)
3. Remove the dough from the refrigerator 20 minutes before baking.  Preheat the oven to 350°F.  Cut the dough in half and roll one half on a dusted surface (or between waxed paper).  Roll the dough as thin as possible, about 1/8 inch.  Cut your crackers into 2×3″ rectangles (or use cookie cutters!).  Place on a baking sheet using a spatula.  They won’t spread, so they can be very close.  Reroll the scraps and repeat until all of the dough is rolled.
4. In a small bowl, combine the remaining 1/2 teaspoon cinnamon with the 1 teaspoon sugar.  Sprinkle the crackers with the cinnamon-sugar and prick the dough several times with a fork.  Bake for 15 minutes or until the edges are just starting to brown (about 12 minutes in my oven).  Remove from the oven and cool.

These crackers are incredible good.  Nothing beats homemade!  Enjoy!

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Reader Q&A: How Do I Get My Family To Eat Healthy?

Reader Melissa A. sent me an email asking a question that I think most mothers and wives face: How do I get my family to eat healthy?  See what she had to say.

I am on a path to start eating clean but I am having trouble getting my husband and children on board. 

My children are 2 and 3 and would not eat/throw a tantrum for hours if they don’t get their standard terrible toddler food (hot dogs, crackers, tons of sugar loaded processed foods).   I’ve actually tried for over a year to correct their menu just to throw it away in the trash every time.  Since I’m the grocery shopper in the house I have tried to reduce their intake where I can, improving the amounts they receive. 

Our biggest challenge is that my husband feeds them 5 out of 7 dinners as I work an hour away.  He’s not much of a cook/leftovers guy so they almost always eat Take and bake pizza or corn dog nuggets on a daily basis. 

Any words of wisdom?

Thanks so much,
Melissa A.

I know exactly how you feel.  While Ava has always had fairly good eating habits, Tony has not.  My husband had what I considered to be the “typical American diet”.  He is a lover of  meat, fried things, and anything containing the ingredient “partially hydrogenated oil”.

When I started this clean eating journey, he thought I was totally nuts.  He didn’t understand why I didn’t want to eat meat, or that I didn’t want our daughter eating Doritos.  I continued to do what I knew was right.

Tony’s eating habits are changing.

If you ask him, he may still tell you that my eating habits are a little strange, but I know he hears what I’m saying.  I realized that I had gotten through to him when I heard through the grapevine that he got on to someone who was trying to give our daughter excessive amounts of candy.  He explained to the person that we (yes, he said WE!) choose not to give junk like that to Ava and even though I wasn’t there, we stand together (together!!!) on our decision.  He was listening all along!  He made me proud!

So what did I do to get through to him?

In the beginning, I led by example.  I knew he would never just jump on board.  Like most men (sorry guys), I needed to let him decide that it was his idea.  Even though he thought it was all crazy, I ate healthy.  I also explained to him why I was eating the way I was.  Once the weight started falling off, I think he started to notice that it wasn’t a bunch of nonsensical hippie talk.   What I was doing made perfect sense, and he noticed!

I wasn’t above trickery.

I admit it, I tricked my family more than a few times.  (And I still do!)  I got crafty with the whole wheat and whole grains.  I learned how to add veggies into meals so that they wouldn’t  notice.

Don’t fight against them.

Although Ava is a fairly good eater, I know a little girl who sounds just like Melissa’s kids.  She only eats chicken nuggets (frozen or from McDonald’s), cookies, and a few other unhealthy items.  Her parents continued to feed her these things for fear of her being hungry.  Start by offering your children healthy options along with their favorites.  Slowly (over a few weeks) remove the unhealthy options from their diet.  They will probably protest, but if they are truly hungry, they will eat the healthy options.  If they won’t eat the healthy foods, set them aside for later when they are hungry again.  When they are hungry, they will eat.

Get your children involved!

Children who help grow or prepare their meals are more likely to try new things.  Start a small garden and let them grow new veggies to try.  Invite them into the kitchen.  Not only will your child be more likely to try new foods, but you will be bonding with them and building their self-esteem.

Prep your meals.

If you are not the one who cooks most of the meals, prep easy and healthy meals ahead of time.  Here I talked about prep being one of the three “P’s”.  If you can’t be home to cook a healthy meal, try doing once-a-month cooking.  Make and freeze healthy, clean meals that your spouse or kids can heat up.  If it’s just as easy as a frozen pizza, they just might cook it.

Getting your family to eat clean (or just somewhat healthy for that matter) is not going to happen over night.  Just remember to stay positive and lead by example.

Do you have any advice for Melissa or anyone else dealing with a picky family?

Food Waste Friday | Saving Some Spinach

After years of wasting hundreds, if not thousands of dollars of food, we are attempting to reduce our food waste. I will post a photo each week of our food waste and I will link up with Food Waste Friday over at The Frugal Girl.

This week wasn’t all that bad.  As usual, I found a few new ways to save some veggies AND trick my family into eating more of them.

I had a package (ugh, I hate overly packaged food) of organic spinach that had a few leaves that were starting to look sad.  I decided to throw some into dinner that night and put the rest in the freezer for fear that they wouldn’t make it before I got around to eating them.  We were having pasta with a simple tomato sauce (no meat), and I diced a few spinach leaves very fine and tossed them in.  Tony had no idea.  That’s one thing I really love about spinach.  Its flavor isn’t all that strong, so it’s easily added to other dishes with little or no detection.

Freezing spinach is super simple.  I just pick off all the stems and toss them into a freezer bag.  Simple as that.  Oh, don’t forget to wash and dry it first.  As long as the spinach is really dry, the leaves shouldn’t stick to one another making it really easy to just pull a few out and add to meals.

I did actually throw something away this week.  We made pasta the first week we lived in the house and not thinking, I made an entire box.  Rylan was still here, so I think that threw me off.  I usually cook just over a half of a box.  This makes enough for the three of us, plus a small lunch-sized leftover portion.  This particular meal made lots of leftovers.

After eating on them for a few days, I guess this little container got pushed to the back of the fridge.  Although it doesn’t look or smell bad, it has been in the fridge for about two weeks.  That’s way beyond my threshold for leftovers.  Oh well.

How did you do this week?

Eating Clean When You Don’t Have Time

While visiting my mom in Florida, her biggest complaint about eating clean was that she doesn’t have time.  I will be the first to admit, eating clean can be a bit time-consuming if you want it to be.

But it doesn’t have to be!

• Plan ahead!  This truly is key if you are busy.  You MUST sit down and plan out your meals for the week.  How will you eat clean if you have no clean meals planned? Your refrigerator will probably be empty too.  This goes hand-in-hand with the next step.
• Prep!  Take an hour or two on Sunday afternoon to prep your food for the week.  Bake bread, cook beans, wash and cut fruits and veggies.  Make your good food your fast food.
• Bread.  I have yet to find a commercially baked bread that I deem “clean”.  You’re probably thinking to yourself, “bread from scratch takes forever.”  Wrong!  Baking bread really only takes 30+ minutes of active work.  The key word here is ACTIVE.  Most of the time the bread is rising or baking.  Start with a simple whole wheat recipe.  You may be surprised to find that you actually enjoy baking.
• Beans.  I’m a huge fan of beans. And while you can buy canned beans, I’m not a fan of all the added salt or the BPA-lined can.  I prefer to soak and cook my own beans.  Soak your beans overnight, then cook the next day.  You may be pleasantly surprised to find that beans don’t take all day to cook.  I can cook a pot of black beans about an hour.  The best part is that you can turn them on and walk away.  I’ve also cooked them in a crock pot.
• Make a double batch.  If you are making soup or a casserole one night for dinner, prep a double batch and freeze it.  You can also cook a little extra and have enough for lunch the next day.

• Buy clean!  This may seem like a no-brainer, but only buy clean food.  If you buy junk, you’re going to eat junk.  Buy loads of fresh, seasonal produce!  If it’s there, you will eat it.
• Create you own convenience foods.  If your family is stuck eating frozen meals from the grocery store, try creating clean freezer meals.  Spend a day freezing healthy meals that will feed your family for the entire week (or month, if you’re brave).  You don’t have to freeze complete meals either.  Below I have (from left to right) a rice mixture (brown & wild rice, black beans, corn, cilantro, and spices), cooked black beans, and sliced sweet peppers (which I saved here).  The rice and beans are both fully cooked and can easily be warmed or incorporated into a meal.  The peppers are ready to be tossed into stir-fry, or chopped into your morning eggs!

• Watch out for store-bought convenience foods.  There is so much hidden junk in prepared foods.  That being said, there are a few clean packaged foods. Look for organic items, they are a good place to start. (Think condiments to start off.)  But don’t be fooled, everything labeled organic is NOT automatically good for you!

Practice the three P’s: Plan, Purchase, and Prep!  If you decide you want to eat clean and make it a priority, it will happen.

Do you have any shortcuts that help you eat clean?

Reader Q&A: Why Does Food Make Me Feel Horrible?

I received the following email from reader Brittany E.

I started eating clean about two weeks ago and I have felt great. I haven’t “cheated” other than a peanut nature valley bar due to not having eaten all day and that was about a week ago.

Well yesterday I let myself have a small bowl of red beans and rice and this morning I had one biscuit. Oh my goodness. My body absolutely hates me. Stomach pain, cramps, and even a slight bit of heart burn.

My question for you is did you ever go through this after you started eating better? And if so how did you handle it? I honestly was not having cravings when I ate these things and my sugar addiction is practically broken.

Hope this doesn’t sound crazy!!
Love the blog by the way 🙂

 

First off, thank you so much for taking the time to ask a question.  It means so much to hear from readers.

To answer your question, Yes!  This still happens to me if I eat something undesirable.  I’m guessing that the rice and beans and the biscuit were not homemade.  What is probably making you feel that way is the shortening in the biscuits.  Shortening does the same thing to me, every time.  Here are the ingredients in Crisco straight from their website:

Ingredients:

SOYBEAN OIL, FULLY HYDROGENATED PALM OIL, PARTIALLY HYDROGENATED PALM AND SOYBEAN OILS, MONO AND DIGLYCERIDES, TBHQ AND CITRIC ACID (ANTIOXIDANTS).

In my opinion, shortening is one of the worst things you could possible put in your body.  Unfortunately, that’s what most people use to make their biscuits.  My mom also uses butter flavored Crisco in her Judy’s Almost Famous Chocolate Chip Cookies.  Sad to say, I won’t touch her cookies anymore.  They make me feel HORRIBLE!  It’s exactly what you described, stomach cramps, pain, and heartburn.  So not worth a cookie.

I’m no doctor, but here’s my theory on why this happens after you start eating clean.  When you start eating clean, you are allowing your body to heal.  Your body starts to expect only whole, nutrient rich foods.  What you feel after eating the biscuit is your body’s way of saying, “What were you thinking?  Never again!”  Your body doesn’t know how to process this chemical slurry.

Don’t beat yourself up over it.  Everyone slips up now and then.  Just be prepared for your body’s protest.

If you love red beans and rice and biscuits, it’s okay.  If you make these things at home, you can control what goes into them.  I’ve made very delicious red beans and rice from scratch that even my husband loves.  And we’re from the South, we love our biscuits.  When I make them at home, I use whole wheat flour and coconut oil instead of shortening.  That’s part of this journey, learning to cook all of your favorite foods in a way that’s better for your body.

You’re on the right track.  Being in tune with your body makes a huge difference.  Keep up the good work!

Does anyone else have any helpful information for Brittany?  If you have a question, email us at scacchihouse@yahoo.com.

Food Waste Friday Is Back

After years of wasting hundreds, if not thousands of dollars of food, we are attempting to reduce our food waste. I will post a photo each week of our food waste and I will link up with Food Waste Friday over at The Frugal Girl.

Since I’m finally in control of the groceries once again, Food Waste Friday is back!  When we moved into our new place, I decided a few things right off the bat.  First, I would do everything in my power to have zero food waste.  Second was to start a compost bin.

We have been in our new place for two weeks now.  We love it, even though it’s more space than we need or want.  It’s even bigger now that Rylan (our nephew) went back home.

Since Ava and I are home all the time, we are on leftover patrol.  I’ve taken it upon myself to eat any leftovers so they do not go bad.  So far, so good!

I am pleased to report that they only thing that went into the compost pile were a few pieces of moldy sweet peppers.  My mother-in-law sent them (not moldy) with us from her house when we moved.  By the time I got around to using them, a few of them were starting to grow mold.  No big deal.

I cut the mold off and decided to cut and freeze the rest of them to be on the safe side.  I love freezing peppers.  I love having them on hand.  I just pull the jar out of the freezer and pick a few out.  Easy peasy.  We also saved some very brown organic bananas by making some of my Nana’s delicious banana bread.  It didn’t last very long.

I’ve got my recycled jug in the fridge for any leftover coffee. (I got all fancy and wrote it on with a sharpie.) Just add milk and sugar and you have iced coffee.  No waste!  Speaking of coffee, I just bought this coffee pot…. for $3.73!

I’ve been looking for one at Goodwill but they’re either not the right size/style/color, over priced, or just flat-out nasty.  I spotted this one a few days ago.  It’s the exact one we had in Alaska (only paid $5 on Craigslist for that one) and was clean and an additional 30% off.  My patience paid off!

I did manage to start my compost bin.  It’s actually looking pretty great, if I must say so myself.  Check out all the kitchen scraps I need to add!

I keep a bin in the door of the fridge.  My bin is an aluminum loaf pan with a plastic produce bag.  Eventually I’ll be able to grow new food from these scraps, and that makes me very happy!

Did you waste any food this week?

How I’m Saving on School Supplies: Part 2

I had originally intended on updating this every Monday until school started.  Such is life, things changed.  Things changed drastically.  While attempting to enroll our nephew in school, my sister-in-law decided to fly him home.

So here I am, stuck with a bunch of school supplies that I don’t really need.  What’s a girl to do?  I’m very glad that I hadn’t even spent $10.00 on everything yet, so it really wasn’t that big of a deal.  I sorted through everything and made three piles.

The first pile was for things I would keep.  I kept things like the scissors, black pens, pencils, colored pencils, one of the pencil sharpeners, glue, ruler, and the dry erase markers.

The second pile was for everything that I would return.  I returned the markers, one of the pencil sharpeners (we don’t need two), mechanical pencils, and the erasers.  I didn’t see us using any of these things, so back to Target they went.  I got $3.28 back.

The third pile was for the things we just won’t use, but were too good of a deal to return.  I think I will take all of these items to our local elementary school.  There are always children that don’t have any/enough school supplies. This pile consists of the folders with brads, highlighters, pencils, and a pack of red pens.  As a former teacher, I know the importance of the red pen.

So we are back down to just one child.  I did learn a few things about buying school supplies:

1. I despise Office Max and Staples for their $5 minimum to buy their penny items.
2. Office Depot doesn’t have a minimum purchase on any of their items.  And if you are super friendly, they will probably let you buy more than the limit too!
3. No matter how good Wal-Mart’s deals are, I’m still not venturing in.  Saving an extra $.05 is not worth my sanity.
4. Watch your sale flyers!
5. Don’t be afraid to return items when you find them cheaper.  Save your receipts!

How did your school supply shopping go this year?

The Feeling of Health: Part 7

I am so very sorry for leaving you waiting for the last part of this series.  We have been without internet since we moved.  But we’re back!

 

So why do all of this?  Why eat healthy?  Why exercise?  Who cares?

I care!  Someone commented on Part 2 on Pinterest stating, “Stop worrying so much, #YOLO”. While I completely understand the desire to live free, because in reality, we do only live once, why not live this one life in the best way possible!

I did this for me!  I started this journey to feel better, and maybe drop a few pounds in the process.  I’ve been my biggest fan and cheerleader along the way.  It was all about ME for once.  I spent so much of my life feeling fat.  For once I just wanted to wear a bikini and not feel like the fatty at the pool.  I was finally able to do that this summer.  It felt amazing!

I did it for my husband!  My husband works so hard to provide for our family.  I also did this for him.  He deserves a healthy, fit wife!

I did it for my daughter!  She is the reason I keep it up.  She is the reason I scan every label at the grocery store and the reason I walked there instead of taking the car.  I want to instill in her healthy eating habits and the simple joy of exercise.  I don’t want her to ever struggle with her weight, or any other food/weight related ailment.  She is worth every extra mile I run and every cupcake I miss.

I think this picture speaks for itself.  It’s working!  She watches everything I do.  And while others may see me as the crazy mom for withholding Crystal Light, lollipops, and sugar-free gum, I am trying my best to lead by example.  Trust me, she isn’t missing out.  We enjoy a bowl of fro-yo together at the local self-serve yogurt shop now and then.  And that’s okay.  I’m trying to raise her to understand that treats are just that, a treat.  They are to be savored and enjoyed and that they are so much better when you don’t eat them every day.  All I can do is give her the tools that she needs to succeed in life.  She will be left to make her own choices one day.

I’ve come a long way in my journey, but truth is, I still have a few goals I want to meet.  I’m far from perfect, which is fine with me.  I’m just your average woman trying to do her best.  I will continue to update you on my progress (or lack there of) from time to time.  If I have encouraged and motivated just one of you during this series, it was all worth it.

What is your reason for staying healthy and fit?

Please check out Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4, Part 5, and Part 6 if you missed any of them.

Be sure to check out our giveaway that’s going on!