Tag: organic

Eating organic part 2

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We are slowly switching everything to organic. EVERYTHING! I have become obsessive about it now. It is super addicting. I am finding myself reading EVERY SINGLE LABEL. Which turns a quick grocery trip to a 2 hour grocery trip. Who am I kidding? Grocery trips are never short but now, they are super long. I switched from Trader Joe’s to Sprout’s. It seems to have a bigger selection. Although, I do still LOVE Trader Joe’s! Sprout’s has organic and non-organic. Even their non-organic is less processed. I am in love with that store. Hubs and I must have spent a majority of our grocery trip browsing through their bulk bins of nuts and dried fruits. I wanted EVERYTHING. Sprout’s is a bit more expensive. We figured it’s about $30 more than our groceries would have been at Wal-Mart. We still had to stop at Wal-Mart for diapers, toothpaste, and drugs. I haven’t switched our toiletries or diapers to organic. I tried the organic diapers and they sucked and were WAY more expensive. He will survive with Pampers. I know what you organic freaks are thinking…I can make my toothpaste, deodorant…etc. I don’t have enough time in the day to do that. Even if I did,…eh, my time is worth more than that. That,…or I’m too lazy.  But GO YOU! Way to make your own stuff 🙂 Seriously, that’s really cool.

I am switching things slowly. I am finishing everything that we have that is processed, and then when we need more, I am buying the new stuff organic. For instance, we were out of butter and olive oil yesterday so I bought new. We are still using processed flour, condiments, and a lot of other things. I am too cheap to throw everything out and buy everything organic. So,  we are finishing everything we have and then buying organic when we need it. That keeps hubs from having a heart attack at the store :).

My parents came up last weekend and we introduced them to our new way of life. I also made them watch Food Inc (on Netflix! it is an eye-opening documentary on the food industry)  I’m sure they had a blast. They did love our new grocery store! And…they were in LOVE with our organic tacos. OHMYGOSH! Did I mention how unbelievably amazing those tacos were?! AMAZING! Organic vs. Non-organic is like eating something when you have a cold versus eating that same food without a cold. The flavors are just so much more pronounced and alive!

Along with eating organic, I am having smoothies for breakfast and lunch. They have made such an improvement in the way I feel and my mood. I saw the idea of freezing fruit ahead of time for smoothies on Pinterest. This is an amazing idea! It saves time in the mornings (which is great with an impatient baby!) and it keeps your fruit from going bad. Last week, we bought five boxes of strawberries for $5.00. They were going bad in the refrigerator so I made little zip lock baggies of fruit/veggies for my smoothies and threw them in the freezer!

A few have asked about my smoothie recipe. I don’t really have an exact recipe. I found a basic guide of making smoothies on…yep! you guessed it! Pinterest. I use coconut water, sometimes I add Greek yogurt, flax-seed (I’m going to try chia seeds next week), 1 banana (it masks the veggies), two different fruits (whatever I am feeling that day), kale, spinach, broccoli, and sometimes cauliflower. I usually use our bullet but sometimes I mix a big one up in our blender and save half for lunch.

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On top of the clean eating I have started Insanity…again. Hopefully, this time I will stick to it. Insanity + Running + Eating clean will surely = BEACH BODY!! The problem with our grocery store is that it has some amazing “healthy” junk  we can’t say no to. I shared a blueberry muffin with my little man this morning..meaning I ate most of it. So, I’m going to need to go work those 300 calories off!

– Court

 

My journey to eating organic

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You would think that I am a healthy eater. You would think that because I’m a runner. But the truth is I am not a healthy eater. I love all junk food. I started running because my metabolism has slowed down. I soon realized that if I wanted to continue to eat the same way I would have to exercise…a lot. So you could say that I ran so that I could eat. When really, you should eat so you can run (pun intended).

Since I started running I would count calories almost religiously. I would know exactly how much I had eaten and how much I would have to run to compensate. It worked. I could continue to eat crap and run without gaining any weight. But I constantly felt fatigued and just heavy. Then I had my baby boy. My whole world was turned upside down. I had to eat enough so that he would be getting what he needed. I had also taken a hiatus from running while I was pregnant because I had pregnancy induced hypertension. I have no idea if it was related to the crap I was eating but I am going to go ahead and assume so. After my little man was born, I tried returning to running but it wasn’t the same. I felt exhausted and I could barely get out a couple of miles. I know that lack of sleep, poor nutrition, and not taking care of myself led me to feeling that way. I had been looking at losing weight and food the wrong way. Calories…forget them. It’s not calories that are so important. What’s important is the food you are eating. The more nutrients you give your body…the better it runs, the less you get sick, the better you feel.

On top of that I am a super helicopter momma. I am a total freak about what my little man eats. So, he’s only getting organic /non-processed food. I started wondering one day why I fed him organic and I continued to eat crap. Then it dawned on me…he will learn to eat what his parents eat. We will teach him to eat junk. I knew then that I had to change. I have also wondered if there might be some correlation between the influx of cancer and processed food? I would LOVE to do that study. So…I had it in my mind that I needed to change the only problem would be….THE HUSBAND.

He and I are two peas in a pod. We love the same things. Wings, burgers, fries, pizza, Chinese, cookies, cake, ice-cream…and SODA ahh, how I LOVE soda. He was not going to be easy to get on board. I started by changing small things without telling him. I started, by just trying to make simple meals with simple ingredients. I read every label on every product I bought. If I couldn’t pronounce it…or better yet, if I didn’t know what it was, I didn’t buy it. I started avoiding anything that comes in a box, can, or is frozen. I stuck to veggies, fruit, meat, bread…the basic food groups….except Pepsi. I am still working on breaking my addiction to Pepsi.

That worked for awhile until I started finding that even “good food” is covered in pesticides and injected with hormones and antibiotics YUCK. Food is not created equal.  There is a difference between organic and non-organic. It’s a huge difference. It means the difference between eating foods laden with chemicals vs. food free and clear of chemicals. There is also another difference…THE PRICE TAG!! Holy smokes batman! And…everything is processed. I didn’t know that “organic sugar” even existed! Oh but it does. It exists with a price tag of $4.99 vs. $2.00 processed sugar. There’s a difference in taste too. Organic sugar is SO MUCH BETTER!

I quickly learned that you don’t have to buy organic everything. There is something called “the dirty dozen” which are the fruits/veggies that contain the highest amount of pesticides. They are fruits like strawberries and grapes. Those are things that you need to buy organic. All the other fruits and veggies you can save money by not buying organic.

Since starting on this journey I can tell a HUGE difference in the way I feel. Try going organic…you won’t go back.

– Court