by Claire
Hello! I’m BACK! I’ve had some technical difficulties on my end but I am back and running with my internet connection fixed! It was a neighborhood wide issue over the weekend and it turns out to have been a great “problem.” My neighborhood is pretty open and friendly as it is but when all technology is on the blitz, it became even friendlier! We ended up having a great time spending time outdoors and doing things we might have otherwise missed because we were inside watching television or fiddling on the internet.
The “technology outage” also led the kids and I to catching up on reading books! I was finally able to finish the book I started far too long ago: “French Kids Eat Everything” by Karen Le Billon. I think I mentioned it when I first started reading it about 4 or 5 months ago as I was diving deeper into my real food journey. I know there are some readers who aren’t crazy about hearing about my real food adventures but I know, without a doubt, that this food journey has saved me money!
I don’t have many regrets about how I raised my kiddos. I’ve certainly made mistakes but, for the most part, I’m regret-free. I communicate well with them and vice versa. BUT, if I did have things to do over again I would follow some of the great rules presented in this book. So, if you are a mom or dad to be, or a new parent—I write this post for you. Go get this book. It will teach you things to do very early in your journey that will undoubtedly improve your health and the health of your children, AND save you MONEY!
The book presents 10 food rules. 1) YOU (as the adult) are in charge of food education, 2) avoid emotional eating, 3) parents schedule meals and menus AND KIDS EAT WHAT ADULTS EAT (no short order cooking), 4) eat family meals together, 5) eat your veggies, 6) you don’t have to like it, but you do have to taste it, 7) no snacking! It’s okay to feel hungry between meals! 8) slow food is happy food (as in, EAT SLOW), 9) eat mostly REAL food and 10) Remember that eating is joyful and RELAX!
These rules are a quick summary of what the book talks about but it offers such great tips on training your children early to eat well. And children that eat well simply cost less money—from health issues to fewer snacks, we are saving money! Take a look at this book—good stuff!
Things are moving along at a decent pace and I am continuing to live each day with being debt free as my goal. Some days are harder than others but thankfully I haven’t had any major setbacks. It’s been a good month and we are taking one day at a time!
Born and raised in Texas. I’ve at least driven through every state in the US courtesy of a roadtrip loving Dad.
I’m single with two children and a good parenting relationship with their father.
I am a “life is just half full of funny” kinda gal. Humor is my saving grace and I am thankful for it every single day. I have a strong Catholic faith and am thankful for that foundation.
I read a lot for a living but still enjoy a good book. I love biographies but in recent years have found the need for fun fictional books–sadly, for a long time I just didn’t enjoy fiction!
I love live theatre of any kind–from local productions to Broadway.
I love to scrapbook and pride myself in my kids’ albums.
I love being a mom but also love my career. I’m blessed to have found a balance allowing me to be at everything my kids need and want me to be at–while also having a career.
Favorite Quotes: Well behaved women rarely make history.
Behold the turtle. He makes progress only when he sticks his neck out. -James Bryant Conant
Please, keep the real food comments going! It shows a balanced attitude that everyone should be interested in.
Dare I say that good health is even more important than saving a dollar…!
And with a little time, effort and know-how you can ditch the food products (read packet food), enjoy real food and save money!
Sounds like a book with good solid advice! We rarely ever catered to our son at meal time (except for Asian food when he was really young, he refused to eat it) and there isn’t much of anything he won’t eat now at 19. No eating disorders,food allergies or overweight issues. Of course, he prefers buying himself a pizza all the time now, but what are you going to do? At least he ate good the first 19 years:)
When our kids were little we used the age=bite rule. If you are three you have to have 3 bites of everything. You can’t keep that up forever or weight would become an issue (I know I don’t eat 40+ bites of each thing!) But by the time they were 7 or 8 they were so used to at least giving everything a try, we never had to mention it.
In an effort to reinforce good table manners, we also occasionally rewarded them with a Rude Dinner. The idea was to intentionally break as many rules as you could (chew with your mouth open, reach across people for things, etc). You can’t break the rules if you don’t know them. The kids loved these nights and used their proper manners the rest of the time in order to earn a Rude Dinner every now and then.
Sounds like a great book. My wife and I watch what our kids eat everyday. We try to make sure that they get at least a serving of fruits and vegetables with every meal. We also make sure we eat our meals together to show the importance of family.
We mostly follow those rules, and we get so many comments on how well our kids eat. (Not sure about the no snack rule, but we are all “high metabolismed/eat frequent smaller meal” types. & I think it is best just to follow your own body’s rhythym. I could not imagine anything ever ruining my kids’ appetites though!! Which I suppose is the reason for that rule…).
I can certainly attest that it works. My younger child is a little pickier, but probably nothing like you would imagine a picky child to be like. The pickiness is genetic, but my parents just catered to it so I never tried anything. He’s lucky to have the good cop/bad cop parents. I understand a little more where he is coming from, but appreciate my spouse has gotten him to eat so many foods. In fact I just heard him say, “This is much better than it looks!” A meal heavy with veggies.
@JMK – I love the rude dinner idea!!
My three year old has been an amazing eater and we follow most of the ten tips there (with the sole exception the one about not snacking. It’s sort of a cultural thing for us lol). But yes, we don’t short order cook; he eats what we all eat, and he has been awesome about at least trying food. So now he pretty much eats what we eat, but in a smaller portion, and sometimes he even eats healthier than us!