A Whole Family FINISHED with Whole30 - Meal Ideas

I can't believe that we are finished with our Whole30 process. Now we know what foods bother us and what foods don't. I have learned how my family reacts to certain things and I feel much better prepared to feed my family in the best way that I can. 

We also tried so many new things on our Whole30. Some that were great some that weren't so great. But I will admit that one of most difficult parts of the process was figuring out what to make for meals before we got started. There are a million and a half ideas out there on Pinterest but I thought I would share what we ate. 

Breakfasts:

Frittatas - We ate these ALL the time, I would make these little mini frittatas in muffin liners once a week and then freeze one day's worth. The were super easy to reheat and it was the easiest way I could find to get vegetables into the boys at breakfast. Here is a helpful hint: every muffin liner I have ever used has not worked well with mini frittatas or even gluten free muffins... until I came across these. They are fabulous and you can get them at Target. 

Fried Eggs and Sweet Potato Hash - I made this a few times: sweet potatoes, onions, spinach, kale, all cooked together and topped with a fried egg. This certainly wasn't a quick breakfast but it was good. 

Sauteed Spinach with Chicken Sausage and Scrambled Eggs.

Boiled eggs with avocado slices and veggie sticks. This wasn't our favorite breakfast but it was something we could eat on the run.

Green Eggs and Ham - For this I would run several cups of greens (spinach, kale, chard, etc...) through the food processor until it was in tiny little pieces (almost like chopped herbs. Then I would mix them with the raw eggs and scramble them all together. To this I would add cooked breakfast sausage since I had a hard time finding ham without sugar. 

Leftovers - Easiest breakfast ever.

Lunches:

Mexican Shrimp Cocktail - I only made this once, and while it was very good, I was the only one who ate it, so it just didn't seem worth the work.

Roll Ups - Who would have thought that a piece of lunch meat wrapped around some spinach, avocado, and/or zucchini would be so loved. We ate these all the time.

Chicken Salad - It is pretty easy to make Paleo mayonnaise. That plus some chopped cooked chicken and a few seasonings and veggies in there made it pretty quick and easy. Especially if it was all prepared ahead of time. 

Chicken Drumsticks - If you throw these in the crock pot at breakfast, and put them on high they will be ready by lunch. Plus, for whatever reason, meat on a bone is super exciting for little boys.

Chef Salad - If you have grilled chicken and cut up veggies in your fridge you can always have lunch in less than ten minutes.

Chili on Baked Sweet Potato - This turned out to be one of my favorite meals. I would make chili ahead of time and dump it on a sweet potato. Then I would top it with green onions, avocado, tomato, and whatever else I had in the fridge. So stinkin' good, every time!

Meatballs - This was another one of those meals that I could make ahead of time and just throw in a lunch box. Since it was summer when we did our Whole30 we ate a few lunches at the water park or on the way to Six Flags. I would actually throw them in our bag frozen at breakfast and they would be thawed by lunch. No one really had a problem eating them cold and since they were made with a LOT of vegetables mixed in and very lean meat they didn't get that awkward cold fatty texture or taste.

Turkey Burger - This was another quick lunch. I tried to keep cooked bacon in the fridge. I would throw a few turkey burgers in the oven, make a couple of fried eggs and then put the burger on a bed of spinach, then the bacon and egg on the burger. 

Chicken Cucumber Salad - Chopped chicken, cucumbers, tomatoes, and Italian dressing. Simple and quick. 

Leftovers - I used to dread leftovers but after cooking ALL THE TIME during the Whole30 I have come to cherish leftovers.

Dinners:

Steak - We had steak a few times. This always made my handsome husband happy and it was easy to just throw a couple of vegetable side dishes together and all my men were happy.

Tilapia - This takes about three minutes to cook and can be thawed in about 15 minutes. That means that we had this a few times!

Taco Salad - It is ridiculous how often we ate this but everyone loved it, even the non-eating littlest man. I always tried to keep some taco meat in the freezer so that in a pinch I could just pull it out and heat it up.

Spaghetti Squash with Marinara and Meatballs - The same meatballs that I used for lunch I would use here. You can make spaghetti squash in the oven, crock pot, or microwave. It is really great.

Grilled Chicken: Always keep it in the fridge!

Italian Chicken - Chicken, potatoes, sweet potatoes, asparagus, green beans, Italian dressing. Mix in a glass pan and bake for an hour or so. This takes about five minutes of prep work. 

Shish Kabobs - This is just one of those fun ones, why is it that anything even remotely stick shaped you put in a boy's hand becomes a sword?

Swordfish - We hadn't had this in forever and Whole Foods had it one sale one week. This is a much meatier fish. The hubs and I enjoyed it a lot more than the boys did.

Pot Roast - So easy to make Paleo friendly!

Sausage Cooked with Summer Squash - This dinner is super easy and the Pederson's German Smoked Sausage is pretty good. 

Ribs - We made our own dry rub and cooked these babies in the slow cooker. They were great and of course all my carnivores loved them.

Chili - This is another one of those I would make ahead. It made for a pretty easy dinner (after it was all cooked) which was good if we had been out all day.

Mahi Mahi - I made this with pineapple pico de gallo and loved it. The rest of the family not so much.

Zoodles - We made these with the Old Fashioned Italian Meat Sauce recipe from Well Fed 2. It was so good and all but the littlest learned to appreciate the zoodles, or zucchini noodles.

Salsa Chicken - If you put a jar of Paleo approved salsa and chicken breasts in the crock pot and leave it for a few hours it turns into this shredded, moist, almost creamy chicken that is great on top of a salad or with a few sides.

Chicken Soup - Homemade bone broth makes this great but boxed broth would work too. I just cooked carrots, onions, white potatoes, zucchini, and spinach in broth with shredded chicken. 

Hot Wings - Who knew that this could be Paleo friendly. I always think of hot wings as a junk food but they are really just hot sauce, wings, and butter. But they do have a LOT of calories so be careful.

And last but not least: LEFTOVERS.  :)

A Whole Family on Whole30 - Reintroduction of Grains

Thankfully, reintroducing grains was not nearly as eventful as dairy. For breakfast I made oatmeal. I'm not really an oatmeal fan and I try to avoid loads of carbs. The boys loved it though.

 For lunch we had chicken sandwiches on gluten free buns, roasted okra, and corn on the cob.  Corn on the cob is one of my favorite foods! It's a must have at the state fair, I would take roasted corn over a corn dog or fried Twinkie any day. The gluten free buns weren't great, I didn't even finish mine. And they were expensive!

For dinner I was going to make stuffed bell peppers but I ended up just throwing the cooked rice, taco meat, and roasted squash and peppers together in a bowl. Flavor wise it was great, but it was just so heavy. 

None of us had any reactions but I felt sluggish all day. Just not my usual self. 

The jury is still out on grains. I haven't decided if they are going to be a part of our regular diet. I kind of feel like we have done just fine without them. And if I'm being honest, the littlest man will shove bread in his face over vegetables any day. Heck, most of us will so we are just going to keep stocking the fridge and filling the plates with the healthiest food possible. But, I'm not necessarily opposed to giving the boys oatmeal or rice occasionally. 

There are also a few "paleo" things that we have thought about trying, like coconut flour muffins. I'm pretty sure that if we can find a few new treats for special occasions the boys are going to be thrilled. 

A Whole Family on Whole 30 - Reintroducing Dairy

As we began to near the end of our official 30 days a while back I started thinking about what I did and did not want to add back in. I decided that we were going to do a test day for each of the four groups that the book It Starts with Food talks about: grains, gluten, dairy, and legumes, regardless of whether or not I intended to add those groups back in.
I did this for two reasons.

1.  I know that the book says that if you don't miss a food group, don't worry about adding it back in. But since there are four of, just because I don't necessarily miss something doesn't mean the handsome husband or one of my little men doesn't miss it.

2. The second reason is that I feel like no matter how prepared I am, there will be times when eating some of those things will be the best (or only) choice we can make at those times. I want to know if any of us have a gluten or dairy intolerance or if it is simply something we prefer to keep out of our diet. I feel like the more information I have about our health and bodies the better equipped I will be to provide the best diet possible for us.

With that being said, I really had given a lot of thought to dairy, and ultimately came to the conclusion that I probably was not going to add much, if any, back into our normal routine. This was even if we didn't really have any 'reactions' to it. (I am sure this was just the Holy Spirit preparing me for what would happen on dairy day.)

This news was a little disheartening to my biggest little man, who loves dairy. But we had talked about choosing foods that made us healthier instead of less healthy and he understands.

So, dairy day comes. Here is what we ate:

Breakfast: Frittata as usual plus all three of the men had a yogurt and berry parfait.
Lunch: Chef salad topped with cheddar cheese.
Dinner: Chicken breasts topped with marinara and a ton of mozzarella and zucchini pizzas. (Which is basically just zucchini sliced thin topped with pepperoni, pizza sauce, and cheese.) The boys also both had a glass of  milk with dinner.

After dinner we all shared a pint of vanilla ice cream.

Like I said earlier, everyone was hoping for no reactions but that isn't what we got.

My littlest man started crying about an hour after breakfast. Now, when I say little man, he isn't two, he is seven, so crying is definitely out of the norm for him. Actually he is by far my least emotional child. He was so whiny all day long. We went to a birthday party that afternoon and he cried because I got sunscreen on his back. I was putting sunscreen on him because it was a swimming party. He cried because he and his brother didn't have matching forks at dinner. He cried because dog was lying close to him. All day long. At bedtime, about an hour after the ice cream, he cried because my husband told him that he couldn't sleep in our bed. He was inconsolable. I had to get him bed with him and convince him that Daddy wasn't trying to mean. I eventually just moved him to our bed and moved him back to his own bed after he fell asleep. (I know, parenting fail on my part.)

This behavior was very out of the ordinary. Especially for the last 30 days. We certainly didn't eat dairy at every meal before the Whole30 and I think going a month without it cleared it out of his system and made him have a greater reaction to it.

When my little brother was young he couldn't eat dairy or bananas without losing it. He would bounce of the walls, go crazy, and generally be uncontrollable.

Just a quick internet search let me know that my poor kid isn't the only one who goes crazy on milk. Poor dude (and poor MOM!).

Now, my biggest little man. This is the kid that loves dairy.He has actually said over the last 30 days "man, I hope my eczema isn't from dairy." I was really hoping for his sake that it was only corn or soy (which I already knew about) but alas he woke up the next day with two dry, scaly, patches on the inside of his arms, right where he gets eczema outbreaks. I didn't think that he would have a reaction that fast even if milk was a trigger. The other thing that he noticed is that he woke up with a LOT of snot. This would happen from time to time before the Whole30, and I knew it was probably food related but now we know exactly what caused it.

The oldest boy comes by his snot naturally. My husband really struggles with this. And it was bad the day after dairy day. He also seemed to get hives quite a few times on dairy day and the days following as well.

Now, on to me. I don't drink milk, eat yogurt, or really consume a lot of dairy. I do like a few good cheeses but when it comes to every day food, I would much rather have a burger without cheese than one with it. But I wanted to know exactly what dairy did to me so I ate everything they ate on dairy day with the exception of the glass of milk at dinner and yogurt at breakfast. I didn't sleep well at all that night. I also woke up the next morning very bloated. My stomach hurt the whole next day and within 48 hours of dairy I had THREE ZITS. On my face. Noticeable zits. My kind and ever so sweet husband even looked at me one, pointed to the mountain growing out of my face and said "that looks painful".  No cheese is worth zits.

So, while we hoping for no reactions we all a reaction to dairy. I have made the decision that we are not going to keep it in the house or eat it here. Brandon, knowing what dairy does to his body, can make his own decisions about what he eats when he eats out for lunch or something. I also told the oldest boy that since he is a little older, that when we go out to eat, he can make most of the decisions about what he eats. If he wants to order a burger with cheese on it then he can. I am not so sure about the little one. We might try a smaller dose of dairy at some point in the (distant) future and see how he reacts to that. Since I didn't really eat much dairy to begin with, I am not really going to miss it and on the rare occasion that I do decide to have something with dairy in it. I am going to make sure it is really really worth it. Like the lobster bisque from Texas de Brazil.  :)

A Whole Family on Whole 30 - Reintroducing Legumes

I have not made any concrete decisions yets about what we will or will not be adding back into our diet. But we have decided that we are going to reintroduce each of the four food groups we cut out on one day, way for a couple of days to watch for a reaction, and then move on to the next group. This way, even if we decide not to add something back into our diet I will know if anyone has a particular issue. 

The first food group we tested was legumes. So Wednesday was legume day and I've never seen my boys so excited to eat beans. :) For breakfast I made a hash with onions, potatoes, ham, bell pepper, and pinto beans. Then I topped this with a fried egg. This is actually a go meal that I used to make all the time, for breakfast, lunch, and dinner. At lunch time I completely forgot it was legume day. And for dinner we had the boys' favorite: Taco Salad. I made black beans at Brandon's request and refried pinto beans for the little men. I ate a bite of the refried beans, but skipped the black beans. I don't really like beans, they have a lot of calories and carbs, and I would rather have something I enjoy... Like peanut butter. After dinner I had one GLORIOUS spoonful of peanut butter. I love peanut butter.

So far, I haven't noticed any reactions in anyone. I understand why beans are excluded from the Whole30 and tend to avoid them myself just out of a personal preference but will probably add them back in for Brandon and the boys. They like them, they have some nutritional value and the are a great filler food. When we eat things like taco salad, I use A LOT of taco meat and organic beans are a lot less expensive that organic ground beef. 

As for PB, I'm hoping that this can stick around and be a special treat. My oldest boy has a new found love for cashew butter which is great, but a bite of peanut butter every once in a while never hurt anyone... Right?

Other than legume day we have pretty much stuck to our Whole30 diet. I made banana pancakes this morning and homemade jam, but it's all grain free, no added sugar, etc... We did add ham back into our diet. It does have organic sugar as one of the ingredients but it has less than one gram per serving. I am not worrying about the boys turning into sugar fiends because of Black Forest ham. We also all had a bite of a chocolate bar tonight. There was only one bar that Sprouts sold that didn't have soy in it, so I was skeptical (plus it was expensive) but it ended up being really pretty good. 

Tomorrow is dairy day! I'll keep you posted!

A Whole Family on Whole30 - Our Results!

Tuesday was our last day of the Whole30. And, like I said in the post that day I can't believe we made it, but let me tell you that I am SO glad that we did this. I have been so blessed by seeing how using the whole and healthy foods that God designed our bodies to eat have drastically impacted us. I am going to go through each family member and let you know just what this month has done for us.

Starting with the littlest man:

This one is my non-eater. I started the Whole30 saying that he was going to either eat, or starve. And he didn't really do either, well at least not the way I would have like. I was hoping that a new found love of vegetables would spring forth in this child. That did not happen. There were still lots of nights where he and I were left at the table (while big brother and dad were doing the dishes) both stubbornly refusing to budge about trying certain foods.

My rule about veggies ended up being that he (or anyone else) had to try a bite of everything I put on the plate, and then you had to eat ALL of one vegetable. He could always also add additional veggies if he wanted to. This often led to the one veggie that he actually ate being the carrots or spinach with Italian dressing that he added to his plate.

I also modified the Whole30 rules a bit on snacking throughout the month. I believe that kids need snacks. I read an article about how children in France go six hours between meals and are fine; my boys would think that I was torturing them. I basically gave them a snack when they asked for it, but didn't offer any snacks. Since all of our snacks were Whole30 approved they weren't quite as exciting as Annie's bunnies or something like that. If I didn't really think they were hungry, or if it was soon to when we had just eaten I would offer a boiled egg and fresh veggies. If they ate it, I knew they were actually pretty hungry, and if not, I knew they were just bored.

I had also hoped that this would 100% magically cure any and all hyperactivity and concentration issues. And while it did not do that, his focus has been dramatically improved. As we reintroduce food groups I feel like I will have a good base line for seeing what effects him in this area.

The littlest man has eczema. But his is nothing like his older brother's. It comes and goes and sometimes varies in how bad it is. As of right now he is eczema free, which is great, but I don't think this is the first time this has happened. BUT something else happened that I had not even thought of as a possible positive side effect of Whole30. He has had cradle's cap since he was a baby. Since his hair is long it doesn't really matter, but it has always been something he has dealt with. His pediatrician actually said that children who have it this long almost ALWAYS develop psoriasis of the scalp, sometimes as early as the teen years. Sorry for the gross factor coming up... About two weeks I was scrubbing his head and I noticed that he had lots of flakes that were falling off, but clean scalp underneath. For two weeks his head has been pristine. It is perfect.

He has tried so many new foods, found some new favorites, and seems the least opposed to remaining on a modified paleo diet. The only thing he has requested is Texas de Brazil for his birthday. What can I say, kid has expensive taste.

On to my Older Little Man:

Holy cow, this kid has rocked my world. He is usually a good eater, but he loves his junk food. Giving up junk hasn't been easy, but he seems to be dealing with a much healthier diet for the foreseeable future quite well.

The Whole30 has also been great to him! About a week ago I had a bunch of coconut oil on my hands and didn't just want to rinse it off. I told him to get over here so I could put it on his eczema. He started checking his usual spots, backs of the legs, arms, trunk, he checked EVERYWHERE and there was not one patch of it on his body. I don't think he has been completely eczema free since he was a babe. Good news, Whole30 worked. Bad news, it was something we were eating. I know he has sensitivities to corn and soy, so I am hoping that it is just that. And he is really hoping that it isn't dairy.  :)

Also, it breaks my heart to say this but in the last year or so my sweet boy has become sensitive about his weight. While my littlest man has the most definable ribs ever, Ez is bigger than some of his friends. I was the fat kid growing up, I know what it's like to feel different. And while he was still within the normal range for children his age, he didn't look like he wanted to look. I have never suggested dieting to him, and I believe children don't need to be taught to diet but need to be taught to fill their plates and bodies with healthy wholesome food. But he did lose TEN POUNDS this month. He was thrilled, his face has thinned out and his favorite pair of orange shorts from last summer fit him. He is thrilled and has mentioned to me several times that he feels more like playing outside than watching television. That my fellow parents is a victory!

Now to the handsome husband:

He has never completed a month long anything when it comes to food. I can't believe how well he did. He is an emotional eater, and a late night snacker. Both of which were symptoms of a hormonal imbalance according to It Starts with Food. He has cut out his late night snacks and has been making a great effort to think before he eats. He has also went from eating only iceberg lettuce, corn, and peas as his vegetables (and two of the three aren't even vegetables) to eating every single vegetable I put on his plate. A few of them he appeared to muscle through but he has eaten all of them. We have been fighting about vegetables for ten years. He even said, I feel like I could go a mission trip now and just know that I could eat whatever, that I wouldn't starve. Music to my ears.

He has a few health related concerns that we wanted to see if the Whole30 might address. One of those is hives. He breaks out in hives pretty regularly. At this point, we think it is one of our dogs (we have one short hair dog and two yorkies  who are hypoallergenic) but he went from breaking out every day to maybe once a week.

He also produces an ungodly amount of snot, this could be related to the allergy but since the snot was here before the dog, I am going to blame it on something else. Mostly likely something we cut out during Whole30 because he has had one tenth the amount he did before.

The other thing I noticed in him was his energy. It used to not be uncommon for him to have to take an energy pill to make it through the day. Not anymore! Also, and this one was great for me, he is waking up easier. He has always been a snoozer, and unless he has to get up for work is impossible to wake up. On his days off I would often pop my head in the room 15 times in an hour before he would finally roll groggily out of bed. It was more common for him to miss breakfast than it was for him to be at the table with us. Now, I can pop my head in one time and say breakfast is in five minutes, and amazingly, in five minutes he is at the table.

This handsome man also lost a whopping EIGHTEEN pounds. His heart was set on fifteen pounds and he crushed it. He also has gone down two pant sizes. He did great, I am so proud of him.


And last but not least: Me

I know that I still have a LONG way to go in my journey to better health, and in my relationship with food, but I feel like I know what my body can do with the right fuel now.

The biggest and best change I have noticed is my energy, especially in the mornings. I would drag in the mornings, sometimes for a few hours. On weekends I would sleep as late as I could, and I would snooze as long as I could. I have been feeling awake and refreshed in the mornings. That is such a welcome change from foggy and hungover (even though I didn't drink I always felt so blah in the mornings). I have also felt like I could make it through the day without any issues. Often times before I would be exhausted by three or four in the afternoon, and not have any energy in the evenings. I feel like I have done so much more this month because I haven't wanted to just sit on the couch and veg out. At this point I can't imagine any food tasting good enough to going back to feeling like that on a daily basis. I am always impressed with people's stories when they try some new shake or something like that and have tons of energy, but honestly, I don't want to drink shakes or replace meals with bars or take 17 pills a day. The change I felt in just 30 with just changing my eating habits has been great.

Also, my asthma has been greatly improved this month. I have used my inhaler three, maybe four times this month, usually it was three or four times a week, unless it was really bad, then it was several times a day. I thought initially that maybe the allergens were down and the air quality was better this month but then I did a little research using myself as the guinea pig. I went to go visit my brother because he was home from college. He lives with my aunts, and in their home they have five dogs and two cats. Plus they live next to goats and horses. (They live out in the country). I am allergic to anything with a heartbeat except humans basically. I have gotten used to our dogs but other peoples dogs are bad and cats are REALLY bad. Usually before going over there I take an extra dose of my preventative asthma medication, TWO Zyrtec, and use my allergy reducing essential oils. And even then I usually have a hard time. Actually usually I get very sleepy over there because I just can breathe. This time I did not take ANYTHING! We were there for almost three hours. I did have allergies by the time we left, my nose was itching and my eyes were watering a bit, but I could breath, I wasn't exhausted, and I felt like I had been there five minutes, not three hours. And all of that was with no medications or essential oils. I think that in the future I will just use the essential oils and I shouldn't have any issues at all.

Now, it is no secret that I am trying to lose weight. I decided at the beginning of the summer that it was time to lose weight. I turned 30 this year, which was hard. Mainly because I didn't want to spend my 30s like I had spent my 20s. Fat, frustrated with my body, unhappy with the way I looked and feeling like I couldn't be the wife and mother I wanted to be because of the extra weight. So in the last 30 days not only have I been eating fabulous, satisfying, healthy food, I have also been losing weight. I lost 14.4 pounds on the Whole30. That makes my total weight loss for the year 54.6 pounds. I am thankful for that. I am thankful for the work the Lord is doing in my mind and body. I am thankful that I am beginning a healthy relationship with food, and hey, I will celebrate every pound I lose, especially 14 of them!

(And I happen to be only 4.4 pounds away from a very BIG milestone!)

But that is not my most exciting accomplishment. I made some questionable choices in my younger days, but at one point in my life I have quit smoking cigarettes, quit drinking alcohol (when I drank way more than I should of), and quit a few other things I should have not been doing in the first place. But I have struggled for YEARS with quitting diet soda. I have been trying to quit, asking friends to pray for me as I try to quit again, I have struggled with feeling like I just couldn't make it without a diet soda. It sounds so trivial and stupid as I write this but it was really struggle for me. I am drinking sparkling water but I haven't had a diet soda in 32 days. And I never plan on having one again. I have decided that if I am ever in a situation where I decide to drink a soft drink, it will not be diet, and it will not be often. Breaking that addiction alone has made the Whole30 SO worth it in my book but seeing all the amazing things that happened in family means the world to me!

I would love to help you get started, share any Whole30 ideas I have, or talk to you about your Whole30 journey!

A Whole Family on Whole 30 - Days 24-30

Today is our last day of Whole30! 

First of all, let me say this: I wasn't completely sure that we would make it the whole 30 days. And three out of the four members of the family didn't cheat, at all, ever! And while I don't want to throw anyone under the bus I will say that the person who cheated happens to weigh less than 55 pounds and is the sneakiest person in our house. :) (And it was two bites of potato chips at a birthday party and a few of a friend's snack at the swimming pool.)

I have been so blessed by this experience and I can wait to share our results in the coming days (we get to weigh in tomorrow!) and let you know how this has affected our family!

But first, here's what we are on days 24-30. 

Day 24

Breakfast: Mini Frittatas

Lunch: Taco Salad

Dinner: Italian Chicken

Day 25

Breakfast: Green Eggs and Ham

Lunch: Roll Ups

Dinner: Buffalo Wings with veggie sticks, roasted okra and potatoes. 

These were a huge hit with everyone! I used less sauce on a few for the littlest man and everyone ate them up. And honestly since we haven't had any "junk" food they felt like a splurge. 

Day 26

Breakfast: Mini Frittatas and Clementines

Lunch: Meatballs and Broccoli

Dinner: BBQ Chicken Drumsticks and Green Beans

Snacks: Trail Mix and Dried Peaches

This day was rough. We had breakfast on the road, while heading to the dealership to pick up our van. Then we headed to Six Flags. It was HOT. We were supposed to be there from 10:00 to 1:00, but it ended up being 10:00 to 4:00. Since our lunch was in the van we were STARVING by the time we got back. And, despite having just picked it up from the dealership where they were supposed to be fixing the air conditioner, I had NO air conditioner. I was fuming ( both physically and emotionally). We had to drive back to the dealership, in traffic, in 105 degrees. We didn't end up having dinner until almost ten. But, despite all the great smelling Six Flags food, we stayed on plan. It's a good thing I snuck lots of snacks into Six Flags or the boys would have never made it. 

Day 27

Breakfast: Applegate Chicken Apple Sausage, Spinach, Avocado. The boys had frittatas and sausage with grapes. 

Lunch: Leftover Day! I had leftover zucchini noodles and meat sauce. The boys had green eggs. 

Dinner: Summer Squash cooked with Pederson's Garlic Basil Sausage and a side salad. This was simple and great!

Day 28

Breakfast: Mini Frittatas and avocado. The boys had bananas instead of avocados. 

Lunch: Taco Salad

Dinner: Leftovers again! I had zucchini and meat sauce again and the boys had drumsticks, carrots, and mixed berries. 

Day 29

Breakfast: Mini Frittatas and avocado. The boys had bananas instead of avocados. 

Lunch: This was our first attempt at fast food. I neglected to thaw what I supposed for lunch and I had a doctors appointment in the morning. I just ran into Sprouts and bought two "fast food" meals. We had rotisserie chicken, steamed broccoli and cauliflower, and I just threw in dried fruit we had at home. 

Dinner: Chili on sweet potatoes with avocado, onion, and tomato. Still one of my favorite meals. No need to cheat when the food is this good! The boys even tried the chili on their potatoes and loved it. 

Day 30

OUR LAST DAY!

Breakfast: Mini Frittatas and avocado. The boys had bananas instead of avocados. 

Lunch: The second rotisserie chicken and steamed green beans with oranges. In the past we would often spend $30 (easily) on Chick Fil A if I didn't have lunch prepared. Not only was this almost as convenient (if only Sprouts had a drive through) I knew exactly what ingredients I was feeding my family. If you get the unseasoned rotisserie chicken from Sprouts the only ingredient is chicken! I bought steam in the bag green beans, and just cut up some oranges. There were exactly three ingredients on our plate and it took me only a few minutes to get it ready. 

Dinner: Roasted lemon pepper chicken with red carrots, onions, sweet potatoes, and celery. 

Tomorrow we are reintroducing legumes. I'll admit that peanut butter is one of the few things that I have missed. I will share our results of the Whole30 soon and keep you updated on how reintroducing certain food groups goes, what we might be adding back and what we will not be found in our kitchen from this point on!

Whole Family on Whole30 - Days 17-23

I know this post is a few days late, but perhaps I should have considered just how busy we really are in the summer without trying to overhaul everything in our family's diet and ALSO blog about it. But, better late than never. 

Like I said in my last Whole30 post I am not repeating pictures of things I have already shown you. And we typically have two or three breakfasts we repeat and then six or seven lunches and we repeat those every week. And then there is taco salad. We have had more taco salad this month than ever before (and it was a regular already) but everyone is still digging it and keeps asking for it so I am going to keep making it.

Plus you can sneak A LOT of veggies into taco salad. I will post our recipe in the next few days. 

So here is a break down of what we ate (kids and all) on days 17-23.

Day 17

Breakfast: Mini frittatas and Applegate Little Smokeys, along with avocado and fruit. The kids still don't really avocado but I can't get enough of it. :)

Lunch: We threw together a ten minute meal. I already had meatballs prepared and frozen so we pulled them out, threw a few veggies, olives, and fruit on the side and we were good to go. 

Dinner: Chili over a sweet potato. Still delicious! Still one of my favorite meals. 

Day 18

Breakfast: Mini frittatas, raspberries, roma tomatoes.

Lunch: Chicken chef salad.

Dinner: Grilled Mahi Mahi with roasted okra and potatoes, broccoli, and pineapple salsa, or pineapple on the side for those whose taste buds haven't developed a love for all things spicy. 

 
Day 19
Breakfast: Green eggs and a banana.
Lunch: Zoo Day! Since we were going to the zoo I had to have something portable. Here is what we had:

I had roast beef roll ups with avocado, bacon, tomato, and spinach in the them with leftover roasted okra and a sliced roma tomato. I also threw a package of pistachios and a lemon Larabar just in case I was still hungry but I didn't end up eating them. The boys gladly split both of them between themselves, they can never get enough "snacks".

The boys had roll ups, berries, cut carrots (and ONE piece of zucchini, I keep trying) along with an applesauce, Larabar, and pistachios. We also loaded a bag full of sliced oranges and cantaloupe  to help with the munchies and the boys ate every single piece of fruit by the end of the day. This was August 1st and were were having unseasonably nice weather but even though it wasn't hot, walking all over the zoo is hard work.

Dinner: Taco Salad

Day 20

Breakfast: Green eggs, berries, and avocado. (Bananas for the kids instead of avocado)

Lunch: Leftovers! Yay, any meal where I can get in and out of the kitchen in five minutes is FABULOUS!

 The boys had Applegate hot dogs, salad, carrots, and cantaloupe. I had grilled chicken on top of romaine and spinach with roma tomatoes and homemade Italian dressing.

 Dinner: Grilled chicken with broccoli and cabbage. This was actually the first time Brandon had ever tried cabbage. After trying it he said, "hmm, it's actually pretty good. I always just assumed it tasted like it smelled." We have been having a vegetable battle for the last eleven years of our marriage and it turns out he actually likes a lot of it, he had just never tried it.

Day 21
Breakfast: Mini frittatas, roma tomatoes, and avocado for me. Frittatas with berries and carrots for the boys.

Lunch: Taco Salad

Dinner: Chili with a baked sweet potato.

Day 22
Breakfast: Mini frittatas, clementines, avocado, banana.


Lunch: Roll ups with fresh veggies (cucumbers and tomatoes for me, salad and broccoli for the boys.) Along with apples and cashew butter. I took a picture of this, not because it was new and exciting but because this was the first time ever that my little non-vegetable fan asked for broccoli.






Dinner: This was a fun night. We made the Old School Italian Meat Sauce from Well Fed 2. This was great! I subbed the Italian sausage links for homemade ground Italian sausage and we skipped the meatballs but it was still great. We served it over zucchini noodles along side fresh green beans. The littlest man wasn't too thrilled with the zucchini noodles but he ate the pork chop and green beans. My handsome husband ate everything on his plate, and ENJOYED it. I can't get over how much his tastes are changing.


Day 23
Breakfast: Green eggs, pork sausages, orange. We tried these for the first time and they were pretty good.

Lunch: One more water park picnic! I put grilled chicken bites on toothpicks (because my children will eat almost anything off a toothpick) along side fresh veggies, Italian dressing for dipping, and mixed berries and grapes. They had the usual Larabars, nuts, raisins, and applesauce pouches for snacks. I was so proud of them at this meal. The other family that we went with had a few things that my boys would have loved to eaten in their lunch (Capri Suns, Cheetos, PB&Js on white bread, and Oreos) but they didn't complain about what they were eating and had great attitudes.

Dinner: Thai Basil Stir Fry. I used the sauce recipe from Well Fed 2 and just changed out the veggies for ones that I thought everyone would like better. This wasn't everyone's favorite meal everyone loved the "Chinese noodles" I threw in there. It was broccoli slaw, which is super easy and I will definitely be making again. But the flavors in the sauce weren't really a hit with anyone so next I make stir fry I will be coming up with a different sauce.

So there you have it. We have seven days left, counting today. After much discussion we have already decided that we are adding back in legumes first. My husband loves beans and the boys have decided that beans will be great on their taco salads. This has gone by so fast. I feel like it was just yesterday that we started the Whole30. And why my husband and boys are already thinking about what they want to slowly add back in, I am pondering what foods and food groups we are going to kick out for good.  

Homeschool Workboxes

Things are a little out of whack this week. I will post our Whole30 update tomorrow but I thought I would share this with you today!

During the school year last year I was really struggling with finding a balance between working with both boys simultaneously on joint work, working with each of them individually, and their independent work. A few google searches later I found a potential solution:

  Workboxes! 

Workboxes are actual boxes that their work goes in. I put one assignment or activity in each box. The after we finish our family lessons (mostly our My Father's World curriculum) both boys start on their boxes. They start at box one and work until they have completed all ten boxes. Intermixed within the math assignments and writing journals in the boxes are short little brain breaks and quick, fun, education activities. I make sure that they have any and all supplies that they will need for the day in their supply boxes. Workboxes really set our days up for success. 

 Workboxes also allowed me to better use my time. I would typically put all the little one's "Work with Mom" activities or assignments in the first few boxes. My older one can do most of his book work independently but if there was something he needed my help with I put it towards the last few boxes. This allowed both boys to be productive, to not have to wait on me to do their work, and to give me a breather. 

The tough part of all of this was figuring out what to put in their boxes. 

It took me forever to come up with this list, and so I thought that I would share it with you.  The first few things on the list are the basics, these went into a box everyday or almost everyday.

* Math Lesson

* Grammar Lesson for Ezra

* Explode the Code for Elisha

* Scripture Practice and Memorization

* Spelling Practice

* Book for Reading Time

That was about half the boxes. I knew I didn't want our school day to take forever, and I knew that I wanted to make the workboxes fun and exciting. So the other half of the boxes were filled with the following things: 

• 15 jumping jacks.
• 30 minutes computer time. (Educational games only!)
• Color this. (There are some amazing adult coloring pages for free on the internet, they are really calming for the boys, probably because they are detailed and require focus, without being stressful.)
• Do 10 minutes of stretches.
• Do a maze.
• Explore these books. (I usually gave them several books on topics we were studying with this card.)
• Have a thumb war with someone.
• Illustrate something from our history or bible lesson today.
• Lay down on the couch and practice being still and quiet like a ninja for three minutes.
• Listen to this music and draw what the music makes you feel.
• Listen to this worship music and just soak in the presence of the Lord. Listen for what He may be trying to say to you.
• Logic Puzzles
• Magnetic Robots.
• Make a Monster.
• Pick a few Karate cards and practice your ninja moves.
• Pick out a story and read it to Granny. (We happen to have a Granny that lives with us, if not, you can substitute for a little sibling, or even a stuffed animal.)
• Play fetch with the dogs for 15 minutes.
• Play goldfish with Dad.
• Play Math Detective.
• Play Tenzi.
• Practice saying the books of the Bible using your Bible. Then listen to the Books of Bible song on the iPad.
• Practice your typing skills.
• Ride your scooter outside for ten minutes.
• Spend some time outside and draw or write something in your nature journal.
• Take a ten minute break.
• Tanagrams.
• Use this clay to create something.
• Use this recipe and make something with Mom.
• Walk on the treadmill for twenty minutes.
• Watch one education video on Netflix. (Like Magic School Bus)
• Water the plants.
• Work with flashcards.
• Write a letter to someone.
• Write a poem.

Let me know if there is anything you have thought of that I missed. I am always looking for more great homeschool ideas!