30 Day Shred!

As I am writing this, I just got done with the 30 Day Shred!  It was a challenge that I took on along with some other ladies for the month of November!It was a great workout and it helped get me moving!  One thing that I have noticed from doing it is that I have more energy.  When it is getting towards the evening when I just want to sit down and relax, I still have power to fool around with the children.  It has also helped get the children motivated into doing some workouts!  Even though I am done with the 30 Days, I think I need to keep doing something so I just don't go back to where I was.  I will take a couple days off during the week though.  Any little movement helps out, even if it is tapping your foot when you are sitting down, to dancing around the living room with your children.  How my children love that!  Thank you to the ladies that kept me moving and kept me going.  Good Luck at finishing up.

Dump Truck birthday party!

For my son's third birthday we had a construction party!  The cake was a dump truck holding dirt in the back.  I had made signs and put them up around the house.  I used black and yellow table settings.  And we played two games that my son just loved and kept wanting to play over and over again.  The first one was a construction site obstacle course:  I cut cardboard into stripes so they were kinda like boards, and we had some cones set about.  They had to walk the cardboard and go around the cones.  The second game was tossing little cones, that I picked up at the Dollar Tree, into the back of a dump truck.  We also had hats that we let people write on!

Day 90

Day 85 - Thanksgiving day!  We went down to the community Thanksgiving meal!  Thank you to all that helped out with it.  So I don't know how well we would have stayed in our real foods!  I think it would have been pretty close!

Day 86 -

Day 87 -  We had a birthday party for our turning 3 year old.  He had a pound cake made into a dump truck!  It was good, but the toppings were not all real foods!  The frosting was homemade, but I have not figured out how to make frosting without powdered sugar and it to turn out good.

Day 88 - Another day without a doughnut!  This can be hard on one of my youngsters.

Day 89 - Eric is starting a new adventure as we are finishing up ours!  He is starting the Danial Fast for 21 days.  Good luck to him.  I am not going to be trying it any time soon!  So with that being said, we tried split peas for supper!  The children all had a spoonful.  We also had chicken and baked potatoes with yogurt on top.

Day 90 - 90% of our days are done!  So tonight for supper I used mayo!  I was making open-faced tuna salad sandwiches and took out my homemade mayo to use and it didn't look all that good.  I didn't have time to make any more, so I just used the mayo that was in the fridge from before we started.

Day 83

Day 75

We have made it to day 83 and I have not had much time to let people know how things are going.  I can't do my day to day telling right now, because I don't remember them.  But here I go to try to get some of it down.

Day 78 - We went out to Pizza Hut for lunch.  The older children are doing the booklet program, so we thought that we should let them get their little pizzas.  We felt that they worked to get them and that they should be able to have them.

Day 80 - Eric was gone and I decided to take the children out to subway for lunch.  They had 2 school buses outside and were packed inside.  We then went to our local ice cream place called Smilies.  We had their subs on their homemade bread, but it was white.  I went to a Ladies Night Out event that evening and I do have to confess that I did have a very small piece of pumpkin bread that I am sure was not all real.  But they had a lot of samples and I didn't give in very often.

Day 81 -  My youngest boy really would have liked to have a doughnut this morning at church.  But he did good to not keep asking for one.

Day 82 - Eric made us a wonderful lunch.  He made homemade spaghetti sauce with chicken pieces, spaghetti, and spaghetti squash.  He even made some cookies for us.  We had a homemade vegetable soup for supper.

Day 83 - Had some waffles for breakfast and leftovers for lunch.  Then we had scrambled eggs and potatoes with homemade smoothies for supper!  I didn't make enough eggs!

It is getting easier to know by looking at things if we can have them or not! It is hard to believe that we are just over 80% of the way done!  We can finish strong, even with Thanksgiving in a couple of days!

New Craft!

My son kept wearing his sisters which is pick, green, yellow plaid.  So I decided to try to make him one of his own.  This is what it turned out to look like!  He loves it and his little sister even likes to put it on.  It goes down past her feet!

Day 74

Day 72 -  We went ahead and had a little bit of a down day for lunch today!  My husband went and got us a pizza at the pizza place here in town.  So the crust would not have been all real food I am sure, but it is always nice to be able to pick out good toppings to have on top!  My daughter went and stayed over at a friends house for the night.  They went out to eat at McDonald's for supper (which would be a big no-no for us) and she choose not to have anything but a glass of water.  So she didn't have anything for supper or for breakfast the next morning.  The place was just next door and I told her that she could have came home and grabbed something to eat!  She told me that that was alright!  She may have some downfall, which is alright, but she also is learning a lot!

Day 73 -Today my husband make some all real food cookies for the family!  I am thankful for him and everything he does around the house to make things a little easier for me.

Day 74 -  So today at church someone came up to Eric and I and told us that they feel sorry for our children.  We asked why, and they said because of what they have to eat!  I think some people need to look into what we are doing or ask us questions before judging.  I think people would come to realize that it is not bad at all.  It is not like we are just eating tasteless food with no sweets.  Sometimes things are just best to keep to yourself and that does not just go for how people eat.  Everyone makes choices on their diets and in other areas in their lives and I am thankful that I do not go around telling people that I am sorry for them.

Day 71

Day 67 - Pot Luck Sunday!  It was our Thanksgiving Potluck, so there was turkey, ham, and the whole nine works.  Everything looked so good.  We all had a dessert, that most likely would not have been all natural, but it was for Thanksgiving and we wont be going anywhere for Thanksgiving!

Day 68 -

Day 69 - We had some mashed potatoes, green beans and tenderized steak for supper!  I don't know how many times the boys asked for more meat.

Day 70 -

Day 71 - Made some homemade vegetable soup for supper tonight.  It had ground turkey for the meat with carrots, green beans, peas, corn, and celery!  It was good and helped us warm up our bodies on this cool night.

Day 66

Day 63 - For supper tonight we had chicken, potatoes and carrots.  I just breaded the chicken with egg and whole wheat flour.  The potatoes and carrots I cut up and put some spices on them and into the oven they went.

Day 64 - This morning for breakfast I made myself a peanut butter, banana, and plain natural yogurt smoothie.  The children had already had their breakfast and they still helped me eat mine.  I guess I should have made more than one serving.  I made some chicken noodle soup for supper.  The children and adults eat it right up.  Fresh homemade foods are always so good.

Day 65 - My husband had a meeting at Subway, so he brought us home something to eat!  How sweet of him!

Day 66 - Baked a couple of pumpkins today!  Then I started baking with them.  I have been baking with them all afternoon and not getting anything else done!  First, I made a crust less pumpkin pie for potluck tomorrow.  Then I went on to make the mini pumpkin raisin muffins (made them before and the recipe is in another post.) so we would have them for doughnut time tomorrow at church.  Next, I went on to pumpkin bread and I am eating a piece right now!  Mmmm Good!  What I have in the oven right now is Pumpkin-Brownies!  I will have to let you know how they turned out, for I did some substituting!

Pumpkin Bread Recipe

Ingredients

• 1 1/2 cups whole wheat flour
• 1/2 teaspoon of salt
• 1 cup fructose
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
• 1 cup  pumpkin purée*
• 1/2 cup  olive oil (I used applesauce)
• 2 eggs, beaten
• 1/4 cup water
• 1/2 teaspoon nutmeg
• 1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
• 1/2 teaspoon allspice
• 1/2 cup chopped walnuts (I didn't have any)

* To make pumpkin purée, cut a pumpkin in half, scoop out the seeds and stringy stuff, lie face down on a foil or Silpat lined baking sheet. Bake at 350°F until soft, about 45 min to an hour. Cool, scoop out the flesh. Freeze whatever you don't use for future use. Or, if you are working with pumpkin pieces, roast or boil them until tender, then remove and discard the skin.

Method

1 Preheat oven to 350°F (180°C). Sift together the flour, salt, fructose, and baking soda.
2 Mix the pumpkin, oil, eggs, 1/4 cup of water, and spices together, then combine with the dry ingredients, but do not mix too thoroughly. Stir in the nuts.
3 Pour into a well-buttered 9x5x3 inch loaf pan. Bake 50-60 minutes until a thin skewer poked in the very center of the loaf comes out clean. Turn out of the pan and let cool on a rack.
Can easily double the recipe.
Yield: Makes one loaf.

Pumpkin Brownies

Ingredients

• 3/4 cup whole wheat flour
• 1/2 teaspoon baking powder
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 3/4 cup applesauce
• 3/4 cup raw brown sugar
• 2 teaspoons vanilla extract
• 3 eggs
• 1/4 cup cocoa powder
• 1/2 cup dark chocolate chips
• 1/2 cup pumpkin puree
• 1/2 cup chopped walnuts (I didn't have any)
• 3/4 teaspoon ground cinnamon
• 1/2 teaspoon ground cloves
• 1/2 teaspoon ground nutmeg

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C). Grease an 8x8 inch baking pan. Stir the flour, baking powder, and salt together in a bowl.
2. In another bowl, stir together the applesauce, sugar, and vanilla extract; beat in the eggs one at a time with a spoon. Gradually add the flour mixture, and stir the batter until it's evenly moistened. Divide the batter in half in two separate bowls.
3. Into one bowl of batter, blend the cocoa powder and chocolate chips. In the second bowl of batter, stir in the pumpkin puree, walnuts, cinnamon, cloves, and nutmeg.
4. Spread 1/2 of the chocolate batter into the bottom of the prepared baking pan, and follow with 1/2 of the pumpkin batter. Repeat the layers, ending with a pumpkin layer, and drag a kitchen knife or small spatula gently through the layers in a swirling motion, to create a marbled appearance.
5. Bake in the preheated oven until the brownies begin to pull away from the sides of the pan, and a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean, 40 to 45 minutes. Cool in the pan, cut into squares, and serve.



Pumpkin Bread, Muffins, Pie



My son cleaning the bowl!



Pumpkin Brownies



Day 62

Day 57 - You end up not having as much to say as we get into this over the half way point.  Everyone is getting else to what we need to do and it is becoming away that we are living!  It can still be hard when others around you are eating things that we should not!  Our 7 year old went to girl scouts tonight and turned the snack down because she knew it was something she shouldn't have!  She is learning better than I am at times, I think!  Bless her heart!

Day 61 - We did pretty good up until we were at the church and the children were by themselves with candy!  My 5 year old was eating it as he was getting it, I think!  Our 7 year old did wonderful.  Anyways, we have decided that today did not count and will be going to 101 days! With the mishap of all the candy!  Three pieces would have been okay!  So let us see what the next holiday will bring for us!

Day 62 - We will be going out for a soccer party around supper time!  The little bit of candy that was left went into the freezer, it all fit into one container.  They ended up not getting as much as the do most of the time!