Page 11: School Lunches

School has started, and it is time to start making those school lunches. While preparing your school lunches, questions about what you need, and how much to pack. I hope that some of the content in this article will help you. A few things you should always pack in your lunches are fruits and veggies, protein, and a fluid of some sort. Fruits and veggies help you maintain energy throughout the day, and are really tasty. Protein is also a great way of maintaining energy, and it helps you concentrate! But fluids are very important for your body to have. If you don’t have enough fluid, you won’t be able to function. 

Something that I love to have in my lunch is Cucumber Sandwiches! You can have them on white or wheat bread. You spread cream cheese on it, the you put thinly sliced cucumbers on top of that! They are DELICIOUS! I also like having soup, or spaghetti! If you are a picky eater, try the things that you are thinking of putting in your lunches over the weekend or as a snack. That way if you don’t like it you aren’t stuck at school with a lunch that you HATE! 

I ALWAYS bring a carrot and pretzel to school with me, they make a great during school and after school snack. A carrot and pretzel are also low maintenance. They are easy and cheap to get a hold of, and the carrots can even be grown at home.

I know that my blog is about obesity, but I wanted to put in a little something about the environment. If you get a lunch box, instead of using a paper bag everyday, you will be saving a LOT of paper, and you can reuse your plastic bags. That way you can save plastic to. 

Try some of my tips, I’m sure one of them will work for you!!

-Natalie

“You can only improve!!”

 

Page 10: My Top 10 Snacks ~ Healthy or NOT!!

As a celebration of my tenth post, I am going to list my favorite snacks ~ healthy or NOT!!! It’s normal to have favorite snacks that aren’t healthy, you just have to learn how to balance them with healthy ones. 

1. My FAVORITE snack EVER is a cucumber!! I will eat them ANY WAY you serve them to me. I LOVE them. I will eat them in a car, and I will eat them near and far. Just joking, but I will eat them in a car because they are easy to take with you when they are cut. I love eating cucumbers with lemon and salt on them. I also like cucumber sandwiches. You take some bread, then you put cream cheese on it with the cucumber’s skin peeled of. DELICIOUS!!!

2. The second best snack for me is a baked potato!!! People think that either potatoes are healthy, or they aren’t. But both of them are wrong!!! The potato itself is healthy, but the things that we put into it are not. We put in LOADS of butter, sour cream, bacon bits, salt, pepper, and LOTS of cheese. When I eat my potato, I  put in a little bit of butter, and salt. That’s it. Overall, it isn’t as bad as it could get. I just can’t stay away from them!! 

3. I am a big fan of corn, I even have a t-shirt that says so!! I love it with butter and salt. I know, not the healthiest way to eat it, but I love it!!!

4. A lovely, and tasty snack is Edamame Boiled Soy Beans. They are easy, and pretty quick to make, and they are SUPER yummy, and pretty healthy. It’s 120 calories per serving, and they have lots of different vitamins.

5. Another one of my favorite snacks is a plain old carrot!! I take a nice fresh crisp carrot, and take the skin off. I am not a big fan of the skin because it is dirty.  And, as most of you know, carrots are great for your eyes, and Bugs Bunny’s favorite!

6. High on my list are Oreo’s dipped in milk ~ sigh. I know, it isn’t healthy AT ALL, but I love them. You can’t have fun in life if you never have a treat, but you also can’t have fun if you never have a fruit or veggie. You just have to learn how to balance your snacks.

7. I love eating watermelon!!! It’s fun and a pretty easy snack to make. I think that it tastes like a candy would, or like a treat. All of the treat manufacturers try to make lollipops and hard candies after watermelon, so that is definitely a sign that it is tasty, and that many people like to eat it!

8. Very similar to watermelon is cantaloupe!! I also love that. I think that it tastes different, but good. Unlike watermelon, I don’t see many candies out there that taste like cantaloupe. 

9. I also like strawberries. I’ve always loved having farm fresh strawberries, which has always been a great privilege. What I mean by farm fresh, is that they were picked THAT DAY!!! They aren’t the kind of packaged strawberries you are going to find in the stores!!

10. I love a nice and simple apple. How easy is that??? Just rinse it off and chomp away!

Well I have gone through my top 10 snacks ~ healthy or NOT, I just have to have them ALL!!

“You can only improve!!”

Page 9: Gardens

Taking the first step to starting a garden isn’t always easy. You have to go and drive to the nearest nursery or Lowes, then you have to go find the seeds, then you have to wait in the LONGEST line ever, then you have to prepare the spot you want to garden in.  It’s very overwhelming when you think of it this way, but if you think of the fun you can have, the work doesn’t seem so bad.  Planting the seeds or transplanting is always fun. Then you water, watch, and water some more. After you’ve planted the garden it all gets easier, and a lot more fun.  

When it’s time to harvest the garden – pick the vegetables – you are so ecstatic! You can’t wait to see how big the carrots look, and taste that crisp lettuce. So, you go and you start pulling out the plants, and then you find that a little gopher has eaten up the bottom of the lettuce and carrots. You are so BUMMED! What are you supposed to do now? Most people would throw in the towel at that point, but some would look at it a different way. They would be happy that the gopher had something to eat. Who knows, maybe the gopher has a family to support. I know that you would be disappointed, and you wouldn’t want it to happen again. But don’t go and call the pest dude. Just stay calm, and find a solution.

There are solutions to almost every problem in life. You just have to look around for them, and ask for help. If you have an annoying pest you can try a raised bed, a container garden, or put wire in the bottom of your garden bed. For help with gardening problems, there are always Master Gardeners, which I know about because my mom works with the program.  Just google Cooperative Extension Master Gardeners, and you’ll find the number for your community.  They don’t charge to answer gardening questions, because they are volunteers.

I know that starting and maintaining a garden can be a challenge, but gardening is super fun.  And the fruits and veggies are WAY better than the ones you are going to find in the store!

If you would like to get more information about gardens, go to Victory Grower.

“You can only improve!!”

Page 8: Veggies!

Lets face it, veggies can be delicious, or disgusting. It all depends on how you prepare them, and what your taste buds are like. My favorite way to eat veggies is like this: I slice zucchini, carrots, and broccoli and put them in the dutch oven. Then I add a little olive oil and Mrs. Dash (it’s low-sodium, which is a good thing).  We bake it for 45-60 minutes at 450 degrees.  While it’s cooking, we make some rice…and serve the veggies with that.  It’s a healthy and low-fat meal that’s quick and easy to make. Then the next time I make that meal, I add in a different veggie. That way I can see the different kinds that I like, and I will be getting a healthier meal.  I just used purple peppers the other day, and the flavor was very different.

It says that you are supposed to have 5 servings of fruit and vegetables every day. (Actually, it is really more than that, but 5 is a good goal to start with).  I know that is going to be really hard to do at first, but there are several solutions to solving that. Some of these may not work for you, but some of them might. My first suggestion would be trying my veggies recipe up there. You can also have it with chicken breast if you like meat. I would also suggest trying several different veggies to see if there are any you like. Once you find your favorites, ALWAYS have some at home. One of my favorite ways to make sure that I get 5 servings of veggies a day is to have some at every meal. What I mean is that maybe you have strawberries with breakfast, an apple at lunch, and broccoli and carrots for dinner, or mix it up. That way you are getting some good healthy veggies in EVERY meal. Try these tips, and find the one that works the best for you!

If you don’t already know, veggies are  a really important part of your diet, as some people say, “You are what you eat.” that’s why my parents call me a “veg head”. I LOVE veggies! I will eat them almost any way. I have that veggie meal up there at LEAST 3 times a week, sometimes even 4. But I really love veggies when my Mom or Dad cooks them, because then I don’t know what is going to be the new veggie!

“You can only improve!!”

Page 7: A Busy Schedule

I, like most people have a very busy schedule. Most of the times my days are full of driving. My mom takes me to school, then home, then to cello, then to basketball, then home, then to the store. It’s REALLY hard to find time in my busy schedule to eat healthy meals and snacks. For me eating healthy snacks are WAY easier than eating healthy meals. For a snack you can grab and apple, and munch it in the car on your way to a practice or game. But it is super hard to find a healthy meal that you can eat in the car. I know that some days you are going to end up eating fast food in the car, or a greasy cheese burger. It’s OK to do that every once in a while. But it’s not okay when it is your dinner for 4-5 nights a week. 

What I like to do to get a healthy meal is find 1 hour everyday to either make a real good meal and pile fruits and veggies on it. I know that some of you might not have an hour, but you can make a meal in 30 minutes. Rachel Ray has several recipes in her cookbooks and magazines that can be made in 30 minutes. Another solution is that you cook the meal on a night that you aren’t working, and then you just heat it up.

My Mom and I make a chicken and veggie meal about once a week for dinner. It takes only an hour, and is awesome.  We take skinless chicken breasts, put them in a dutch oven, and put a little olive oil on them. Then we put some crushed garlic and Mrs. Dash on them.  We slice zucchini and carrots (and sometimes broccoli) and put them in the dutch oven, too, and add a little more olive oil and Mrs. Dash (it’s low-sodium, which is a good thing).  We bake it for 45-60 minutes at 450 degrees.  While it’s cooking, we make some rice…and serve the chicken and veggies with that.  It’s a healthy and low-fat meal that’s quick and easy to make.

There are a whole bunch of solutions to a busy schedule, you just need to find one that works for you.

“You can only improve!!”