As much as I love the holidays and love the time I get to spend with my family, I am thrilled to start a new year and get back to normal life again. In past years, it has taken me several weeks to slowly convince myself that the joyous holidays are over and move on with my life.
Not this year!
I have been motivated to be healthy for the past 2 months and I’m ready to really make progress now that Santa has gone into hibernation for another year. Make sure to subscribe to our emails so you won’t miss out on our “heathy home makeover” adventures! IF you’re struggling to create healthy habits in your family, you are not alone. This past week, we decided to ditch all the holiday leftovers, and clean out the cupboards! I should probably mention that our goal is to FOCUS on eating healthy but not to be so strict that our kids (or us) rebel and go on a hunger strike. The point is to fill up on healthy foods FIRST and to ADD more than take away. Yes, I cleaned out my fridge and pantry and fridge to give us greater success, but I’m sure there will still be times when we eat foods that aren’t on our top 10 list and still eat our comfort foods. IF you fill up on healthy foods FIRST, though, there is less room for the not so healthy. Here are 5 simple steps to a healthy kitchen makeover in your own home. Stay posted for more posts to come on each of these steps!
- Ditch the junk! If you’re tired of opening your pantry every day only to be assaulted with countless temptations just waiting to sabotage your health, then junk it….ALL OF IT! In order to make NEW habits, there has to be ROOM. Make room and kick the former inhabitants out of your pantry and fridge.
- Containers. I went to Costco last week and stocked up on some new containers like these so I would have plenty of options for storing healthy snacks in the fridge. I’ve learned the hard way, that if I just buy a bunch of healthy food and shove it into random places in my fridge or pantry, a lot of it will go bad before it gets used. Organization makes a huge difference!
- Make a menu…or not! It can be really helpful to sit down, find some healthy recipes, and make a menu before you go shopping. I have been there, done that and still do, usually. Not everyone likes to be that organized, though, so if you are NOT the kind of person that likes to plan that much ahead, you can also do what I did last week….just skip to #4.
- Shop! This is the FUN part! Focus on filling your cart with fruits and vegetables first (frozen and fresh). Costco has a great selection of organic frozen fruits and vegetables so I stocked up on a ton of those so I had options when we ran out of fresh. I loved shopping at our local Whole Foods Market for healthy produce. I tried to buy things I knew I could chop up for snacking, and also greens for smoothies. (you can freeze greens if you end up not using them quickly and they are still great in smoothies later!)
I tried to focus on healthy proteins, (meats, cheeses, plant protein) next, and then I added in whole grains and other items for fillers. (more on everything I bought in a later post) - Put away and Prepare. This step was not as fun for me but I enlisted the help of my husband and kids. After I came home and put most of our groceries away, I left out all of the fresh produce on the counter so that I could wash, bag, chop, etc. ahead of time so it would all be ready to eat immediately the following week. I’m so glad I did this because it has made eating healthier a whole lot easier. In the past, if I wanted a salad, the thought of getting everything out, washing it, and chopping up veggies would usually deter me and less healthy choices would unfortunately win. With everything ready to go, I don’t have that excuse. I also noticed my kids have been devouring fruits and vegetables like nobody’s business since it’s now the first thing they see when they open the fridge.
If you haven’t already made healthy goals for yourself this year, we challenge you to take on the healthy kitchen makeover! Also if you have any great ideas or previous successes in this area, we would love to her about it! Please share in the comments below!