January is rolling on by and we are already well into the New Year. Workout goals, clean eating. organic options, gluten-free and less carbs are on the minds and mouths of people everywhere. We have always included vegetables in our meals. This year, we stepped it up a notch and we are having more Kale… and brussel sprouts…  everyday. I know, we are livin’ on the edge. We’re so radical.

Kale has been a part of our lives for a while. It’s not a New Years fad.  We’ve had smoothies, We’ve had a kale Christmas tree, Adam has a kale tee-shirt. But hold your horses — we’re not ready to give up sugar… yet.

We have one family rule for mealtime: Eat your vegetables  > > >  then you may have a cookie… an “organic” ‘Joe Joe’ from Trader Joes (the healthiest kind! 🙂 Our kids eat salad everyday, usually twice a day. They’re so used to it, they ask ‘where’s the salad?’ on the rare occasions we have a meal without salad.

Mealtime isn’t a torture scene of threatening and bribery. We still eat sugar, for heaven’s sake. Other than requiring our kids to eat their vegetables, they still act like buffoons at the dinner table most of the time…

/// case in point ///

And our table time is also filled with songs about burping and farting and stories about butt holes. This is still our 5 year olds favorite word. I’m not sure this will ever change.

/// in case you need another example… ///

They don’t act like fools with their food all the time. We also hear about their day at dinner time, sharing their ‘Highlights’ from the day… usually it goes something like this, “My highlight was the whole entire day — expect the parts where I got mad.”

The kids always want to help cook. Our favorite show is Master Chef Junior, and they are gleaning much inspiration watching kids their ages tear it up in the kitchen. They love to be involved with mealtime. Sometimes I love their help 🙂 Sometimes it’s more work to have their ‘help’… Our 10 year old loves baking cupcakes, so we bake in order to balance out our kale smoothies.

So we eat our lettuce … and we’ve snuck in more kale and brussel sprouts in our daily salads. It takes work, but we’ve aligned our taste buds to react with affection toward kale. Kale tastes good (I promise!). Now the kids ask where is the kale when we don’t add it in.

Healthy eating has a stigma attached to it. It is hard to eat organic, no sugar, no carbs, etc… 100% of the time. But it starts with one choice. We stopped drinking soda several years ago. Now, if I have a sip of soda, it tastes disgusting. We don’t eat fast food. But no judgement for those who do! When we go out, we pack a lunch. It began with one choice – I stopped going thru drive thru’s and the kids never ask. In fact, they prompted the decision. They asked not to go thru Wendy’s anymore… Okay – Done. We started serving salad for lunch and dinner. We started with one choice, made one change at a time, and kept adding healthier eating options.

At the beginning of a New Year, it can seem overwhelming to set goals with the pressure we put on ourselves to start fresh and make changes. But – We can start with one choice. With food, with work outs and with our time spent with God. Start with one choice. Read one Bible verse — it takes 30 seconds. Then, be all crazy and read a few more.  The more time we choose to spend with Him, the more time we will crave with Him. We can taste and see the Lord is good!  There’s no pressure. He’s pursuing us, waiting of us to respond to Him… Like lettuce and Kale and brussel sprouts are waiting for us at the farmers market, in the grocery aisle… or in the garden.

So whatever choice – make one. Eat one more vegetable. Read one Bible verse. Pray one prayer. God is waiting… kale is waiting…

What are your New Year goals for 2015? Healthier eating? Daily Bible reading? Do share 🙂

Our story rages on… In Him, Leslie