Eat More Plants Challenge Update: Week 1

Well, hello! Here we are into the first week of February and I’m ready to give you an update on how the Eat More Plants Challenge is going.  If you’re brand new (welcome!) this is part of the Happy Healthy Mama Healthy New Year Challenge. Each month we are focusing on improving one aspect of our health together.  This month’s theme is to Eat More Plants!

The Eat More Plants Challenge Update: Week 1

Since February started Monday, we technically aren’t a whole week in yet, but this week has been eye-opening so far.  My main goal of this challenge was to keep track of how many vegetables and fruits me and my family are eating each day and challenge ourselves to eat at least the recommended daily minimum amounts, if not more.

We are using this chart to keep track.  

I laminated four of these, one for each family member, so we can use dry erase markers and reuse them each week.  Last week I sent this printable to my email subscribers.  If you missed it and haven’t signed up to receive my weekly newsletter (I sent it out on Sunday evening), you can sign up here and I’ll include the printable again this week.

So how’s it going?  Very interesting!  I made a little table to show you how many vegetable and fruit servings each of us had so far this week.  

Let me just summarize my thoughts on each person.

• Myself:  I knew I ate more vegetables and fruits than anyone in my family.  I didn’t need to keep track to learn that. I was happy with my amounts and actually think this is a pretty typical week.  There is always room for improvement, though, and I’d like to try to eat even more next week.
• Tim: Yikes!  I think Tim compromises a lot when it comes to the food we eat.  He’s kind of begrudgingly accepted the healthier foods I buy and has even come to prefer some whole foods instead of processed ones.  But he is still obviously not choosing vegetables and fruits enough. The only meal of his I control is dinner.  On Monday the only vegetable part of dinner was a salad (we had chicken sliders and a mixed green salad with fresh vegetables) and after eating four sliders he said he was too full for the salad.  Ugh! My hope is that this helps motivate him to choose more vegetables and fruits for breakfast, lunch, and snacks.
• Meghan:  Meghan has come so far in her eating! Even though her week so far hasn’t been perfect, I am happy with it.  I have learned that when I offer her only her favorites, she’ll eat all of her vegetables and fruits no problems.  The days when she didn’t get the 2 servings of vegetables recommended were days I offered vegetables she doesn’t love and she ate some, but not all.  I’m still processing this and thinking about how to encourage her to eat the vegetables she doesn’t love as much.  I can’t only offer her favorites every day, even though that would be the easy answer.
• Luke: This is not a typical week so I can’t comment much on his intake.  On Tuesday I got a call from his school that he threw up everywhere. I think he had a quick stomach bug and even though he wasn’t vomiting on Wednesday, he didn’t eat much.  I’ll comment on him next week. 🙂

This has been SO FUN to keep track of with the kids.  Tim isn’t quite as enthusiastic about it. I overheard him telling a friend, “She’s lost her mind. She’s having us color little pears for all the vegetables and fruits we eat.” Haha!

But that’s okay, because I think it’s been eye-opening for him.  And it’s totally worth it for having the kids love keeping track of their healthy eating. At the end of every day they are excited to color in the pears! The coloring part is fun for the kids and making them more aware of their food choices.  One day Luke said, “I hope the snack at school is fruit, because that will count and I can color a pear!” That alone makes this a win in my book.

I’m excited to see what the rest of the month brings.  Just having this awareness can only be a good thing. Thanks for following along on our journey.

Now, I want to hear how YOUR challenge is going! How are you implementing the Eat More Plants Challenge?  How’s it going?