I am a wife and mother of 2. I am a PTA volunteer, a stay-at-home mom (who is never home), a Young Living Essential Oil enthusiast and independent distributor, along with being a jack of all trades.  My daughter is 14 and will be finishing up 8th grade this Spring. About to have a high schooler – gulp!  My son is 11 who is in 5th grade. I was married 22 years last August.

I am a natural living newbie type of crunchy momma. I’m not hard core, but I figure anything I can do that’s more natural will help. I love buying lots of organic fruits and vegetables, but then life happens and the next thing I know they have decomposed in my refrigerator. ?. I was taking my children to the chiropractor when they were newborns. When the pediatrician would tell me to just let the illness run it’s course, I would take them to the chiropractor so they could give me some homeopathic items. Nothing worse than watching your children suffer in sickness. It made me feel like I was helping them. I also use essential oils religiously. I would love for everything in my life to be natural and holistic, but at the same time I am an on the go mom and lots of times that just isn’t realistic for me. So I struggle a lot with what I want to be and what I actually am.

I have done Weight Watchers since 1998. I use that term loosely! I lost 68 pounds back in 1998 and made goal and Lifetime, but underwent two in vitro fertilization procedures and I had gained all the weight back plus more. The hormonal injections along with the emotional roller coaster were the reasons for the weight gain.

By God’s grace I become pregnant via natural methods and had my daughter in 2004. I had just started back to Weight Watchers seriously working the program when she was 2 and had really started losing some of the weight I had gained. Surprisingly enough I became pregnant with our son. I gained a lot of weight during this pregnancy.

So I started back to Weight Watchers… again. I show up weekly but still haven’t found my groove. I will do well for a month or possibly two, but then I fall off the wagon. It is a cyclical pattern. I decided to start my blog with the idea that it would help me create my weekly menus and keep me on plan. It would hold me accountable. Just about the time that I was ready to launch my blog, they came out with Smart Points. I struggle with the items that are low in points but have lots of chemicals in them versus the items higher in points but that I can read all the ingredients. It really is all about portion control. I really am trying to eat cleanly and to keep my blood sugar levels even.  I was very excited when they launched Freestyle and I gave it a go for about a couple of months.  In a 2 month period, I gained 12 pounds back so I realized that that was not the plan for me.  I need more structure!!  I can’t have 0 zero point foods other than fruits and vegetables.  So all the recipes are Smart Points – Back to the Scale, not Freestyle at this time.

I have been known in my meetings to be the person who plans out my dinner meals months ahead. Fellow members have always wanted to get copies of my menus. I decided as of late – why not??!! So I will be putting my dinner menu plans on here along with the recipes or the links to the recipes. Just to let you know up front, I have no creative bone in my body to make and create my own recipes. But I am amazing at following a recipe. I will always cite the source of where I found my recipe. I’m not very creative with side dishes either – just FYI. My hope is that if I have to keep everything posted and up to date, then I will be more likely to use my menus myself so I can help my daughter and myself achieve our goals. Basically this is what I’m doing for myself and I’m offering it to you as well. Some of these recipes I’ve already tried, some I have not, so it will be a surprise to us both whether they are good enough to be in the “definitely make again” category or the “please don’t even say that recipe’s name again” category – or “uck” for short.

So I go on this adventure with you. You will get to see all my daily struggles with trying to be healthier, being a mom, and being a business entrepreneur. They say you can’t have it all, but I’m certainly gonna try.