I'm just like every other mom: Whole30, day 1

I love to cook.

My dad gets a lot of the credit. Throughout my childhood and teen years my dad spent a lot of time in the kitchen creating delicious things. I've always loved the idea of being able to feed everyone around me with food I made myself. Over the past four years I've really embraced this passion of mine and have branched out in the way I cook. I love baking bread for my family, and "wowing" people with cookies, pies, and apple crisp. The majority of time now though, I've been trying to sick with more nourishing food. Less processed ingredients, more vegetables and lean proteins. Not because I'm a health nut, or some wonderful person. It's actually because I'm the opposite. After having 3 kids (and eating whatever the heck I wanted to all the time) I found myself much more overweight than I wanted to admit I was. A few months after my youngest turned 1 someone asked me when I was due. Yep, I had really let myself go. Even though I've lost some weight since then, and have put in a lot of effort to get in better shape, I'm still a work in progress.

It only seems natural that The Whole30 would appeal to me. Over the past month, I was strangely drawn to this program. After reading the book, and really asking myself if I want to try this out, I decided to do it. For me, the next 30 days isn't some kind of insane crash diet. I'm striving to change the way I view food. I reward myself, and punish myself, with food. All too often I find I am living to eat, and not eating to live. With that in mind, this is less about what I'm removing from my meals, and more about the new and creative ways I can incorporate whole foods into my everyday life. Being forced to avoid my "crutch foods" (hello, chips and queso) and stick to better options (that I enjoy!) for 30 days is actually something I'm excited about.

And so we have Whole30, day 1.